I strongly considered buying the current model, but no matter how much I think about it, the MediaTek MT8183 AP and 4GB of RAM seem insufficient for opening, highlighting, and annotating PDFs that are hundreds of pages long.
I want to strongly warn people about the Durobo Krono and my experience with their device and customer support.
I purchased this device primarily because of the Smart Dial, which Durobo heavily advertises as one of its key features. Unfortunately, after only a few days of use, I discovered what appears to be a serious software bug: the dial randomly freezes and stops responding while scrolling.
And this isn't limited to a single app. It happens across all the apps I've tested. Once the dial freezes, the only ways I've found to get it working again are to physically touch the screen or lock and unlock the device.
That completely defeats the purpose of having a physical dial in the first place.
I contacted Durobo customer support with a very clear description of the problem and titled my message:
> "Critical Smart Dial Bug on Durobo Krono - When will this be fixed?"
The response from their CS representative, Danny, was honestly unbelievable. Instead of addressing the system-wide issue I described, he blamed app compatibility and told me:
> "We don't have information on when it will be compatible with Moon+ Reader Pro. You could consider the Moon+ Reader (free version) as an alternative."
Seriously?
I'm reporting a Smart Dial that randomly stops working, across multiple apps, and the suggested solution is to use a free version of one particular app?
After I pushed back and explicitly asked whether this was actually Durobo's official position, the response changed to the usual generic PR answer: it's a known issue and they will fix it in a future update.
The problem is that people on Reddit have reportedly been complaining about this exact issue for around five months, and it still hasn't been fixed.
Yet during that time, Durobo has apparently had the resources to develop and release a new product, the Moodi remote controller.
That's what really frustrates me. If the Smart Dial is one of the Krono's major selling points, why has a fundamental bug affecting that feature remained unresolved for months?
At this point, I'm done with Durobo. The product itself might have potential, but the customer support experience has been incredibly disappointing, and I don't feel confident that Durobo is going to properly support the features they're selling.
I'll be moving on and looking at alternatives such as the Viwoods AiPaper Reader.
Save your money and think twice before buying a Durobo device.
And Danny, after that customer support experience, maybe "Durobo" really should be "DumbRoBo.
I want to strongly warn people about the Durobo Krono and my experience with their customer support.
I purchased this device primarily because of the Smart Dial, which Durobo heavily advertises as one of its key features. Unfortunately, after only a few days of use, I discovered what appears to be a serious software bug: the dial randomly freezes and stops responding while scrolling.
And this isn't limited to a single app. It happens across all the apps I've tested. Once the dial freezes, the only ways I've found to get it working again are to physically touch the screen or lock and unlock the device.
That completely defeats the purpose of having a physical dial in the first place.
I contacted Durobo customer support with a very clear description of the problem and titled my message:
> "Critical Smart Dial Bug on Durobo Krono - When will this be fixed?"
The response from their CS representative, Danny, was honestly unbelievable. Instead of addressing the system-wide issue I described, he blamed app compatibility and told me:
> "We don't have information on when it will be compatible with Moon+ Reader Pro. You could consider the Moon+ Reader (free version) as an alternative."
Seriously?
I'm reporting a Smart Dial that randomly stops working, across multiple apps, and the suggested solution is to use a free version of one particular app?
After I pushed back and explicitly asked whether this was actually Durobo's official position, the response changed to the usual generic PR answer: it's a known issue and they will fix it in a future update.
The problem is that people on Reddit have reportedly been complaining about this exact issue for around five months, and it still hasn't been fixed.
Yet during that time, Durobo has apparently had the resources to develop and release a new product, the Moodi remote controller.
That's what really frustrates me. If the Smart Dial is one of the Krono's major selling points, why has a fundamental bug affecting that feature remained unresolved for months?
At this point, I'm done with Durobo. The product itself might have potential, but the customer support experience has been incredibly disappointing, and I don't feel confident that Durobo is going to properly support the features they're selling.
I'll be moving on and looking at alternatives such as the Viwoods AiPaper Reader.
Save your money and think twice before buying a Durobo device.
And Danny, after that customer support experience, maybe "Durobo" really should be "DumbRoBo."
