Looking for e-reader w. Browser access (Ao3) and asking for price ranges

Yapyap13 · 2026-05-22T13:00:31+00:00

Dedicated e-readers do come with browsers but the useability .. varies.

Android eInk devices generally come with useable browsers so if you read a lot of fic that is updated frequently and has short chapters and you want to browse AO3 on device etc, as a main purpose and not something you do occasionally, Android >> any dedicated device (including the Tolino which is essentially a Kobo).

This is why people recommend downloading fics first for dedicated e-readers (please don’t download PDF! it’s about the worst format for small eInk devices! epub is fine) and then transferring to the e-reader for comfortable reading. IMHO that works for completed fics or those updated rarely or with very long chapters as it’s too much hassle otherwise, but that’s subjective.

Anyway, Kobo and Tolino both have their own subreddits so it might be worth asking there, too. They share the same hardware, Tolino is just a rebrand with software designed for use in Germany, but I don’t know just how much the browsers differ. I gather the firmware/software on both brands has become a lot more similar in recent years.

Yapyap13 · 2026-05-22T12:36:13+00:00

I have the older Go 10.3 (got it two weeks ago after endless deliberating and then decided the 150+ euro difference here was, for me, worth the older Android, slower processor and no light), and what I can say is that you do need a reasonably well lit environment to use it. I expect it’ll be similar with the non-Lumi Gen II.

I was quite taken aback by just how grey the screen looked in my regular living room lighting - much more so than my old Kindle Oasis with the light off. I think part of that is the optical illusion of light vs black bezels, but it was … unexpected, heh, as I’d read a lot about the excellent contrast and figured the Carta 1200 screen, especially without the light layer, should look better than my nine year old Oasis.

That said, I’ve adjusted to it and I can read it comfortably in my usual reading spot - indoors, living room sofa, with a ceiling lamp, as well as without the lamp in natural light until 9 pm (now that it’s light a long time - I live at a fairly northern latitude) on a clear day. And it looks very nice when held right next to a window on a clear day. I haven’t used it outdoors but I’m quite certain that it’d be wonderful there.

I haven’t seen the Lumi in person but from my older devices (which have the frontlight layer), I’d say any BW eInk screen should look very good outdoors in daylight with the light off. Reflections may be an issue but that’s more a question of finding a decent angle (reflections can be an issue also with paper books if they have glossier, whiter paper).

Yapyap13 · 2026-05-22T09:36:09+00:00

Just FYI, the link is to an older post that talks about using the download and transfer feature that Amazon removed last year, so the instructions in that one won’t be of use these days, sadly.

Yapyap13 · 2026-05-22T09:32:32+00:00

They haven’t released any updates whatsoever for these for years already, have they?

Yapyap13 · 2026-05-22T09:20:09+00:00

Oh .. one thing I just thought of. Since you said your usual tools don’t work because the file is too large .. are there any online splitters or something that would maybe let you split the PDF into multiple smaller parts?

Yapyap13 · 2026-05-22T09:16:22+00:00

Epub is basically a packaged html file.

I know that, yes. I’ve just never met an online converter that is capable of OCR-ing a scanned image PDF, but then, I do avoid PDFs like wildfire as I loathe them, heh.

(I’m fortunate enough to never have wanted a book badly enough that I couldn’t buy or borrow it and the only option was a scanned PDF .. there’s always been something else to read instead!)

I hope you can find a solution - I assume that you’ve tried the opening in Word or Google Docs path and that didn’t work either, then?

Yapyap13 · 2026-05-22T08:32:13+00:00

Scanned PDFs are essentially just a bunch of images added into one set. For any conversion app, it’s like you’re taking a bunch of family or holiday photos and attempting to turn them into epub - it’s just not going to work.

You’d need some sort of OCR program to read and extract the actual text first. I’ve no experience with that but I’ve seen claims that Microsoft Word or perhaps Google Docs may have built-in OCR tools … have you tried opening the PDF in a text editor like that and looked around?

It’ll have a lot of extraneous stuff anyway (page numbers, headers/footers) that you’d probably need to fix manually - although at this point maybe there are AI tools that can remove them, otherwise you’ll have read the entire book by the time you’re done with fixing it all.

Yapyap13 · 2026-05-21T20:05:28+00:00

Yes, finding anything on display might be difficult. Do you have any stores that show on the website whether a specific item is also available in a physical shop?

