Boox Nova Air C Impressions

 

Nova Air C Backlight off

I like tech and I especially like tech with styli. I had a Note and upgraded to the Ultra. My computer flips and has a pen. Now I have an e-ink tablet ... with a stylus. I do use the stylus on my phone to write notes. I'm hoping to use the stylus on the Boox for making notes when I read books. That sounds like it's a process to learn. For a really good introduction to this device, check here and here. This is an expensive device so make sure you have a specific use in mind.

That said, I wanted to get a larger device and was willing to give colour and a stylus a shot. I have a Poke 3 so I'm familiar with Boox; I have to admit the Kindle Scribe gave me some FOMO. This is a 7.8" screen which was as large as I want to go for a device that may fall on my face as I fall asleep while reading. I'm happy with the experience I got with the Poke 3 - I can get library books and read books from all the stores. I haven't used the default app (yet) because I tend to upload through Play Books. I have to explore upload options (I do tend to get epubs). NeoReader has some features, like page keys, that I'd like to try.

The Nova Air C is quite a bit heavier than my Poke and the included cover is not as "nice". and by nice I mean it's kind of floppy when it folds back because of the wider spine. I've got a pen holder on order that should help how the case folds and store the pen better. The magnet is ok but the pen gets in the way.

So the most important part - reading! I wanted colour just for reading magazines. I'm used to the AMOLED screen of my phone and computer so I would want that quality of display for reading graphic media. These colours are fine but not intense. I find a lot of screens too bright so the contrast for reading works well for me with the settings available. I love the screen size. If you want phenomenal battery life, you'll have to accept screen ghosting. I found the Nova Air C to be much more responsive than my Poke 3.

Backlight on 

Sooo...would I buy again if on a budget? I would stick with my Poke 3. If the Poke 3 broke, I would look at a Leaf but I suspect, from the splash screen that it would be the same speed as my Poke 3 which is mildly annoying so yeah, likely. It would be nice to be able to check performance out in a store before purchasing but that's not available. 

New Tech is in the house...Hybrid Cayenne

 

It's been an exciting week - Saturday we picked up the Cayenne, Monday my S22 Ultra arrived and Friday we got the charger installed. Phew - let's do the small stuff first.

Galaxy Pro 360 so far 👍👍

It's been over a week since I got my new computer (13.3" with I7 processor) so I've done most of the things I tend to do with it and watched a bunch of video reviews with different tips. I've had time to check whether the reviewer identified negatives matter to me.

Black Friday - Roku for me; gifts for others

Like everyone (?) shopping Black Friday I take advantage of sales to get some stuff I've been waiting for. I was fiddling with my desk set up and thought it would be nice to have a Chromecast so I could watch Netflix without having to connect the Surface or Note10 to the monitor. Scouting around online I decided it was finally time to get a streaming stick or something to my monitor a streaming screen. Black Friday sales were the perfect opportunity.

Galaxy Active2 Review with Accessories

While I got the 42 mm Galaxy Watch when it came out, I found it a bit heavy and the rose gold finish to be little restricting when changing out bands. When the Active2 came out and it had a speaker I decided to give the 40mm option a try. It's lighter and smaller which is a bonus for smaller wrists like mine. While it has a smaller battery, it recharges quickly. I usually top up the charge while eating breakfast.

Galaxy Note 10 accessory review

Winning combo

I dropped my S8 a few weeks ago and replaced it with a Note 10. That means the hunt was on for a case. I also wanted to have a cardholder and took the opportunity to try a PopSocket. The winner in this whole thing was Amazon followed by Best Buy.

Retirement project - with magnets!

I have a phone wallet I love that uses magnets to stabilize a case with the wallet. It has annoyed me no end that my magnetic Spigen ring won't stick and it seemed like more than a positioning issue. I suspected fun with magnetic polarity but didn't have time to figure out a work around. Now I do!

Shiny new things - planned and unplanned

I was doing pretty good budgeting my allowance so I replaced my Galaxy Watch with a Galaxy Watch Active 2. Then I dropped my phone on a rough cement driveway.I wasn't even worried initially because I knew it hit the case edge. It must have hit a stone as it landed the second time. Budget blown

Quick reviews

The hardest part of being retired is I am still a huge consumer. I'm trying to focus more on small items to help stay in budget. If I do spend big - I expect high quality and reliability. Here are my most recent 3 purchased items.

New Amazon Prime Service in Canada - Prime Reading

Yes, this pic is skewed

The main reason I have an Amazon account is for the e-books. I've been a digital consumer for almost 2 decades starting with my first Sony Clie. Spouse has a Prime account for free shipping so we've been using Prime Video and Prime Music by logging in through their account. Most purchases are done through their account but the other day I wanted some dog stuff so I pulled the trigger on the free Prime trial...just in time for the Prime Reading launch.

