* Never looks up how to do the basic gestures
* Complains about the size, when it's comically obvious what the size is from the constant advertising.
Look, the device isn't for most, but HN really deserves a less half-assed critique than this.
It profoundly changed how I organise my desk and work day.
I used to have a stack of papers which contained mostly random noted and work related diagrams. It was a mess to find anything and most notes were of "questionable" quality (strikethroughs and corrections galore)
Over the years I tried several methods to get better at organising myself (hi-tech and lo-tech aka pen and paper).
For some reason I can't explain, the remarkable stuck and helped me to get my shit together.
I suspect that it was mostly by chance that this specific model came to my attention at the right time with the right design. Most likely any one of several similar products(e-ink, "paperlike writing feeling", no app store or browser) would've done the trick.
It was quite expensive though and had they had their subscription service at the time, I probably wouldn't have bought it.
The trick is to get a spiral paper notebook. When full, run it through a sheet-fed scanner, and throw the notebook away.
You'll need a scanner anyway, for all those other random papers.
Also, a sheet-fed scanner is infinitely faster than a flatbed, and it'll do both sides at once.
Don't forget to back up your disk drive. If you drop it on the floor (like I did) it's gone.
Presumably other features in the future because VC love subscription.
I used to have stacks of notebooks which I had to dispose of regularly (shred or put into security paper bins). For me the most convenient and quickest way to make personal notes is by hand. Remarkable2 has a proper pen&paper-feel and it works for me. It is the killer feature for me and I'm happy.
But yes, OCR is bad and having accumulated 100+ pages of notes on certain subjects makes me really want to have a better search.
To me, it read like it just didn't work, not that he didn't try or look it up.
>* Complains about the size, when it's comically obvious what the size is from the constant advertising.
It's still a valid criticism, no? The digital pen/e-ink combo gives you way less feedback, hence precision, hence density of writing in a given area. I'm not just speculating, I've tried out a Remarkable 2 my friend got, and that was my impression - nearly like paper, but I still had to focus more and write slightly bigger letters for it to be legible.
It’s the same with movie critics, knowing a movie with 84% on Rotten Tomatoes or something isn’t half as useful as the opinion of your twin flame critic.
The reMarkable was panned pretty hard by every major tech outlet as being useful for only one thing, and worse, not very good at that one thing.
yet my colleagues who loved the first one love this one to and keep recruiting new users so there is obviously a market for it.
Personally I returned mine because I couldn't justify both the iPad and the reMarkable at that time but the writing experience was fantastic.
Oh, well. I guess if nothing else it's a valuable refresher on the correct weighting to apply when evaluating early adopter opinions.
Is it too late to return your?
I'll find some worthwhile use for the thing, even if it takes a while. I'm just disappointed that that looks so much like not being the use for which I actually bought it.
The writing surface has less friction which makes writing different. And easily to be very sloppy. So like learning to write with a marker or a different stencil you have to relearn how to write again.
* Gestures should be intuitive, and if they're not they should be prompted
* Size on paper != size in reality. The weight distribution alone can make two devices with seemingly identical dimensions feel very different in hand
This is a fair critique of device, your comment just feels like a kneejerk defense of something you like.
For the record I returned mine, I get it's meant to be a focused device but the value proposition is just not there, and it felt like a complete waste.
It sits in the awkward position of doing too much to be smaller and cheaper and doing too little to take advantage of its size and computing power.
No matter how much you value minimalism and paperfeel I'd easily recommend an iPad Mini over this. If you're a tinkerer making a distraction-free iPad is an evening's work. And if you're not a tinkerer the Remarkable is not that interesting