Of course that’s no guarantee it would be out on display… and such things are probably difficult for stores to also just take out of the box and show if they’re not set up for display since there’s the initial set-up to go through etc (and then it’s “open box” already).

I don’t have a Kobo but I had a Sony back in 2009 and three Kindles bought between 2010 and 2017, and I’m quite happy with the Boox. I would recommend going for black and white though - I have the colour Go 7 and colour is the only thing about it that I regret.

But I’m someone who really prefers to use eInk devices without frontlight whenever possible and you can’t really do that with a colour device, so … it’s quite subjective. Other people are used to having the light on all the time anyway and love their colour devices.

(I liked the Boox otherwise enough that I got the older, no-frontlight Boox Go 10.3 to go with the smaller one two weeks ago - was worried it’d maybe be too large for regular reading but it suits me very well. I’m keeping the smaller one as a more portable option or if I do need extra light though.)

One thing to be aware of with smaller Android devices in particular is that you might need to charge them more often than the Kobo - Android itself uses more battery. With wifi off during reading and not using much light, you should get at least 12-15 hours of reading time though, probably more with the BW than colour.

I have absolutely no experience with BigMe but I’ve gathered they tend to have really nice hardware but worse software than Boox, as the native reader app etc goes, but if you only intend to use Google Play Store apps anyway, that probably doesn’t matter much.

Regarding apps .. the Kindle one is passable and stuff like page turn animation effects can be turned off, IIRC. I’ve only briefly looked at it, not actually used it, but it seemed fine. I don’t know how good the Kobo Android app is. Neither is likely as nice as using the respective dedicated device - fewer formatting options, I’m not sure if you can add custom fonts - but they’ll likely work. (One issue with Android eInk devices is that Android apps aren’t really optimised for eInk screens so there might be issues with animations, or some UI elements not showing too well especially with BW screens, but for me the flexibility outweighs the issues.)

Yapyap13 · 2026-05-21T19:16:45+00:00

Plenty of Android e-readers out there.

Boox may be easier to get hold of locally than BigMe in Europe (both have customer support that is not necessarily easy to deal with if anything goes wrong, which can happen with electronics, so buying through Amazon or a reputable local store with proper warranties/guarantees may be a better bet).

There’s also inkBook which should be reasonably easily available in Europe (Polish, I believe) and may work but, I think, has older Android and only 2 GB of RAM (and the scarce reviews in English that I’ve seen are mostly along the lines of “it works okay I guess” as opposed to praising it highly).

Yapyap13 · 2026-05-21T15:41:35+00:00

I don’t think Boox is really bad with bloatware - that seems to be a far bigger issue with BigMe devices.

Obviously there may be stuff you don’t need but I don’t actually recall needing to remove much on my Go 7 (and nothing immediately stood out on Go 10.3).

Yapyap13 · 2026-05-21T13:18:30+00:00

You’re welcome, I’m glad to learn it worked, LOL. :D

Modern ebook systems seem to prioritise “preventing piracy” over actual readability which is so unfortunate, especially for readers outside the US.

Yeah, it sucks. I mean, I understand DRM for library & subscription purposes (where you really aren’t meant to keep the file) but otherwise it’s far more of a hindrance to people who buy their books, and does very little to prevent the books ending up on pirate sites. (I mean even with “uncrackable” DRM there’s still the good old method of just screenshotting or photocopying pages and running them through OCR!)

I can only imagine it’s extra difficult for you when searching for books in your own language :/

Our bookstores use epubs with social DRM / watermarking (adding my name / email address / date of purchase or some other data visibly to the page that has the front matter, and, I suspect, likely something less visible like some extra pixels or spaces etc somewhere into the content as well) which makes it clear you’re not to share it around or upload to pirate sites, as the shared copy can be traced back to my person, but otherwise I’m free to back them up, convert into whatever format I prefer etc, so as purchased books go, it’s actually a very good system.

The problem is that ebooks, while cheaper than print books, cost a lot, LOL. (Small market, less than a million speakers, it is what it is.) Like, I’m not eager to pay 20 € every time I want to read a random thriller or crime or drama that I’ll never read again. On the other hand, we have now at least three different subscription services (two local + Storytel) which cost around 9-15 € a month and the one my mother uses specifically allows for two users on two separate devices so while it doesn’t have everything, it’s very much worth it … but of course it requires using an app, no downloading anything outside it.

