Aura ONE Kobo Aura One owners thread

[anacreon]

Originally Posted by Katsunami

- Palatino: It's the font I use on the Kindle, but for some reason, it looks weird on the KA1. I didn't use the Kindle version; I scrounged it from one of the many font sites. Maybe that version was not fit for high dpi screens.

I like Palatino on the One. I use the Windows 10 version (I have a 265 DPI PC screen). Similar to Charis SIL (I tightened the lines for this one), with smaller serifs, rounder characters (I've read you set narrow fonts for young adults, wider for young children and old adults) - and I like the shape of the letters better. It looks better to me, but if you want more characters per line Charis is better. My narrowest, but sans serif: Arsenal.

[Katsunami]

Originally Posted by anacreon

I like Palatino on the One. I use the Windows 10 version .... My narrowest, but sans serif: Arsenal.

Hm. Now I have to re-install the Font Freedom patch again I didn't know Windows 10 had Palatino on board by default. I'll try that version. Who made your version of Arsenal? I can find different versions, and not all of them are serif.

[anacreon]

Originally Posted by Katsunami

Who made your version of Arsenal? I can find different versions, and not all of them are serif.

I found it in Font Squirrel, where I also found Aller, Amble, Noto Sans, Noto Serif, Roboto and Ubuntu.

Noto Sans is my font of choice for the Calibre catalogs. Ubuntu is a little narrower.

[frenshprince]

Ember and Bookerly are my fav.
I really like the Kobo Nickel as well, but the linespacing bug make it unusable.

[Katsunami]

Ow, the huge line spacing with Kobo Nickel is actually a bug? I thought the font just had a ver large height with a lot of whitespace at the top.

[emilov]

SleepCover update:
- I'd ordered it nearly 2 weeks ago, it was shipped yesterday and arrived today. So apparently, Kobo.de has them in stock now.
- I expected a lot from it since at 50 EUR it's far from cheap.

The good
- It fits the reader well and doesn't add much bulk.
- It feels expensive and durable (ask me again in 2-3 years).
- It wakes up the device and puts it back to sleep (duh).
- With the flap it can stand on the table. It's a bit hard to do the first time because the flap is somewhat stiff but the crease loosens up a bit if you force it slightly.

The bad
- Occasional (very rare) ghost touches: it seems like putting the device to sleep takes a sec longer so it might still register a touch after closing it (I hate touch screens on eReaders, what I wouldn't give for a non-touch device with hardware buttons like the old Kindles). This leads to it skipping a page back or forward, or to highlight a random word (that remains visible on the sleep screen: ugly). This really sucks. The Kindle PW2, well, its cover (after 3y and hundreds of books still in good condition) never does that.

Conclusion: I'll still use it and I hope they can fix the ghost touches upon close at some point (or maybe we'll get one of those oh-so-useful patches for this ). I'm used to having a reader with a cover, I use it to hold the device one handed while reading in bed.

Regarding fonts:
Now that I enabled the “Freedom to advanced fonts control” patch I can tweak Bookerly a bit too, making it somewhat thicker. IMO, this makes it more readable on the KA1 and puts it in my top two fonts list (the other one being Charis SIL ModifiedLarger).

[robertpolson]

I am returning my Kobo Aura One.

- Screen size is good
- Natural light is great compared to blue light for night reading

I read a lot of non-fiction material and often highlight text that I need to save for notes. Unfortunately, highlighting on Kobo is frustrating. I never had these problems on any of my Kindle devices before. With Kobo, it is a trial and error every time and there is no easy way to highlight text to next page.

Taking notes out from Kobo is also not as easy as it is from a Kindle device.

I'll look into Kobo again in the future if they will ever improve their software/hardware for better annotations.

[SCION]

Originally Posted by robertpolson

I am returning my Kobo Aura One.

- Screen size is good
- Natural light is great compared to blue light for night reading

I read a lot of non-fiction material and often highlight text that I need to save for notes. Unfortunately, highlighting on Kobo is frustrating. I never had these problems on any of my Kindle devices before. With Kobo, it is a trial and error every time and there is no easy way to highlight text to next page.

Taking notes out from Kobo is also not as easy as it is from a Kindle device.

I'll look into Kobo again in the future if they will ever improve their software/hardware for better annotations.

Yeah, understandable about annotations. The Kindle experience is on a different level.

[Canuck_in_Japan]

I don't really highlight so something like that wouldn't bother me but I have found that it's easier to select text on my Paperwhite than my H2O. I was hoping that that was just the IR screen. It's funny how Kobo supposedly gets all these 'real readers' to design the hardware but then they don't ask them for any input on the software?

[jackie_w]

Originally Posted by Canuck_in_Japan

It's funny how Kobo supposedly gets all these 'real readers' to design the hardware but then they don't ask them for any input on the software?

But all these 'real readers' would have been reading kepubs not standard epubs. Screen responsiveness is better in kepubs than epubs.

However, I'm not claiming kepub performance is a match for a Kindle because I wouldn't know.

[howyoudoin]

Originally Posted by Canuck_in_Japan

I don't really highlight so something like that wouldn't bother me but I have found that it's easier to select text on my Paperwhite than my H2O. I was hoping that that was just the IR screen. It's funny how Kobo supposedly gets all these 'real readers' to design the hardware but then they don't ask them for any input on the software?

They're supposed to be real readers, not real annotaters.

[mathil]

In my experience, I don't find the Kindle's highlighting software superior than the Kobo's for what concerns KEPUBs. One thing that is true about annotations though is that the Kindle, at least for those who have a capacitive screen, has a faster keyboard response.
I can't comment about exporting them because I've never tried that with the Kindle.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Katsunami

Ow, the huge line spacing with Kobo Nickel is actually a bug? I thought the font just had a ver large height with a lot of whitespace at the top.

The line spacing of Kobo Nickel is a very simple fix. It's just too bad we cannot access the font to fix it.

[rashkae]

Originally Posted by mathil

In my experience, I don't find the Kindle's highlighting software superior than the Kobo's for what concerns KEPUBs. One thing that is true about annotations though is that the Kindle, at least for those who have a capacitive screen, has a faster keyboard response.
I can't comment about exporting them because I've never tried that with the Kindle.

Try selecting part of the bottom line on Kepub. I tried to figure the trick on a A1 for almost an hour. Still can't get the text I want in 1st try. (And using those handles to modify the selection? Actually works reasonably well on the Glo HD with IR, but the capacitive screen of the A1 is just too imprecise and unresponsive.

As for exporting, Kindle saves all your highlights and notes into a text file. It just can't be simpler than that.

[Bookworm_Girl]

Originally Posted by rashkae

Try selecting part of the bottom line on Kepub. I tried to figure the trick on a A1 for almost an hour. Still can't get the text I want in 1st try. (And using those handles to modify the selection? Actually works reasonably well on the Glo HD with IR, but the capacitive screen of the A1 is just too imprecise and unresponsive.

Highlighting on the KA1, even on kepubs, is awful! It is my biggest frustration. The most helpful tip for me was to aim above the word and then you have to press harder than you'd expected. Often I end up turning a page instead. It especially has a difficult time with highlighting longer passages of text. The handle bars do not really work. I can only compare to my experience owning Sonys, Nooks and Kindles and a variety of IR and capacitive touch readers over the years. It's just really poor execution is the only way to sum it up for me.

I can accept that Kobo doesn't have the annotation export options that Kindle does (although I wish they'd make improvements in this area). That just is what it is and is a challenge for other brands too. I just wish the KA1 was better at highlighting a passage - a very basic expectation.