Forma Just ordered new Kobo Forma

[kansaskyle]

Originally Posted by khalleron

Does your price include tax? There's no sales tax where I live, which might be the difference.

Yes, it looks like it includes tax here in Texas.

[donbrubaker]

I know this is an unusual question, but is there an option to reverse the screen? On the Kindle Oasis there is an accessibility setting to allow you to reverse the screen so that the text is white on a black background rather than the normal black on white background. Unfortunately this setting is only on the Oasis and not available on the other Kindles. Wondering if this new Kobo has that ability. Thanks in advance for checking.

[rcentros]

Originally Posted by khalleron

Does your price include tax? There's no sales tax where I live, which might be the difference.

It looks like, if you buy the Forma and its OEM cover together at Walmart, the total price is $319.98. If you pickup at the star there is a $20.22 discount. So, if the prices are the same where you live, and you don't have tax, your total for the Forma and its OEM cover should be $299.76 with pickup. (In Fort Worth there is (supposedly) exactly $20 tax in my area, so my total would be $318.50 (not sure how that figures comes up, but that's what they show for pickup at my local Walmart). The price (before tax) is $299.76. (You have to put the item in the cart before they show you the discount amount.)

[Barty]

Any confirmation as to whether it can be returned to a Wal-Mart store for a full refund? (I'll choose the pick up at store option if I decide to buy )

[MGlitch]

Originally Posted by donbrubaker

I know this is an unusual question, but is there an option to reverse the screen? On the Kindle Oasis there is an accessibility setting to allow you to reverse the screen so that the text is white on a black background rather than the normal black on white background. Unfortunately this setting is only on the Oasis and not available on the other Kindles. Wondering if this new Kobo has that ability. Thanks in advance for checking.

Yes and no, its an 'option' that's been around for awhile now, but not one you can turn on and off without either patching your Kobo (and the nightmode patch thread is filled with garbage because people do not read back and find the relevant posts), or by plugging your Kobo in and editing a config file.

The latter is the easiest option as it works 100% but does need you to plug in to switch between white on black versus black on white. The former, if you get it working, has had some reports of possibly corrupting your database (I say possibly because again it's a quagmire of information in that thread some good some bad).

I had it working at one point on my KA1, but I reset for other reasons and just have never bothered to reapply the patch.

[Barcey]

After reading with the Forma for a couple days I'm overall very impressed with it. It's very comfortable to hold with one hand because most of the weight is on the button side so when reading in portrait mode it balances on your pinky and doesn't tilt. It's not comfortable to hold with a single hand in landscape mode because it does tilt on you but it's very comfortable to hold with two hands that way. The back grip is good and doesn't slip when wet (I was reading in the hot tub when it was 1C last night so cold/wet wasn't a problem with grip). The screen lighting is very even without bleeding. In portrait mode the width of the reader is the same as a hard cover book and I compared the default text width (no patches) with a hard cover book and it was the same width. I compared a second hard cover and the text in that book was slightly wider but still would have fit within the text area of the reader if the margins were adjusted. The reader is only about 3/4 the height of the hard cover book so length wise it doesn't match. Having a featherlight reader with the same text width of a hard cover is amazing and I'm sure it's not an accident in design. The screen clarity is very good. Side by side comparison with the H2O I would say they are equivalent. I would say the screen crispness is better on my Aura One but it's a very slight edge.

I've mainly been using the buttons for page advance and they've been solid. No clicks without page advance and no double page advance. Out of habit I found myself swiping to advance and i never experienced a false swipe either. Hoping it stays that way (knock on wood).

It wouldn't be a Kobo without a few bugs though. The worst I experienced is last night I had the settings set to show progress as pages per chapter. I noticed it changed on it's own to % per chapter and I left it alone. A couple pages later I noticed it had changed to minutes remaining in the chapter. A couple pages later the pages started going backwards on its own. It went back to around where I was where the change started. I put it to sleep, started it again, changed the settings back and it's been fine since. I'm not sure if this is a know firmware bug, I had a stable firmware on my other Kobos and haven't been upgrading.

A second minor bug was with it coming out of sleep mode on it's own. I didn't purchase the sleep cover but when I pressed the button to put it to sleep I would set it down and a couple minutes later it came out of sleep on its own. I disabled the sleep cover setting and haven't had the problem since.

The other minor bug is with the auto orientation. I've picked up the reader and held it in the same orientation where I put it to sleep and when I press the button to bring it out of sleep it starts upside down. I plugged the USB cable into it once when it was in portrait mode and the screen half changed to landscape mode, the orientation was still correct but it was about a third of the way down the screen and then wrapped around. The touch screen didn't align with the button location so I wasn't able to click on the dialog asking if I wanted to connect. I just changed the orientation back and forth and it corrected itself so it's just a minor annoyance. You can lock the orientation into landscape or either portrait modes so if it bothers you there is a work around. It will lock in either left or right hand portrait mode depending on the orientation you have it in when you lock it. I like the auto orientation though because you can just flip it to move from one hand to the other and the buttons change with the orientation.

