![]() Reading these saved stories later on a Kobo device, the Forma included, is something I look forward to all week. I use Pocket to save research and long-form writing that I haven’t the time to dig into while I’m working. For those unfamiliar with it, Pocket it an online service that allows readers to select articles found online to archive and read later when they have the opportunity. With the Forma, OverDrive is easy and pleasurable to use. ![]() ![]() Simply enter your library card number and passcode: Boom, you’ve got free books. OverDrive makes it easy to browse, reserve, and read the digital content available via your public library. The greatest advantage that Kobo has over Amazon is the amount of free content made available through two of the services built into the Kobo operating system: OverDrive and Pocket. Features such as a contextual dictionary, a lack of advertising (looking at you, Amazon,) and the ability to alter font spacing, weight, line and gutter spacing on a granular level all add to the Kobo Forma’s outstanding reading experience. The device’s large, crisp display makes reading comics and other graphic content a joy. As with Kobo’s other recent devices, the Forma also supports CBZ and CBR, file types often associated with comic books and manga. For those who often side-load their reading material, the Kobo Forma supports 14 different file formats, including EPUB, EPUB3, PDF, MOBI, JPEG, GIF, PNG, BMP, TIFF, TXT, HTML and RTF. Excluding books that are available only through Amazon, the Kobo Store offers just as wide a variety of bestsellers and other titles as Amazon does. However, Kobo’s digital offerings have, in recent years, become a compelling alternative for those who choose to avoid Amazon or prefer to hunt down free content online to read. Granted, Amazon’s Kindle Store and Kindle Unlimited are still the best option for North Americans looking for one-stop eBook shopping. Turn over the e-reader, and the display will re-orientate to accommodate your needs. Thanks to a built-in accelerometer, it’s also possible to use the Forma as a right or left-handed device. When perusing your digital library, you’ll be able to turn pages by using the Forma’s page-turn buttons or tapping at the device’s capacitative display. During testing, I discovered that going light instead of resilient might not have been the best idea. But it feels flimsy compared to Kobo’s excellent Aura One, and positively cheap when held up against Amazon’s aluminum-bodied Oasis 2. The result of this decision is that the Forma is comfortable to hold and is light enough that it’s easy to forget it’s there when tossed in a backpack or purse. ![]() Instead, Kobo opted for lightweight materials. With the amount of screen real estate that the Forma offers readers, Kobo had a tough choice to make: If they’d opted to provide the device with premium feel, through the use of heavier, more resilient materials, its large size and heavier weight would have made it unwieldy and uncomfortable to use one-handed for extended periods of time. It makes for a frustrating reading experience. This could mean that the device will mistake the liquid on its display for input from your fingers. You should know, however, that unlike Amazon’s Oasis 2, it’s not possible to deactivate the Forma’s touch controls before exposing it to water. The Kobo Forma can be completely submerged in up to two meters of fresh water for two hours at a time and continue to work just fine. Happily, thanks to the Forma’s IPX8 rating, you’ll be able to burn through a lot of the this time reading in a hot tub or at the beach. In either case, depending on on your habits, you’ll be able to enjoy weeks of reading, on either device, with a single charge. Not so: where the Oasis contains a 1,000mAh battery, the Kobo device is equipped with a 1,200mAh battery. One would think this means that the Forma packs a smaller battery. Where the Oasis sports a battery hump on one side of its chassis, the Forma is flat, both front and back. Pick up an Oasis or a Forma, however, and you’ll immediately understand that the similarities are shallow, at best. Both devices boast large displays with an oblong bezel on one side, which hosts a pair of page -urn buttons. One of the first things you may notice about the Kobo Forma is how much it resembles an Amazon All-New Kindle Oasis. The Forma’s power and page turn buttons can all be found on the device’s bezel, similar to the design of the Amazon Oasis 2. A 32GB iteration of the device is also available for a whopping $330-the same price as a 32GB iPad. So long as you’re not stuffing it full of chunky Manga, comic books or PDF files, this is more than enough storage to contain thousands of books. In its base configuration, the Forma is available with 8GB of non-expandable storage for $280.
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