My Kindle Oasis is now really showing its age. It is slow, at times will reset itself and, most importantly of all, the battery will only hold a charge for 2 – 3 days at best.

With no direct replacement available anymore and with pre-owned devices likely to have similar problems, I decided to look at the Colorsoft.

I really wanted the buttons, which I had on my Kobo, but there is no Kindle with buttons anymore. The Kobo had to (very sadly) be let go because too many books were not available and on too many occasions they were priced much higher. Also, the screen did not have the clarity I wanted and this, I then discovered, is the same problem that the Colorsoft has.

The reason comes down to the fact they are colour screens and that there is no way currently to produce the sharpness that non-colour devices can offer. I should have known this before I looked at the Colorsoft and I should have remembered that 99% of use is through reading text. Having a nice colour book cover on the screen when it is idle is nice, but does that really matter?

The other problem I found with the Colorsoft is that it is exceptionally boring. The design is extremely bland, the outer coating picks up marks very easily and it just feels like a downgrade when compared to something as old as the Oasis.

So, the Kobo was sold, the Colorsoft has been returned and I am debating if the Viwoods should be sold as well (the lowest brightness setting is far too high for comfortable reading when I prefer to read).

I don’t know what to do, I may just buy the cheapest Kindle and live with it for a while- no other device feels like it is worth the expense which is a sad state of affairs. I suspect that this is because Amazon dominates the market in so many ways and so we are left to choose between whatever meagre offerings are available to us.

The Colorsoft is the darkest device in the above photo. This is the main problem with colour e-ink devices today.

Categories: Product Reviews