Library music
You can also press the Read Now icon near the bottom of the display which opens the last book you were reading at your last-read page, of course. Need more variety? The next icon along is the Library shortcut which opens a bookshelf designed like glossy white wood with your tomes in order. All very straightforward. And the books look good, the colours subtle rather than bright, but making photographs shine.
Menu and apps browser
Of course, you’re reading a backlit screen which is less restful on the eyes than e-ink or, you know, paper. Page turns lack the artful animation of the iPad’s iBooks, for instance, either sliding the previous page or just replacing it instantly. Still, at least it lacks the intrusive flashing which e-ink displays require.
Bookshelf
The bookstore, called Shop Kobo, is another icon on the home page’s bottom shelf and guides you to the Kobo book store. It has over 2 million titles, including a million free ones. Some of these are poorly laid out – the epic poem Paradise Lost is presented as continuous text which is really not what Milton intended, given his obsession with which lines fell at the beginning, middle and end of each stanza.
Sharing options and reading history
Storage is excellent, with 8GB on board. This is the same as the fire but the Vox also has a memory card slot so you can add an extra 32GB so the reader can hold around 40,000 books (are you really that indecisive about what you might want to read?) at a time.
Next page: Touch and go?
COMMENTS
Not really a "reader"
I'm beginning to think that e-book readers needs some sort of standard definition to seperate them from low-end tablets. How about something like:
e-ink screens or similar non-backlit technology (colour optional, if and when)
light weight for long periods of use
looong battery life
really, really easy to use for non-techies
and, most importantly, as little, obvious, geeky, technology stuff as possible.
The idea is to have something as easy to read as a book, with as little as possible to distract you or get in the way. Anything else is a tablet.
"Surely most people who want one of these have a phone that'll provide a mobile WiFi hotspot for them..."
Except NO they don't - firstly not everyone buying a tablet has an iPhone or recent Android that will do it and many handsets (especially supplied by mobile operators) have the 'hotspot' feature disabled unless you pay extra for it.
Then if you assume you do - you may only have a fairly small data allowance (perhaps 250-500-1000Mb per month) which may be insufficient - data plans for iPads / tablets often come with 1-3-unlimited usage.
Then of course it kills your phone battery while you are using it. Then it's less 'convenient' than having 3G on the device.
Of course you could have a phone that does support it - do have a massive data plan on the phone and not mind your phone battery running flat - but that is not MOST people.
This has the same (but not quite as bad) problem
In it's not a official Google recognised device and therefore no Android Market.
At least they offer GetJar, which is better than what Kindle offer, and of course I suspect you can load the Kindle e-reader app, which means you have the luxury of both EPUB and Amazon's locked in format (surprised that this "review" doesn't mention that rather important point).
Personally, I think tablets are for tablet things, and e-readers should be for reading, so these kind of devices are poor at both. Get an e-ink reader like the Koko touch, Sony Reader, Nook, or even dare I say it, a Kindle for reading books, and get a recent tablet for everything else.
WELL SAID....
E-book for reading books, tablets for web browsing, laptops for working.
It just another way to strain your eyes reading a book on a back lit screen.
Cheaper and better can be had by far!
This device has FAIL written all over it.
It's a branded cheap, but not cheap, tablet masquerading as an e-book reader.
It's locked down from the start, so your not getting a full android experience.
Do yourselves a favour (altho most Register readers will already know), search on Amazon for android capacitive tablet, filter by price and rating.
There's a number of them, one that comes to mind is the NATPC M009S for £100
1.2Ghz, Stock Android 2.3 (so your not locked out anything), 512mb ram.
For £70 less, it wipes the floor with the kobo.
No-brainer if your in the market for a cheap tablet.
Sure, it's not massively fast, hasn't got a great deal of RAM and your limited to 20gb storage space with an SD card, but for £100?
Sadly, I would say a lot of people are going to fall for the kobo, as it's branded whsmith and will be pimped in their stores.
Mod me down if you want, but from where I'm sitting, this device is a *massive* rip off at £170 = FAIL.
