Tolino Shine 2 HD

Tolino Shine 2 HD: At a Glance

At the 2015 Frankfurt Book Fair, the Tolino Shine 2 HD was officially unveiled. This model is a refreshed edition of the very first Tolino eReader. The new version not only features updated technology, but also comes with a redesigned look.

The eBook reader uses a high-resolution E-Ink Carta display with 1448×1072 pixels. This results in a very high pixel density of 300 ppi across the 6-inch screen. In other words: the text now looks just like it’s printed. In our test, the new model was thoroughly convincing and is now easily on par with Amazon’s competition.

As with its predecessor, the Tolino Shine 2 HD comes with built-in front lighting, allowing you to read even in the dark. Compared to the first Shine, the lighting quality is vastly improved, making the Shine 2 HD well worth a closer look—even for owners of older Tolino models. As usual, operation is via touchscreen.

Since the release of the previous model, the software has been improved in many areas. The eReader is now on equal footing with competitors from Amazon and Kobo, both in terms of core features and user-friendliness. The user interface is easy to grasp—even for people new to technology. Advanced users can also root the device. Note: Root access is still possible, but with the new 11.x.xx firmware, it has become more difficult.

Page, Shine, Vision, or Epos

Currently, Tolino partners offer four different eBook reader models, each serving a specific market segment. So as a potential buyer, you shouldn’t have too much trouble choosing—provided you know the differences. Let’s take a quick look at what sets the four devices apart.

The Tolino Page is positioned as the entry-level model and comes without front lighting, so the price is lower. The Tolino Shine 2 HD is aimed at the mid-range segment and is positioned as a well-balanced all-rounder.

With the Tolino Vision 4 HD, you get one of the best 6-inch models on the market, featuring blue light reduction and water protection, but you’ll need to invest more for this premium model. The same goes for the Tolino Epos, which essentially offers the same technology as the Vision but features a large 7.8-inch display.

So as a buyer, you’ll first want to ask yourself two questions: how much are you willing to spend, and do you need blue light reduction? The Tolino Shine 2 HD offers excellent value for money, so you really can’t go wrong. However, the blue light reduction on the Tolino Vision 4 HD is a great bonus and worth the higher price.

Summary and Commentary

The Tolino Shine 2 HD is a high-quality device that can easily hold its own against the competition. In our test, it impressed with solid build quality and an excellent display. The lighting is even, the contrast is good, and the color temperature is pleasant. When it comes to advanced software features, though, the competition still has a slight edge.

Buy Tolino Shine 2 HD

Still undecided? Our detailed review below offers an in-depth look at the build quality, display, and software of the Tolino Shine 2 HD.

Tolino Shine 2 HD: Full Review

With the launch of the Shine 2 HD, the Tolino alliance has revamped its first jointly developed eReader after more than two years. The model has been completely overhauled. It’s been given an entirely new display and has shed its somewhat dated retro look.

The new Tolino Shine confidently positions itself as a competitor to the Kindle Paperwhite. In the review below, we’ll see whether this eBook reader lives up to the “Paperwhite killer” claim.

Build & features

Let’s start with the most obvious change: the housing of the Tolino Shine 2 HD has been completely redesigned and looks refreshingly modern. The matte-black finish absorbs incoming light and isn’t overly prone to fingerprints.

Good in-hand feel

The material (used on both the front and back) feels relatively soft and is very pleasant to the touch.

Compared to the first Shine, the new model is noticeably shorter and now measures 164.2 x 113.5 x 9.3 mm. The predecessor was 175 x 116 x 9.7 mm. The difference in size is clear to see and feel. The area below the screen has been reduced most, but the other bezels are slimmer as well. That doesn’t hurt handling one bit. The relatively low weight of 184 grams reinforces the positive impression. For comparison: at 205 grams, the Kindle Paperwhite is noticeably heavier.

Build quality is very good overall. Only the back rattles a bit if you tap it with a finger. Not as pronounced as on the Kobo Glo HD, but noticeable nonetheless. Otherwise, there are no creaks or clicks. The annoying USB cover on the previous model is thankfully gone.

The two buttons on the top edge. The light button finally has a distinct tactile click.

Right away you’ll notice the buttons have crisp, satisfying clicks. On the first Shine, the light button was so mushy you couldn’t tell if you’d pressed it or not. That’s history now. All buttons have clear tactile feedback. The home button is still a physical button (i.e., not capacitive like on the Vision). It’s a bit smaller than before and requires slightly more pressure. The shallow indentation is a nice touch that feels good.

Unlike the housing, the feature set hasn’t evolved only for the better. The removal of the memory card slot is particularly annoying.

