Pleasantly Surprised by my Recent Upgrade
I’ve been using Kindle devices for years - had a Kindle “Keyboard” WiFi (Gen3; 2010 - dropped it) followed by a Paperwhite WiFi (Gen6; 2013 - still in the household) and then an Oasis 32Gb WiFi + Mobile (Gen10, 2019 - still in the household).
The Oasis was meant to be the “end game” device and for me it was perfect; what it lacked in battery life it more than made up for in terms ergonomics and general usability, and I appreciated having newspapers and journals delivered to my device via the mobile network irrespective of where I was.
I was disappointed when newspapers and journals stopped being available via Kindle; it diminished the value of the mobile connectivity.
More disappointment followed when ComiXology was merged with the Kindle library; I enjoyed reading graphic novels but the Oasis wasn’t really up to it in the end and I didn’t want to take all of my reading onto a distracting device like an iPad just so that I could continue to have a smooth experience (never mind colour).
Enter the ColorSoft (Gen12, 2024 - Signature Edition). It is the only Kindle I haven’t bought shortly after release and the hesitation was mostly to do with the loss of mobile connectivity and the loss of physical buttons.
A few weeks in and I can say that the ergonomics are great and surprisingly I do not miss the physical buttons. If I need connectivity on the go I use my phone’s hotspot. And the colour is great! I haven’t experienced any yellow banding - the only downside has been transferring my now massive library across; took a few days.
If you’re like me and hesitant about losing the buttons and feel of the Oasis (or even the mobile connectivity if you went for that model), if colour and graphic novels matter I think the ColorSoft is worth a shot.