The reMarkable 2 came out around three years ago and is currently being sold. This is the previous generation model with a black and white e-paper display and is very popular with people who want to freehand draw and edit PDF files and don’t want any distractions. The Paper Pro is their latest generation product and started shipping out a couple of weeks ago. This model has a Gallery 3 colour e-paper display and can showcase over 20,000 colours.
The reMarkable 2 features a 10.3 inch E INK display with Canvas 2.0 technology for a better refresh system when viewing PDF files or reading ebooks. It has improved contrast, ensuring an excellent writing and reading experience. The resolution is the same as the original with 1872×1404 with 226 PPI; it also has multi-point capacitive touch. The screen has 21ms latency, which is very ideal.
Underneath the hood is a 1.2 GHZ dual-core processor, 1GB of RAM and 8GB of internal storage. Remarkable has doubled the processor and RAM from the original but has kept the internal storage the same. Also, the company has decided to forgo a Micro USB port and instead embrace USC-C, which should appeal to the vocal minority that hates having multiple cables.
It is powered by a 3,000 mAh battery, and one charge should last around three weeks; the original model only lasted a few days. You can also leave it in standby mode for up to 90 days. It has wireless internet access to download firmware updates and other materials.
The remarkable Paper Pro features an 11.8-inch e-paper display with Canvas Color 3.0, based on E INK Gallery 3 and employs electrophoretic technology. The white and white colour content resolution is 2160 x 1620 with 229 PPI. Other paper tablets put a filter on a black-and-white display to produce colours. On reMarkable Paper Pro, coloured ink particles inside the display move around to render what users write and read. The natural colours evoke the feeling of a printed newspaper page. Compared to LCDs or LED screens on laptops and smartphones, the Canvas Color display doesn’t use bright, flickering lights to produce colours. The low-glare display reflects natural light for a more comfortable reading experience. In dim lighting conditions, a new adjustable reading light softly illuminates the display, making it possible to read and work for hours without eye strain.
Remarkable is the second company to use Gallery 3 on a commercial product. However, reMarkable is the largest and has the potential to go truly mainstream. How did the company manage to make Gallery 3 work? reMarkable told me in a written statement, “In the Gallery 3 platform, E Ink gave us the right ingredients for making a unique colour display. Using that display paper technology as a foundation, our teams have redesigned every part of reMarkable’s signature paper-like writing experience, from the Marker tip to the textured display surface to how reMarkable OS, our custom operating system, behaves. The result is the Canvas Color display, a custom display stack that delivers an even better writing experience than reMarkable 2. Out of the box, Gallery 3 promises “an update time of 30 ms.” On reMarkable 2, it’s 21 ms. On reMarkable Paper Pro, it’s as low as 12 ms.”
Underneath the hood is a 1.8 GHz quad-core Cortex-A53 processor, 2 GB LPDDR4 RAM and 64GB of internal storage. There is a USB-C port to charge and transfer documents to the device. Wi-Fi 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz are available, primarily to access cloud stuff and fetch firmware updates. It is powered by a giant 5,030 mAh battery. The dimensions are 274.1 x 196.6 x 5.1 mm (10.8 x 7.8 x 0.24 inches) and Approximately 525 g (1.16 lb).
Wrap Up
Here are the things that I noticed when using both models. The black and white e-paper display performs faster with no latency when using the stylus to draw, take notes, or flip the pages of an ebook or PDF file. The colour one can display colours, and users can draw in colours or edit full-colour PDF files. However, browsing the UI and flipping pages of ebook or PDF files does take a while; it is not instant, but there is a noticeable delay. This is because of the intrinsic nature of the Gallery 3 e-paper display; there is no getting around the lag.
reMarkable could improve the latency issue with the colour screen via firmware updates. However, the company spent over two years developing this product with E INK.
The reMarkable Paper Pro is more expensive than the reMarkable 2. The colour variant comes bundled with a Marker for $579 or a Marker Plus for $629. The black-and-white model starts at $399 with the basic marker or $449 with the premium pen.
Michael Kozlowski is the editor-in-chief at Good e-Reader and has written about audiobooks and e-readers for the past fifteen years. Newspapers and websites such as the CBC, CNET, Engadget, Huffington Post and the New York Times have picked up his articles. He Lives in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
