There a comes a time when you don’t have any more space in your house for shelves full of comics, and you run the risk of your hobby kicking you out of the house by your spouse or parents. The utopia of color e-ink devices is still a ways away, so those of us who love the ninth art constantly analyze the market looking for the right device so we can once and for all put the paper behind us and switch over to digital reading in a way that is most faithful to the original experience. Here we review the tablets that are best for reading comics, and the most efficient apps for doing so.
What tablet is best for reading comics?
There are several fundamental requirements to consider when choosing a tablet for reading comics: the size, and the relationship between aspect and resolution. Needless to say, any Android device would work (desktop computers aside), whether it be a tablet or a smartphone. Even an old netbook placed vertically would work! Even still, what we’re looking for is an experience that is as similar as possible to reading the physical version. So, you need a device whose dimensions are similar to that of the one you’re trying to replace; that is, a 10-inch tablet.
The other big challenge is being able to view the pages in full screen without having to scroll or zoom it’s easiest to read the same way you would read actual pages, that way you can see an entire page in just one glance. Because of this, it is important for you to have good resolution so that when each page loads on the screen the text is perfectly legible and you don’t strain your eyes. Here’s where we talk about screen resolution.
Anything with a resolution of 150 ppi or greater will work, which means 1280×800 for a 10.1-inch screen, which tends to be a standard feature on the majority of high-end tablets. There really is only one tablet that offers great resolution at a crazy affordable price: The Nexus 10 by Google, which has a 2560×1600 (300ppi) display, which is matched only by the most recent versions of the iPad from Apple. If you take into account that the latter has more limited software options to choose from, and 4:3 aspect ratio (which means that the pages won’t fit the frame). If we had to choose, we would go with Android for this purpose.
Where can you get digital comics?
The main comic distributors—Marvel and DC—have their own distribution stores, both official and non-official, such as the platform Comixology.
The other option is to get your hands on the comics yourself. Even though you can find comics in PDF format, or even on ePub, the most common one that stands out for reading is the so-called CBR, which isn’t anything more than a .rar file with a different extension that contains JPG images, each one of which is a page of the comic in question.
The Internet is full of websites where you can download comics in this format, which would otherwise be impossible to get your hands on because they are completely uncatalogued. Another thing is that you have to consider whether or not your acquiring certain publications is legal. We’ll leave that up to each person to decide on their own.
What is the best program for reading comics on Android?
If you type “Comic reader” in Google Play, several options will appear. After testing a half dozen of them, we ended up deciding to stick with just a couple.
Perfect Viewer is one of the most versatile because, in addition to being great at cataloging publications, it is completely customizable, and also works as a viewer for images of various formats. But the reader that takes the cake is without a doubt Comic Rack. There are enough reasons to put you to sleep, and we’re going to share some with you.
Its greatest feature is its speed. Although it depends on how powerful your device is, Comic Rack displays the image and shows the change in page almost instantly, even when the image resolution is really high. This feature, combined with the clean interface (something Perfect Viewer is missing), makes it the ultimate app for reading comics.
The interface can automatically catalog the comics you have into one folder. So, if they file name is the same, they’ll all be put in the under the same roof. Another brilliant feature is that it remembers the comics you have read and are reading, and allows you to filter them in the library.
The free version of Comic Rack is completely functional, but it comes with in-app advertising, which isn’t ever intrusive, and only appears when you are in the menu, never when you are reading. The paid version costs $7.89, and gets rid of said advertising, but also adds the ability to sync your comics with desktop computers through the Windows program.
Download Comic Rack Free | http://comicrack-free.en.uptodown.com/android
Download Perfect Viewer | http://perfect-viewer.en.uptodown.com/android
[…] Among the most commonly used apps that offer an improved reading experience, we find: Aldiko Book Reader, Kobo, and Wattpad. If what you’re looking for is a reader designed specifically for comics, there are other specialized apps for these purposes. […]