For the third installment of the academic equipment series (we’ve so far talked about bags and chairs) we turn to the subject of e-readers.
Some of you will recall the days of having to photocopy journal articles out of unwieldy bound volumes you pulled off the shelf in the lower levels of your university library. Now, in the era of PDFs and digital books, access to academic materials is easier than ever.
But on what do you read those materials?
Are you using your computer or a tablet? If so, what app do you use to read and annotate the materials? Are you happy with it?
Are you instead using an e-reader? Which one? Why?
Let us know. Thanks!
I am using a Remarkable 2 as a reader. Not ideal because it doesn’t allow me to cut and paste parts of PDFs, but I tend to do the more heavy annotating on Logseq.
Me too. I love the Remarkable 2, that there is no backlight, and that you can switch between landscape and portrait. I do some annotating with the pen, but I appreciate that you can tag pages to go back to on the desktop, and then you can view those annotations on your desktop with the Remarkable app.
I also recently got this case which is super functional with a lot of really nice attention to detail and is much cheaper than the one sold by Remarkable. I recommend it, but since it is Amazon, I recommend buying it after the economic boycott on 2/28 if you are participating in it. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0D3LNY9W2?ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_fed_asin_title&th=1
I use an Onyx Boox Note Air 2. The screen is basically the size of standard printer paper (i.e. A4 size), and it’s e-ink, so the battery lasts a really long time. All my PDFs are in a Google Drive or Dropbox, which connect easily to the Boox since it’s an Android device. Mine came with a stylus, which writes nicely, but I still prefer to take notes with a pen and paper. YMMV — for me the main advantage is not having a huge stack of printed articles, and instead having them in something portable, easy on the eyes, and a big battery. (If you need it, the screen does have a backlight, but I like the unlit e-ink screen for its resemblance to paper. Again, YMMV.)
seconded. all the features of a remarkable without a subscription and less proprietary software. also allows me to do some sneaky fan-fic reading on a break.
I use an Onyx Boox Note 2. It’s very nice that it has Android. So you can use any type of file synchronization you like, and use any app available for android. The builtin apps are also quite good.
However, for most academic reading I still prefer to use a “normal” screen (such as an iPad). Quickly scrolling and searching through PDFs is quite bothersome with an e-ink screen. So I only use an e-reader when I plan to read a book linearly.
I want to second using a Boox device. I used the reMarkable 2 before, but Boox just makes it much easier to integrate the reader with my reference management software. It’s much easier to transfer files back and forth. Not to mention the fact that Boox doesn’t put anything behind a subscription wall, which I find ridiculous.
My favorite productivity tools.
Doesn’t have the crucial “erase” function.
We’re doing philosophy here! Who erases anything?!
Yep, philosophy is the only department that is cheaper to run than mathematics.
Mathematicians need pencils and erasers. Philosophy only needs pencils, because philosophers don’t make mistakes.
Don’t forget wastebaskets! Mathematicians use them extensively. But philosophers don’t need them.
I find the ‘books’ application that comes free with the Mac perfect – it automatically syncs to my iPad, so I don’t have to think about moving stuff about.
12″ Lenovo P12 matte
8″ Kobo Forma + KOReader software
I do almost all my reading on the Galaxy Z Fold, which is a phone that folds out into a mini tablet. It has the key advantage of fitting in my pocket (and I use Xodo as my preferred PDF reader).
I use pdf-tools in Emacs. It does (pretty much) everything any other PDF reader would do, but it also links to all the rest of the cool things Emacs can do really well.
Sioyek is a good PDF reader with vim-like keybindings – for those of us who do not want to use a bloated OS masquerading as an editor. It also works well in combination with (neo)vim and the vimtex plugin.
For me the ideal tablet screen size is 8 inch, and so I have an iPad mini. It’s big enough for comfortable PDF reading and small enough to fit into a small bag and take it anywhere.
Also important for reading is a high screen solution (300 PPI or more), because I don’t want to look at blurry text all day. Sadly, Apple is about the only company that makes small tablets with a high screen resolution. And so I’m stuck with this terrible company whose software I hate… (There is also the “Lenovo Legion Y700″, but it’s marketed for gamers and not available in most parts of the world.)