Kobo Forma: seeking heads up as to any probs

[mezzanine]

Originally Posted by Sirtel

The reason is simple: I just like to put several thousand books on my ereader. Do I need it? Of course not. But then I don't NEED an ereader in general. I could still read paper books.

Not everything in life is and should be done only because you need it (else why read ficton, why watch movies, why travel, why eat comfort foods and so on).

I'd never suggest there aren't many people who prefer to have many thousands of books on an ereader, merely that there is no rational reason to have that many books on an ereader.

There are many rational reasons to prefer ereaders over books. Decisions regarding travel/artistic/food choices usually have a rational component. Different category than a preference that has no rational basis.

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by mezzanine

I'd never suggest there aren't many people who prefer to have many thousands of books on an ereader, merely that there is no rational reason to have that many books on an ereader.

There are many rational reasons to prefer ereaders over books. Decisions regarding travel/artistic/food choices usually have a rational component. Different category than a preference that has no rational basis.

Don't know. I don't analyze my preferences and decisions as to how rational they are, or try to justify them to anyone, even to myself. If I want to do something and the advantages for me (usually emotional) are bigger than the drawbacks, then I do it. I don't care if it's rational or not, justified or not.

Just like I bought the two new Kobos. Did I need them? No. Was it a rational decision, given that I already had several perfectly working readers? No. I wanted to buy them and I did. Simple.

But then of course people are different and some do try to justify and rationalize everything they do. I've seen it plenty of times here as well.

[mezzanine]

Originally Posted by Sirtel

Don't know. I don't analyze my preferences and decisions as to how rational they are, or try to justify them to anyone, even to myself. If I want to do something and the advantages for me (usually emotional) are bigger than the drawbacks, then I do it. I don't care if it's rational or not, justified or not.

Just like I bought the two new Kobos. Did I need them? No. Was it a rational decision, given that I already had several perfectly working readers? No. I wanted to buy them and I did. Simple.

But then of course people are different and some do try to justify and rationalize everything they do. I've seen it plenty of times here as well.

We all self-justify what we do the great majority of the time. Most definitely in the case of consumer choices.

Even if a decision comes primarily out of an emotional motivation, it can still have rational components. There were surely rational components to your decision to buy new ereaders even if the motivation was mostly emotional.

You most certainly analyze your decisions on the basis of their rationality. If buying a new ereader would cause you to be evicted from your home, you wouldn't choose to buy one.

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by mezzanine

We all self-justify what we do the great majority of the time. Most definitely in the case of consumer choices.

Even if a decision comes primarily out of an emotional motivation, it can still have rational components. There were surely rational components to your decision to buy new ereaders even if the motivation was mostly emotional.

You most certainly analyze your decisions on the basis of their rationality. If buying a new ereader would cause you to be evicted from your home, you wouldn't choose to buy one.

Of course I weigh the advantages and the drawbacks, as I said. And no, there are no rational components whatsoever to many of my decisions. Including the one to buy the new ereaders. There was no rational reason at all to buy them. There would have been, if some of my previous ones weren't working correctly or I'd felt dissatisfied with them. But they were and I didn't. To buy not one, but two new readers was a purely emotional decision. And non-justifiable at that.

[mezzanine]

Originally Posted by Sirtel

Of course I weigh the advantages and the drawbacks, as I said. And no, there are no rational components whatsoever to many of my decisions. Including the one to buy the new ereaders. There was no rational reason at all to buy them. There would have been, if some of my previous ones weren't working correctly or I'd felt dissatisfied with them. But they were and I didn't. To buy not one, but two new readers was a purely emotional decision. And non-justifiable at that.

I've got more e-readers than are necessary, myself. It's not hard to start collecting them when you become habituated to using the technology. A rational reason you bought additional unnecessary ereaders could be in the behavioral and dopamine reward you derived from the very first one you purchased so long ago. Often it's the anticipation of purchasing that becomes the reward. Talking about ereaders like we do here has direct influence on your likelihood to purchase future devices.

Ereaders can be very powerful tools once one fully embraces their use. I think some of the personal connection people historically developed with the physical presence of books is replaced in the e-reader. I guess most people stare at their phones quite a bit, but I stare at this e-reader screen all the time.

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by mezzanine

I've got more e-readers than are necessary, myself. It's not hard to start collecting them when you become habituated to using the technology. A rational reason you bought additional unnecessary ereaders could be in the behavioral and dopamine reward you derived from the very first one you purchased so long ago. Often it's the anticipation of purchasing that becomes the reward. Talking about ereaders like we do here has direct influence on your likelihood to purchase future devices.

Ereaders can be very powerful tools once one fully embraces their use. I think some of the personal connection people historically developed with the physical presence of books is replaced in the e-reader. I guess most people stare at their phones quite a bit, but I stare at this e-reader screen all the time.

