Kobo Aura One review

[The_Immortal]

Look at the review from Digital Reader:

the Aura One is simply unusable for PDFs.

:-|

[chrisridd]

Originally Posted by The_Immortal

Look at the review from Digital Reader:


:-|

Does koreader handle PDFs acceptably on the One?

[The_Immortal]

chrisridd, I guess this question should be addressed to the owners

[Ken Maltby]

There appear to be a number of differences in the Aura One's functioning, that the developers over at the Github project, need to address, to have KOReader working properly on the new device. The issue has been raised.

Luck;
Ken

[anacreon]

https://teleread.org/2016/08/30/in-d...e-order-day-1/

For once an American reviewer with a balanced view between Kobos and Kindles.

And for those who read French, a review full of mistakes, and ridiculous comments but some valid points: yes, a "luxurious" device shouldn't come with a mix of French and English in the menus, yes, the French dictionary is abysmal.

https://www.actualitte.com/article/t...-de-luxe/66697

[aceflor]

Originally Posted by anacreon

https://teleread.org/2016/08/30/in-d...e-order-day-1/

For once an American reviewer with a balanced view between Kobos and Kindles.

And for those who read French, a review full of mistakes, and ridiculous comments but some valid points: yes, a "luxurious" device shouldn't come with a mix of French and English in the menus, yes, the French dictionary is abysmal.

https://www.actualitte.com/article/t...-de-luxe/66697

I had read the actualitte one yesterday but was not sure what to think about it.

Ana, could you do me a huge favor and test the German and Spanish dictionary, as well as the Spanish-French one if it exists, and tell me what you think ? Do you know which dictionary they use for French ? and for English ? I am very interested in your opinion on the device in general, as well as on the dictionaries. Do you think the FNAC edition is different than the Kobo one, dictionary wise ?

merci bcp !

[NightGoat]

Originally Posted by chrisridd

Why would the number of books make a difference? They're just stored bits on the internal flash storage, nothing should be accessing them unless you open the book.

I don't know about Kobo readers, but my Kindles index the books I put on them. Downloading/sideloading a bunch of books all at once can knock my battery down by quit a bit, and quickly.

[vandafc]

Originally Posted by anacreon

https://teleread.org/2016/08/30/in-d...e-order-day-1/

For once an American reviewer with a balanced view between Kobos and Kindles.

And for those who read French, a review full of mistakes, and ridiculous comments but some valid points: yes, a "luxurious" device shouldn't come with a mix of French and English in the menus, yes, the French dictionary is abysmal.

https://www.actualitte.com/article/t...-de-luxe/66697

seems to be written by a guy from Bookeen

[chrisridd]

Originally Posted by NightGoat

I don't know about Kobo readers, but my Kindles index the books I put on them. Downloading/sideloading a bunch of books all at once can knock my battery down by quit a bit, and quickly.

Kobos do that too, but that's a one-off procedure whenever you add new books and apart from the file system search to find the new books the processing should be proportional to the number of books being added.

Once the books are added, there should be zero impact on performance.

[chrisridd]

Originally Posted by anacreon

https://teleread.org/2016/08/30/in-d...e-order-day-1/

For once an American reviewer with a balanced view between Kobos and Kindles.

And for those who read French, a review full of mistakes, and ridiculous comments but some valid points: yes, a "luxurious" device shouldn't come with a mix of French and English in the menus, yes, the French dictionary is abysmal.

https://www.actualitte.com/article/t...-de-luxe/66697

It is surprising that a Canadian company has such a bad French localization. Are other Kobo firmware versions that bad, or is this problem only in the One's firmware?

[Cinisajoy]

Originally Posted by Richard529

Review by Goodereader:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e8Zxhhsh-Ho

This may or may not be accurate. Leave the sound off to prevent uncontrollable laughter.

[soulfuldog]

Originally Posted by Cinisajoy

This may or may not be accurate. Leave the sound off to prevent uncontrollable laughter.

Or just ignore goodereader videos altogether and wait for reviews that are actually worth watching.

[anacreon]

Originally Posted by aceflor

I had read the actualitte one yesterday but was not sure what to think about it.

Ana, could you do me a huge favor and test the German and Spanish dictionary, as well as the Spanish-French one if it exists, and tell me what you think ? Do you know which dictionary they use for French ? and for English ? I am very interested in your opinion on the device in general, as well as on the dictionaries. Do you think the FNAC edition is different than the Kobo one, dictionary wise ?

merci bcp !

So here goes for the German. I stayed on 3.15.0 for the Kobo Glo HD, because it was the last F/W with a decent process, and some fair dictionaries, notably the Italian (good for Dante too) and Spanish ones. The Italian plumetted afterwards, not surprising when you see that it went from 9.3 Mo to 2.6, but I assume that the Spanish improved (it went from 6.2 to 6.8 Mo) since Kobo seems to aim for Latin-America - and I suppose the Spanish speakers in the US. I have few Spanish books, mostly classics up to and including the 20th century.

