Kobo

I was going to give it a three but on reflection there are a lot of things that make the experience a bit disappointing. This is my first e-reader.… Read more

I like that it is light, and that it has buttons to turn the page which are comfortably located for me. It’s easy to add books to the Wishlist to preview and purchase. Even though it is colour, which some reviews mentioned will affect the crispness of the text, I think it’s fine. There are a few annoying things. Some of the books I read (mostly non fiction) are pretty expensive and they don’t seem to have specials for any good books. The screen is touchy so i inadvertently flick through pages and need to find my place again. When the stylus is magnetically attached to the side with the buttons, the kobo flicks pages and I lose my place. It’s pretty distracting. And I specifically bought the ereader so that I would mark up pdfs, but the screen is tiny and the text on pdfs is not dynamic, so I need to either read the tiny text or enlarge it and move the image around like a microfiche.neither of those options are appealing so I guess I need to consider purchasing something else. There are limited options for the notepad. I like the feature to convert handwriting to text but that’s only available for the basic notebook. As soon as you switch to the advanced notebook, which has different templates, you lose the functionality. Pretty disappointing overall.

Device great, Kobo sucks – My Kobo ia great.. their app and customer service is absolutely rubbish. Full of bugs everywhere. I can't even buy books without jumping through so many hoops because their "one tap buy" doesn't work.

An original Kobo Aura h20 - for me its very useable, reliable and battery is 100% ok – Disclaimers first = always updated to the latest Kobo firmware, never purchase books on the device, always side load books by using Calibre as the… Read more

library manager with plugins. All my personal opinion based on several years with this device. Pleasure to read day or night and 6.8"is just right for single hand holding with minimal eye strain. This early model has a storage micro sdcard slot and no auto brightness or blue light. However I use manual brightness and that seems most reliable rather than swipe lhs of the screen to change brightness (for me). 4G inernal storage is never fully used! New software makes a world of difference to faster loading and reading, using kepubs (shows chapter estimated time to read, size of chapters etc).

Many many drops, especially late night, droopy eyes, and next thing it falls onto the floor, dropped from side cupboard, result is a few plastic nicks in the black plastic frame but the screen is as good as new and text just as sharp too.

Software system suits me and I get lost in the wifes kindle, compared to the Kobo.

The original model as purchased just works, does what the box says, so I have NO plans to upgrade or change to another model or product in anyway. Newer models do not have anything momentus to upgrade for, this one just reads books, handles all the formats I need. I dont need audio, comics or even pdf's.

KOBO GLO HD DIED – I had my Kobo Glo HD for nearly 12 months, buying it from JB HiFi, when it froze during a software update. It would not complete the update so I… Read more

could not do any resets to it at all so I contacted Kobo Customer Service with my problem and rang the musing the 1800 number that was supplied after I emailed them with my problem.

The gentleman I spoke too was very helpful and said that he would contact the relevant are regarding a replacement Kobo and they in turn would contact me. I was asked too send my tails too Kobo via email so they would know were too send the replacement.

When I finally received an email after a number off days I was told that they would replaced my unit with a new Kobo Aura Second Edition because they don't make the Glo anymore. I was also offered a custom black case and a $10 credit on my account. I accepted their offer who wouldn't a brand new Kobo or so I thought.

I received the $10 credit and after a few days was told too send my old Kobo Glo down too an address in Melbourne and then Kobo would send the replacement. I did this insuring it and asking for signature and this week Kobo FedEx me the replacement unit.

Imagine my surprise on opening the box too find no packing in the box too stop the unit they sent from bouncing around on its way too me and a Refurbished Kobo Glo HD. I have not opened the box on this unit nor have I connected it too the internet. I have however emailed Kobo about the mistake they have made emphasising that I had NOT accepted a refurbished unit and their offer was for a brand new one.

My only experience with overseas companies has been with Amazon and I haven't had any problem with returning stuff too them but it seems Kobo is a company that cares more about the almighty dollar than customer service.

I will await their reply too my email for a couple off days an my next stop will be the ACCC who I'm sure will love to investigate this because they offered me a new Kobo in writing not verbally so they should have too follow through.

Kobo emailed me apologising and asking me too return the refurbished one and then I would receive the new one, the new Kobo Aura Second Edition arrived as promised so far it is performing well.

Absolute Rot - Do not buy a kobo ebook – Bought at JB Hifi as I travel and read a lot. Thought this would save me space. Uploading epub versions of my books, and connecting to my library… Read more

were simple. The screen is slow to respond, but I expected that with the eReader. The reason for not using the iPad was that this would lead to less distractions and you have the "book" experience. Worked well for the first three weeks, then something happened, the unit froze (though it had charge) and had to end up doing a reset. This lost all my books, which I had to set up again.

I thought the problem was behind me, but then it occurred again, and this time it had lost all of the books again, and I had to reload, but since I was travelling without my laptop, it was just a piece of crap i had to lug along for no reason. Back home I reloaded. Then it happened again, again and again. The last time it only lasted a week.

