Amazon Kindle Scribe Fans Should Look At This Overpowered Alternative Before They Buy

We may receive a commission on purchases made from links.

The Amazon Kindle Scribe may easily be the one and only e-notebook you consider. It has a large e-ink display that feels like paper, and it's a great tablet alternative for taking handwritten notes and reading books. But those Kindle fans who haven't purchased the Kindle Scribe may want to check the brand-new TCL Note A1 NXTPAPER that TCL announced on Tuesday. The Note A1 is, at least in theory, a great alternative to the Kindle Scribe and similar products. It's an overpowered tablet-like device that may remind some users of TCL's Android phones and tablets featuring the paper-like NXTPAPER screen technology. But the Note A1 is tailored for taking notes with a stylus and consuming content. It also features a variant of the NXTPAPER tech TCL has used in its Android devices for a few years and includes built-in AI capabilities for writing and reading.

The Note A1 features an 11.5-inch NXTPAPER Pure color display, customized for taking e-notes. The screen supports 16.7-million colors, adaptive brightness, a 120Hz refresh rate, "reflection-free clarity," and TÜV certification for eye comfort. The T-Pen Pro stylus has a latency of under 5 milliseconds, and supports 8,192 levels of pressure sensitivity. TCL said in a press release that the stylus is certified for "pencil-like writing," replicating the feel of writing on real paper.

TCL

Other specs include 8GB of RAM, 256GB of storage, an eight-microphone array system, two speakers, a fingerprint sensor, a 13-megapixel camera, USB-C, Bluetooth 5.3, and an 8,000 mAh battery with 33W fast-charging support. The Note A1 is also incredibly thin and light, measuring just 5.5 mm and weighing 500g. TCL also developed a Flip Case and keyboard case for the note-taking device, which will be available separately.

What's interesting about the TCL Note A1 is that it features an MTK G100 chip, according to the specification sheet, which may be the same processor TCL is already using in its TCL NXTPAPER 11 Plus Android tablet. Combined with the 8GB of RAM and 256GB of storage, the Note A1 would easily work as a high-end Android tablet, though that's just speculation. Interestingly, the same specs document indicates that the Note A1 supports installing third-party book APKs, including Amazon's Kindle, which suggests the Note A1 may run a version of Android. It's unclear whether the Note A1 is able to run other Android apps or app stores.

Operating system aside, the Note A1 will support various built-in AI features, including audio-to-text transcription, translation, summarization, writing assistance, and handwriting-to-text conversion. The e-notebook will support a variety of document types, including PDF, and Microsoft Office files. Data transfer options include wired connection (USB), cloud services, and email.

TCL

With all that in mind, the TCL Note A1 NXTPAPER price seems a bargain, especially when compared with the Kindle Scribe. Amazon's device starts at $399.99, and you get 16GB of storage for that price. The Note A1 will cost $419.99, and includes the T-Pen Pro stylus. However, unlike the Kindle Scribe, which is available from Amazon right away, the Note A1 will not ship immediately to buyers. TCL plans to make it available via a Kickstarter campaign in the near future. The good news is that the campaign will get you a few discounts, according to TCL's sign-up page. The bad news is that crowd-funded products take longer to ship to buyers. TCL has not disclosed the Note A1's release date.