Here’s something you don’t see very often, a good deal on an Onyx product. Right now Onyx has the 1st gen Boox Palma on sale for $199 on their website, and it even comes with a flip-fold case and free shipping.
They have both the white version and the black version in stock from their US warehouse so you don’t have to worry about it shipping from Hong Kong. The deal is part of Onyx’s Anniversary Sale where you can also get $30 off when spending $500+ and $80 off when spending $1000+.
The Boox Palma was replaced by the Palma 2 a few months ago so Onyx is probably looking to clear out their remaining stock with this sale. They only changed a few details with the new model so you’re really not missing much by going with the 1st gen Palma.
I posted a review of the Palma 2 last month if you want to see it in action. The only difference with the Palma 1 is it lacks a fingerprint sensor and it has a different CPU. The Palma 1 also runs Android 11 instead of Android 13, but with Onyx’s customized software there’s not much of a difference between them, and it’s not like Android apps are going to stop working with Android 11 anytime soon.
I really like the form factor of the Palma, and the BSR makes navigating and scrolling and refreshing much smoother than regular E Ink devices, although battery life isn’t as good with BSR (but it’s totally worth it on an Android device). My biggest complaint with the Palma 2 was the price. It sells for $279, which is the same price the Palma 1 originally sold for until the Palma 2 came along.
Unfortunately this sale appears to be limited to the Boox Shop. The Palma 1 is still selling for $245.99 on Onyx’s Amazon store, which is what it’s been selling for since they released the Palma 2.
Just as a note, the Palma 1 hasn’t gotten an update from Boox in a year – they claimed there was some sort of issue they were still working on, and then it’s been radio silence for about 8 months.
Of course then I go looking and see that the original Palma is listed on the 4.0 beta program now. it’s still not great that they kept everyone in the dark for that long, but they do seem to possibly *not* be abandoning it so quickly.
They are probably just clearing stock. In meantime I noticed B&H increased prices for new and used Boox Go 6 by $10 just like Pocketbook earlier on Amazon. It seems they are first increasing the lowest profit products. Likely we’ll see more price increases unless they somehow can manage to import from another country. One advantage Amazon has and other larger companies is to simply shift to Taiwan, Singapore or Vietnam.