When Tolino first dropped it on the Vision 2, I assumed it was to accommodate waterproofing. Since the new Tolino Shine doesn’t offer water protection, the reason is likely cost savings. A stronger push toward the Telekom cloud could also be a factor. In other words: as with the competition (Kindle Paperwhite and Kobo Glo HD), you’ll have to make do with internal storage. Out of the box you get 1.99 GB free, which typically holds around 2,000 ePub eBooks. While that should be enough for most users, the reduced flexibility is still a pity.

Wi-Fi is of course on board again, letting you go online and access the built-in store. The bigger change, as mentioned at the outset, concerns the display. Let’s take a closer look.

Display & lighting

The old Tolino Shine had only an E Ink Pearl display with a 1024×758 pixel resolution. That was solid at launch, but just six months later the Kindle Paperwhite 2 arrived with the much better E Ink Carta technology. Since then, the Shine was considered a budget entry-level device.

That’s over now. The new Shine 2 HD has a 6-inch E Ink Carta display with the same high resolution as its main rival. It offers 1448×1072 pixels for a pixel density of 300 ppi. This time the Tolino alliance doesn’t have to worry about being outgunned by Amazon again, since the Paperwhite hit the market only a few months earlier.

Excellent edge sharpness thanks to the infrared touchscreen.

The device uses an infrared touchscreen. Aside from the light guide layer, that means there’s no additional coating on the e-paper panel. Under the microscope, this pays off: edge sharpness is better than on the Paperwhite and on par with the Kobo Glo HD. Touch responsiveness is flawless.

There have been all kinds of rumors about display contrast—even though the Shine 2 HD wasn’t yet available when we conducted this test. In practice, the eReader proves to be a solid device with a great real-world implementation.

Against the industry leader Kindle Paperwhite (right), the Tolino Shine 2 HD (left) easily holds its own. Both devices are neck and neck.

With the light off, our real-world measurement shows a contrast ratio of 7.75:1. That puts the new Shine squarely between the Kobo Glo HD and Kindle Paperwhite. The improvement over its predecessor is dramatic. The old Shine looks low-contrast by comparison. The comparison image with the light on below illustrates the difference very well.

In other words: the Shine 2 HD is very legible—both against the current competition and especially compared to its predecessor. There’s nothing to complain about here.

Note: To make differences between models even clearer, the measurement method and the light source were changed again. The numbers below were remeasured and aren’t directly comparable with older figures (from previous tests). These are real-world measurements, not maximum contrast ratios.

Contrast ratio with no light (higher is better)

• Kobo Aura H2O 8.98
• Kindle Voyage 8.48
• Bookeen Muse Frontlight 8.25
• Kindle Paperwhite 2 8.0
• Kobo Glo HD 7.99
• Tolino Shine 2 HD 7.75
• Kindle Paperwhite 3 7.61
• Tolino Vision 2 7.48
• PocketBook Touch Lux 3 7.45
• Tolino Vision 1 6.96

With the frontlight on, the good impression continues. Contrast improves visibly and again matches the high level of the two competitors. The washed-out look of the predecessor is gone: with the light on, the Shine 2 HD looks crisp and sharp.

The frontlight also makes sense during the day.

Contrast ratio X:1, at full brightness (higher is better)

• Bookeen Muse Frontlight 10.78
• Kindle Voyage 10.5
• Kobo Aura H2O 10.0
• PocketBook Touch Lux 3 9.54
• Kindle Paperwhite 3 9.33
• Kobo Glo HD 9.21
• Tolino Shine 2 HD 9.1
• Kindle Paperwhite 2 9.0
• Tolino Vision 2 7.4
• Tolino Vision 1 6.5

One more big plus: ghosting while reading is extremely low. I haven’t seen another device (apart from the Vision 3 HD!) with such minimal ghosting. Even after countless page turns, there’s virtually no trace of previous pages “showing through.”

The manufacturer clearly knows this: in the device settings, the full-page refresh is set to “never” by default. Alternatively, you can set it to refresh every 10 pages, 20 pages, etc.

You’ll only notice ghosting when opening various menus. Usually the screen then refreshes automatically, so there are no issues while reading.

Brightness and quality of the frontlight

It’s worth noting that the device’s frontlight has a hidden higher setting. That means if you just use the regular slider in the menu, the maximum brightness is a rather modest 45 cd/m²—about the level of the predecessor.

If you go into the device settings and press and hold the right-hand light icon, you can unlock a brighter mode. With this new maximum, the frontlight jumps to a much brighter 89 cd/m².

A hidden mode to increase maximum brightness.

Why the developers opted for such a hidden mode is a mystery to me, honestly. When you unlock it, a pop-up warns that battery life may suffer. In my view, that’s negligible. Even though the test period was relatively short, I didn’t notice any unusual battery drain.