More Shiny Things - Galaxy Buds first look

I've been searching for a pair of BT in ear buds for quite awhile. I've had the ones with the cable and tried a couple of the 2 individual styles including the original IconX and some Airpod dupes by fun 7. The Galaxy Buds sounded perfect for my needs - just reasonably good sounding playback - no health monitoring or storage needed.

New Tech setup and Surface Go update

Monitoring electrical use has made me very aware of what is turn on and how much energy it uses. things we have done to reduce energy range from free to minimal to expensive. Free included turning off a ceiling fan and an amp we had on all the time. Low cost included changing out incandescent lights for LED when the carbon levy subsidized them and installing motion detection switches for rooms where we tend to forget to turn off lights. Expensive includes using smart plugs and changing out my tech set up in the den.

First Impressions of the Microsoft Surface Go

We were in Edmonton so I took the opportunity to visit the Microsoft Store, check out the Go and finally purchased it. I knew there was a special offer that included Office 365 and a maintenance agreement but there is an offer that includes the type case at no cost and up to 50% off for accessories.

iOS apps vs Android - Why iOS still has more features

Jerry Hildebrand asked why the difference in Android vs iOS apps after all this time. It's not just a single operating system with one set of support; I think it's user expectations.

Originally the base seemed to value free apps over apps with more than minimal functionality. And I mean minimal functionality. There was the constant accusation of "bloat" whenever an OEM included innovative features. Never mind the features were useful and/or later incorporated; they weren't part of Google's version of Android.

Then there's updates. I'm in no rush for an operating system update. Samsung (who I've gone away from then returned) was doing major updates for supported devices after the newest Galaxy S device was available with the newest OS version. Yes it's quite awhile after Google releases but Samsung often has features to be tested and I've had an updated brick my device once in 10 years - between Eclair and Froyo.

Android users have always seemed more negative about their devices than Apple users and very vocal about it. Most Android users will never know what they're missing as they don't access an iPhone to check or they will switch to iPhone. Choice is good.

Finally using Samsung Pay - what took me so long?

1) GPay was working just fine
2) Winter coats + smartwatch payment = Meh
3) Phone to verify card; who has time for that?

How to keep in touch as we disperse from G+

There are a couple services you can use to let people know where you will be. I'm going to focus on the free services for About.me and the wheretofind.me experience.

Retirement - tech edition

I had said before I was refraining from purchasing at the moment so it's time for more fiddling. I really want to hold off since sales are pretty well over and there could be some really interesting things coming in the next year if CES is to be believed.

Importing from Google+ using Friends+ Me tool

Friends+ Me has made an easy to use exporter tool that grabs posts and comments so it can be imported to Blogger (and WordPress) It is free to use for up to 3000 posts; after than you can accept truncated data or pay for more. Go to their post on exporting in the G+ migration community for download information.

If you like to be more handsy - download the dropbox files.

Step 1	download all the files from the link
Step 2	click on the exe file to install. If you get a warning, click the small print to run anyway
Step 3	Launch the exporter, it will look for your G+ account. You may have to log in manually by entering your email and password
Step 4	Select the files you want to export and the format you will want for importing. You can export your entire feed or just collections. I know a lot of my stuff is time sensitive.
Step 5	Open Blogger, Under settings, select other. Import Content will be at the top. Navigate to your saved file and select it.
Step 6	A window will launch and show it is working to convert files. I left the window open but once the file has been uploaded, I'm pretty sure it's like google check out and all the work is being done on the server. I told it to auto publish and the posts were nicely sorted by dates.

If you were using Friends+Me for sharing posts across social media feeds, it will use the headline as the post title. It also does some tags automatically. I wish I had been better about using the collection name as the hashtag but I don't want to expand my visibility that much....

Samsung's new Galaxy Tab S4 tries to emulate a full PC experience with smaller bezels, a bigger battery, and a much-needed computational boost. #Reviews #Samsung #SamsungDeX

Samsung's new Galaxy Tab S4 tries to emulate a full PC experience with smaller bezels, a bigger battery, and a much-needed computational boost. #Reviews #Samsung #SamsungDeX
https://www.androidauthority.com/samsung-galaxy-tab-s4-review-891863/?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=gplus

This is why our first EV will be a lease.

This is why our first EV will be a lease.

A lot of these features will be embedded in mid range vehicles.
https://www.youtube.com/attribution_link?a=r-Jsx0rmdLk&u=/watch?v%3DdKVnSGTWx04%26feature%3Dplayer_embedded