this post was submitted on 01 Nov 2023
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Remarkable

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What aspects/features of reMarkable 2 require a subscription to work?

I would say my interest is in using it to take class notes and use it during Zoom calls to diagram live.

I am very interested in the product.

At the same time, I have exactly zero interest in the subscription.

I generally avoid anything that bleeds money from you every month. Very soon you are spending tons of money per month and you didn't notice you are being bled to death.

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[โ€“] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

There are three "levels" of the reMarkable Connect service ...

  • the paid subscription
  • the free service
  • not connecting at all

These are reMarkable's official information about what is and is not included with the subscription.

I got my first tablet (I own two) back in June, and have not allowed either of them to connect to the reMarkable cloud service at all, so everything below is based on what I've seen and read from other people.

  • The reMarkable Connect service is hosted on google's EU cloud. I don't trust google as far as I could throw them, which is the biggest reason my tablets (I have two) don't connect to the service.

  • When a tablet is linked to the cloud service, the reMarkable servers are the only thing they talk to. The integrations with google drive, dropbox, and whatever microsoft calls their file sharing thing this week, all work by giving the reMarkable Connect servers access to your accounts with those other services. (I don't know if the third party integrations require a paid Connect subscription, or if they work with the free plan.)

  • The handwriting recognition functionality is done by a third party. The pen-stroke data is sent from the tablet to reMarkable, who forwards it on to MyScript for processing. If the reMarkable servers are not accessible, handwriting recognition won't work.

From my own experience, a lot of functionality is still available with the tablets not connected to reMarkable Connect.

  • The tablet will still synchronize its clock (using NTP), and check for software updates, without being linked to a reMarkable Connect account.

  • The tablet has a VERY simple web interface built into it. When you connect the tablet to a computer, you can visit http://10.11.99.1/ on the computer. This interface allows you to download documents (as PDF files), and upload PDF and EPUB files. One of the settings screens has a switch to enable and disable this web interface.

Not related to the Connect service at all ...

  • The tablet is running Linux. You can SSH into the tablet as root, one of the settings screens will give you the tablet's root password. Be careful though, the tablet's warranty covers the hardware. If you type the wrong command and break the software, reMarkable may not be willing (or able) to help you.

  • The tablet comes with a collection of "templates", which are "background images" for the pages in a notebook. An example is horizontal lines, like you would see on the pages of a writing pad, or the grid pattern you see on "graph paper". The reMarkable software has no way to let users manage these templates, however it is possible to upload new templates via SSH if you know what you're doing.

  • The same is true of the screens that the tablet shows when it's sleeping or powered off. The reMarkable software doesn't provide a way to manage them, but if you know what you're doing with SSH, you can customize them.

  • There are several programs out there which can be used to manage the tablet directly, rather than using a cloud account. I use RCU (which costs $12/yr) to upload and download documents and templates, plus it provides a "virtual printer" function where my computer can "print" to it, and the output that would normally have been printed on paper, ends up being saved as a PDF on the tablet instead. Notable Utility is free, it lets you upload images for sleep screens. I've seen several others but don't have links handy, spend some time reading through this sub and you'll come across most of them.

  • There are also programs out there which talk to the reMarkable Connect servers to upload and download files from your tablet. These don't talk to the tablet directly, they rely on the tablet's automatic sync functionality to actually get the files into and out of the tablet.