The Palma is an odd product. It’s a small e-reader with far larger gadget ambitions. On its web site, Boox describes the product as a “distraction-free device that lets you reclaim your focus in the exact middle between tech and life.”
In quite a lot of methods, the corporate’s ambitions seem to reflect these of Mild Telephone’s by constructing a secondary gadget designed to take away you out of your smartphone’s built-in distractions. That’s a pleasant sufficient sentiment many people can little doubt get behind, having skilled yet one more deeply polarizing U.S. presidential election by way of the lens of social media.
What, exactly, constitutes a “distraction” versus a necessary perform is extraordinarily subjective, nonetheless. Turning again to Mild Telephone for a second, we see a product that was deliberately launched with a restricted function set, solely to subsequently introduce new performance that was initially deemed “nonessential” by the startup.
For higher or worse, we depend on our little pocket communicators for almost each side of our lives. Lowering dependence and distraction are valiant objectives, however depriving customers of genuinely useful options could be counterproductive.
The Palma doesn’t begin from that very same place of practical minimalism — at the least not totally. There are specific limitations baked straight into the product by the character of its ePaper show. There’s sure performance that works higher on the know-how — studying, for instance — but it surely lacks an incredible quantity of versatility in comparison with your commonplace smartphone/pill display.
The gadget, nonetheless, runs Android (albeit a number of generations behind) and has entry to the Play Retailer. It has a digicam, microphone, audio system, and Bluetooth connectivity. The Palma 2 options an upgraded octa-core processor and provides in privateness by the use of a fingerprint reader.
The fascinating decisions of what to place in and what to depart out make it really feel like PDA with an id disaster: an odd client digital chimera that’s not solely certain what it needs to be when it grows up. Because it seems, that’s a part of the enjoyable.
Taking part in round with the Palma 2 despatched me down some surprising rabbit holes, together with Reddit threads whereby individuals focus on methods to backdoor performance onto the gadget. There may be, for instance, a microSD slot for expandable reminiscence, however not one for a SIM. Meaning, despite the inclusion of microphones, audio system, and Bluetooth, it’s not particularly designed to make cellphone calls.
As such, individuals debate the viability of utilizing WhatsApp’s voice function as a work-around. There’s no GPS, which places the kibosh on mapping performance, however how about piggybacking on a tool that does? It’s quite a lot of work for comparatively little reward, but it surely’s at all times hopeful to see the methods during which technological limitations spur intelligent consumer innovation.
Granted, I’ve solely been utilizing the Palma 2 for a short while, however I are likely to fall within the camp of customers content material to think about the gadget as a pure e-reader. It enjoys a lot of these options, together with ePaper that’s far simpler on the eyes (and sleep schedule) and extends battery life far past what the typical smartphone is able to.
The brand new processor provides zip to the Palma, whereas eradicating the annoying latency from the earlier technology. That stated, the product continues to be hampered by ePaper’s refresh limitations. If Boox have been to make a model of the Palma that was a real e-reader, stripped of a lot of the doubtless extraneous options, and delivered it at a lower cost, I might see these items flying off the shelf.
Simply the promise of a reader that’s skinny sufficient to hold in a pocket will probably entice quite a lot of consideration. I’ve wasted extra time than I care to say attempting to resolve whether or not to take my Kindle with me on a protracted practice journey, figuring out it could imply awkwardly carrying the gadget round for the remainder of the night and probably leaving it behind in a darkish nook.
Boox makes some nice e-readers, and the Palma suits the invoice. It’s good {hardware}, with a flush 300 ppi show and a strong entrance gentle for studying in mattress. The $280 asking value, alternatively, is difficult to justify until you propose to make the most of a lot of the different options.
