New "Mars" device from Likebook?

[franzli]

Originally Posted by notimp

@franzli: Was quicker than expected, because the likebooks behavior actually was normal at this point.

I just switched between the eink launcher, the built in launcher, KOReader and Librera, without them closing on me.

The only prerequisite was, that both the apps I wanted to have remaining running in the background were set as "being allowed to do so" in the Usersettings/Powesavings/something menu.

So it does work. And its normal android behavior at this point. I had a second launcher (eink Launcher) switch between them as well, and that also worked, without them being closed.

So - at this point, its

- either the app you are using
or
- their android killing processes in the background after a certain memory or app number threshhold in which case this is intermittent behavior and not fun to troubleshoot


In short - everything I've seen so far tells me that "it should work" (If the app thats launching the others does not specify , that it absolutely wants them launched "fresh").
(Android normal behavior is, that if you call any app name, the app will be launched in "its current state" if its already running, and be launched if its not - so thats actually not something that launchers usually mess up.)

So may I as you what you'd require in specific? alt+tab as a keycombination working, an applet on screen that can launch from one app into another?

I didn't use any such trinkets on android in the past, so my guess on what works is as good as yours at this point.

Because we are dealing with an unrooted device, there are several "tricks" an app might perform, to be able to act as a launcher from within another app. One I'd look for is, that it would put up a persistent notification (that way it doesnt get killed from ram), another way is that the app can actually require permission to see what other apps are running (thats grantable in Android 6 afair), and the third one would be to put up an overlay over any other app, thats grantable as well.

Everything should be possible in theory.

Thanks for your reply. I tried a few more apps from the playstore and indeed one that has a persistent notification in the status bar (Recent Bar) is the only one that actually works. All the others seem to be designed to call up the regular, Android-internal recents screen (just what you'd get if there actually was a recents button, or using Alt+Tab), but it appears that for some unfathomable reason Boyue decided to deactivate that core functionality in the system, so there simply is no Recents screen.
That's something I'm honestly quite disappointed about because it seems so unnecessarily silly/restrictive, but with the notification app I can at least come close to emulating an actual Recents menu, although it is still more cumbersome than I'd like.

[Vortex]

A2 mode turns itself off every time I turn the reader off, is there anywhere to set it to stay on?

The reader bar is microscopic, I found some settings to make it larger a few days ago but it reset itself, and now for the life of me I cant remember where I found them.

Oh, and where have they hidden the control for the blue/red light balance color. I cant find it anywhere?

[xoanohn]

If anyone has Mangarock installed on the device, can you tell me what the performance is like?

Is there excessive flashing with the page turn animations?

Also, does anyone have both the new onyx (boox 2 or note) and the likebook mars? Which has better performance? Does the octa-core make any difference?

[Waiting4somethin]

From watching the videos, this Likebook Mars appears to have the smoothest web experience I’ve seen so far for an ereader. Only matched by Yotaphones.

[notimp]

@Vortrex: Probably not, probably DPI settings - if any, and there is none. There was a coder in this thread before that said, that he could modify system level settings such as LED light temperature and that he'd written apps for that - but as of now this form of customizing your device settings beyond the manufacturers consent is beyond our reach.

@xoanohn: Right - and directly following your favorite app of choice - I'll test the other 120 million available on the Play store - for anyone that just asks, really. I think that its a wonderful use of my time. I'll be so happy, when someone buys something, because I said something. Or not. That stuff really makes my day. And if that means, that I'd have to sign up to a few 100.000 web services, I'd do that as well.

Also - you haven't grasped yet, that "screen flashes" are needed for "better contrast" on eInk devices, right? Those are two sides of the same coin.

With most apps - any options likebook implemented to "enchance contrast" (f.e. raise contrast on image content), do nothing. If you use transition animations, this washes out the image, if you use A2 mode, this washes out the image, if you prevent full screen flashes, this results in frequent afterimages - especially with image handling, or browsing (image/text mixed content).

What the Likebook basically does is, that it only refreshes regions of the screen that change, with A2 mode active it tries to redraw, without refreshing - until, after some time, lets say every minute or two - it does a full screen refresh. They/you can prevent it from occuring often - but it comes at a price. You cant get rid of it, its needed for this technology.

There are other people in this forum, who'd like nothing more that to be able to trigger a full screen refresh on every photo/image change on screen. They want that for a reason.

With A2 even the image in Perfect viewer is pretty washed out - and remember I have "contrast enhancement" settings active in that program (native to that specifics programs options). A2 mode in the end is still usable with perferct viewer - but even when it comes to browsing A2 mode has clear setbacks (washes out the image) - watch some youtube videos. Dont make us explain something to you you didnt bother to look up.

Also - even with A2 mode active, navigation and web browsing on this device is slugish at best. NOTHING that you'll do for prolongued amounts of time. Reading Manga in Perfect viewer (with saturation enhancements actiive) in A2 mode, is feasible, but only just. Its not great.

