M**E
Excellent note-taking size and feel
Not quite fifteen years ago, I purchased a Nook reader for my husband, and fell in love with e-ink. When he abandoned the Nook after getting a large-screen phone, I would use it. However, it was a bit small, and I could only really use it for Barnes and Noble content. (USB transfer of material was hit and miss.) Also, there were no note-taking capabilities.So, after years of yearning for an e-ink note taker, I finally came across the Ares. I was trying to hold out for a Remark II, but the Ares is smaller and much less expensive. The screen is not glassy, so there is some texture when note-taking. My preference is handwritten notes on paper, but digitizing those notes is tedious. Note taking on the Ares is even easier than on my Samsung Galaxy Note 8. Having the Google Play store at my disposal means that I can install my favorite note taking and document reading/editing apps.Pros. Access to the Play Store library. Excellent screen texture for handwriting. Good handwriting recognition (if you do not write too quickly nor use a lot of technical jargon). Perfect note taking size: portable, but large enough for note taking and reading not to be a chore. Stylus/screen are pressure-sensitive, allowing for thin or thick and bold lines just by changing pressure on the fly. Expandable memory - I purchased a micro SD card and loaded it up with my Humble Bundle library.. E-ink readability. My hesitancy to use apps such as the web browser keeps me focused on my reading/writing tasks.Cons. Really long boot time. Horrible refresh rate - I hope to never be desperate enough to open the web browser again.. Bit of a lag in responsiveness. I'm getting pretty old, so this doesn't bother me as much as it would have even five years ago. However, if you are used to not having to think about opening and closing apps, switching home screens, etc., the lag time might be an unpleasant surprise.. A lot of the settings were in Chinese out of the box. Since I do not understand Chinese, it took some guess work for me to adjust settings, like switching language on the browser. But then, it might not have been that hard because I'm not the sharpest tool in the shed.. Although it runs about $200 cheaper than the Remark II and other larger e-ink tablets when completely kitted out, $250 is a bit much when I can't (or shouldn't) use the web browser or some other graphically intense apps.Do I regret the purchase? Not at all. I'm still thrilled after a month.
S**E
Sluggish --- SOOO sluggish (after over a month of using it I am changing from 3 star to 1)
UPDATE - to my review after having this more over a month- I should have returned this when I could. there are MUCH better options out there. I added one more plus and a few more cons.original review ----I am considering returning. I feel it is not quite worth the price. I feel as if I were to spend a little more money I would get more bang for my buck. Some may say the e-ink display is slower. yes it is but the sluggishness i refer to in this review is MOSTLY an OS issue. You can tell the difference by how it responds in different situations.PROS -...responsive when taking notes in the note app...Small enough to be a carry around e-reader and not too small for note taking...light weight...can install and use gmail, drive, sheets, docs, app store (all the google stuff I need)...the e-reader is very configurable....with some inconvenience you can manually backup and restore your notes.CONS -....OVER a minute to boot.... CANNOT use it in the sun . if the sun shines on the display the display slowly turns black....when taking notes on PDF its VERY unresponsive....When going between apps and using menus it is VERY unresponsive. leading to extra clicks....ALL my google apps are slow to respond. Even Gmail the one I wanted to use the most....much more ghosting than my kindle paperwhite (does have a refresh screen button and an A2 setting BUT...)... still on android 6 - they have promised an upgrade for quite a while but it is still 6. I will believe the upgrade when I see it.Indifferent-...e-reader has average flip speed... setting menus (device, android, user) are hard to navigate to what you want. but I guess you only need to do this every do often... OCR from notes is acceptable not great and not bad.BOTTOM LINE - if you ONLY need an e-reader its great. if you want to take notes but don't care if you loose them occasionally its great. if you need to do anything else (gmail, backups, edit PDFs, markup PDFs) its toooo slow to use. My wife wants one also. I will most likely keep this one (or give to her) and research something else. NOT bad enough to return not good enough to be excited about. (UPDATE - I should have returned this)
X**E
Nice ebook reader but cannot upgrade software
Received the e-reader with a screen protector already on it--discovered that when I try to put another screen protector onto it. Reading experience is nice. However, when trying to upgrade to Andriod 8.1, it failed... even follow the instruction and tried many times.
M**N
Worth buying!!
I bought this last year and was going to return it since I had difficulty working it. But I totally forgot about it and I am so thankful for it. I've just loved it. It took time to figure out how the system works but once you do it's awesome. I'm able to download most apps that I use on my phone or tablet. It reads like my kindle, you can even download kindle app onto it. It's not as fast as a iPad and of course with thus type of tablet they do have a ghosting problem but you get an e-reader, e-ink, e-paper / tablet all in one. It reads like a kindle, it's awesome for note taking, and it's a android tablet. The feature that absolutely sold me is the SD slot. I love my kindle but it only has so many GB of memory on it. Which for the price you pay, why is the memory so low? Anyway, the SD slot allows you to expand your memory which is beyond amazing. It could be better but for now I absolutely love it and will wait for a newer version of my likebook. I hope they never get rid of the SD slot and make the screen bigger, but keeping it price point because it really makes it worth buying. Some e-ink tab are way too over priced for what they do.
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