A couple of days ago, reMarkable released a new edition of their ePaper tablet: The reMarkable Paper Pure. Compared to the Pro it is a smaller, lighter, grayscale tablet for about €250 less (€399). As always, pen and folio are not included so the full price there is still €469.
I already have an iPad Air so why am I even looking at this? Mostly because I’m not happy with the app landscape there. Most handwriting apps on iPadOS come with a subscription model and their own cloud outside of iCloud. Goodnotes was also a pure battery hog whenever I tried it for taking notes during an event, making it not feasible for a full day of taking notes. And don’t get me started about them just moving features in an out of the product, most of the times adding stuff that I just not need while every new version feels slower and slower. I also tried other tools over the years but they didn’t seem any better.
I don’t want to carry yet another device, though. Laptop + iPad + paper notebooks + reMarkable is just a lot! The reMarkable could replace the iPad in some contexts but just not in all. It also doesn’t support iCloud or NextCloud and you cannot simply send documents to specific devices like with AirDrop. At least there is the option use USB and if I look at resources like the reMarkable Guide then I should have also the option to code around the sync problem myself.
But, let me be honest here: I really want to finally give reMarkable a try after all these years and the current price is attractive enough. The lack of a color display shouldn’t be a big deal for my use-cases. What I’m going to do now is to give the iPad another try using good, old Apple Notes. It has enough features for what I normally need. If the battery drain is still an issue, I’ll consider getting a Pure. If not, then I have a working solution and don’t need a reMarkable to begin with… not that this has ever
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