The Onyx Boox Max Lumi 2, Onyx Boox Note Air 2 and Onyx Boox Note 5 are now available for pre-order from Good e-Reader. Each of these digital note taking devices come with a free case and stylus. They all have Google Android 11 OS and the Play Store, to download millions of free and paid apps. They will begin shipping out in the first week of November, so make sure to place your order if you want to ensure you will get them as soon as possible.
The Max Lumi 2 features a 13.3 inch E INK Carta HD display with a resolution of 2200×1650 with 207 PPI. The screen is completely flush with the bezel and there is a protective layer of glass, this is a similar design that the Max Lumi provided. You will be able to read at night with the front-lit display via the white LED lights, and it also has a series of amber LED lights to provide a warm candlelight effect.
This large screen device is designed to take notes, freehand draw and make annotations in PDF files or ebooks. It comes a brand new stylus called the Boox Pen Plus, which give get for free with the purchase from Good e-Reader. It is blue and has a hexagonal design. It has a new nib that make writing a pure joy. The pen is also magnetic and attach itself to the side of the device. The pen has 4,096 degrees of pressure sensitivity, so the harder you press down on the screen, the thicker the lines become. There is also palm rejection technology, to prevent your hands from registering as touchscreen interactions. There is a screen protector that is installed on the factory, so you don’t need to install it yourself, this is a special one that Onyx developed, they call it writing film, and there is more resistance when writing on the screen with the stylus. All the other models have this same screen protector and the new stylus.
Underneath the hood is a Qualcomm Snapdragon 662 octo-core CPU with a whopping 6GB of RAM, which is the most RAM ever found on an e-note. There is 128GB of internal storage, which should be enough for your PDF and ebook collection. There is no SD card to expand the storage further, but it does have access to the Onyx Boox Cloud. There are two stereo speakers which can be used to play audiobooks, podcasts or music. It has Bluetooth 5.0, which can be used for wireless headphones or an external speaker, it can also be used for things like wireless keyboards and other accessories. You can charge the Lumi 2 with the USB-C port, by plugging it into your PC/MAC or a wall charger. It is powered by a respectable 4300 mAh battery, which should provide a couple of weeks of constant usage. There is a fingerprint scanner to unlock your device. The Lumi 2 is running the Google Android 11 operating system, which is basically the most current version out there. Onyx has always adopted the latest version on all of their products, this helps with security patches, and also ensures that it is compatible with virtually any app found on the Play Store. Onyx Boox has made optimizations to Onenote, Evernote and WPS to make sketching much smoother.
Meanwhile, the Onyx Boox Note Air 2 features a 10.3 inch E INK Carta HD display with a resolution of 1872×1404 with 226 PPI and 350ms response time. It has a flush screen and bezel design with a glass based screen. There is also a WACOM layer, which can be used with the accompanied stylus to take notes, freehand draw or edit PDF files.. It has a front-lit display and a color temperature system, with more LED lights than the first generation model.
Underneath the hood is a Qualcomm Snapdragon 662 octo-core processor and 4GB of DDR4X RAM and 64 GB of internal storage. It has speakers, which is great for listening to audiobooks, podcasts or music. There is no 3.5mm headphone jack or an SD card. You can however, use a pair of wireless headphones or a speaker to listen to audio content. Charing and the transferring of data to your Air is done via the USB-C port. It also has g-sensor and a microphone for audio to text or voice chat apps like Discord. You can connect up to the internet with WIFI.
The Note 5 has a 10.3 inch E INK Carta HD display with a resolution of 1404×1872 with 226 PPI and 16 levels of greyscale. It has a flush screen and bezel design and has a layer of glass protecting it. There is WACOM integration, which is designed for note taking, freehand drawing and editing PDF files. It has the same screen protector as the other models and the brand new Boox pen.
Underneath the hood is a Qualcomm Snapdragon 662 Octo-Core processor, 4GB of DDRX RAM and 64GB of internal storage. It has speakers to listen to audiobooks, podcasts or music. There is also Bluetooth 5.0, which can be used in conjunction with wireless headphones or various Bluetooth accessories, such as keyboard. Charging and transferring of data is done via the USB-C port. It has a G-sensor to help with orientation from landscape to portrait mode. It is powered by a 3,000 mAh battery, which should provide a couple of weeks of daily usage. The weight is 380g and is 5.8 mm thick.
Wrap Up
I think the Lumi 2 is the best buy out of all of the new Onyx devices. It will read A4 document, which is the standard size 8.5/11 piece of paper, so PDF files will look really good on it, it also has 128GB of storage and tons of RAM and a great processor. If you need something that will read A5 documents, the Note Air 2 is very solid, and also is more affordable than the Note 5. All of them are really great pieces of hardware and will be the e-notes to beat going into 2022.
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.