I agree with you on all these points.

[rashkae]

Originally Posted by mezzanine

I'd never suggest there aren't many people who prefer to have many thousands of books on an ereader, merely that there is no rational reason to have that many books on an ereader.

Having my entire TBR on the device, (now at about 800) lets me defer any hard decisions to the point I finish a book (or want a change), rather than when I connect to the pc or add more books to the list.

Realistically, I don't think I 'need' more than 10 or so.

[LivresInOz]

Power button problem...

Just adding to some things Josieb1 and John F said: reviewers have also mentioned that the power button is:
- quite hard to turn on and off
- perhaps in an odd/uncomfortable position

John seemed to imply it might get easier with time...

Apart from that and the screen eveness-problem (which seems to only exist in some individual units), I haven't come across many other 'shortcomings'

[LivresInOz]

Originally Posted by mezzanine

Incidentally, there is no legitimate reason to need more than 8GB if one is reading books. Once you've loaded more than a thousand books on a device, any argument for needing more pretty much dissolves.

I'm not one to pick an argument, but since the manufacturers may (if they are wise) read these pages occasionally, I must strongly disagree.

If this were the case, I wouldn't be considering spending $250 USD to upgrade from the Libra H20 (i.e first gen) with its 6.72 GB available space, which I soon found inadequate (and even 'ungenerous' considering how cheap storage is now).

Some of us:
a) have alot of books and/or large books (eg. pdfs running even to 250 MB)
b) like to dip in and out of books
c) like to read a few different books at once

I really want to have ALL the main books I'm interested in:
a) reading
b) checking out
in one space

And for that I need at least 21GB, based on what I currently have on my Boox Air.

On the other hand, I also know people who only EVER read one book at once and would be happy with 1 GB! Then again, there are people who ONLY like paper books.

It's a very human thing to expect everyone to be like ourselves, but there's a wide variety in the way people do and enjoy things.

[LivresInOz]

Originally Posted by Sirtel

I'm not negative toward the Forma. I just go by what I've read about it.

Yes, and this is exactly what I asked for - thankyou.

I wanted a heads-up of any shortcomings I should look into/check.

[LivresInOz]

(Warning: slightly OT 'philosophical digression'!)

Originally Posted by martinot

Usually everything gets better with a newer device....But that is not always the case, even if it usually are.

ABSOLUTELY!

I see this everywhere - even in APPS.
For eg I've seen developers (act in bad faith, I feel) by TAKING AWAY features in apps, usually by stealth.

It's always useful to be realistic and realise: the manufacturers are NOT in the game to make a better device. They are in it to make profits.

So for example: manufacturers often CHOOSE to spread all the various good features amongst their models, so people are forced to choose a device based on MOST of what they want, not all.

You might get A B and C, but you will miss out on D and E.

Also, they will deliberately withhold features that they COULD incorporate now, then add them later so you feel you should buy again/upgrade.**

So for example I bet Kobo could make a near-PERFECT e-reader (for most people), but they do things like:
- put a poor battery in the Sage even though surely they understand batteries by now
- put a substandard power button and lighting on the Forma
- provide the Libra with a very small amount of storage for today's device standards
etc

I bet they could make something that combined everything great - but companies so often prefer to either spread the good qualities among a few devices instead of incorporating them into one, or withhold features.

Only rarely does a company have the guts, confidence, integrity and smarts to go all out and attempt to dominate the market with a piece of art - something like the (earlier?) iPads for example?



_________________________________________
** Frankly, this is what has made me somewhat angry about the Libra: I bought it, found a few weeks later that 6 GB wasn't enough, and then a few weeks after that Kobo brought out the 32 GB version that WOULD have served me. I PERSONALLY feel this is a bit 'bad faith' because storage has been cheap enough for awhile that they COULD have offered 32 GB from the start

[Lynx-lynx]

Originally Posted by zenji

Power button problem...

Just confirming something Josieb1 said: reviewers have also mentioned that the power button is:
- quite hard to turn on and off
- perhaps in an odd/uncomfortable position

Apart from that and the screen eveness-problem (which seems to only exist in some individual units), I haven't come across many other 'shortcomings'

zenji, to pick up on some of your points:
- my local jbhifi has a forma on display (southern suburb, Sydney. I obviously can't speak for other jb stores)
- I bought the forma when it was first released, and have been very happy with it. I don't keep a lot of ebooks on it, and don't use it for audio books.
- if you want to listen to audio books, your phone or tablet may be the best (also you can use your tv as the speaker which I'm sure you're aware)
- my forma doesn't seem to have a lighting issue that others talk about, but, I use it outdoors a lot at zero device light and the background screen is pale ish, but not particularly grey, like the libra 2 is grey at zero light setting
- at night i use the yellow light and keep the lighting very low still anyway
- as to durability, my forma has travelled a lot, and gone through many many airport scanners (pre covid obviously), and I've never had an ounce of problems with it.
- as to the power button, it's very rare I use it because I have the kobo sleep cover which works perfectly, and I recommend you to also buy one of those
- I think the kobo book store has the forma on special at the moment, not 32gb as you want, I appreciate
- a major hassle with the kobo book store is that the ereader sales are not accepting visa or mastercard, only paypal. Kobo customer service reckons they don't know when whatever the unkown problem is will be fixed.