[rcentros]

Hopefully they'll fix some of the minor bugs with new software releases. Thanks for the review.

[icallaci]

What about screen calibration when using the on-screen keyboard? When you tap the "A" key, does the "A" key highlight or does some other key light up? On my Aura One, pressing the "A" key actually highlights the "S" key about 80% of the time (and this occurs for every keypress; i.e., tapping the "S" key highlights the "D" key, etc.). Thanks for any info on this.

[Barcey]

Originally Posted by icallaci

What about screen calibration when using the on-screen keyboard? When you tap the "A" key, does the "A" key highlight or does some other key light up? On my Aura One, pressing the "A" key actually highlights the "S" key about 80% of the time (and this occurs for every keypress; i.e., tapping the "S" key highlights the "D" key, etc.). Thanks for any info on this.

Interesting, I have the same screen calibration problem on my Aura One, I thought it was just my unit. I've experienced no screen calibration issues on the Forma and the keyboard is accurate.

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by Barcey

It wouldn't be a Kobo without a few bugs though. The worst I experienced is last night I had the settings set to show progress as pages per chapter. I noticed it changed on it's own to % per chapter and I left it alone. A couple pages later I noticed it had changed to minutes remaining in the chapter. A couple pages later the pages started going backwards on its own. It went back to around where I was where the change started. I put it to sleep, started it again, changed the settings back and it's been fine since. I'm not sure if this is a know firmware bug, I had a stable firmware on my other Kobos and haven't been upgrading.

I suspect that is related the change a while ago where you only need a tap rather than a long press to change the page number display. I was changing it accidentally all the time as it was to easy to happen. They changed back to a long press in the 4.10.x firmware.

A second minor bug was with it coming out of sleep mode on it's own. I didn't purchase the sleep cover but when I pressed the button to put it to sleep I would set it down and a couple minutes later it came out of sleep on its own. I disabled the sleep cover setting and haven't had the problem since.

The other minor bug is with the auto orientation. I've picked up the reader and held it in the same orientation where I put it to sleep and when I press the button to bring it out of sleep it starts upside down. I plugged the USB cable into it once when it was in portrait mode and the screen half changed to landscape mode, the orientation was still correct but it was about a third of the way down the screen and then wrapped around. The touch screen didn't align with the button location so I wasn't able to click on the dialog asking if I wanted to connect. I just changed the orientation back and forth and it corrected itself so it's just a minor annoyance. You can lock the orientation into landscape or either portrait modes so if it bothers you there is a work around. It will lock in either left or right hand portrait mode depending on the orientation you have it in when you lock it. I like the auto orientation though because you can just flip it to move from one hand to the other and the buttons change with the orientation.

Hopefully those issues will be fixed with the first firmware release. The one you are using now is the factory installed version. There will have been a couple of months of development since that was created. There should be a release in the next day or so to match with the official availability date.

Originally Posted by Barcey

Interesting, I have the same screen calibration problem on my Aura One, I thought it was just my unit. I've experienced no screen calibration issues on the Forma and the keyboard is accurate.

Calibration of the Aura ONE touch was a fairly common issue. The my wife uses is about half a letter off when using the keyboard.

[icallaci]

Originally Posted by Barcey

Interesting, I have the same screen calibration problem on my Aura One, I thought it was just my unit. I've experienced no screen calibration issues on the Forma and the keyboard is accurate.

Thank you for that information. I will probably order a Forma when the 32gb version is available.

[stumped]

Still impossible to buy or pre order in UK?
Checked the usual suspects, Argos, John Lewis also Google shopping and search, and kobo themselves
Nothing
No wonder their market share is so low here.
They have no idea how to promote a new device,, there is no coming soon, no register your interest...

Originally Posted by stumped

Still impossible to buy or pre order in UK?
Checked the usual suspects, Argos, John Lewis also Google shopping and search, and kobo themselves
Nothing
No wonder their market share is so low here.
They have no idea how to promote a new device,, there is no coming soon, no register your interest...

EVERY Kobo retailer up here has been pushing it well, publicising the pre-order and availability dates. The fault may lie with the UK distribution channels more than with Rakuten/Kobo, perhaps

[djazz]

In Sweden it's available for preorder from the two usual Kobo resellers; Inet and Webhallen, for 2899 SEK. It releases here on the 9th of November.

EDIT: Yes, the 8 GB model.

[Lady Stardust]

That sounds very expensive if it is 8GB.
Price in Japan, inclusive of tax, for 32GB is 34,344 Yen (full price without any discount).
On the other hand, I just saw on Rakuten Japan site that during this year they will make possible two page view on Forma (with software update). I think a lot of people have asked for it, so maybe it is worth premium price.

For speakers of Japanese

Kobo Formaでは、2ページ表示を可能にした見開き機能で、大切なシーンを、今まで以上に臨場感たっぷりに味 わうことができます。見開き機能は年内に公開予定！先にご購入いただいた方もソフトウェア更新にてお楽しみ いただけますので、今しばらくお待ちください