I usually discover it very onerous to jot down on my pc. As quickly as I settle in and let these inventive juices stream … ding! In comes a Slack notification. OK, it will take two seconds to handle this primary. Minutes later, I am going to really feel the urge to test my inbox. Oh wow, six pressing emails. Two hours later, I may need typed a single phrase on my web page. That normally results in a late evening of writing. Rinse and repeat.
The ReMarkable 2 has been a salve on this course of. This e-paper pill with a snug stylus is a wonderful digital notepad—it mimics paper and pen much better than many different units—and the keyboard attachment has change into an effective way for me to kind up tales distraction-free. You may write notes, draw sketches, mark up PDFs, and manage all of those paperwork into folders. 5 years after the discharge of that pill, the corporate is unveiling a brand new product referred to as the ReMarkable Paper Professional. It elevates the notepad expertise whereas nonetheless prioritizing that distraction-free ethos.
“We invented the class,” says Mats Herding Solberg, the top of product administration on the Norwegian firm. “We’re centered actually on focus and making a single product that is actually good on the verticals that we consider are necessary. We do not need to be the corporate that goes tremendous broad and tries so as to add too many bells and whistles.”
Paper Path
ReMarkable’s Paper Professional is not strictly a successor to the ReMarkable 2. Consider it like how the “Professional” version of the iPhone aligns to the usual mannequin. It has some good upgrades at a better worth beginning at $579, however you may follow the $399 older mannequin if you happen to do not want the brand new options; it isn’t going away anytime quickly.
So what’s new? The spotlight is colour. At CES 2024, E Ink—the corporate that produces most of the electronic paper displays present in Kindles and the like—showed off extra units than ever utilizing color E Ink technology. This record now consists of the brand new ReMarkable Paper Professional, although Solberg says ReMarkable has accomplished quite a lot of work on prime of E Ink’s know-how to good the colour expertise. The customized “Canvas Shade” show stack is comprised of bodily colour particles that transfer across the display to indicate particular colours, relatively than a separate filter on prime of the black and white show. Solberg says this could higher replicate the precise feeling of “colour on paper.”
Do not anticipate vivid, shiny colours such as you see in your smartphone’s display. These hues are nonetheless muted, and you’ll solely select from 9 colours (from magenta to cyan), however you may mix and layer them collectively, which may then create much more colour choices.
Additionally new is a front light system. It is completely different than the backlight typical of telephone screens. As an alternative, a entrance gentle angles the sunshine supply down onto the pill’s display so it is mirrored up at your eyes. It is a design that is change into fairly commonplace through the years on the earth of e-paper units. The ReMarkable 2 solely displays ambient gentle, which makes it tough to see the display in a darkish room. This is not an issue with the Paper Professional. You may modify the brightness of the sunshine, although it is nonetheless not going to get eye-searingly shiny. Simply sufficient that you should utilize it in dim circumstances.
The Paper Professional has a bigger 11.8-inch show, which suggests not one of the outdated equipment for the ReMarkable 2 will work on this unit. That is why there are an array of folio covers ($89 and up) at launch to help the brand new system, together with a Sort Folio cowl ($229) that provides a keyboard. Even the stylus has been rebuilt. The Marker/Marker Plus are energetic styli, in order that they should be charged—simply pop ’em on the sting of the Paper Professional, the place they’ll magnetically connect and begin wirelessly charging.