The Super Note Manta is a 10.7-inch, 300 PPI E Ink notebook that is rather interesting. Framed as the most advanced e-notebook on the market, the Super Note Manta offers a unique and impressive design, durable construction and one of the better tablet writing experiences available. But is this impressive work of technology enough to tear you away from your iPad or Android tablet and stylus?
vThe Manta is, first and foremost, impressively light—even for an e-ink tablet. Weighing 467 grams (with half folio cover), this 10.7-inch notebook offers a sleek and functional form factor. Even with the half folio (a separate purchase) attached, the design remains incredibly thin and light. With an overall thickness of 6.0 millimetres (3.6 millimetres at its thinnest), the Manta is an impressive work of engineering.
The half folio (again, sold separately) easily clips into the left side of the Manta and offers a fold-over cover that both protects the device and acts as an additional power switch. Much like Apple’s Smart Covers, the Manta’s half folio powers the unit on when opened and powers it down when closed. It works well and is easy to install.
The Manta offers a very minimalist design aesthetically. It features fairly large bezels on the top and bottom, which seem a bit odd, as they take up what could be precious display space without providing any additional function. The side bezels, however, are a different story. Each one hosts a sidebar that offers additional navigation access. As contextual sidebars, they adapt to accommodate whatever the currently active screen is, making them highly adaptable and useful during tablet use.
“Super Note’s modular design with an upgradable motherboard, expandable storage, and a replaceable battery ensures the longevity of the Manta.”
A single power button on the top right edge powers the unit on and off, while the top left side houses the USB-C charging port. The right side of the unit offers a single, stretchable pen holder that can be swapped out easily thanks to two mounting screws located on the back of the unit. It’s a simple but functional design.
The display is another impressive element of the Super Note Manta. At 10.7 inches and 300 PPI, this E-Ink display is unlike any I’ve ever written on. The screen is incredibly flexible, allowing the pen to push into the page, temporarily simulating a paper-like writing experience. This is further accentuated by the scratch-resistant layer of FeelWrite 2 self-recovery soft film that covers the screen. When brought together, the result is a wonderfully smooth and tactile writing experience.
If you’ve spent any time using a tablet for note-taking, you are most likely familiar with the experience of a stylus sliding across glass. It’s manageable but far removed from the experience of writing pen to paper. The Manta, through the use of the aforementioned display along with its unique pen (more on this shortly), manages to simulate the best writing experience on a tablet I’ve ever tested. It’s incredibly smooth, natural and functional.
As for the pen, it’s an impressive piece of engineering. Unlike a traditional stylus, the Super Note Push-Up Standard Pen (other models available) features a ceramic nib that never needs to be replaced. This also helps reduce the tip-to-ink distance, which translates to a smoother overall writing experience. The best part is that there are no batteries to charge. The pen simply works.
As for the visual representation on the screen, it looks natural and offers a paper-and-pen-like quality to your handwriting or drawing. The longer I’ve tested it, the more impressed I’ve been with how well the E-Ink display handles the pen input. It has no issue registering pressure sensitivity and translating that accurately. This is ideal for artists looking to leverage the Manta for sketching. It also features layer support, giving artists an additional level of artistic freedom while creating. The Manta is an impressive piece of tech.
Battery life is another area where the Manta shines. Thanks to the low voltage needs of E-Ink coupled with the 3,600-mAh battery, you’ll have no issue running the Manta for weeks between charges. In fact, in my three weeks of regular testing, I’ve not had to charge the unit yet and am still at 55 percent battery.
“The Manta, through the use of its unique display and ceramic-nib pen, manages to simulate the best writing experience on a tablet I’ve ever tested.”
What is more impressive is Super Note’s aim at providing longevity with an e-ink tablet. This is thanks to its modular design and upgradable components. Removing the back cover reveals an upgradable motherboard, expandable storage via microSD and a replaceable battery. This ensures the longevity of the Manta. As for actually swapping components, it’s exceptionally easy. A small indent on the back panel allows for easy removal of the panel. Once removed, each component can easily be removed and swapped for upgraded parts. It takes only a few seconds and can be done by most people with ease.
Software on the Manta is a unique affair that, while quite functional, does leave me wishing it could do a bit more. The Manta offers a wide range of paper templates to work with, from lined to grid to blank pages to choose from. Each can be tagged as a favourite, and any template can be customized and saved as a new template to accommodate your needs.
Once a document is created, a sidebar that can be positioned on either side of the display offers a host of editing tools such as various customizable pen tips, layering options, and page customization. Additionally, Manta’s software allows for easy organization of pages or even notebooks, allowing you to stay organized even with several pages saved.
While everything created can be saved locally, Manta also offers online sync storage via many popular cloud storage systems such as OneDrive or Google Drive. Setting it all up is as simple as connecting to Wi-Fi and logging into your account. It’s a nice addition that allows you to easily check notes even when away from the Manta.
The Manta also offers some advanced organizational tools such as indexing via keywords for easy searching and connecting pages via links. These little quality-of-life features help elevate the Manta above some of the competition and help make a solid argument for the Manta’s usefulness to traditional note-takers.
Thanks to an RK3566 quad-core 1.8 GHz processor and 4 GB of RAM (all upgradable), the Manta is also impressively responsive while navigating and using the software. I never felt like I was waiting for the OS to load a page or refresh the E-Ink display. Everything was incredibly smooth and responsive.
“A steep price point and piecemeal approach to essential peripherals is disappointing, but its value to traditional note-takers can’t be overstated.”
Along with the aforementioned features, the Manta also includes some other great applications such as a calendar, email, Atelier (a drawing application) and a tool called Digest, which allows for PDF markups. All of these work seamlessly with the pen, blending the worlds of digital and hardcopy note-taking together into this beautiful one-stop-shop notebook.
While I love everything about the design, from the half folio to the ceramic-tipped pen to the Manta itself and much of the software, I’m a bit disappointed with the piecemeal approach to pricing the components. While I can forgive charging an additional fee for the cover, as most companies do this, making the base pen an additional charge on a tablet that requires it to leverage the functionality of the unit seems a bit off-putting to me as a consumer.
If you were to shell out the extra for a pen and cover, you’d be looking at a subtotal of $607, which puts you over the price point of a 10th-gen iPad with a branded Pencil. While not the latest in the iPad lineup, it is more than enough power for note-taking and a host of other useful features like backlighting (the Manta lacks the backlighting of traditional e-readers) and colour (a feature I wish the Manta had for highlighting and colouring). The $607 price point just seems a bit steep for a superior tactile note-taking experience to me.
However, with that being said, I believe the Manta does have a place in our modern tech-forward world. For those who have struggled to make the transition from traditional pen and paper to digital note-taking, the Manta is the absolute best paper-like digital writing tool I’ve tested. Its ability to mimic a paper-and-pen experience, coupled with its powerful toolset and cloud storage options, make it the ideal digital notebook for traditional paper note-takers.
The Super Note Manta is an impressive E-Ink notebook. Its rugged design, full feature set and impressive writing experience make it stand out in a crowd of tablet note-taking devices. A steep price point and piecemeal approach to essential peripherals is disappointing, but its value to traditional note-takers can’t be overstated. So while it targets a niche demographic, it does so exceptionally well.
