Kobo Glo disaster

[Ravensknight]

Originally Posted by alicepattinson

LOL!! true, but since it's the first time to get a reader, the 1st item to look for is really the paper manual.

All my Sony's came with paper instructions [505, 350 and T1]. It was immeasurably helpful to figure out how to navigate for the first time.

[Kloos]

Up to now we did not hear anything from NHunt. I think he is not serious and should never use an ereader at all.

[Marcy]

I had a similar experience with Kobo, and I bought my reader directly from them. Their CS is horrific. The only reason I ever got my issue resolved was a post I made on this forum in anger, because I wanted everyone to know how crappy their supposed customer service was. A nice person from Kobo on this forum contacted me and helped me return my device, that I'd been trying to do since it was 1 week old with no success.

But, you shouldn't have to make angry posts on a public forum to get service from a company. I wish amazon made a device that reads epubs, because you can't beat their CS.

[geormes]

My wife has a new Kobo Aura. Her previous ereader was a Nook Touch. Once she was able to register the Kobo with ADE she could borrow books online using the EXACT same process she used with the Nook.

Believe me, if my wife can do this on her own, anyone can!

Maybe your problem is with the initial setup or getting ADE to recognize the Kobo?

Is there is a manual on the device? Connect it to your pc with the supplied usb cable. After the pc adds it; print the manual.

[Strategist]

Have a nice day...

[Strategist]

(:- | )

[Prestidigitweeze]

Strategist:

Your first two posts appear on a calibre thread and pose questions to the developer about the calibre manual. They were posted a day after May 3, when you joined MR. Your last two, posted today, are ringing endorsements of Kobo which instruct people to use calibre and avoid ADE.

You've mentioned you don't work for calibre, and I appreciate your forthrightness. Most people on this site already know that calibre is the work of its creator and is also free, so we'd have sussed that Kovid Goyal doesn't astroturf this site and doesn't need to either.

But since you report owning two Kobo e-readers and have only recently gotten around to asking questions about calibre or being active on MR, I have to ask: Do you happen to work for Kobo?

OP:

I haven't found it difficult to add books to the Kobo Aura, and while I love and appreciate calibre, I try not to use it except when necessary because I don't want to add extra code to my books or convert ones that work well as is and are already in the correct format.

The only thing I had to learn about dragging and dropping from my laptop to my Aura was not to place sideloaded books in the same folder as books I'd bought from Kobo: one has to create a separate folder for that. Mine's titled books and is placed at the root level of my Aura.

The device will also file any visual content you place on the Aura -- jpgs, etc -- as books whether you place them in a dedicated folder or not. You can open and view your images, but the database will list them in your library as "read" and you can't use them as screensavers.

Beyond that, there's no getting around it: if you live in the States, Kobo's CS is pants. If you live in Canada or the UK, that isn't as problematic because most of your resellers are going support returns.

In the USA, Kobo's a harder sell because neither vendors like Powell's nor Kobo will support your purchase.

My experience with CS is this: Through creative misinterpretation, Kobo reps actively try to make the customer the guilty party so that the responsibility isn't theirs and returns are not effected. I don't know why they treat customers that way, but despite my appreciation for the commitment, creativity and specs represented by the Aura, I'm very unlikely to purchase another Kobo reader unless there's a dramatic change. I've asked everyone I could at Kobo about whether they will ever stock SleepCovers for the Aura again and no one has been able to give me a straight answer. Likewise my questions about a bright dot on the screen.

[Strategist]

No I don't work for Kobo and I am in no way affiliated with anyone who works for Kobo. I suppose there is a little cynicism in your question. I was just trying to help someone who ask a question and I felt I had valid input. I personally don't feel the need to count posts for someone to have something relevant for me to read.

Perhaps only a chosen few are welcome here. I'm sorry I obviously misunderstood the intention of this site.

[tubemonkey]

Originally Posted by Strategist

Have a nice day...

Originally Posted by Strategist

(:- | )

[Marcy]

Originally Posted by Prestidigitweeze

My experience with CS is this: Through creative misinterpretation, Kobo reps actively try to make the customer the guilty party so that the responsibility isn't theirs and returns are not effected. I don't know why they treat customers that way, but despite my appreciation for the commitment, creativity and specs represented by the Aura, I'm very unlikely to purchase another Kobo reader unless there's a dramatic change. I've asked everyone I could at Kobo about whether they will ever stock SleepCovers for the Aura again and no one has been able to give me a straight answer. Likewise my questions about a bright dot on the screen.

