No substitute for paper and pen

Laptops and Chromebooks are great for taking notes, but sometimes you still want to jot something down with a pen. Whether you’re drawing a graph or marking up a document, it’s much easier with a pen. Depending on how you process information, writing it may be much better than typing it into a document.

Unfortunately, tablets with a stylus can be expensive, and depending on how much you spend, the writing experience can be subpar. Boogie Board aims to make Blackboard affordable and give users the benefits of a pen and the ease of use of a tablet. Results have been mixed, but it might be worth checking out if you like writing notes.

Price and availability

Amazon is the best

Blackboard is available for $45 through Boogie Board and Amazon, but due to frequent sales, Blackboard sells for around $30. Boogie Board also offers a variety of sizes and accessories to carry your Blackboard, including folios and protective cases.

design

Always all plastic

Boogie Board kept the blackboard design simple. The thin plastic frame houses an 8.5″ x 11″ translucent LCD. The LCD is plastic and flimsy. I probably shouldn’t abuse the blackboard too much. Boogie Board also includes several templates to insert behind your blackboard, from weekly planners to grid lines.

Translucent LCDs have just the right amount of opacity to let the image through, so if none of them meet your needs, you can create your own. I found it great for tracing because you can copy the image to the blackboard. One coin-cell battery will power his Blackboard for several years.

Blackboard has the analog feel of Etch-a-Sketch, with three buttons on the top bezel controlling all features. The magnetic lip on the bottom fits well with the included pen and can be stored naturally when not in use.

The stylus has the right size and weight for a comfortable and natural writing experience. I can’t stand flimsy or unbalanced styluses, so I’m glad Boogie Board took the time to make a decent stylus. The top of the pen has a built-in eraser, but it only works if you’re desperate enough to put it into erase mode (more on that later).

take notes

Decent but not without flaws

Writing on the chalkboard is comfortable, and the plastic LCD provides enough resistance to the pen for a natural experience. I don’t like the stylus sliding along the glass surface. Blackboard isn’t a texture, but it’s good enough. Even if the writing is good, readability is another story. Blackboard’s LCD is dark green, and notes appear in lighter shades. If you grew up staring at an Apple II, you’ll find it pleasant, but it’s hard to see without a backlight.

When the lighting is dim, it’s nearly impossible to decipher notes and background templates. And if it’s too bright, the glare can create nightmares. If you want to start over, press the main button at the top and the slate will instantly be completely erased, revealing a new canvas.

Blackboard’s design further hinders readability. A pen is great for typing, but almost any pressure makes marks on the screen, so you can use your fingernail or other stylus to write if you want. Unfortunately, this added versatility poses a problem, as Blackboard lacks palm rejection capabilities. Without software on your device, it’s impossible to avoid it and the sensitivity is adjusted to accept almost anything as a writing instrument, leading to an awkward experience. In addition to palm marks, grazing the display from fingertips to knuckles can cause smudges, or worse.

Palm marks may be acceptable if there is an easy way to remove them. But Blackboard’s erasure feature only muddies the picture further. Boogie Board links to several videos on its website that teach users how to adjust the eraser. After a few tries, changing settings seemed to only make things worse, so I gave up. Instead of erasing the error, it just smudged and hid the text, resulting in a huge eye sore on the display.

Thankfully, Blackboard has a physical lock on the top bezel to prevent you from losing notes or adding marks to existing documents, but it doesn’t help with what’s already on the page. It wouldn’t be so bad if your smartphone’s capture software had the ability to filter out unnecessary input, but that leads to the next problem.

software

At least there’s an app

Boogie Board’s Blackboard app is available for Android and iOS. It’s designed to handle several categories of Boogie Board devices, so you’ll see options like Bluetooth, but they’re not available on Blackboard. If you add a page to the app, you’ll be asked to take a photo of Blackboard. Then convert the photo into a black and white image with notes, smudges, etc.

The app doesn’t eliminate typos, and the pages look like something you’d receive by fax in the early 90s. It works in a pinch, and I can understand most of what I write, but it’s not a pleasant experience. On the bright side, the app links to OneNote, Evernote, Google Drive, and Dropbox, making it easy to move notes around, but that doesn’t make up for the other complaints.

competition

What else could there be?

Rocketbook dominates the smart notebook space with a wide variety of products. The Rocketbook Core reusable notebook costs $37 and offers many of the benefits of Blackboard. Although it doesn’t have a pass-through LCD, the Rocketbook has 36-line pages and the flexibility to use any Frixion pen. When you finish reading a page, simply wipe it clean with a microfiber cloth and start over. Unless you’re into the idea of ​​a translucent LCD, the Rocketbook is worth a look.

Boogie Board also makes VersaTiles, a small whiteboard replacement product. It uses the same LCD technology as Blackboard, but because it’s wall-mounted, it eliminates many of Blackboard’s problems. It does not have an opaque display, making it easier to read. Because the VersaTile is wall-mounted, it is not vulnerable to palm prints or other unwanted input. Blackboard isn’t ideal for taking long notes, but it’s great for short reminders. At just $30, it might be the perfect thing to have on your fridge.

Should I buy it?

It’s hard to recommend Blackboard. I like the concept and can write naturally on the display, but it has too many drawbacks. It’s an ideal solution for quick notes, but when you’ve finished an hour-long lecture and your palm rests on the screen, the page looks like a disaster. I’d be more sympathetic if it were sold at a discount to its competitors, but Rocketbook’s more versatile options are available for less.

The translucent LCD is the main reason to choose Blackboard over all others. While it offers versatility that its competitors don’t, I doubt you’ll use it often enough to make it worth buying a boogie board. If the company finds a way to add palm rejection to Blackboard, analog or otherwise, I’ll be over the moon, but for now I’ll pass.