need help finding one I'd be able to buy in a store

[dakini]

US reader here. I live in inland California, where it's a billion degrees, so ordering electronics and having them sit in a mailbox all day while I'm at work is a bad idea (as we learned a couple summers ago with a new mobile phone), so I am looking for something I'd find in stores. Wide variety of those here.

I have a Kobo Glo that I adore. Have always had Kobos. But can't get them locally anymore. And their customer service can't help with the battery (which only lasts a day now).

I'm looking at e-ink, with a backlight of some sort (paperwhite, glo, etc). my whole library is in epub format right now, which kindle seems to need converted to mobi to work? I prefer to side load my books. overdrive support would be awesome, but not a dealbreaker.

I know of the paperwhite (though looking on amazon, it only comes with ads? no non-special-offers version?)? I know there's a Nook with a light. Any others I should be thinking about or considering?

Thanks for any help.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by dakini

US reader here. I live in inland California, where it's a billion degrees, so ordering electronics and having them sit in a mailbox all day while I'm at work is a bad idea (as we learned a couple summers ago with a new mobile phone), so I am looking for something I'd find in stores. Wide variety of those here.

I have a Kobo Glo that I adore. Have always had Kobos. But can't get them locally anymore. And their customer service can't help with the battery (which only lasts a day now).

I'm looking at e-ink, with a backlight of some sort (paperwhite, glo, etc). my whole library is in epub format right now, which kindle seems to need converted to mobi to work? I prefer to side load my books. overdrive support would be awesome, but not a dealbreaker.

I know of the paperwhite (though looking on amazon, it only comes with ads? no non-special-offers version?)? I know there's a Nook with a light. Any others I should be thinking about or considering?

Thanks for any help.

At this point, you might want to wait a few more days and see if your nearest Walmart does start selling Kobo ereaders. Otherwise, I would recommend a Kindle if there is a local retailer selling them. Kindles seem to have fewer problems with sideloaded books than Nooks going by the number of posts from people who are having issues in the Nook forum. If you are not already using calibre, you might want to check it out.

For Overdrive support? That will depend on your local library but in the US, quite a few libraries support epub and mobi borrowing. At this time, the only ereader with builtin Overdrive support is the Kobo Aura One but I'm still hoping that they will extend Overdrive to their other ereaders. The newest Kindle firmware does allow returning library books from your ereader but I really can't recommend using the builtin web browser in any eInk device to borrow library books.

[rcentros]

Like DNSB mentions ... Walmart is supposedly going to be selling Kobos on the 21st. Everyone assumes that means in store as well as online. But no guarantees.

As for the Paperwhite. If you want to get rid of the ads you just click "customize and put in the cart" where you'll have the choice to remove the special offers (or you can do that after buying the Paperwhite (if you wanted to pick one up at Best Buy, for example) by paying Amazon $20 to remove the special offers.)

Have you considered the possibility of replacing the Kobo Glo's battery? If you can find the battery, it doesn't look like it would be hard to replace.

[dakini]

I've been trying to find where to get a replacement Glo battery ... it seems silly to throw it out for something that should be easy to replace. What I know so far is that the battery is glued to the motherboard, although the battery is easy to disconnect apparently it's not so easy to get out. Other Kobo models seem to have easily-found batteries; there are very few Glo-identical batteries available online in the right physical shape/size. There's one site from Russia that people here recommend, but I'm not sure if I trust it.

The Walmart news is good news. I hope that does happen. Even if they only sell online, they'll probably do ship to store which at least means it won't sit in my USPS easy bake oven all day.

Thanks.

[rcentros]

Originally Posted by dakini

I've been trying to find where to get a replacement Glo battery ... it seems silly to throw it out for something that should be easy to replace. ...

According to another thread on MobileRead ...

https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sh...d.php?t=280484

This battery is supposed to work ...

https://www.aliexpress.com/store/pro...ceBeautifyAB=0

You might have to solder your old battery connector to the leads, but it looks like it may be offering a choice of leads.

Someone on eBay is selling the motherboard with battery, so you can see what it would look like there.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Original-Ko...sAAOSwaMFZ34-k

I probably wouldn't buy it for the battery though.

[OregonJim]

Originally Posted by dakini

US reader here. I live in inland California, where it's a billion degrees, so ordering electronics and having them sit in a mailbox all day while I'm at work is a bad idea (as we learned a couple summers ago with a new mobile phone), so I am looking for something I'd find in stores. Wide variety of those here.

Close to a billion degrees here as well. I think we've gone 3 weeks now without a day below 90F. Three in a row above 100F.

Anyway, the only store local to me (if you call 20 mi away local) is Staples, and they "carry" the PaperWhite. However, every time I try to buy any piece of electronics at Staples, it's always the same answer: "We're out of them". Well, why don't you say so on the floor display? Crickets. Been that way since the 1990's - has happened to me personally on 25+ separate occasions.
My optimism finally expired, so I only go there for paper and pencils these days.

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by dakini

US reader here. I live in inland California, where it's a billion degrees, so ordering electronics and having them sit in a mailbox all day while I'm at work is a bad idea (as we learned a couple summers ago with a new mobile phone), so I am looking for something I'd find in stores. Wide variety of those here.

Could you have the reader delivered to work?

I have a Nook Glowlight 3 and I do really like it. But there have been too many complaints about sideloading issues to ignore (though I haven't had these issues on mine).

[AnemicOak]

As others have mentioned, hopefully in the next day or so WalMart might be an option for Kobo's in-store.

Originally Posted by dakini

I'm looking at e-ink, with a backlight of some sort (paperwhite, glo, etc). my whole library is in epub format right now, which kindle seems to need converted to mobi to work? I prefer to side load my books. overdrive support would be awesome, but not a dealbreaker.

Yeah with a Kindle you'd have to convert to Mobi or preferably AZW3/KF8 (more like ePub). In the US most OverDrive libraries (assuming that's why you want OD support) have Kindle support so books can be directly downloaded over wireless to a Kindle which may be useful.

I know of the paperwhite (though looking on amazon, it only comes with ads? no non-special-offers version?)?

When ordering from the website you can get it with the ads disabled for an additional $20. Retail outlets only, AFAIK, carry them with the ads enabled, but once you've registered it you can pay Amazon the $20 to remove them if you choose.