I used to be a huge fan of these guys, going as far as buying their extremely expensive $800 device as gifts for a few friends, but now I advise anybody and everybody against ever giving them money

Two separate reasons.

One: they design hardware very poorly, and when advised and shown, do not fix it. I am convinced this is on purpose, and this saddens me. I can share my email exchange where i advised them on this. Did not go anywhere. This has been the cause of a lot of broken USB C ports on remarkable2. I have documented this extensively with photos on multiple devices. No sane person places a USB-C port that will interact with the a real user in the real world, handling insertion/removal forces on the very very edge (less than 1mm from edge) of a very very thin (0.4m thick IIRC) PCB, without affixing it to something else as well -- to take the load. They did. Predictably, it breaks.

Photos: https://photos.app.goo.gl/eu4P8fnaNtV9vhMo7 . The video in there, via microscope, you can see how the contacts peeled off. Larger photos show the PCB and how the connector is "affixed". Final photo is after it was fixed, but before the epoxy was added by me

Two: they took features that were part of the original very expensive product, bought under the understanding that "I pay you much $$, you do not nickel and dime me ever again", and locked them behind paywalls of monthly service years after original purchase. They did sort-of grandfather-in all existing users, but not if you reset the device or gift/transfer it. Devaluing/crippling products post facto is something that should never be rewarded. Companies that do that should fail.

Please help reMerkable fail for the above anti-user behaviour. They deserve it.

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benji_is_me 5 days ago | parent | next [-]

Another hardware issue they have is the tip of the Marker Plus. It has a thin collar around the nib that (in my experience) is brittle and breaks off, at which point the marker becomes useless because the nib flexes. There are lots of posts on Reddit complaining about the same issue.

They replaced mine the first time this happened. Now my replacement broke and they aren't replacing it :(.

With that being said, I'm still very happy with my RM2. I purchased a "V-Pen" as a replacement and it's working okay. I'm lucky enough to have a free connect subscription for life because I purchased it early enough.

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sowbug 5 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

When I bought mine, I appreciated that they seemed to be pricing it to make a profit as a product, not as a loss-leading foothold for future subscription revenue. How naive I was to think they wouldn't do both.

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choilive 5 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I have a friend that went through 3 remarkables due to failures, I didnt dig into the root cause but I suspect you might be right on the USB-C port since they all "stopped charging".

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whatevertrevor 5 days ago | parent | next [-]

They also have the USB C charging quirk/cheap-out that if they're completely drained they will only charge with a low powered trickle charger until the device gets to some minimal level of charge, and then you can use a higher power source.

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dmitrygr 5 days ago | parent | prev [-]

It is TERRIBLE IDIOTIC INANE design: https://photos.app.goo.gl/eu4P8fnaNtV9vhMo7

the video in there, via microscope, you can see how the contacts peeled off. Larger photos show the PCB and how the connector is "affixed". Final photo is after it was fixed, but before the epoxy

	▲	choilive 5 days ago \| parent [-]
		Hilarious. Especially compared to the USB-C connector on an iPhone, which is secured by 6 (!!!) screws to the frame.

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mmastrac 5 days ago | parent | prev [-]

I use a magnetic charger adapter for mine. I can see how these could break over time but the magnet has never failed me.