howler

Hello, entities that lurk in my phone. You might remember my last "review" or comparison between KLC and Kobo Forma.

I thought that maybe an update was in order, seeing that the KLC is going to stay with me till one of us dies.

Usually the ereader has to retire before I do, but don't let that keep you from betting against me!

Anyway. The KLC.

I have to admit that while I'm not too thrilled by the darkness of the screen, I also have to admit that the backlight doesn't seem to use a lot of battery (I keep it on between 5 and 16%, I haven't needed more than that).

Pictures show the screen under full, midday sun. And my drink.

THE PEN:

I don't do much highlighting or doodling on the Colour, probably because I ain't gonna drop 60€ on the pen (also there's a thing called metapen for around 29€ that works on the Colour, which I'm also NOT going to buy hehe).

BUUUUUUUUT I do have a friend with terrible self control that bought the pen and allowed me to try it. Hilarious, since in my 5 minute test I used it more than her since she got it lol.

Pen is nice to hold, highlighting is snappy. Good. Writing... For an emergency... OK. I can definitely write my name on it. But this is no Remarkable 2.

And that's my review of the pen. The Kobo case that has room for the pen is nice too.

My case is from Aliexpress :)

BACK TO THE SCREEN

I have to admit that 7" is perfect for an ereader. Perfect.
The pages fly by, I see no ghosting, nothing to complain about. No delay when pressing the buttons (VERY GOOD BUTTONS, PEOPLE. THE VERY BEST).

However, I've seen people claiming that ereaders don't reflect light, like an actual book, when placed under, I don't know, let's say, the fucking sun. I swear I don't get why people claim that. Maybe I keep misunderstanding them?? But just in case: e-ink does have reflections, sometimes. You have to angle the screen to obtain the desired shine free surface.

Examples:

FEATURE I WASN'T EXPECTING:

"Read out loud" Honestly it's not that great because itreadsthetextlikethis ignoring commas and any other punctuation you can think of. But hey, it exists.

Verdict: 'tis a good device, fellas. I still think that a Libra 2 would have been the ideal solution, but this isn't bad. And somehow fingers don't stain the frame (the screen yes).

You might be wondering... Where did the Forma go?? Did I throw away my soul-ereader?? NEVER.

It crossed the black-and-white bridge (just below the rainbow bridge that pets cross eventually) and landed on the desperate hands of my mother. Seeing how attached she has gotten to it in two weeks, I'm looking to hire a hobbit or two to cast the device into the fires of Mount Doom or something.

Maybe I should have noticed that she, too, wanted a fancy ereader because hers wasn't dead, but should have been.

Thanks for reading!

Hi! The name is Howler and I'm an extremely avid reader.

When ereaders hit the market, I wasn't a fan. Where was the smell? The pleasure of passing pages, the (not always) comforting weight? I didn't want an ereader.

But it got to a point where I could not fit a single book in my bedroom anymore, and I had to surrender. I got a Sony (the one with buttons on the lower part) and my fate was sealed.

Since then, I've owned a couple more devices (Boox, Tolino...) and they all died from exhaustion.

BUT

Then I met her. 8" screen, buttons, not part of Amazon, lightweight... The first impulsive purchase of my life.

I'm talking about Kobo Forma, my companion and best friend for the last 10 years. I've taken it to the beach. To the desert. Mountaineering. It fell in a swimming pool. A dog threw up on it and I immediately simpathy puked on the Forma too.

Good as new (well I had to tape the buttons because they fell).

Forma has an extremely crispy screen, it's almost weightless despite it's size, and though many people found that the frontlight of their devices didn't work as intended, mine did.

It's so thin that even now I fear breaking it, somehow.

One would think that with such a lot of real state, I'd read mangas or comics. I'll be honest. It sucks for that. That could be a big problem for some people, obviously.

It was advertised as a good device for highlighting and note taking... But I found it so buggy, laggy and annoying that I never used the feature.

I used it ONLY to read (sideloaded books) and Heaven knows it did its job impeccably, despite the janky buttons some CEO decided they were acceptable in such an expensive device.

HOWEVER

It's going down the same road as my previous devices: burnout. The battery ain't what it used to be. Not bad for most, yet, but for a compulsive reader... It's a problem.

ENTER THE NEW DEVICE

T'was supposed to be a Kobo Libra 2 BUT THEY GOT DISCONTINUED. A minute of silence for the friend I never met, please.

ENTER MY LAST HOPE

Dun dun duuuuuun the Libra Colour which y'all knew about because it's on the title.

Right off the bat, the Colour is 7", 1 less than Forma. I'm not upset about it at all, but it's noticeable. The buttons feel functional when you click them! (In Forma they worked, but you had 0 feedback) and it uses USB-C.

The device itself feels sturdier than the forma, and since it's flat, I'm not afraid of it breaking around the handle.

Device is snappy, the backlight is a delight (hehe), I loaded all my books with no issues, battery seems durable, it's very comfortable to hold, mangas show up nicely...

