BOOX Note Air 10.3 E Ink Tablets, ePaper, Android 10, Front Light, G-Sensor, Digital Paper, E Ink Notepad

TLDR: This is perfect for the person who thinks and works best by taking hand-written notes (or needs to do so for school/work), uses multiple notebooks for different purposes, and has grown to hate trying to organize notes in sectioned or multiple notebooks.I am a data engineer and data architect. I write plans, flows, and project tasks for work, but I also journal, take notes when learning new technologies, and write notes when reading books in my free time. I love critical thinking, but my thoughts tend to be all over the place and I've found the best place to organize my thoughts are by hand-written note taking; typing on a computer never cut it for me. However, I've grown to HATE notebooks. There's no good way to section off notebooks whenever you need a new category or organize multiple notebooks for different purposes. I also cannot go back and add new thoughts to previous pages (something I need to do ALL THE TIME).So a few years ago I started looking into digital alternatives. This was when the reMarkable first released. I was looking between it and the iPad pro with the pen. The software of the remarkable looked inconvenient and at the time I don't think I could create a my own hierarchical note structure, there was a fixed hierarchy. I also was apprehensive of spending so much when I could get so much "more" out of the iPad in the form of apps. I bought the iPad.And I hated it.- The palm rejection was terrible.- I had to recharge it every day so that it wouldn't quit on me the next.- The pen has worse battery than the tablet since it turns on with motion, and I had to keep it in my backpack so I wouldn't forget it, and I moved my backpack a lot! Oh and the pen was unusable while recharging. SO MANY TIMES I would take it out to take notes and it was dead. I shouldn't have to remember to charge up a pen so I can take notes for the day.- All the good note apps had a fixed note hierarchy: Notebook -> Section -> Note page. This still led to messy notes in the long run.A few months ago I looked back into e-ink writers, found the Boox Note Air, and pulled the trigger. It seemed to do a lot more than the reMarkable, and it ran Android, so I could download Kindle and any other app if needed (ironically, I didn't feel boxed into very limited software like I would have with the reMarkable). It's been two months and I've already put more than double the time on this than I did with the iPad and have LOVED every minute!- Best kindle reader out there- Over a week and a half of battery life. My iPad is now lasting less than a day, while I bet this device will have a good battery life for many years.- Writing on the screen feels SOOO much better than the iPad- I can easily share files and notes remotely with my phone or computer, the cloud service is free, and the most recent patch has made saving and synching with the cloud service automatic!- It has gotten patched pretty often: one every 2-3 weeks. And these patches are not cleaning up noticeable bugs (I haven't encountered software bugs), but it's to make improvements to the experience! That's a rare and valuable thing!- Beyond the limitations of e-ink screens, I've never felt like this is a slow device. Unless you load it with a bunch of Android apps (which I would not recommend), the software should be lightweight and stay snappy for many years.Most importantly for me:- The note app is similar to file structures in a computer, so I can structure note hierarchies however I want and move notes between them as easily as copying files between computer folders.- I can also create new pages in the middle of an existing notebook to add more thoughts.Even the small things:- A nice space to hold it without touching the screen- It's incredibly sleek feeling and a beauty to look at, from the front and the back. I honestly think this is the best looking piece of tech I own. I've gotten so many comments on it even with it turned off because of the images it displays while it's off.- Split screen I'll occasionally use while reading kindle and writing notes and it works flawlessly while giving about as much reading screen-space as a kindle paperwhite.- The included pen has a surprisingly strong magnet that can hold it to the side of the tablet even while in a backpack for a day without it detaching.- Search all handwritten notes for any word/phrase, and it does a great job with it's results.- You can clear background apps to make sure the device runs smoothly.- While I don't and would never expect it to be, it has enough features to be a usable Android tablet which I find nuts since I only expect it to be a reader and writer. It's got a fast screen mode for watching animations, videos, and fast scrolling through apps and web pages. It's even got speakers to listen to audiobooks. It absolutely shouldn't be bought for this, but that they put these features in there so that it could be is a sign to me that they want to make a top-tier, no compromise product.Things that I found lacking:- I wish they'd add the ability to copy or cut a selected section of notes to another page or notebook. It'd also be nice to do this for a full page.- The included pen feels good but doesn't have an eraser, but their own pen that does have an eraser feels very cheap and lacks the magnet that holds it to the side of the tablet.This device is invaluable for me, It's what I've been looking for for years. I've put thousands of dollars into building computers and other electronics and this is now my favorite piece of tech. I know I'm a VERY small sample of consumers, but if you fall in the same sample, you will not be disappointed in the Boox Note Air.

I am a graduate student in social sciences, so most of what I do all day is allow a computer monitor to slowly eat away at my eyes and brain while I read and write. I have struggled for a long time with spending the whole day in front of a screen, but pandemic times have made it much worse. So when I discovered this tablet (after initially considering the Remarkable 2), I was excited. I'm here to tell you that if you fit the relatively narrow niche of graduate student life, this is a great device. It makes it very easy to transfer files in either direction, the note taking is solid, and reading is so much easier on the eyes. More and more academic pdfs are DRM-free now, which is making it easier to use a device like this. The thing I was most worried about was all of the different capabilities of the device proving to be a distraction--the absence of these abilities is a major selling point of other similar devices--but I haven't found that to be an issue. You'll probably want to stick with the native notetaking and reading apps, since they are optimized for the device and therefore work much more smoothly than any alternatives. The handwriting recognition, at least for English language writing, is very effective--it's nice to be able to handwrite notes but then (almost) immediately have them available as plain text. You don't need to be tech savvy to take advantage of the best features of the device.It's nice to hold in the hand, the design is solid (a white border might have looked nicer), and the screen is crisp and clear. The cool/warm options for the backlight are amazing, and revolutionary coming from a Kindle that only has a blue light. The magnetic stylus is a nice touch, although it will probably come off if you're putting into or taking it out of a backpack.I have only two, relatively minor, complaints. Since I ordered the device off Amazon, rather than through the manufacturer, it did not come with a case and I cannot for the life of me figure out where to buy one. And the palm rejection could be better in PDF reading mode--that's been a bit annoying lately. I've had no issues with palm rejection in the notepad app.