- booktopia is also selling the forma if you're interested (they charge $7.50 postage), and are in sydney (they partner with Kobo, but their web price is not on special, so ask for a price match)


I've just bought the libra 2 from booktopia, and even though it's only 7 inches and not the forma's 8 inches, the first thing I noticed was how small it was, yeah right! I wouldn't have thought an inch made that much difference, but it does. And the libra 2 is heavier than the forma. I can still get a lot of standard type on the libra 2 page, so it's not an issue now I'm used to it. Again, get a sleep cover.


I'd still recommend the forma even though it's 3 years old, although if you want a new device then the libra 2 would probably be the way to go (and you'll find lots of valuable info in that thread eg the clarity of the fonts are as good as the forma etc etc)

edit
and I just checked, my libra 2 is 32gb

[LivresInOz]

BTW, I'm after reccos for affordable, honest and reliable freight-forwarders so I can buy (the Forma) from the Kobo US store and forward the item to me in Melbourne!

(I looked into myus.com but they have some bad reviews)

[Lynx-lynx]

Originally Posted by zenji

BTW, I'm after reccos for affordable, honest and reliable freight-forwarders so I can buy (the Forma) from the Kobo US store and forward the item to me in Melbourne!

(I looked into myus.com but they have some bad reviews)

instead try Canada, this store ships direct to aus:
https://www.chapters.indigo.ca/en-ca...der#internal=1

but, I've just noticed they don't have a forma

and they wouldn't accept an aus visa card because of some reason to do with visa, apparently, so paypal for them.

[LivresInOz]

Thanks Lynx-lynx!

QUESTION...

Originally Posted by Lynx-lynx

I use it outdoors a lot at zero device light and the background screen is pale ish, but not particularly grey, like the libra 2 is grey at zero light setting

I didn't understand this...Do you mean you think 'greyness'/'paleness' is bad/good? It might help to know I have the Libra H20 (i.e the first Libra iteration) and have zero issues with the screen colours. But if you are saying the Forma is different than the Libra H20 (i.e 1) in this area (but especially WORSE), could you elaborate what you mean?
________________________________________
Thanks for letting me know:
* About the JB Hi-Fi...it gives me some hope of actually HOLDING one (seriously, the lack of demos is a real joke)...my local apparently got rid of all the demos...
* About the one-inch making a difference: that is the SECOND main reason im considering Forma and WAS considering Sage
________________________________________

Comments On the other aspects:


* The US Kobo store has Forma for $US 250 ($AU 350) and Im looking at using a 'freight forwarding' company to buy one

*The whole reason I want a Forma or Sage (or even a Libra 2) is I need 32 GB, so I have no interest in anything under that

* A key consideration is I want something not much heavier than the Libra H20 (i.e 1) , which I DID fall in love with because the WEIGHT (and maybe size) (and probably e-ink screen) got me reading alot more than I ever had with tablets or paper. I KNOW the Libra H20 is a good weight for me.

* No need for audio books - you're totally right that other devices probably better for that. Even my good old Galaxy Note 8 tablet is just fine for that. Or my phone. I don't actually get audiobooks much. I usually use TTS, with @voicereader, EZpdf reader or Xodo (or Prestigio sometimes) (maybe Lithium for epubs?) on any Android device.

* Don't care too much about my 8 inch reader having noting either, FWIW - since I have a 10 inch Boox Note Air 2 which is great for that...and I realised: if you want to take notes, you NEED two hands anyway. (Hence for me getting the Sage for that is probably not worth the battery life problem, 50g extra weight and the risk of something so new)

_______________________________
'Consumer matters'

Originally Posted by Lynx-lynx

a major hassle with the kobo book store is that the ereader sales are not accepting visa or mastercard, only paypal. Kobo customer service reckons they don't know when whatever the unknown problem is will be fixed.

...now here is where my cynicism (realism?) kicks in.

I would guess its harder to get a credit card chargeback thru paypal vs your own card?

Many people might want to return the Sage if the battery problem turns out to be a serious one (even tho some people have said that it becomes alot better (for READING, not noting) after updates and power cycles).

Kobo apparently does give you a month to return the item even for change of mind.

But what about after that...Im just one of those people with enough experience and current affairs knowledge about what corporates get up to, that something like that makes me question why...