Onyx Boox Palma 2 evaluate: a slight improve on an important e-reader

The Boox Palma 2 stays a Boox Palma. That’s the greatest and worst factor about it. A bit of over a yr after Onyx shipped its first $279.99 smartphone-sized e-reader — a tool I like and use nearly daily — the corporate has launched its successor. And it’s, in each significant approach, the identical actual factor.

On one degree, that is fantastic. Good, even! The Palma’s entire enchantment is predicated on its simplicity. By delivery a tool roughly the scale of a smartphone, with entry to all of the apps within the Play Retailer and an E Ink display that’s straightforward to take a look at and takes days to empty the battery, Onyx discovered a profitable combo. For anybody looking for a strategy to simply learn books, paperwork, and stuff from the net, there’s actually nothing fairly prefer it. For me, it grew to become not only a reader but additionally a strategy to play music and podcasts and even take fast notes, with out having to wade into the chaotic morass of my telephone.

My greatest fear with the unique Palma was merely how lengthy it will final. It ran on an previous chip and Android 11, each of which have been woefully outdated even when it launched. The Palma 2 has a more moderen chip and Android 13, which suggests you’ll be able to most likely anticipate it to work and get safety updates for not less than a few years. I wouldn’t depend on something previous that, although — Onyx is a lot better at spitting out new gadgets than updating its current ones.

About that new processor: Onyx calls it a “sooner octa-core CPU,” and I completely positively can’t inform the distinction. It out-benchmarks the earlier mannequin, notably in graphics duties, however in use, I didn’t discover the advance anyplace. Apps nonetheless open slightly slower than I’d like; web page turns work fantastic however sometimes faucets don’t register; God make it easier to should you ever attempt to play a sport or watch a video. I’m not particularly bothered by the shortage of efficiency improve, since “quick” isn’t the purpose of this factor. However simply to place it in perspective: the unique Palma benchmarks like a strong midrange telephone from 2017, and the Palma 2 checks like a strong midrange telephone from 2019. The most recent Pixel telephones from Google roughly triple the Palma 2’s scores. Boox upgraded the Palma, however solely from a very, actually previous telephone to only a actually previous telephone. 

Every part else in regards to the Palma is identical, for higher and for worse. The 6.3-inch E Ink Carta show nonetheless seems good, and the plastic physique nonetheless feels fairly flimsy. It nonetheless has 6GB of RAM and 128GB of storage, each of that are loads for this gadget’s functions. The 16-megapixel digital camera works okay for scanning paperwork and QR codes and nonetheless takes crappy footage in any other case. The ability button is slightly greater than earlier than and now has a fingerprint reader for less complicated safety, which is good, but it surely’s slightly sluggish and slightly finicky, and do you even want a passcode on a Palma? (I don’t have one. Possibly I ought to.) My Palma 2’s battery lasts 4 to 5 days on a cost, similar to the previous one.

I’m torn between the Palma 2 being precisely what I wished and a little bit of a missed alternative. There’s a lot extra Onyx may do with this factor. It may have added a SIM slot and turned the Palma into a correct minimalist smartphone. It may have fastened the massive hole between the glass and the display, upgraded the supplies, and made an object worthy of that $280 price ticket. It may have refined the Palma’s tackle Android, cleansing up settings and eradicating pointless built-in apps to make it even less complicated. Or skip all that, ditch the digital camera, downgrade the storage, and discover a strategy to promote this factor for half the value.

As an alternative, the Palma is the Palma. When you’ve got the final one, you positively don’t want this one. If you happen to don’t have both, get this one so it’ll final slightly longer. Possibly this machine will find yourself just like the Kindle: yr to yr, there’s often not a lot cause to improve, however whenever you break yours or depart it in a seat-back pocket someplace, there’s a solidly higher machine ready to exchange it. And very like the Kindle, it appears the Palma’s customers will all the time have greater ambitions for the product than its makers.

My actual hope is that the Palma will get some competitors. This mix — smartphone measurement, E Ink display, Android apps — isn’t notably subtle or proprietary, and there are many methods different firms may do it higher. There are another choices on the market (right here’s a great Reddit thread discussing a few of them), however no person, together with Onyx, has executed this kind of product justice but. I’d like to see somebody get it proper.

Till then, the Palma 2 will do exactly fantastic. It lets me learn my books and articles, shops my podcasts and my music, and makes it rattling close to inconceivable to get distracted by TikTok. Nonetheless a profitable combo in my e-book.

Images by David Pierce / The Verge