Kobo announced it is launching its products in Malaysia, the website Lowyat reported. That includes its entire line-up of e-readers – the Nia, Libra 2, the Sage as well as the latest Clara 2E. The Elipsa e-note is not going to be available at the moment, it seems.
Among these, the Kobo Clara 2E stands out from the rest owing to its environment-friendly attributes. The company said the e-reader is made largely from recycled plastic, which includes those retrieved from the ocean. The e-reader otherwise comes with a brilliant 6-inch E Ink Carta 1200 display having 300 PPI resolution. A huge plus with the Clara 2E is that the E Ink display is exposed, which no glass layer on top. This ensures there is zero reflection of external light.
Under the hood lies a 1 GHz dual-core chipset coupled to 512 GB of memory and 16 GB of native storage. Power comes from a 1,500 mAh battery which the company said will last weeks on end depending on the actual usage. The Clara 2E comes with an IPX8 rating as well which will let it survive when submerged up to 2 meters under fresh water for an hour at the most. Apart from the Clara 2E, the Libra 2 and the Sage also come with an IPX8 rating.
Other features of the Clara 2E include support for both Wi-Fi and Bluetooth connectivity, something that applies to all the other e-readers as well. Plus, there is a USB-C port on board too for charging and data transfer roles. In fact, all of the Kobo e-readers with the exception of the Kobo Nia sport USB-C ports.
The Nia, meanwhile, also sports a 6-inch 1024 x 758 resolution display and offers 8 GB of native storage. It is also the only one to come with a micro-USB port and features a 900 MHz processor under the hood. The Sage, on the other hand, offers an 8-inch display having 1440 x 1920 pixel resolution and comes powered with a 1.8 GHz quad-core processor. The Libra 2 is larger with an 8-inch 1264 x 1680 resolution display and is powered by a 1 GHz processor. Both offer 32 GB of storage. The Sage is however unique in it being the only e-reader that offers stylus support though the stylus has to be procured separately.
The Kobo e-readers are sold in the country via authorized retailers such as Mono Digital, All IT Hypermarket, Flash Gadgets, Quantum Gadgets, and Popular Malaysia. Coming to the price, the Kobo Nia is the cheapest of the lot with a RM 499 price tag. Next comes the Clara 2E which is priced at RM 699. The Libra 2 and the Sage are priced at RM 929 and RM 1,299 respectively.
With a keen interest in tech, I make it a point to keep myself updated on the latest developments in technology and gadgets. That includes smartphones or tablet devices but stretches to even AI and self-driven automobiles, the latter being my latest fad. Besides writing, I like watching videos, reading, listening to music, or experimenting with different recipes. The motion picture is another aspect that interests me a lot, and I'll likely make a film sometime in the future.
