Replacement for Sony PRS-T2?

[dcalder]

My mom's Sony PRS-T2 is getting temperamental so I need to find her a replacement. She uses it for hours a day and carries it in her purse whenever she leaves the house. She almost exclusively uses it for ebooks from the local library which uses Overdrive ePub mainly.

Musts:
Small
Light
Clear, non-glare screen
Long battery life
Native DRM ePub compatibility (no converting/cracking/etc required)
Physical page forward/back buttons if possible

iPad mini is too large and heavy, per my mom (my dad, on the other hand, has taken permanent possession of my iPad mini for his ebook reading). Kindle is out due to the library ebook requirement.

Since 5" ereaders seem to be a thing of the past, I guess she'll have to live with a 6". I wish there was an option that would let her check books out from the library and download them directly to the device but I don't think there's anything Android based that would be small and light enough. Looked at the Fire 7 HD but it's almost twice as heavy as her Sony.

Suggestions? We're in Canada, BTW. Don't have any objection to buying online as long as the seller will take back any lemons without argument.

[Cinisajoy]

Kobo.

[dcalder]

Originally Posted by Cinisajoy

Kobo.

No physical buttons on any current models, as far as I can tell. Mom is not a fan of touchscreen. May end up not having a choice but would really prefer hard buttons for page turning.

[JSWolf]

Kobo Aura H2O 2nd Edition is what I recommend. I went from a T1 to an H2O and I never looked back.

[Cinisajoy]

Originally Posted by dcalder

No physical buttons on any current models, as far as I can tell. Mom is not a fan of touchscreen. May end up not having a choice but would really prefer hard buttons for page turning.

If she wants to use Overdrive, I think in Canada, Kobo is the only choice.

[jackie_w]

Originally Posted by dcalder

I wish there was an option that would let her check books out from the library and download them directly to the device.

The Kobo Aura One would satisfy that requirement but as it has a 7.8" screen it's probably too large for you. It's not as heavy as you might imagine, though.

If you did want to investigate the Kobo models I believe Canada has them in high street stores so you can get a proper look before buying.

ETA: Alternatively is a 5" Android smartphone out of the question? There are quite a few nice reading apps for epubs.

[dcalder]

Per Overdrive, Pocketbook and Tolino models are also compatible. Pocketbook has models that have physical buttons plus are small and light. Price wise, not much difference from the Kobos. It's been a long time since I had a Pocketbook device and it had the peeling plastic problem but was great otherwise. No prior experience with Tolino devices but they don't seem to have physical page turn buttons anyway.

I haven't had my hands on current Kobos but previous models felt very cheap and flimsy and the firmware was often buggy. And again, even on current models, no hardware page turn buttons and quite a bit bigger than my mom's current device. I intend to take her in to handle Kobos in a store, assuming I can find them in stock locally, but I'm pretty sure she's going to be unimpressed by the size and touch only interface.

[dcalder]

Originally Posted by jackie_w

The Kobo Aura One would satisfy that requirement but as it has a 7.8" screen it's probably too large for you. It's not as heavy as you might imagine, though.

It's not weight alone that's an issue. Both for purse and comfortable one handed use, she wants the dimensions small. My dad and I have both tried to coax her into something bigger but no luck.

Originally Posted by jackie_w

ETA: Alternatively is a 5" Android smartphone out of the question? There are quite a few nice reading apps for epubs.

I wondered about that option. But there's still no hardware page turn buttons and most phones are relatively heavy compared to an ereader.

[AnotherCat]

Originally Posted by dcalder

...But there's still no hardware page turn buttons and most phones are relatively heavy compared to an ereader.

The android reading app I use (and from memory others too) enables the phone's Volume Up and Down button so that it turns pages.

Weight should not be an issue, my 5 inch phone at 137 grams is much lighter than typical 6inch ereaders which come in, typically, at around 200 grams upwards.

The biggest disadvantage of a phone or tablet is the little understood need to set up the app for the desired results and how to do that, whereas an ereader will work, in my view in an inferior manner, straight out of the box.

[dcalder]

Originally Posted by AnotherCat

The android reading app I use (and from memory others too) enables the phone's Volume Up and Down button so that it turns pages.

Weight should not be an issue, my 5 inch phone at 137 grams is much lighter than typical 6inch ereaders which come in, typically, at around 200 grams upwards.

The 6" Pocketbooks seem to run 180g and her old PRS-T2 is 155g so weight does seem okay. I don't know how well she'd like the switch away from eink though. May have to try to get her to read on my iPhone a few times. She may find it awkward to hold too as the bezel is almost nonexistent on most smartphones.

The biggest disadvantage of a phone or tablet is the little understood need to set up the app for the desired results and how to do that, whereas an ereader will work, in my view in an inferior manner, straight out of the box.

Onetime setup isn't a problem as I either my brother or I can handle that. It's the day to day functionality that has to be as uncomplicated as possible. She's just not interested in having to follow a long, involved set of instructions to checkout, load, and read her books. Overdrive has both iOS and Android versions of their Overdrive and Libby apps so hopefully she could handle the transition.

Ideally, though, a new device would be as close to her old in procedure as possible. Since Sony has abandoned ereaders, that won't be entirely possible, unfortunately.

[jackie_w]

The other nice thing about the Android/phone combo is that the better reading apps let you switch on text-to-speech whenever you'd like to keep reading but your hands are busy doing something else or you're out walking or you'd just like to rest your eyes for a while.

Perhaps I should add the caveat that none of my epubs contain DRM. I'm not sure whether DRM prevents TTS working.

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by dcalder

It's not weight alone that's an issue. Both for purse and comfortable one handed use, she wants the dimensions small. My dad and I have both tried to coax her into something bigger but no luck.

Has she actually had one in her hands? The Aura ONE is surprisingly easy to handle and the larger screen size might convince her. Especially if she needs to go to a larger font.

[rcentros]

Originally Posted by dcalder

Suggestions? We're in Canada, BTW. Don't have any objection to buying online as long as the seller will take back any lemons without argument.

Here's a listing of someone selling a "lightly used" (in excellent condition) T2, located in Canada.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Sony-PRS-T2...sAAOSwuQxaVo8o

Since your Mom likes and uses T2 now and you know it will do the job you need done, you might want to look in into one of these. Or maybe upgrade to a T3 (the last 6" eReader Sony made).

[rcentros]

Originally Posted by Cinisajoy

If she wants to use Overdrive, I think in Canada, Kobo is the only choice.

I can still download ePub books directly to my T2 in the U.S.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by dcalder

Per Overdrive, Pocketbook and Tolino models are also compatible. Pocketbook has models that have physical buttons plus are small and light. Price wise, not much difference from the Kobos. It's been a long time since I had a Pocketbook device and it had the peeling plastic problem but was great otherwise. No prior experience with Tolino devices but they don't seem to have physical page turn buttons anyway.

How easy is it to get Pocketbook or Tolino Readers in Canada?