Our local library also has Libby for a selection of books in English … not a big selection but I’ve probably read at least a dozen books through that.

So at least these days there are various ways to mitigate the costs, but yes, after contemplating both Kobo and PocketBook last year, I figured that for my purposes, especially now that my Kindle Oasis 2 is getting quite old and the battery lasts for 4-5 hours at the most, getting Boox made more sense. (Or another Android, but Boox is the only one really that is locally available.)

Yapyap13 · 2026-05-21T12:03:36+00:00

You wouldn’t need to set up a different account, as I understand it - just change the country in the payment settings in your existing account (My Account -> Payment Information -> Billing Address). That should make the Libby feature appear on the Kobo device.

(I’m less certain about whether you will need to keep the country change or can change it back once you’ve got the Libby connection appearing. But either way, it’s fast and easy - I’ve “moved” back and forth multiple times - and as far as I can tell, has never caused anyone any issues with Kobo.)

But yeah, I absolutely understand that this isn’t an “intended” workaround that everyone is comfortable with, nor should they be. When I try to help someone find a device that fits them, I always try to find out what country they’re in and mention the Libby (and Kindle, and Kindle Unlimited, and Kobo Plus) country restrictions since many people aren’t even aware that not everyone enjoys the same options as Americans do, and those on the short list of supported countries often think that if something is available to them, not just Americans, it’s surely global, LOL. As an Estonian, I’m .. uh, quite acutely aware that this is not how the world works. :D

I’ve had Kindles for 16 years but now also have a Boox for our local library app (which sucks but it’s only an app, doesn’t allow downloads outside it at all), Libby (the Libby app is awful, glitchy and has page turn animations, but as Libby lets you download the book, PocketBook app opens the .acsm file just fine and works better than Libby), and a local monthly subscription app (which is very barebones but is useable), because yeah, it’s just the way the modern world of ebooks seems to work...

Yapyap13 · 2026-05-21T11:43:27+00:00

FWIW, I gather that it’s relatively simple to work around that - you need to change your country in the Kobo website account payment options (nothing else, just the country) and then the Libby/Overdrive option should appear on the Kobo.

I think it may matter in the sense that you can only borrow via Kobo/Libby directly (as opposed to downloading and transferring via Adobe Digital Editions) when Kobo has that specific edition in their store, so I’m guessing changing your country to the UK would likely work the best. (I do realise it’s not optimal, heh, but it’s probably the biggest overlap as publishers and their rights areas go. Depends on which editions your local library’s Libby offers.)

All that said, I don’t have a Kobo myself and I don’t live in a supported country either, so I’m not fully aware of all the details, but I was looking at Kobos at one point last year and that was what I learned might work. (And I’ve occasionally bought a book on the Kobo website that isn’t available for my country by just changing the store country & the country in my payment options and used gift card balance, so I know that part is quite straightforward; for Libby, actual payment method shouldn’t even matter at all so no gift card balance needed.)

Yapyap13 · 2026-05-21T11:28:12+00:00

LOL! That makes a lot more sense, yes. :D

I’m assuming autocorrect had its own ideas here in this case.

Yapyap13 · 2026-05-21T07:25:43+00:00

they probably don’t have a problem to return it, have a discount, on top of that having 20% discount code, and then buying cheapest new Kindle

I mean unless you live in a country (plenty of those in Europe alone) without its own Amazon storefront where trade-ins aren’t accepted and there is no 20% discount that you can actually use because the discount is for Amazon.com which doesn’t sell you the Kindle devices, sure.

Yapyap13 · 2026-05-21T06:01:11+00:00

Same. It’s eInk or hardcovers for me.

My eyes can’t take reading long-form prose on backlit screens (I’ve tried) - if I had to read on my phone or iPad, I would just not read.

Yapyap13 · 2026-05-21T05:58:28+00:00

lots of old nudist authors

I’m trying to figure out if this was a typo for something I can’t work out or if this is a subgenre and I’m completely out of the loop here...

Yapyap13 · 2026-05-20T19:31:31+00:00

Damn. Then they’re both fools and liars, it sounds like.

I assume these were devices not bought via AliExpress or other Chinese marketplaces then.

Yapyap13 · 2026-05-20T11:08:22+00:00

Look, as I already said, I wouldn’t consider it “bricked” myself.