Maximum screen brightness in cd/m² (higher is better)

• Kindle Voyage 122
• Kindle Paperwhite 3 115
• Kobo Glo HD 114
• Kobo Aura 112
• PocketBook Touch Lux 3 111
• Kobo Aura H2O 99
• Kindle Paperwhite 2 91
• Tolino Shine 2 HD 89
• PocketBook Sense 70
• Icarus Illumina 2015 60
• Tolino Vision 2 53
• Tolino Shine 41

The minimum brightness of 2 cd/m² is low enough to avoid glare in a dark room. Unlike the Kindle competitors, you can also turn the light off completely.

Minimum screen brightness in cd/m² (lower is better)

• Tolino Shine 2.4
• PocketBook Sense 2.4
• Tolino Vision 2 2.2
• Tolino Shine 2 HD 2.0
• PocketBook Touch Lux 3 1.6
• Kobo Glo HD 1.4
• Kobo Aura H2O 1.2
• Kobo Aura 1.2
• Icarus Illumina 2015 0.7
• Kindle Voyage 0.2
• Kindle Paperwhite 2 0.2
• Kindle Paperwhite 3 0.2

Light quality is also impressive. While the previous model showed visible color and brightness gradients, there’s no sign of that here. On the contrary: the illumination is exceptionally even, with no noteworthy artifacts.

One of the most uniform frontlights I’ve seen to date

If you tweak the photo to exaggerate inconsistencies, the light cones along the bottom edge become more visible, as does a very faint color shift that you won’t notice with the naked eye.

Image manipulation can reveal irregularities—but there are hardly any here.

The color temperature on our test device is a neutral white and very close to that of the Kobo Glo HD. It’s worth noting, however, that normal production tolerances can lead to slightly different LED hues. That’s true for every manufacturer because LED production varies. What matters is that only LEDs of the same hue are used within a single device.

The Shine 2 HD’s frontlight (left) is light-years ahead of its predecessor (right)

Bottom line: the Tolino Shine 2 HD’s display is convincing. It may not have the absolute best panel on the market (that crown still goes to the Kobo Aura H2O), but with this excellent showing it finally catches up to Amazon and Kobo. In my view, this is the first time the Tolino alliance has offered a device that’s technically on par with the competition—no ifs, ands, or buts. From a value-for-money perspective, it’s spot on. For Shine 1 owners, upgrading is a no-brainer (see photo).

Reading & usability

Tolino users will feel right at home on the Shine 2 HD. After the familiar initial setup with language selection, Wi-Fi (optional) and store login (optional), you’re guided through a brief quick-start, then land on the familiar home screen.

That does mean you still have to put up with the non-removable store recommendations that take up almost half the home screen.

Unfortunately, recommendations from the connected store still can’t be hidden

Otherwise, operation holds no surprises: the system is very responsive and the layout familiar. A few icons were visually tweaked for the higher pixel density. A vector font is now used so icons look razor sharp at any resolution.

Library and reading

The library hasn’t changed either. eBooks can still be displayed in a grid or list view and sorted by recency, title, author, or recently added. Tolino’s proprietary collections system is back as well. It lets you better sort titles by category, but unfortunately can’t be synced with Calibre tags.

Since the last software update, you can finally swipe between library pages. Previously you had to use the virtual buttons at the bottom of the screen. That worked fine, but wasn’t as intuitive.

Library

If you’re signed in to the built-in store, all titles in the cloud are shown as well. They’re marked with a small cloud icon and can be downloaded with a tap.

Open an eBook with a tap. You can then turn pages with a swipe, or by tapping the predefined screen areas.

The text settings still let you adjust the font (Fira, Dosis, Linux Libertine, Droid Serif, Rokkitt, and publisher font), size in seven steps, as well as line spacing and margins in three steps each. For alignment you can choose justified, ragged-right, or centered.

Adjusting text display

There’s no time-to-chapter/book estimate, but a tap will show you the remaining pages to the next chapter.

Highlights, notes & dictionary

Tap and hold a word to open a context menu. From there you can create highlights and notes, or use the dictionary.

Entering notes works great on the very responsive on-screen QWERTZ keyboard. Highlights are shown with a light gray background, notes in dark gray. They’re also saved together with bookmarks in an external TXT file so you can easily process them later on a PC.

The dictionary would be better if it displayed inline, not in a separate full-screen window

The dictionary offers two modes: definitions and translations. The following are included:

• German
• English
• French
• Italian
• Dutch
• Spanish
• English–German
• English–Italian
• French–German
• Italian–German
• Italian–French
• Italian–Spanish
• Dutch–German
• Dutch–English
• Dutch–French
• Dutch–Norwegian
• Spanish–German

Although these Wiktionary-based dictionaries don’t match the quality of editorial ones (like Duden), the breadth of translation dictionaries into German is a real plus. Most other manufacturers only offer translations into English.