[Vortex]

Originally Posted by notimp

@Vortrex: There was a coder in this thread before that said, that he could modify system level settings such as LED light temperature and that he'd written apps for that - but as of now this form of customizing your device settings beyond the manufacturers consent is beyond our reach.

Found the red/blue day/night temperature setting hiding in plain sight disguised as a backlight on/off button: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UGiBnMmj3ck

Also found a setting in Moon +Reader Pro to always run the App in A2 mode.

[franzli]

Originally Posted by xoanohn

If anyone has Mangarock installed on the device, can you tell me what the performance is like?

Is there excessive flashing with the page turn animations?

Also, does anyone have both the new onyx (boox 2 or note) and the likebook mars? Which has better performance? Does the octa-core make any difference?

I've got the Onyx Note. On Geekbench 4 the Note is a little bit faster than the Likebook Mars - I posted the numbers somewhere earlier in this thread or on the Onyx subforum. They're relatively close, but I think the Mars tops out at about 1700-1800 points in multicore, with the note I mostly get slightly over 1800, but occasionally slightly over 2000 points.

[notimp]

Originally Posted by Vortex

Found the red/blue day/night temperature setting hiding in plain sight disguised as a backlight on/off button: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UGiBnMmj3ck

You found the toggle for day/night mode. Not a gradual temperature setting that doesnt exist on the ereader, but is feasible according to a user whos written system level apps for the mars. Sorry that I dont immediatly think of "rtfm" stuff, When someone tries to farm answers from the public. In my world, people on the internet still look for the obvious, surface level answers on their own. In reality of course they dont.

Originally Posted by Vortex

Also found a setting in Moon +Reader Pro to always run the App in A2 mode.

No you didnt. This is "important", because when I talk about app level settings, and you conflate launcher level settings with that, more confusion ensues. The context menu that pops up, when you longpress an app in the likebook launcher - isnt a setting "in the app", its a setting in the launcher (/the OS) - for that app.

And congratulation, by permanently enabling A2 mode in a ebook reading app, you've done about the dumbest thing you can do. You've now artificially limited contrast levels to "most washed out possible", for an app that doesnt benefit from it in any way.


Here is the summery for people that will talke about branded modes all day, without grasping what they actually do.

You can think of A2 mode as "moving half the available black pigment". So eink works by moving black particles to the top or the bottom of the screen, where you see them - or you dont. This takes time. And to switch from 1 to 0 (black to white) it takes a "flash" (invert the state fully). If you now want to optimize for "switching time" you only move half the pigment. Resulting in an image with far less contrast, than it could have. (60% grey instead of "black"). Also - by doing that, you can theoretically get away with less "screen flashes" (state resets), because you moved less of the pigment to the visible area. You cant get rid of it though - because eventually pigment will accumulate - so once in a while you need a screen flash (more time to move pigment > visible flash) to "reset".

With all apps that arent its own reading app, the likebook already uses more a "middle of the road" mode, where it "fully" refreshes only once every minute (in normal use) or so. This means that you cant have "optimal" contrast to begin with, then you activate A2 mode to wash out the image even more.

Now - with some apps, I'm guessing, that Boyue optimizes the contrast/refresh profile - if they identified the app as "very likely to be used by their users". I could be entirely mistaken here, but some of the "ereader level app contrast settings" sticking in some apps, and being entirely disregarded in others points that way.

Also, I dont know how "intelligent" their "full refresh needed" algorithm is (could be time based, cycle based, "amount of pigment moved" based, ...), but I do know, that the only time you have to deal with massive after images, is in A2 mode, where they shorten the time that pigment can get moved for.

So dont use A2 mode for book reading, is what I am indicating. You arent getting the optimal font contrast anyhow - if you are using a third party app (depending on how good the "full refresh needed" algo is), there is no need to wash the image out even more, if you dont need a quicker refresh rate (one pageturn every 40 seconds? Thats 0.025 frames per second. You dont need high performance mode for that.

But then its also a way to lessen font contrast (which isnt always a bad thing - it depends f.e. on the frontlight setting, and the reflected room light, and if moon+ (the App everyone repeats using, because apparently a few users "recommended it" although I have yet to find out why - I dont think its a very good reader - but what a coincidence, its the one with the most catchy name - huh, so branding works, you tells me?) doesnt have another font contrast setting, I guess you could also try to modify it by using A2 mode. Its just not the first logical thing that springs to mind. In fact its the opposite.


But "A2 mode, A2 mode, A2 mode" quit using terms you dont understand, and call the thing by its real name "that thing which cuts needed screen refresh time in half - and needs to half contrast to do so, not to suffer from major after images, which it is prone to anyways".

Now - on font contrast. Here is the fun part.