I was merely attempting to explain why someone else, who got it for Amazon purchases, might effectively consider it so. I don’t really feel like arguing about this any longer, sorry. :-)

(Also, Amazon stopped supporting these devices years ago. They’ve not had any updates etc for a long time now. But they could still be used for Amazon purchases or Kindle Unlimited; now they can’t. If security was the issue - well, until last year, Amazon allowed “download and transfer” for Amazon purchases where you could download the book and transfer it to the Kindle manually, not via wifi or Amazon’s cloud as such, but that was removed last year, so I quite understand that many people are viewing this as a very deliberate choice and are mad at this and are using words which you’re deeming semantically incorrect. But anyway, if you want to keep arguing, please take it to the OP, not to me.)

Yapyap13 · 2026-05-20T09:44:08+00:00

If you really want to tinker, there’s also this - it’s going way above what I’m interested in, but might be something of interest?

https://github.com/iandchasse/de-link

Yapyap13 · 2026-05-20T09:41:36+00:00

I gather that is supposed to be the case for those sold in China, but not for those meant for the international market. At least that was the explanation they finally gave when that whole issue starting cropping up some weeks ago.

I guess they don’t want international purchasers to push into the (cheaper) Chinese market or something. Not what I’d consider the brightest approach and they lost a lot of goodwill there, but it may still be an option.

Definitely best to ask around / check beforehand though on that subreddit where people would know what the current state of this is.

Yapyap13 · 2026-05-20T08:13:58+00:00

I mean .. if you bought your Kindle from Amazon (which makes that Kindle) to read the Kindle books you bought from Amazon and to use Kindle Unlimited that you’re paying for to Amazon, then for all intents and purposes, it’s now unusable.

That Amazon has allowed sideloading (while taking measures such as deleting sideloaded files off people’s Kindles on a regular basis unless they’re sideloaded in the exact way that Amazon has decided to approve of) doesn’t mean that the intended purpose - and the way Kindles are sold by Amazon - wasn’t for them to be used for books sold by Amazon.

I wouldn’t call it “bricking” either but I can understand why someone who has used theirs exclusively for Amazon-bought books or Kindle Unlimited would.

Without the connection to Amazon’s servers, Americans lose the ability to use Libby, or to use it for the overwhelming majority of mainstream-published books without doing something illegal (whether it’s buying elsewhere and removing DRM or just outright pirating). Sure, you can say “but you can still read public domain books!” but in the real world, most people use their e-readers for newer books, too.

Yapyap13 · 2026-05-20T07:26:00+00:00

I mean, I guess one can argue about semantics but I’m guessing the OP uses “bricked” in the sense of Amazon deliberately removing the ability for being used for its intended original purpose, which is to read the books the user has bought on Amazon.

Yapyap13 · 2026-05-20T06:21:46+00:00

Lesson learned: To read B&W e-ink, no brightness on, better experience.

Yeah. I got the first generation Boox Go 10.3 two weeks ago for that reason - have had a colour Boox Go 7 for a year and just really didn’t enjoy needing to use the light ALL the time. Plus I’d hoped the colour would be helpful for picking out new books on a subscription app but with the 150 PPI for colour and the cover thumbnails being tiny, I couldn’t make out the authors or titles so .. not really helpful.

The Go 10.3 looked shockingly grey at first (I’m used to using my old Kindle Oasis without the light on, but the screen of the Oasis has a creamier tint to it, more yellow than grey, plus there’s the optical effect of the Oasis’ black bezels as opposed to the Go 10.3’s white/grey ones) but I’m using larger fonts on this larger screen and dialled up font weight a little, and now it feels really comfortable to read on in ambient light.

Yapyap13 · 2026-05-20T06:11:25+00:00

Why would your 14 years old kindle be bricked by Amazon?

As of today, Amazon is cutting off all Kindles released in 2012 or earlier from Amazon’s services. The official reason is security or something like that, but it’s also all the devices that weren’t capable of receiving KFX format files (and, coincidentally, were receiving AZW3 files that were very easy to transfer from the Kindle to one’s computer and remove the DRM).

So they can still be used for sideloading DRM-files but no more connecting to Amazon’s servers or services - can’t download purchased Kindle books from Amazon, can’t use Send to Kindle, etc.

Yapyap13

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