Just learned about Parachute Backup from the Mac Power Users and it is great! It downloaded the entire iCloud Photo library onto my NAS, which is worth the price of admission all by itself. But, it didn’t stop there. It also organized all of my photos and videos by year and month. Now, I have my backup and I can use the media in it’s organized state with other apps like Plex. I love it and highly recommend it.
Here are my takeaways for Apple’s September 9, 2025 event. It is not a comprehensive list of everything they announced, but what I thought was interesting.
• Heart rate monitor • 4× better Active Noise Cancelling (ANC) • Language translation • Includes 5 ear tips • 8 hours of battery with ANC on • 10 hours of battery with transparency on • Same $249 price tag
Here are some things that I don’t like about the reMarkable Paper Pro Move.
The hefty price tag. At close to $650 for the tablet, pen, and folio bundle (including sales tax), it’s a significant investment.
Poor accessibility for visually impaired users. As someone with visual impairment, I find the menus extremely difficult to see, if I can see them at all. The background templates—like lined, grid, or dot paper—are virtually impossible for me to make out. This means I frequently need assistance from a sighted person or my assistive technology to navigate basic functions.
The subscription model. The $2.99 monthly fee for reMarkable’s Connect service is a sticking point for many users, myself included. However, the more I use it, the more I appreciate its benefits. With the free 100-day trial, I suspect it’ll become indispensable, and I’ll gladly pay for it once the trial ends.
Constant passcode entry. I understand the security reasoning, but having to enter the passcode every time I wake the tablet becomes tedious quickly.
My handwriting somehow gets worse. This one’s a “me” issue, but I don’t like how I write on the tablet. You’d think it would feel just like writing on paper, but for some reason, my handwriting actually deteriorates on the device.
Tiny menu fonts. The menus use incredibly small fonts that even some sighted people in my life struggle with—though maybe that’s because they’re over 40 years “young.” (See what I did there?)
It’s not silent like paper. While I dislike the click-clacking sound my iPad makes when writing on glass, this tablet produces similar noises. It’s not the mostly silent experience of writing on actual paper. Perhaps I need to write with a lighter touch—time will tell.
Durability concerns for daily use. I plan to carry this tablet everywhere, but it feels fragile with no IP rating for dust or water protection. I’m not planning beach trips or rain writing sessions, but it rains almost daily where I live, and sometimes I have to dash from my car to work. For this price point, I wish it offered some weather and dust protection.
Zoom lag issues. Since I need to zoom in on my writing periodically, I’ve noticed the tablet occasionally lags during this function. Sometimes it takes two or three attempts before it responds to my zoom gesture.
Here are the things I like about my new reMarkable Paper Pro Move, in no specific order.
Tomorrow, I will share the things I do not like about the tablet, so don’t be shy and come on by.
I ordered the reMarkable Paper Pro Move from Amazon the other day and was expecting to receive it this upcoming Tuesday. Then I found out it was available locally at Best Buy. I quickly checked the order status on Amazon and, since it hadn’t shipped yet, I cancelled it and reordered it. I got it this past Friday, instead. Four days earlier.
At this point, I’ve had it for just over 24 hours but haven’t put it down for any length of time while awake. At first, I was just forcing myself to use it. I was writing down anything and everything I could think of. I even played tic-tac-toe with my wife as she rolled her eyes. Just kidding—she was a great sport about it. I thought it was cool but was still on the fence about it. I told myself I would sleep on it and decide whether it was worth the investment. Don’t get me wrong, the technology and premise behind it is great, but I have to make my decision from the perspective of a visually impaired person. I love tech, but it has to work for me. So far, this wasn’t really doing it for me because the UI wasn’t set up for a person with low vision. It’s too small, and since it was new to me, I hadn’t developed any kind of muscle memory to navigate it with any sort of ease or proficiency. In fact, it was frustrating me.
Well, I slept on it and woke up thinking of returning it when I second-guessed myself and decided I just hadn’t spent enough time with it yet. I really wanted it to work for me but hadn’t found justification to keep it. So I decided to grab it from my nightstand and write a list of pros and cons right on the tablet, which I did.
I am still finalizing the list, so come by tomorrow and check it out.
A couple of weeks ago, I started to revisit Obsidian and have been using it daily for both work and personal projects. In fact, I’m writing this very post using it. Throughout each day, I jot down daily notes to maintain a running log of various activities, use Obsidian databases to track work-related items, and draft blog posts like this one.
For those who are new to Obsidian or returning to it after some time away, this video might be helpful. While it’s a bit lengthy, it covers the fundamentals needed to get up and running. It’s essentially a compilation of many of Nick Milo’s Obsidian tutorials.
The reMarkable Paper Pro Move was recently released and I ordered one to try out. I should receive it in a few days.