Too little front light - and you need "more font contrast" for text to be readable. This is the mistake Amazon made with the Kindle 3 and the Kerning of Bookerly. Basically - eInk couldnt give them more native eInk contrast, then they started to make "the font blacker", by modifying kerning, and "optimizing fonts". What they really did, was to worsen readability though - because although their fonts were "max contrasty" they also were a black inky mess on a grey backgroud. Even K2i fonts where more "readable". Of course no tester ever mentioned it - so... "Very happy with my purchase..:" We all know that spiel.

Enter frontlight. (The most idiotic,... but hey - it works).

Frontlight needs a diffusion layer, which lowers native eInk contrast. (And I laughed for days). But It also introduces artificial light, which hightens percieved contrast ("paperwhite). Because you added more light.

Result: You need frontlight always to be at least "a little active" - or you have worse contrast than without the diffusion layer. While you have "very happy with my purchase" people on the internet complain, that they cant turn theirs off to "save battery". (And I laughed for days.)

Now back to contrast. Now that you have frontlight in the mix, you can actually decrease font contrast, and get a more readable image (see "too much contrast" problem with "specialized" fonts), sometimes a font thats a little bit faded, isnt a bad thing, if the overall contrast is "high enough" (frontlight).

Here is the next oxymoron. The higher you pump the frontlight though - the higher the contrast ("blackyness") of your font needs to be as well. Somewhere in there is a reverse inflection point. If you use low eInk contrast and "max frontlight" the inter font spacing ("paper") will glow so bright, that it washes your font out (eyes adapt (iris, shutter, ...) ) relatively speaking.

Which is a problem only capable to be created by the BESTEST of engineers, because you started with a screen technology, that didnt need any added light - and ended up with a screen technology, where you'd enhance eInk contrast, so it can stand up to all the light you are pumping onto it. (Causing your irises to... (You end this sentence for me.. ) And I laughed for days...)

Long story short. With backlight at lower levels, lessening eink font contrast can actually be an ok thing to do (depending on the font). Just dont use A2 mode, if you can achieve it any other way, and dont need the "responsiveness" at 0.025 frames per second pageturns.

Anyone still got a "didnt read the manual" question for me? Because otherwise, I apparently start to think about the real stuff thats going on in the eReader world - and that wont sell more eReaders either..

[notimp]

Short added point on the orange light. I don't buy the "blue light makes you sleep worse" mambo jambo - that electronics are sold with nowadays - not in the least.

Calibrate your monitors to D65 whitepoint (which already is a "warm" white, compared to the usual "colder sells better" factory settings), sleep much better, with the the notion, that you actually get a color accurate image.

The science behind this apparently is real - but they tested with roomlight as a reference, not with yo smartphone screen. So buy warmer nightlights and stop selling people LCD color filters as "godo for their health".

I digress.

The orangy frontlight is good for another reason though. Immersion. Turns out, that to reach a state of less "activation" is beneficial for long reading. Turns out that "candle light" (TM - reached with orange LEDs) actually is beneficial to get you into that state. We've "amateurishly" tested that stuff with LCD based tablets about 4 years ago - in an incidence of "parallel invention", people started suggesting, to read on LCD tablets black on orange - and, it worked. Better flow state (reading speed, information retention) - still not ideal.

The same holds true with orange front light on these new bunch of ereaders. Better reading experience, still not ideal. (And I still think that some of the "not ideal" part is actually introduced by the direct light source, maybe flicker, maybe difference to room light - I dont know - but to give the frontlight more of an orange tint, imho is quite an improvement - in the "how it feels" department. (Activation level, flow state - however you want to call, or attempt to measure that.)).

Its not "day and night" coming from a Paperwhite, but it helps. Its a good evolutionary step.

[SandraMoon]

Originally Posted by notimp

@xoanohn: Right - and directly following your favorite app of choice - I'll test the other 120 million available on the Play store - for anyone that just asks, really. I think that its a wonderful use of my time. I'll be so happy, when someone buys something, because I said something. Or not. That stuff really makes my day. And if that means, that I'd have to sign up to a few 100.000 web services, I'd do that as well.

You know what the first rule of this forum is? I do because I just signed up..
It is this: Discuss things politely.
Really nobody asks you specifically to answer this question so why answer at all? Just leave the question to other people and if nobody answers then he/she will know that they should figure it out themselves.

Originally Posted by xoanohn

If anyone has Mangarock installed on the device, can you tell me what the performance is like?

Is there excessive flashing with the page turn animations?

Also, does anyone have both the new onyx (boox 2 or note) and the likebook mars? Which has better performance? Does the octa-core make any difference?