This.

Despite my horrendous experience with Kobo "customer service" I was seriously considering a Glo or Aura as I'm having a recurrent issue with Nook Glowlight screen defects. However once you mention a bright dot on the screen, I think Kobos might have the same problem. And unlike B&N I'm 100% sure Kobo won't replace the defective unit. B&N just replaced my STG for the third time, even though I'm one month out of the warranty period. I'll stick with the company that at least backs up their product.

[booklover6]

Originally Posted by Prestidigitweeze

Beyond that, there's no getting around it: if you live in the States, Kobo's CS is pants. If you live in Canada or the UK, that isn't as problematic because most of your resellers are going support returns.

In the USA, Kobo's a harder sell because neither vendors like Powell's nor Kobo will support your purchase.

So you know that Powell's will not honor what their web site states:

Unopened Kobo devices, with seal intact, are returnable within 30 days of receipt. Once opened, Kobo devices are not returnable. If defective, your Kobo can be exchanged for a replacement. No substitutions.

I bought my Kobo from Powell's this month. There is nothing wrong with it. I would hope they would honor their policy if there was. Do you have evidence that they don't?

6 months down the road? I wouldn't think most device makers would be bothered, other than Amazon. But I refuse to limit myself to buying Amazon devices just because they have the best replacement history. I'll buy the devices that I want and take good care of them.

[robko]

Originally Posted by Marcy

... I was seriously considering a Glo or Aura as I'm having a recurrent issue with Nook Glowlight screen defects. However once you mention a bright dot on the screen, I think Kobos might have the same problem.

This appears to be a very limited problem from the reports on MR (if memory serves, I'd guess I've seen maybe 3 or 4 people with the issue) and appears to be a manufacturing defect rather than something that is going to appear after the fact during use.

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by Marcy

Despite my horrendous experience with Kobo "customer service" I was seriously considering a Glo or Aura as I'm having a recurrent issue with Nook Glowlight screen defects. However once you mention a bright dot on the screen, I think Kobos might have the same problem. And unlike B&N I'm 100% sure Kobo won't replace the defective unit. B&N just replaced my STG for the third time, even though I'm one month out of the warranty period. I'll stick with the company that at least backs up their product.

Kobo claim to use different technology for the light. There were some problems when they were first released. I haven't heard of anyone not getting theirs replaced. Also, I have never heard of the light guide being damaged while the device was in use.

There have been a lot fewer reports of this with the Aura.

[Prestidigitweeze]

Originally Posted by Strategist

(:- | )

I actually responded to Strategist's posts last Saturday but made the mistake of doing so not in Safari but Firefox, which promptly erased what I'd written. I was too pressed for time (I had a reading that night) and too frustrated to want to type it all over again.

The gist was that my response was not laden with "cynicism," as Strategist originally wrote, because I stated I expected the answer to my question would be honest. A cynic would assume Strategist couldn't be trusted and neither could their answers.

However, Strategist's conclusion that Mobile Read had to be an awful place because my response proved unsatisfactory really was cynical -- both in its assumption of nasty motives on my part and in its condemnation of every other member of Mobile Read based on that assumption.

The deleted post also made the straw man argument that I'd said Strategist's post count determined the value of the posts themselves. The actual point was that, out of four of Strategist's posts, two were questions about using calibre with Kobo e-readers and the other two were ringing endorsements of Kobo on a thread devoted to complaints.

Post count was only relevant because of the possibility that a brand-new member who chose to post repeatedly about the virtues of a given product might be employed by the makers of that product.

Every moderator on MR asks the same sort of question and I've never taken offense when it was asked of me by anyone whether they were moderators or not.

A fair response would have been to say, "No I don't work for Kobo," and to leave it at that.

[Breid]

Originally Posted by Strategist

No I don't work for Kobo and I am in no way affiliated with anyone who works for Kobo. I suppose there is a little cynicism in your question. I was just trying to help someone who ask a question and I felt I had valid input. I personally don't feel the need to count posts for someone to have something relevant for me to read.

Perhaps only a chosen few are welcome here. I'm sorry I obviously misunderstood the intention of this site.

AFAIK everyone is welcome here, and, in my experience, this site is a very useful resource for exchanging ideas and opinions, and for finding solutions to problems. We all started out as beginners, and you can see from my post count that, in comparison to most members, I am pretty much a beginner myself.