The Kobo Forma is the latest generation e-reader that will soon be available in North America. This device is considered a flagship model and is brimming with features and enhancements. The purpose of this video review is to give you a sense of what it brings to the table and if it is a worthy upgrade to the Kobo Aura One that came out in 2016.
This e-reader features an 8 inch display that utilizes E Ink Mobius and E Ink Carta HD and has a resolution of 1440 × 1920 and 300 PPI. The Mobius display is 15% lighter than the Kobo Aura One and weighs 197g. It is powered by a Freescale IMX6 Solo Lite 1 GHZ processor. It has 512MB of RAM and has two different storage options, 8GB and 32GB. It does not have an SD card.
Kobo employs a front-lit display and also a Comfortlight color temperature system, so you will be able to read at night. It will have both white and red LEDS, it looks like it has 17 lights total for even light distribution across the screen. It is also waterproof with an IPX8 rating, so you will be able to use it at the beach in the bathtub and it can be completely submerged for up to 60 minutes.
One of the biggest aspects of the Forma that many people are not aware of, is that it has an gyroscope that automatically switches the orientation of the screen 360 degrees. This will allow right and left handed people to take advantage of the manual page turn keys that are only on one side of the screen. There is an option to lock the orientation so it will not automatically switch.
This video review gives you a tour of the hardware and the software experience. You will get a sense on how this e-reader performs when reading ebooks and how the whole page turn system works. This is a solid ten minute review that looks at everything but PDF files.
I have been under the weather for the past week, so I have not had the time to visit the studio and take pictures and use it day to day. Luckily Peter has been conducting a bunch of videos. In the next few days we will upload a few more videos, such as the Forma vs Kobo Aura One and Forma vs Oasis 2.
Michael Kozlowski is the editor-in-chief at Good e-Reader and has written about audiobooks and e-readers for the past fifteen years. Newspapers and websites such as the CBC, CNET, Engadget, Huffington Post and the New York Times have picked up his articles. He Lives in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
