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Best epaper tablet for philosophy?

In our newest "how can we help you?" thread, a reader asks:

I know there was a similar thread on here a few months ago, but since (I believe) there have been some updates released since then, I was wondering whether I could try to crowdsource some current opinions from Remarkable, Supernote, and Boox users? The internet is awash with opinions as to which of these devices is the best, but any and all insight I can glean from other academic philosophers is especially helpful before I pull the plug.

The main thing I'm hoping to use a device like this for is to annotate PDFs and create tags to easily find them for when I'm writing. My research thus far (including the last thread on here) has led me away from the Remarkable, but I'm wondering if anyone has any opinions on the Supernote A6 vs. one of the Boox NoteAir2 models? Or is the Remarkable worth looking into again after all?

I've never touched one of these things, so I have no idea! Any readers have any helpful tips/insights for the OP?

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3 responses to “Best epaper tablet for philosophy?”

  1. Postdoc

    I have been using a Boox Note Air 2 for several months. This is an interesting device (especially for travelling), but it can be slow and feel non-intuitive/experimental. I followed this tutorial for linking it to my Zotero notes/pdf collection:


    With the most recent update on Zotero, it’s a good workflow. However, at some point, I lost most of my unsaved annotations on pdfs because of a glitch (now, I frequently downloaded them to integrate them to my Zotero cloud).
    Perhaps I would consider to buy a Remarkable now that they changed their subscription plan.

    Reply
  2. John Basl

    I have a Supernote, but I haven’t tried the others. A lot probably depends on your workflow, but I’ve found it good for mine. I use a mixed-system where sometimes I take handwritten notes other times I take notes using Obsidian. For handwritten notes, I either transcribe them later in Obsidian or, if I’m feeling lazy, I just attach a PDF to a note and tag it so I can easily find it.
    The writing feel is good, it’s mostly very responsive while taking notes, the PDF annotation using the [] system to create a digest note for a specific piece of text is really nice (though sometimes it doesn’t recognize when I’ve bracketed a piece of text). Exporting to PDF is easy enough. They have handwriting recognition + transformation to typed text in the works, but no idea how well that will work. The shortcut buttons for jumping from most recent note to most recent document is nice if you are outlining a text and not just adding notes to the PDF.
    I have found the videos by “Pixel Leaves” and “My Deep Guide” on Youtube to be helpful in deciding between devices and learning more about the features of each.

    Reply
  3. Fred

    I have the Remarkable 2 and really like it. It has fewer potentially distracting features than some of its competitors which for me was a selling point (though for the stronger-willed it might not be).

    Reply

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