Will a digital paperless notebook save you from that infinite doom scroll? Or is an analog journal still your best shot at happiness and productivity? I’m going to show you how to get it done. There was a time we put pen to paper not to be efficient, but to be present. When the scratch of a pencil meant something real was taking shape. Now it’s tap, swipe, delete. A stylus where a smudge used to live. A screen instead of a page. We’ve made everything easier. But maybe we’ve lost something along the way. Because there’s a kind of magic in the slow, in the shuffle of cards, in paper that folds and ink that stains. These moments ask more of us and give something back we forgot we needed. And in a world racing forward, maybe what we’re craving most is what we left behind. [Music] Okay, so this is a notebook. This is a notebook. Okay, kind of like an iPad, but thinner. Has a battery, has a backlight, has a stylus that also magnetically connects to the side, comes in a little folio case, and uh for all intent and purpose, this is a this is a pretty cool device. It’s supposed to mimic and replace your analog paper journal. Now, if you watch this channel, you know I’m a big journal guy. I love writing in my notebook, my ideas, my to-do lists, regular thoughts, daily thoughts. I use it as a scrapbook. I put photos inside it. Put everything inside it. It’s a staple of my everyday process. Without it, I don’t know that I could function. It is at this point like a drug, a useful, healthy drug. So, can this replace it? This is supposed to mimic what it feels like to write on paper. Supposed to sound what it sounds like to write on paper. supposed to have a great battery life up to a week. Has a backlight so you can use it at night. You can archive all your notes, cloud storage, backup, note takingaking. It’s an e- in reader that has color. So, by definition, this should be one of the greatest things I’ve ever purchased, but I’m here to tell you I don’t know that I really like it. Let me start with the things I do think are cool. I think having instant access to every single note that you’ve ever taken is amazing, especially if you’re on a call and you’re just jotting notes down. Being able to pull those up in a moment’s notice from a neatly organized file structure is awesome. And anywhere they’re stored locally on this device and you can also store them on the cloud. That way you can pull them onto your phone using an app and you’re never without your notes. That’s the hope. I will say when I want to find a video idea or something that I remember writing down, trying to go back and and find the actual physical book that I wrote it in, find the actual page that I wrote it on, and then hope that it’s legible. Most cases it is, but there’s times that can be tedious, especially if you’re in a spot where you don’t have access to your notebooks. You only have the notebook you have on you, and maybe you don’t even have that on you. You’ve almost always got your phone. So, being able to access the app that this partners with to get your notes is pretty cool. I think it’s great for travel. When you’re the last one up on a flight, it’s dark, everyone’s windows are down, and you want to write in your notebook. You’re not the one guy turning your light on and crushing everyone around you. This has a really soft, dim backlight. You can use that when you’re traveling. It has that kind of backboard because it is solid. It’s easy to write on. If you’re using your lap, if you’re somewhere where you’re not at a table, I think this is great. It’s pretty cool being able to change your pen style, but we’re used to that. If you ever used an iPad or any kind of drawing app, it’s old news. But that’s about where it ends for me. The things I don’t like about this is that it still requires a battery. Even though you can charge it and it will last for up to seven days, I don’t ever want to be in a spot where I’m like, uh, I can’t use my notebook because it’s out of batteries. That’s just not something you would ever have to think about when you are writing in a paper journal. One of the same reasons I love shooting film, by the way, because it’s like my memory card or the battery in my camera. All those things that can typically go wrong with technology, I don’t have to worry about out the window. Uh, again, all those things are back when you’re using something like this. It curls like smoke, but heavier, thicker, slow motion, spilling into nothing. Edges blur, lines collapse, one shape becomes another, and then disappears. There’s something honest in that. No control, no clean lines, just a trace of where it went. The backlight on this is not very strong. Yes, it’s a backlight and it’s usable, so it gets the job done. You can actually use this in the dark now, whereas the previous versions you could not. Is it a great backlight? No. the footage at the beginning when I was using this and the backlight looks super strong. I actually had my iPhone in front of this because this didn’t give off enough light to even know if the backlight was working. So, it seems like a good upgrade because it does render it now useful. I can actually use it in the dark. It’s just not the greatest. But, it’s still like a bit laggy. And I guess that’s just the nature of an e- in reader. When you highlight something, you got to kind of wait for a second for it to refresh itself and then the color shows up. But in 2025 and with how instant everything is, if I’m going to use technology, I want it to be instant. If I’m going to go ahead and and subscribe to this, and I’m coming from a world where iPads and things like that exist, I expect instant everything. Especially for the price tag that this comes at, which is another one of my negatives. This is $1,000. $1,000. I get that there’s a lot of technology packed into it, but it’s $1,000. Like there’s versions of the iPads that cost less and can do infinitely more. So you’re paying more money to get less features to do something a journal can do for you for five bucks. And there’s just a there’s