The way definitions are displayed isn’t ideal, as they open in a full-screen window and require an extra tap. Inline pop-ups, as on Amazon and Kobo, are more intuitive—and something I’d like to see Tolino adopt.

PDF viewing

PDF support is a mixed bag. On the plus side, the extremely high pixel density means even large-format files are readable at their original size. The text is tiny, but still legible.

The minuscule text in this PDF can actually still be deciphered with the naked eye—thanks to the 300 ppi display

There’s also a landscape mode that improves readability. You can zoom in stepwise with pinch-to-zoom. As a bonus, there’s a text reflow mode. In our tests, even large, image-heavy PDFs (up to 100 MB) opened reliably.

As with earlier models, no additional viewing modes are available. You won’t find margin crop, column mode, contrast boost, etc.

Miscellaneous

With the latest software update, the Tolino Shine 2 HD’s browser finally got bookmarks back. Previously, the Android browser’s features were unnecessarily limited, making it harder to use. That’s no longer the case. You can conveniently bookmark Onleihe, alternative stores, and other websites (e.g., for news) for quick, easy access.

Thanks to its Android base, the browser is responsive and loads pages quickly and reliably.

Buying books in the integrated store—shown here: eBook.de

As usual, you buy eBooks via the built-in store. Which store you get depends on where you purchased your Tolino Shine. You can’t change it afterward. Handily, you can use the so-called library link to connect accounts from different Tolino alliance stores. For example, if you bought your eReader at eBook.de but previously purchased most of your eBooks at Thalia, you can still link your Thalia account. The books from that other account will then be synced as well.

Android rooting for tinkerers and modders

A big plus for tinkerers is not only the above-mentioned ability to swap out the internal memory card, but also the option to root the Android operating system. The you’ll find the full rooting guide here.

A great option for tinkerers, too. Shown here: an alternative home screen thanks to root.

Android 4.0.4 is usually hidden beneath the Tolino interface and not accessible. With a few steps, you can root the OS and enable app installations. In other words: if you want, you can install Android apps.

That lets you expand the eReader with all kinds of useful functions. Among other things, you can even use the Skoobe eBook flat-rate subscription, which is a huge plus for heavy readers.

Conclusion

Ahead of the Frankfurt Book Fair it was already clear the Tolino alliance would equip its two new eReaders with HD displays. As always, the big question was how well they’d deliver in practice. Previous Tolino models were consistently mid-pack—good, but not outstanding. That finally changes now.

The Tolino Shine 2 HD shows there’s another way. It not only introduces new tech, it’s also truly on technical par with the competition for the first time. The high-resolution E Ink Carta display convinces both with and without the light and impresses with even illumination and a pleasant color temperature. The new Shine has nothing to fear from the competition.

The Tolino Shine 2 HD hits the market with a bang. Great hardware, solid software, good price.

It also surprises with extremely low ghosting. Page turns are quick and avoid the usual flicker.

It’s a bit of a shame that, unlike the hardware, the software hasn’t seen improvements. Essentially, everything stays the same. The resources were likely spent adapting the system to the new pixel density.

Even though the functionality is overall good and straightforward, some things could still be improved. First and foremost, the Tolino alliance should enhance the dictionary and overhaul the collections feature (to better support Calibre). More extensive PDF options would be nice, too, though that’s probably less important for most users.

In the end, the booksellers’ alliance delivers a wonderful reading device with the Tolino Shine 2 HD. In our test, the eReader earns an excellent 1.4. The two main competitors—Kindle Paperwhite and Kobo Glo HD—score slightly higher due to more feature-rich software, but they should still be looking over their shoulders. I wouldn’t be surprised if the Glo HD’s price drops in the medium term (it’s currently 10 euros more than the Shine).

One last note: for owners of the previous model, the upgrade is definitely worth it. Not only are the higher resolution and newer E Ink Carta tech convincing; the screen illumination and contrast are also vastly better than before.

Photos

Alternatives

The most attractive alternative to the Shine 2 HD is likely the technically equivalent Kindle Paperwhite. It’s sometimes even easier and more convenient to use, but it locks you into Amazon’s store. On the flip side, frequent Kindle deals often make it cheaper.

Also worth a look: the PocketBook Touch HD, which offers a few goodies for advanced users—including the best library management, a memory card slot, and audio support.

Predecessor

The Tolino Shine 2 HD not only successfully continues the Shine line, it finally lights a fire under the Kindle Paperwhite, its main rival, from a technical standpoint. Compared to the old Shine, contrast, resolution, frontlight, and design have all improved.

Tolino Shine 2 HD: Technical Specifications

All information provided without guarantee.