Onyx has added a new color ereader called the Nova Air C to their lineup of Android-powered E Ink tablets and e-notebooks.
The Nova Air C is Onyx’s third commercial color E Ink device, and it replaces the Nova3 Color that was released about this time last year.
From a hardware and design standpoint it’s basically the same as the Nova Air that was released last fall, but it has a 7.8-inch color E Ink screen instead of a standard monochrome screen, and it’s the first ereader I’ve seen that uses E Ink’s new On-Cell Touch technology that’s supposed to increase contrast and improve screen clarity.
In fact Onyx claims the screen on the new Nova Air C has 30% better contrast and 15% more color saturation compared to the screen on the previous generation Nova3 Color (but they also note the contrast difference with the frontlights off is only 6%).
Onyx also added a warm frontlight to the Nova Air C, whereas their previous generation color models only had cool-colored frontlights, and it supports Onyx’s magnetic accessories, including a cover that adds page-turn buttons.
The device runs Onyx’s customized software that’s based on Android 11, and like other Boox products it’s open to install Android apps. It also comes with a stylus pen for taking notes and writing on the screen.
The new Nova Air C is available to purchase from Onyx’s website for $419.99, but it ships from China. It’ll probably be available on Onyx’s Amazon store in a week or two.
If you go to the footnotes at the C sales page, it says Boox is committed to provide software upgrades for 3 yearss. Is this new?
I noticed that back in December so it’s relatively new. I think they added that after people started questioning how long Onyx would support older products since they release new models every year. It doesn’t seem to apply to the Russian variants that some of their resellers sell, though.
Do you think you will review this Nathan? If I remember, you were pretty skeptical of the value of a few other color e-readers in the past.
I don’t think I’ll be reviewing any more color ereaders unless Amazon or Kobo releases one. The market is just too small.
Makes sense. I like the idea of a color reader, but practically, the color e-ink just isn’t that great yet. So if I want to truly appreciate cover art, or a book that has color photographs or illustration, I’d be on my iPad, not an e-ink device.
If they could manage a 300dpi color e-ink experience, I’d be more inclined to consider it, but probably wouldn’t buy such a thing until it hit mainstream with Amazon or Kobo. And even then, can’t say I’d go for a first generation device.
The reality is most of my reading does not require color, with occasional exceptions.