So far as I can see the kobo touch is basically identical to my Sony Reader but cheaper!
My Sony is about 2.5 years old now, hundreds of books on it, and absolutely ideal when away from home.
Totally different beast to a tablet/iPad/laptop - I take my laptop as well, but if I choose to spend my evening reading the latest Terry Pratchett in bed, the Sony is perfect, easy on the eye, and needs charging up about once a fortnight.
Also as I do sometimes spend a month or so away from home, the ability to just go online and choose then buy the next novel I want to read, is much valued. As is the ability to take work papers (the Sony takes Word files fine) to meetings, then when it gets boring and I know I've nothing useful to say for a couple of hours, to switch to a novel or some research papers I want to read through.
Compare to Sony / Kindle / etc. but in principle - go for it.
The one thing my Sony does badly is pdfs - so if that *might* be important, try a few out on a demo model.
G