Why 32GB is not enough (r.e. Note, max2)

[duckface]

When the note was announced a number of posts lamented the lack of an SD card, but there were replies that the builtin 32GB should be more than for anyone. That is a correct response if you are using it to read novels -- 32GB would be more than enough to last a lifetime.

The need for more than 32GB comes from researchers, graduate students, and professors. A single research academic paper of only 10 pages often requires several megabytes, and even up to 10meg or more in the case where there are figures and photographs. When combined that with some scanned books (could be 50-100 meg each), it means that 32GB is only enough to hold a couple years worth of papers.

Of course you can delete them when done, but that works for a novel better than research papers. Whereas a novel is mostly self contained, and when you're done you might never read it again, research papers are not self contained. They include ideas from other papers that they cite, and those papers in turn cite other papers. So the first time studying a paper might require reading 5 or 20 other papers. And unless your brain is a mega encyclopedia, you end up referring to many papers repeatedly. So an ideal device for these professions would allow having your entire catalog of annotated pdfs available wherever you work.

The story gets worse still for the case of a group of researchers or students in a lab. A common strategy is to maintain a shared and sync'd library of .pdfs across every student or project in the lab, using system such as Zotero or Mendeley. One of my colleagues said her Zotero library grew to 14GB in just over a year. At this rate the these devices (Note, Max) would not even last for 2 years.

Sadly the Note does not support OTG either.

Although both devices look amazing, I am waiting for the Boyue Likebook Note. The SDcard is more valuable than speed, since managing and juggling files is itself quite a slowdown. If there were a "note pro" with 128 or 64g I think it would sell well.

[orebmur]

It's not about the amount of storage but the (im)possibility to keep storage separate from the device.
The strategy of hardware vendors is turning versatile modular tools into mere consumer gadgets.
I consider this unacceptable planned obsolescence.

[mdp]

Originally Posted by duckface

The need for more than 32GB comes from researchers, graduate students, and professors. [...] At this rate the these devices (Note, Max) would not even last for 2 years.

Sadly the Note does not support OTG either

These concerns, which in different form and primary reason are shared by many of us, should be shown to Onyx at their BBS ( bbs.onyx-international.com ). They should be convinced.

Originally Posted by duckface

Although both devices look amazing, I am waiting for the Boyue Likebook Note. The SDcard is more valuable than speed, since managing and juggling files is itself quite a slowdown. If there were a "note pro" with 128 or 64g I think it would sell well.

With all of the material available but the device slow to operate, you would be frustrated anyway attempting actual use.
You want to have both removable storage and speed - they are unrelated. Speed is a tradeoff with battery and cost; SD-Card is a tradeoff with nothing really.
A device with bigger soldered storage would just move the threshold and not change the principle; you are comparing k with unlimited, and the ratio is the same.

The Note also misses the buttons, for example. My point to Onyx was: "Why putting artificial limits, with the only effect of having some customer pass?".

[Philippe D.]

While I completely agree that not having a SD card reader is really a stupid choice, I don't see it really making the Max 2 hard to use for a researcher.

My bibliography directory contains a lot of research papers, including many I stored at some point because I thought I might want to read them but never did - read: more than I really need. The whole directory structure takes up less than 2Gb of space, something that will easily hold in the Max 2 storage space.

OK, then the papers and books I tend to read don't have too much graphics - it's mostly text - but even with much more than that, the storage on the Max 2 is very adequate for my needs. Where it's more of a problem is that these documents have to compete for space with other files (in my case: scanned scenarios for wargame Advanced Squad Leader, of which I have several hundreds/thousands), and a normal thing for me to do would be to have all the maths documents on a SD card, with others on a different card, and to switch between one and the other depending on usage; this I cannot do.

[mobama]

Originally Posted by mdp

You want to have both removable storage and speed - they are unrelated. Speed is a tradeoff with battery and cost; SD-Card is a tradeoff with nothing really.

Amazingly, the single Onyx device I have has managed to make SD card a trade-off with startup speed. First the device needs to start up the Android (which is quite long compared to any Pocketbook device I have owned) and then, if the SD card is there, it begins the incomprehensible "Preparing SD card" process (which takes at least as long as startup).

This is not a general Android issue, but an issue how Onyx in particular implements Android. All would be well, if it were done right.

External SD card is absolutely vital to have. The way the industry is going, I think another Onyx I might buy would be only usable as a monitor, something that I attach to another device where there is enough space to hold my entire library.

[Pajamaman]

I read Onyx is removing the SD card because the Chinese government is enforcing the cloud because they can better control people and data with it. Sounds Orwellian and it is. Communist government is facist. So it goes. Hopefully a company in a democratic country will develop an alternative. I'm not sure why sony device is so closed. Perhaps the Dutch Remarkable is more open? For a device like.these, SD card is important to bold large files like scanned pdf files. SD card slots are not expensive...

[mdp]

Originally Posted by Pajamaman

I'm not sure why sony device is so closed

I think it is corporate identity: they mostly build appliances (as opposed to the "assembling" idea of normal IT systems).

Originally Posted by Pajamaman

Perhaps the Dutch Remarkable is more open?

To the best of my peek, no - the opposite. It could probably run a full GNU/Linux desktop distribution - though its low hardware specs would make it infeasible -, but it only runs specific software and "will consider the possibility of releasing the SDK to an amount of chosen developers". Now - we do not have a full productivity park (no-further-needs-thank-you software) on Android, with Google behind it, after ten years and market leadership...

[M4H35H]

Originally Posted by Pajamaman

I read Onyx is removing the SD card because the Chinese government is enforcing the cloud because they can better control people and data with it.

That is somebody's theory. You must have read it here on mobileread. Boyue's 10.3" device has a microSD slot.

[Tarana]

Niche market - they aren't marketed towards research. They are marketed towards those who use whispersync and read mangia.

The SD card thing has been a bit of a problem with the Fire. After our Fires were a couple of years old, I frequently have to do things to get the Fire to read the SD card. I bought a Nook Simple Touch with SD card about a month after it was released - still works perfect. So, keeping the price down may be why there is no slot. To make it work long term must cost more money for decent engineering. My theory anyway.

[sealbeater]

Originally Posted by Pajamaman

I read Onyx is removing the SD card because the Chinese government is enforcing the cloud because they can better control people and data with it. Sounds Orwellian and it is.

This makes me very sad to hear. I suppose I should start stockpiling devices if this is the trend.

[Philippe D.]

Originally Posted by Pajamaman

Hopefully a company in a democratic country will develop an alternative. I'm not sure why sony device is so closed. Perhaps the Dutch Remarkable is more open?

Remarkable is Norwegian, not Dutch (Still a democratic country, though)

The Remarkable is really designed as a closed system; not as closed as the Sony (the core system is a Linux variant, and you can connect the device through a USB cable and access it via ssh), but then the documents on it are not easily accessed - you need to go through their interface to convert them to PDF. There were some early attempts at retro-engineering it so you could use your own scripts; I don't know how these have evolved.

It's really too bad that Onyx went this way with the SD card, because theirs is the most open device of this kind at the moment - and I'd be surprised if many other companies started to launch their own versions in the near future; the market is not that big.