BUT BUT BUT

THE SCREEN IS HELLA DARK

I know it's because of the technology it uses and that the frontlight fixes the readability issue. (So don't come after me for this complaint).

I was quite baffled. Pictures online showed that it was darker, but daaaamn. The colours are indeed muted, but I like them a lot.

I've highlighted a couple of sentences and it seems to work well, but I don't have the pen so I can't draw a masterpiece for y'all to admire.

I know some people don't care about the darkness thingy. I know that some, do. Hence this post and the images attached :)

I still don't know what will I do (keep the Colour, I bet) but I hope this helps or entertains someone.

WARNING: I don't use the Kobo services (throwaway email for the win) so I have no idea about the integrations it offers.

Verdict: Libra Colour is nice, I guess. I refuse to go back to 6" screens. But for me, the Forma was THE ereader.

I haven't painted in forever, so this one feels extra special. Like sunshine after a storm.

First of all, THANK YOU ALL for your advice and kindness in my last post. You are all wonderful people!

I took your advice of going slowly, and today I sat in the car (alone), played around with the lights, moved the mirrors and the seat.

My anxiety spiked, but reading your comments and encouragement helped A LOT. I spent around 20 minutes there, breathing and pushing buttons.

I can do this! Slowly! The most important step is the next one

So... I got my diver's license as soon as I turned 18. It was a very stressful period of my life, and I hated everything about driving. They promised me freedom, but I got shackled.

Passing the exam as a nightmare (took me 3 attempts) and even during the lessons the professor saw how horribly tense I was. I got sick just by thinking about the car.

Once I passed, my family decided that I'd get over my fears by forcing me to drive, every single day, for weeks, with the whole family in the car, yelling, mocking me...

I had several panic attacks that were dismissed as lack of maturity, and I stopped driving. It's been years.

But now I'm going to have to get better at this due to circumstances, and I'm scared.

I feel that I can't focus on all the elements of the road, I have a very hard time calculating distances because I'm very short (edit: 1'50m, if that is relevant) and barely see above the wheel, I have to move the seat so close to the wheel that I fear that if one day the airbag jumps, I'll suffocate. My blind spots seem infinite.

My car is automatic, so no stick to worry about.

If you have read all I wrote, I'll greatly appreciate any advice or encouragement. Thank you

Some plants react to the sun much like humans do, "getting a tan". It's called sun stressing!

For this picture I kept one of Scylla's "mouths" in the shadow (indirect light), so it shows its natural green colour, but I made sure that the other "mouth" enjoyed as much (direct) sun as possible.

The plant is not upset about this experiment at all. It keeps pushing "mouths" like crazy.

I can't take away the eraser or give it to him only when he asks, because I have more students.

He's impulsive but nice. His parents know he does stuff like that.

Any ideas?

If any of you is having trouble pairing the newest versions of the firmware (Fossil Hybrid HR, in my case, Charter model) with Gadgetbridge because the device keeps getting bricked (the watchface stops working, never going back 'home'), here's the solution:

• Make sure there are no apps in your phone that can interfere with the watch connection.
• Download an older version of the official app to trigger a firmware downgrade (I went back to DN1.0.2.21r.v1, that corresponds with version 4.6.0 of the official app). It will look like it's upgrading, but it will be doing the opposite. Don't let Google Play succeed in updating the app, or it won't work. Delete the old official app.
• Download the patched official app so you can get the password for the device from the Fossil servers, but don't let it upgrade your firmware. You have to be fast, interrupt the process... Honestly, it took me MANY attempts.
• Delete the patched app.
• Download Gadgetbridge and pair it with your watch, using the password you got on step 3.
• Done!
• [https://codeberg.org/Freeyourgadget/Gadgetbridge/wiki/Fossil-Hybrid-HR#user-content-known-firmware-versions](Firmware versions) [https://www.apkmirror.com/?post_type=app_release&searchtype=apk&s=fossil](Download firmware, requires APK Mirror from the Play Store) [https://www.reddit.com/r/FossilHybrids/comments/k81kkq/unofficial_enhanced_android_app_based_on_v460/](The patched app) [https://kurotimedesign.blogspot.com/2022/06/how-to-downgrade-your-fossil-hybrid-app.html?m=1](More instructions)

She was gifted to me last year, with only two flowers that fell in a few days (I guess the change of environments hit her hard), and I was feeling quite pessimistic about her future, because I've never taken care of an orchid.

Apparently I'm doing something right! I can't wait to see all the flowers open to share them with y'all!!!!!

It's mainly about the war in Mali, how it got to that point, and even some of the people that participated in it got more "page-time" than the librarians (around a 90% of the book, I'd dare say). Who are basically a single man.

I really wanted to read about saving manuscripts, so I'm very disappointed.

I wouldn't say that the book is bad, it's just that the title is clickbait material.

If any of y'all know of other books that REALLY talk about saving/protecting/restoring documents, please do tell me the titles!