a disconnect here that I just I I get it, but I don’t get it. And it makes me mad, but I understand it. And then I bought it. And then that’s like, oh yeah, you bought it. Now I should you got to use it. Like I should sell it, but I got to make it. It’s $1,000. That’s crazy. On top of the price, you got to pay a subscription for this. If you want all that cloud storage and access with the apps that you can get to your notes and have them synced and all that stuff, you’ve got to pay a monthly fee to use Remarkable Pro. Not stoked on that. Oh, you want to know what time it is on your phone? Subscription. Check your battery status subscription to know what your battery status is. Oh, you like that backlight? Yeah, that’s go. You got to pay for every moment you have it on. Subscription to the backlight. got a little carried away. I’ll admit I’m just not a fan of the subscription. Now, I don’t think every single e- in reader that mimics a journal, a paperless journal, is subscription-based. So, don’t just blanket that across every device that’s ever been made. There’s other versions of this type of tech that are very popular. This is just the one that I chose cuz I see it around the most. And I I don’t think it sucks. I just don’t think it’s for me. I think I can do everything this can do with a $5 journal and a 10-centent pen. I love writing in my journal. I love making it neat. I love organizing it. I love scrapbooking it. It’s kind of like a work of art at the end. And that’s just how I like to do it. If I’m going to use something that’s going to be way more messy and I don’t care about, I’m probably going to use my field notes. And that’s where I just jot stuff down and to-do list and I rip pages out and tape. It’s wild west with the field notes. But when I’m writing in a bigger journal, I I want to be able to go back and cite it like a like a textbook. And they’re fun to look back on and read on and look at all the pictures I stick in there. Big nerd if you didn’t know. So, if I’m taking notes on a call, I love that I can just scribble them down on this and not care about that. Whereas, if I was taking notes in my journal, uh, I’d be way slower just because I’d be meticulously taking my time to underline and highlight and and make it look good. And that’s just part of what I enjoy about that process, that analog process. But this makes me more efficient in the terms of I can just like blast it onto the page and be done and move on with my life. So, that’s cool. Now, one of the big features of this is supposed to be that it feels like you’re writing on paper. and they’ve done a pretty good job. It’s definitely better than writing on an iPad. When you have an Apple Pencil and you’re writing on an iPad and you’re got that smooth glass, no matter if you put a screen protector on it or a matte screen protector or something to make it feel a little bit more give it more friction. This is still the best I’ve ever felt as far as a digital device feeling like paper. It’s definitely not paper and it definitely is like you can’t mistake it. It’s just not. The other thing that drives me nuts is the nibs on these wear down so fast. Maybe I’m just like I I press harder when I write. This kind of gives a bit of the same thing with those nibs wearing down. It’s sharp and crisp on one side, then if you just barely rotate it, it’s soft again. And I’ve also found the nibs come out like super easy. They give you a tool, but I I can just pull it right off. I don’t need a tool. It just literally pulls straight off. And like this was an upgrade because this version had the eraser on it. It’s the other thing. If you want the good stylus, you got to pay more for that. It’s gone. Look like Look at It’s crazy. Here’s a closeup of that. Just pops right off. Anyway, so I think if you were someone that’s like, I love journaling. I love taking notes. I think I want to get something that I can put in my bag and travel with and use on the fly. I don’t think I could recommend this. I don’t think this is the answer. I think it’s cool and I think it’s like a pretty good device, but I think it falls short in so many categories that I would just rather use a cheap journal that gives me more dopamine, joy, and use case for literally a fraction the smallest sliver of the price of having to pay for this. I think too in this day and age like we are craving nostalgia. It’s trendy. It’s popular. What’s old is new again. And everything always recycles. putting pen to paper is just there’s there’s something primal about it and I don’t think it’ll ever be eclipsed by anything digital. I feel like I’m on this thing. Like I don’t I I don’t mean to. I’m just trying to give you the uh Yeah, I think for some people it’s probably dope. I think if you’re a journal enthusiast and someone that loves tracking habits and loves loves the process of that because the process is what heals and grows and helps you that that is inherently what makes journaling successful and worthwhile. You don’t get that with this. When you feel accomplished in anything, even in your job, leaving at the end of the day, if you feel like I did something, I moved the needle, that feeling is is powerful and that’ll help you move forward. And you get that on a daily basis when you use something like an analog journal. Just tracking your spending, tracking your fitness, tracking your meals. When you can look back at a finished chart amongst everything else you fill those pages with, that is a feeling of accomplishment that is immeasurable. On top of the data that you now have that you can log and flip back on, it’s single-handedly the greatest tool that I have ever used for my creative brain. And I have severe ADHD diagnosed. This practice helps with those things. I hope you got some value out of this. Thank you so much for watching this video. I appreciate you being here. If you want to see more videos like this, hit the like button, subscribe if you haven’t already, and and I will see you in the next video. Peace. Heat. [Music] [Applause] [Music] Heat. [Music]