Now I can answer your first question because I use that app myself
There is flashing with each page turn. This you can see as a drawback or handy as notimp did answer. This device has issues with ghosting so if one page is followed by another page you still can faintly see the previous page. Not ideal with reading manga, but because Manga Rock has flashy page turns you dont have the issue of faintly seeing the previous page.
In my eyes this is a bonus

[Waiting4somethin]

Edit: Watching another video, browsing doesn’t seem particularly sluggish to me, besides general eink limitations.

It’s still the only other eink device (besides Yotaphones, Hisense a2/6 and eink monitors) I’ve seen without regular refreshes during browsing.

I don’t find the a2 mode contrast a problem for web browsing, but for videos the a2 mode on my onyx n96ml was slightly annoying as there seemed to be some dots flashing.

[fduniho]

I have updated my review on Amazon to take into account having Google Play. I have it 4 stars both before and after getting Google Play. Here is a link: What I like and dislike about the Likebook Mars.

[azw409]

I use Google Chrome and it's amazing - I can even watch YouTube videos on A2 mode. For an eInk device, this device is brilliant. Despite all the earlier gripes, I have no issue reading in Kindle and MoonReader - both are perfectly fine for contrast (not A2). Compared with my previous Onyx Boox, this device is a million times better.

[notimp]

Originally Posted by SandraMoon

You know what the first rule of this forum is? I do because I just signed up..
It is this: Discuss things politely.
Really nobody asks you specifically to answer this question so why answer at all? Just leave the question to other people and if nobody answers then he/she will know that they should figure it out themselves.

You actually managed to achieve a little miracle. I thought about my behavior patterns for a little while.

Let me give you a little of my perspective in return.

This is OT, please excuse me, or bare with me if you like.

..and if nobody answers then he/she will know that they should figure it out themselves.

This, sadly enough - doesnt work. I dont know if you've been on social media as of late, but what actually happens is, that people start to tell each other what they want to believe, what feels good, or what they expect is situationally appropriate.

Its much more likely, that someone gives a "I think thats the way it is" answer, with no background knowledge whatsoever, than that a question that stays unanswered, would ever be interpreted as "you know - maybe I should do some research on my own".

I've read a five page blog entry from the premier newscaster of my country (the one with the most twitter followers (Armin Wolf to name the source) ) today, he wrote in accordance with him speaking on the german media event of the year - in which he proclaims, that social media ruined debate culture, and that decency - online - is basically dead (replaced with political correctness bubbles, that each side plays in to their hearts content and expected conformist behavior without anyone questioning its purpose). To break that down even further, people would much rather be talked nice to, than to show any signs of what it takes to tackle or question a "truth" (uncomfortable opinion, however you'd want to put it).

Thats the flavor - but back to the example at hand. Lets say a low effort question draws a wrong answer. A working community is then supposed to correct it, right? In the end its always the same few voices, that go by that code, and put in the effort. In short, it doesnt scale.

So there is something in "blame them for trying" - so instead of going by - lets just ignore that internally I just thought "I will not tell you, that I wont try every app, that you random internet user would like me to, even if that might entail signing up for a "web service", just to give you a subjective assessment on which you can base your purchase decision on" - you actually tell them.

You wouldnt do that for everyone. I will not do that for everyone. Your purchase decision is based on a subjective hunch from a person you dont know. If you base most important decisions on that, thats an issue (media literacy). I have no vested interest in you purchasing the same thing a I did. If information is out there that should give you a rough idea, on how it affects your usecase, go by that - and kiss the notion goodbye, that everything has to be tailored to be a personalized support experience.

Now for forum rules.

I was the guy that basically insisted, that this community failed all their peers, when Amazon, over night, changed to a closed, proprietary file format, and started to exchange peoples eBooks ON DEVICE (whispersync), and this community failed to say anything other than "oh what a lovely new font the new format comes advertised with". I insisted that "the ebook format - only amazon is allowed to create" is a farce - (they tell authors, please send us epubs and mobis/azw3s - then make something out of that, that noone is allowed to understand in concept) and that this needs to be addressed.

It doesnt feel right to me to then in return adhere to common decency rules, when they suggest, that only acting PC should be seen as the cornerstone of a working community. To me acting PC is the cornerstone of making advertisers happy that no conflict ever is allowed - and thats about it.

I take my chances, and would rather be banned, than to conform to a ruleset that suggests, that people will take hints in silence, because talking about the abusive tendencies of "support communities" (Thanks, bye!) is seen as an issue.

Most people have "gamed" social forums and reputation systems for years ("Now which one should I buy - and can you fix my PC?") at this point. Debate culture is at an all time low. The "search for objective truth" and journalism are "out". Fake believe systems are all the rage, while safe spaces are in high demand. I'm not the person to just conform to that - I'm sorry.

This is my form of civil disobedience.

Sorry I made it political. Back to topic.

[romevi]

Anyone else using Nova on this thing? I haven't figured out how to change the background wallpaper of the main desktop. It appears as just solid black no matter what.