I bought a Kobo at the end of last year. It broke, I tried to get it replaced by them, but they would not do it. I sucked it up, bought another one...and also bought a new case ($40) since my old case ($20) did not provide enough protection. Yesterday, I was reading the Kobo and when I pulled it out today (out of the case) it was broken again! I do not understand how this could happen TWICE!! and I do not understand how Kobo thinks I am still in the wrong?! Obviously there is something wrong with the product that they do not want to fix. PLEASE DO NOT BUY FROM THERE...THERE ARE PROBABLY A LOT OF OTHER COMPANIES OUT THERE THAT WILL PROVIDE YOU EXCELLENT CUSTOMER SERVICE. BUT KOBO IS CRETAINLY NOT ONE OF THEM. I would give them no stars but there is no option for for that.

Yesterday, the screen on this eReader cracked (it was in my gym bag, so I guess it's my fault really), but I'm happy about it, because I can finally get a decent one (will try the one from Sony). First of all, forget about reading anything but novels on this thing. Navigating the book is a nightmare: slow and no way to jump to a specific page number, you have to flip one by one and hope the chapters are small. Any footnotes in the book are basically unreadable, as what I'm guessing are the "links" to footnotes do not work, and flipping back and forth is not worth it. There is no way to scroll left/right on eBooks, and I had a few tables with data in books being cut off. The opposite problem is present when reading PDFs, flipping pages is a nightmare as you have to basically scroll to the edge of a PDF and that function works incredibly slow. Wifi with protection is also practically impossible to use, as you enter the key with just one button. It took me 20 minutes to enter my wi-fi key, the eReader didn't connect and didn't even save the key. I tried again, in case I mistyped something, but it still didn't connect, so I gave up on that - 40 minutes of my life I'll never get back. The advertised dictionary for me worked only on the preloaded classics (option was not available from menu on anything else), and even then many words were not in it, and sometimes I couldn't even select the word I wanted to look up. If that's not enough, the power/sleep function works randomly: if you press the power button to put the device to sleep it shuts down, and the next time you want to read you have to wait forever for the device to boot up. Other times it goes to sleep when you want to power off. (I've read the manual about this, and it's definitely the device that is buggy) Another thing that always ticked me off is that it doesn't always remember the book you're reading (seems to happen when you have two or more books in "Reading Now"); basically every time you power off, you have to the go find and open the book again, combined with the sleep mode bug (above), this makes it more than minor annoyance. The overall interface is poorly designed and awkward to use. Also, as others pointed out, Kobo's customer service is non-existent. I sent them a message about the "add to my wishlist" button on their website that disappeared; found it myself (they renamed it to "Preview") and forgot about the whole thing. TWO MONTHS LATER they responded to me with a generic "try updating your browser" response. In summation, this device looks like it was designed on a minimal budget in a rush to push to the market. There are many better devices in the same price range from companies who provide better customer service... Just try someone else. I'll be buying the eReader from Sony today.

I bought the Original Kobo when it came out. Loved it until there was a software update...took it in to Chapters so they could do it (as per Kobo CS) and it broke when they turned it on. I had it sent away (after about 8 months of owning it) and they sent me a new one. I was told that there would be a new 1-year warranty on the "new" one. Lo and behold, a few weeks ago, I had the black and white striped screen and called re: a replacement only to be told that the "new" one they sent me was actually a refurbished one and that it only carried a 60 day warranty. I can send it in (and pay shipping to and from), pay $60+ per hour to have it fixed. No thanks, I will be buying an e-reader and all of my new books from Kindle. Terrible Customer Service. Did not stand behind their product and LIED to me about my warranty and my "new" (or should I say refurbished) e-reader. Buyer beware!

First I have rated this product as really liking it - Until yesterday. I have owned my KOBO wi-fi for one year. I take good care of this device and always keep it in a case. I loaded two new books on my computer yesterday and when I got my KOBO out to sync discovered the dreaded black band across the top of my screen. KOBO staes they can repair for $60 plus taxes and shipping but why bother. I will purchase another KOBO so I can read the books I have in my library but when I am caught up I will only download one at a time so that when this device dies I am not stuck buying another one and can purchase a Kindle instead.

I received this ereader for Christmas. When I drag and drop books some do not appear in my list of books, yet I see them when it is connected to the PC. PDF's do not enlarge properly - portions of the page appear offscreen. Battery life is not that great. It has been 1 week and I am still waiting for answers from customer support.

since i was little i loved books. When i found out about the first kobo, i just fell in love! reading is my fave time! it gets very hard to download books sometimes, but u get use to it. i find charging it alot more then normal ones tho. it it a nice big screen and good to press but takes a while to come on the page and have to press the pad alot. but reading is my fav thing to do, thats why i got this. and i hope it helps u. thanks! ; )

I am just about reading. This e-reader is perfect. It is simple and easy to use. I have had no troubles with it. I was not so sure about giving up my paperbacks. This is an excellent alternative as I go into the modern age. Love it.

While I love using my Kobo to read books I feel that after a fair amount of frustration I should warn potential Kobo buyers about at least one problem with the Kobo. One of the reasons that I ahve a Kobo is for the ease of reading a newspaper while going to work using the bus. However, this depends on actually getting the download of the subscription before I leave to go to work. In my case I subscribe to the Globe and Mail and most days the download is NOT available before I go to work and, since "old news" is, by definition, not "news", I am basically wasting $18 per month. I know that the Globe and Mail delivers the e-version of their product to Kobo by 5:30 a.m., so I is difficult to understand why Kobo seems unable to have it available for download when I leave to go to work. I have exchanged a lot of emails with Kobo on this and they seem unable or unwilling to address this problem. In fact, they are even often unwilling to respond to my emails on the subject. Therefore, if what you want is a convenient means of reading a newspaper in the morning, I am afraid that this is not going to work for you.

No problem with my Kobo! Bought it over a year ago and it's great! Battery lasts a long time (I always turn it off rather than put it in sleep mode). You can charge it with a phone charger as long as it's the right one! My son-in-law has a blackberry and I use his plug to recharge it (He has a spare one he keeps at my house). The free books are pretty old ones, but I have a read quie a few that I have never read before and quite enjoyed them! Hey, they're free! Can't please everyone, but I'm pleased with mine! - read less

Kobo is a poor product. It's fine so far as screen readability and weight. But the battery holds very little charge. And what's the only way to charge the battery? Through a port on your computer, which of course means that you cannot use this product when you travel unless you also take your computer. A genuinely idiotic idea. But in view of the short charge life of the battery, you had better take your computer everywhere. The last insultingly poor quality here is the 100 free books it comes with. They are mostly real chestnuts, showing no effort at imagination. And I was taken aback to see a number of typos in the one book I chose to read. How the heck do you get typos from scanned documents? I don't know, but Chapters-Indigo has discovered the secret.