Now it is hopelessly frozen, will charge and sometimes get onto the "wifi" page, but won't show up on the computer when connected and no amount of long presses resets the damn thing again. Very, very disappointed by the Kobo product. In fact, it would have been cheaper for me to buy the hard copies of the few books I read on the Kobo. Still looks new but does not work. Spent a few days trying to fix it, but now looks like an expensive landfill item to me. Do not buy this. Obviously there is minimal quality control, or how would such a thing have got through. Incidentally, I lodged a complaint within the first three weeks of failingit, but have heard nothing back. I certainly will not buy any Kobo again.

Can't live without it – It's just perfect in every way. I love that I can borrow e-books directly from my local library. It also automatically downloads any books you have… Read more

on request as soon as they become available.

The natural light setting is perfect for night-time reading because it doesn't keep you awake and if you doze off you don't have to wake up again to turn off your reading lamp.

Terrible experience. I click on the upper right corner to save the page, but the bookmark doesn't stay on, the book goes back to the very beginning… Read more

every time and my bookmark disappears. Customer service giving conflicting advice, saying that I have to sync the device before and after reading and also perform "synchronisation repairs". A one month old device shouldn't need repairs. If I wanted a device that fails to sync itself to the marked page and needs repairs one month after purchase, I would have bought a used reading device.

A device specifically designed for reading shouldn't need synching before and after reading to save the page. All my phones, tablets and computer have always saved the page of a book automatically after I set the bookmark to a page.

Looking into how to return this useless device for a full refund, wish me luck. I can see I am going to have to get consumer rights authorities involved.

Rubbish Sprinkled With Sugar is Still Rubbish! – I outlayed the extra money for the Kobo Forma over a Kindle for the library features. I also wanted something waterproof and sunlight readable to… Read more

read on the boat. I immediately fell in love with it and bought another one for my partner. That was 18 months ago and the love affair has turned into a bitter hate-filled divorce! Within 6 months I was having problems with the Kobo running flat overnight then eventually refusing to charge at all. I tried following all their advice - resetting, updating, reverting to old firmware. Kobo sent me a refurbished one under warranty - despite my argument that they should be replacing it with a new one. Six months later, my partner's Forma started going flat overnight even when it was turned off! Of course, this was just a couple of months after warranty expired! Another few months down the track and now my refurbished Forma won't charge. Again, resetting to factory settings, updating to latest firmware, trying multiple different USB cables and power outlets has not helped. I LOVE this device when it works - it's especially good for my old eyes - but the degree of frustration it's causing is an absolute killer.

Kobo??? NoNo!!!

Rakuten Kobo nightmare – An email I sent to Roger from Rakuten, attached below, explains my experience with the Rakuten writing pad. It does not tell the story of what … Read more

followed; ignored emails constantly changing contact persons that did not read the preceeding emails, Etc. Anyway below the initiating email.

Feb 28, 2024, 22:00 EST

Hello Roger,

As you can see from the date of my last communication with you, a little over a year has passed. I have used my Kobo Elipsa daily to record a series of data points and annotations using the advanced notebook function of the device. I have not used it as a reader at all. I would put my use of the device at +/- 2 hours a day. I would class my experience of it's use as irritating at best and enraging at worst. When the device lost 2 documents containing a couple of weeks of my work I reduced the content of my files to approximately 2 X an A4 page size as I thought my file size might have a bearing on its behaviour. Until this juncture my pages would average a content size of 4 to 5 X an A4 page size. From the point of view of importing the document onto my computer for statistical analysis this was a nuisance. I would also have to create a new template every week as the device does not have a cut and paste function across documents. My reason for contacting you is that a few days ago the Elipsa did not just lose one of my weekly documents but another disparate file that had been created on the same date. You will appreciate that this is totally unacceptable I have factory reset and updated the device regularly to see if improvements had been made through bug fixes but these have made no difference. If anything it made its erratic behaviour seem to get worse. If you re-read previous emails you will see that right from new; this device has been erratic. At the time you offered me a replacement (see email Jan 22 2023)I thought I had sorted the problem out and I needed to just learn how to use it, but time has proven this to not be so. I don't know whether I just got a dud or all of the tablets are the same. Perhaps it is a software problem that needs to be corrected. I feel that the the device struggles to keep up with the demands made on it when one is using it, at times when one is writing on the screen, the writing does not appear for several seconds, or not at all. I have used different styluses to see whether this would make a difference. Ensured that the batteries in the supplied stylus were adequate. All to no avail. I look forward to getting some suggestions as to what we can do about this.

Regards John

After this letter eventually an offer to replace it was made but no address to send the faulty one was forthcoming, and emails were not responded to. All of this wasted another 3 Months. I decided that I'd keep the partially faulty unit as I didn't trust I would ever hear from them again. I would not recommend this tablet to anyone.