The Kobo experience is a beautiful experience, apart for those (important) dictionaries and PDF reading point, because of all the developers and helpers here - I'm speaking Calibre too of course.

Which is why when I'm asked for advice for people with no computer savvy, or a need of good dictionaries to improve their own as well as foreign language competence, I orient them to a Kindle.

As I said somewhere the Deutsch was 6.5 Mo in the 3.15 F/W. I had a look, it is the 2011 Duden Fremdwörterbuch; in the One it is the Langenscheidt 2015 Deutsch als Fremdsprache (4.7 Mo).

You find wurden in a book on the 3.15: no definition found; use the menu accessible from the book and type wurden: no answer. For Vorging it knows that it is vorgehen, it is a long definition so you call the full page from the pop-up. Good (impossible for French or Nederlands - thank you Kobo). I saw recently that there is a new development here that allows it, I'll have to explore it when I have the time.

You find wurden on the One: the pop-up gives the root verbs werden1, werden2, no definition. No dictionary menu accessible from the book OR the home page). You try to call wur.den (as it appears in the pop-up), and you arrive in the English dictionary. You choose Deutsch and get the exact same non content of the pop-up, no possibility to call a definition from the declension info. So you remember that it was werden and type it and get 4 full pages of definition - good for you, lucky it wasn't a long complicated word. Try vorging (no capital) in the One: it goes to the substantive Vorgang, no verb. You have to know that it is vorgehen and type it in to get a definition.

I HATE the Kobo way with dictionaries. It is on a par with their way with PDFs.

My first readers were the Sony PRS-T1 then T2. Fair English dictionaries and translation dictionaries, but no French, English or Spanish, and no memorizing the language per book, painful when you read books in up to 5 languages simultaneously and don't like translation dictionary (I want definitions, not translations). But they were stellar for PDFs: streaming (for good PDFs), cropping for the others (the Google scans for example).

I won't go into such details for your other languages, but know that in 3.15 the Italian and Spanish dictionaries are good, and the French abysmal, but you can use the Littré for classics (good even for Montaigne) - look at the dictionaries thread. The English is good too for words I've never met - psychology right now.

@chrisridd: Yes, the originally Canadian Kobo, with a decent market share among the French and the French speaking Canadians show us a distinct lack of consideration. It reminds me of Belgium where as a French woman developing a Belgian subsidiary for our French compagny, I had to speak the politically correct English in front of mixed French / Flemish native speakers, all of whom spoke good French: is Kobo an English Canadian company?

That said, the English, Spanish, and more recently added Portuguese speakers represent a much bigger pool than the French speakers, not to speak of the Italians. The Chinese market is locked, and the Indian fragmented (Hinglish is the politically correct vehicular language for mixed audiences) - so no good opportunities there.

Hey there Kobo: couldn't you at least SELL us good dictionaries?

Thank you aceflor for giving me this opportunity to vent in public. So much healthier than it festering inside. I did complain in this forum since my first Kobo (the Glo in 2013) and my complaints increased everytime a new F/W means much needed improvements elswhere, but a steady decline in customer service with the dictionaries themselves and the process to access them. It is the first time my complaints find an echo in this forum.

EDIT: I also find it VERY POOR customer service that Kobo should choose single language German dictionaries for foreigners! It would make sense for the translation dictionaries, but they do have a customer base in Germany, in spite of Tolino.

Also I'm not the only one to be annoyed that the only pivot language for the translation dictionaries be English - and that went for Sony too. It makes me personally no mind, but it is no wonder that so many people should choose Kindle, however horrible their typography and painful their locked system.

[aceflor]

Originally Posted by anacreon

So here goes for the German. ....

Also I'm not the only one to be annoyed that the only pivot language for the translation dictionaries be English - and that went for Sony too. It makes me personally no mind, but it is no wonder that so many people should choose Kindle, however horrible their typography and painful their locked system.

Thank you so much for this anacreon. I have built dictionaries for our family use for Kobo, but I was hoping that the new ones were better and would allow me to stop this. I guess this is not happening... Plus I'd much rather have the Duden than the Langenscheidt. I will make a copy of my actual one.

And obviously not as Fremdsprache, as my kids are German.

[Erich Zann]

Originally Posted by rashkae

Your own test *confirms* that you're right in line with the Kobo estimates.

H20 estimate is 2 months, (30 minutes / day) with light on, wifi off.

From your test:
light at 50%: 35,9 hours

If the Estimated battery life of the One is half of the H20, that places it squarely in the < 20 hours expected reading time.

And from the same test, light at 15% means 62 hours. Kobo says "light on" not "light on at half power".