I've had a day to play around with this now, and at this point I'm unlikely to keep it. As I mentioned in my initial post, my main use for this would have been as a multi-platform e-reading tablet. From what I've seen, it's going to struggle to fulfill that purpose, for me at least. What I liked The inbuilt functions seemed to work fairly well. The main Kobo app is almost identical to the one on the iPad and works in much the same fashion. I tested the Email, YouTube and Zinio apps, and again, all of them worked reasonably well. My existing content downloaded to the machine with no trouble. I also found the capacitive touchscreen to be reasonably responsive, which was a criticism I'd read in other reviews. I particularly liked the Kobo widget which brings your currently being read content right to your home screen. Being used to iOS, it took me a little time to get used to Android, but it wasn't that difficult. You also can't really argue about the price – $169 is a pretty good deal – if you're prepared to accept the limitations. I also really liked the 7…
I've had a day to play around with this now, and at this point I'm unlikely to keep it. As I mentioned in my initial post, my main use for this would have been as a multi-platform e-reading tablet. From what I've seen, it's going to struggle to fulfill that purpose, for me at least. What I liked The inbuilt functions seemed to work fairly well. The main Kobo app is almost identical to the one on the iPad and works in much the same fashion. I tested the Email, YouTube and Zinio apps, and again, all of them worked reasonably well. My existing content downloaded to the machine with no trouble. I also found the capacitive touchscreen to be reasonably responsive, which was a criticism I'd read in other reviews. I particularly liked the Kobo widget which brings your currently being read content right to your home screen. Being used to iOS, it took me a little time to get used to Android, but it wasn't that difficult. You also can't really argue about the price – $169 is a pretty good deal – if you're prepared to accept the limitations. I also really liked the 7…
As I received a nice tax rebate today, I decided to check out the Kobo Vox 7 inch e-reader Android tablet. For the Canadians amongst you, FutureShop is offering $10 discount. Now, it's possible I will return it before the return period expires; the reviews I've read and seen on YouTube have been rather negative – sluggish, unresponsive machine, poor quality build – but I will see for myself. I am not expecting it to be comparable to the iPad – Apple's tablet has a dual-core Apple A5X custom-designed, high-performance, low-power system-on-a-chip with quad-core graphics and 1GB of RAM compared to the Vox's 800 Mhz processor and 512 RAM – and of course with at least $400 difference in price, you wouldn't expect them to compare. I intend using them for different purposes. I expect my iPad to remain my go to tablet of choice, and the Kobo to be purely e-reading based. The main advantage I'm hoping to get from the Vox is that I will be able to read books from all three of my main sources – Amazon, Kobo and the local library – on one e-reader sized device. This will also be my first experience with…
As I received a nice tax rebate today, I decided to check out the Kobo Vox 7 inch e-reader Android tablet. For the Canadians amongst you, FutureShop is offering $10 discount. Now, it’s possible I will return it before the return period expires; the reviews I’ve read and seen on YouTube have been rather negative – sluggish, unresponsive machine, poor quality build – but I will see for myself. I am not expecting it to be comparable to the iPad – Apple’s tablet has a dual-core Apple A5X custom-designed, high-performance, low-power system-on-a-chip with quad-core graphics and 1GB of RAM compared to the Vox’s 800 Mhz processor and 512 RAM – and of course with at least $400 difference in price, you wouldn’t expect them to compare. I intend using them for different purposes. I expect my iPad to remain my go to tablet of choice, and the Kobo to be purely e-reading based. The main advantage I’m hoping to get from the Vox is that I will be able to read books from all three of my main sources – Amazon, Kobo and the local library – on one e-reader sized device. This will also be my first experience with Android….
The genre of political thriller is not one I read particularly often, and it usually has to have a very interesting premise for me to pick it up in the first place. This one did catch my attention: what could happen if wealthy and influential individuals lost a loved one in a terrorist attack and had the means, motive and opportunity to take personal revenge? The first half of the novel introduces the protagonists, describes the initial terrorist incident which sparked the titular revenge, while the second half follows its setup and first stages of execution. One thing I found detracted from the novel slightly was the abrupt end. I understand this is the first in a two book series, and it felt as though the ending was neither a tied up ending nor a lead in to book two. I found the characters to be well developed and in general sympathetic – at times it was all too easy to forget that what they are planning will cost the lives of many innocents in the name of personal revenge. The author does very well though in the way he describes their grief to gain the reader's empathy. The descriptions…
The genre of political thriller is not one I read particularly often, and it usually has to have a very interesting premise for me to pick it up in the first place. This one did catch my attention: what could happen if wealthy and influential individuals lost a loved one in a terrorist attack and had the means, motive and opportunity to take personal revenge? The first half of the novel introduces the protagonists, describes the initial terrorist incident which sparked the titular revenge, while the second half follows its setup and first stages of execution. One thing I found detracted from the novel slightly was the abrupt end. I understand this is the first in a two book series, and it felt as though the ending was neither a tied up ending nor a lead in to book two. I found the characters to be well developed and in general sympathetic – at times it was all too easy to forget that what they are planning will cost the lives of many innocents in the name of personal revenge. The author does very well though in the way he describes their grief to gain the reader's empathy. The descriptions…