By Andrew Liszewski
After spending some time with the original version Kobo’s eReader back in April I felt that even though it was lacking certain features that made Amazon’s Kindle extremely popular, its ~$150 price tag would shake up the eReader market, and sure enough it did. Since its release we’ve seen drastic price cuts for all of the most popular eReaders on the market, and while I still really like the Kobo, with its price advantage gone it quickly became hard to recommend.
But yesterday the 2nd generation Kobo eReader was announced, vastly improving on the original model with the most notable addition being built-in Wifi allowing users to shop and download new titles without having to connect the eReader to their PCs. The Kobo also now uses a faster processor (the same as the Kindle they point out) making page turns 2.5x faster, and a sharper 16-level gray-scale e-ink display. Battery life has even been improved with an expected 10,000 page turns before needing a charge, though a better battery was definitely a necessity with the added Wifi hardware. Best of all though is what the new version doesn’t come with: a price increase. The 2nd generation Kobo eReader will sell for $139.99 in the US, and $149.99 in Canada, available just around the corner in October. We’ll be getting our hands on one in the next week or so, and will be posting our thoughts soon so stay tuned.
[ Kobo eReader ]
