[teholbeddict]

Yellow, on Jul 2 2009, 11:38 AM, said:

The lack of italics, underlining, etc, is a right pain in the arse. I don't fancy spending an hour converting a book (seriously, does it take an hour per book?) but I think I hate the missed paragraph breaks, dodgy line formatting and lack of fonts even more.

I will give Book Designer a go.

It doesn't have to take an hour per book, it just depends on how busy you are. I use book designer as well in most cases. Many times I am willing to read something in text format though, in which case I use ABC Amber lit convertor. It is incredibly easy to use and takes seconds to do. Of course to do it you need to have the file in lit format to begin with. Converting files to lit format is really easy though and there are several free convertors available for dowload if you don't have one.

I agree with Astra by the way on the E-book library, it is a massive pain in the ass. The only thing I use it for is loading books onto the reader. I personally don't like the way it stores the books, although you can change the way things are categorized. It's also slow as hell and tends to freeze. I didn't even bother to use all of my 100 free downloads that came with the reader because the damned ebook library kept freezing whenever I was downloading the books. That and there was no way to put more than one in the cart at a time. In the end I downloaded about 25 of the 100 and let the rest expire.

[Astra]

Yellow, on Jul 2 2009, 05:38 PM, said:

The lack of italics, underlining, etc, is a right pain in the arse. I don't fancy spending an hour converting a book (seriously, does it take an hour per book?) but I think I hate the missed paragraph breaks, dodgy line formatting and lack of fonts even more.

I will give Book Designer a go.

15 minutes, 1 hour or 12hours? It really depends on how much you would like to invest your time into making the ebook look as if you were reading pbook
And yes, I forgot about broken paragraphs.

[Abyss]

re Kindle, go read this now...

http://www.wired.co.uk/wired-magazine/arch...rren-ellis.aspx

- Abyss, Ellistist.

[Yellow]

I came across this article in Chemistry World today.

Colour e Ink just over the page?

"Just over the page" may be a little optimistic

This post has been edited by Yellow: 07 July 2009 - 06:52 PM

[Yellow]

Abyss, on Jul 7 2009, 07:09 PM, said:

re Kindle, go read this now...

http://www.wired.co.uk/wired-magazine/arch...rren-ellis.aspx

- Abyss, Ellisite.

Good article, nice and curmudgeonly. It does kind of ignore all the other ebook readers out there, though. Most of which actually work in the UK.

[Tamilyrn]

OK - I'm a bit swamped. Can anyone tell me whether this is correct or not.

I'm in the UK so let's say Kindle is no use to me and I buy the new Sony Reader.

- I can download books from legit sources such as Sony's store and other e-stores online.
- I cannot play Kindle books should some happen to fall onto my computer from a torrent.
- I can convert PDF's to a Sony reader compatible format but may have to arse around with pagination etc.
- Any adjustments to font kerning, pagination etc. are better done with tools on the PC before squirting onto the reader but none of this is required for 'off the shelf' books.
- Battery life of the reader is over 12 hours.

Thanks !

This post has been edited by Tamilyrn: 15 July 2009 - 10:57 AM

[teholbeddict]

Tamilyrn, on Jul 15 2009, 05:54 AM, said:

OK - I'm a bit swamped. Can anyone tell me whether this is correct or not.

I'm in the UK so let's say Kindle is no use to me and I buy the new Sony Reader.

- I can download books from legit sources such as Sony's store and other e-stores online.
- I cannot play Kindle books should some happen to fall onto my computer from a torrent.
- I can convert PDF's to a Sony reader compatible format but may have to arse around with pagination etc.
- Any adjustments to font kerning, pagination etc. are better done with tools on the PC before squirting onto the reader but none of this is required for 'off the shelf' books.
- Battery life of the reader is over 12 hours.

Thanks !

I have the Sony PRS 505 so my answers are based on that. You are correct on most fronts, although you can strip the DRM format on the kindle books and convert them to make them compatible for the Sony.

You have to do any adjustments or editing to the files you want on your PC before uploading the file to the reader. There are quite a few programs which make this easy to do.

You were correct in the assumption that no adjustments are needed for "off the shelf" books.

As to the PDF concern, you can read PDF files on the Sony reader. Should you pirate a book though and need to convert it because it is registered to a user or protected, yes you can convert the file. This holds true with other files beyond pdf as well. The ABC Amber converters are great for that type of thing. Depending on how picky you are, you can play around with the pages, and re-insert formatting you may lose in the conversion. If you are fine reading it in text format though you won't need to go through all of that.

Battery life lasts for 7500 page flips, I have gone far beyond 12 hours on my reader. If you are listening to music on it though the battery drains quickly. Hope this answers your questions.

[Tamilyrn]

Very helpful - many thanks.

[Astra]

Re: battery life.

A colleague bought 505 just before Xmas. Over Easter, she went to South Afrika on holidays, 15 days. She finished the first 2 books of The Farseer trilogy by Robin Hobb. She didn't re-charge the reader during those 15 days.

Check out a few other things:
The end of the bookshop?
Kindle anyone?

...and when you get a shiny new silver Sony Reader or........posh RED one go to mobileread forum.

This post has been edited by Astra: 15 July 2009 - 03:56 PM

[teholbeddict]

Go for the Red one! I've got it and it looks fantastic! Although you may have to order one in, because my local Sony store has a hard time keeping the red ones in stock. Apparently they get the red ones in and they are gone the same day.

I agree with Astra check out the monileread forum, most of your questions and anything else that may come up can be answered there.

[Tamilyrn]

I was over in the states last week and went to the Sony store to buy the reader. However, they told me that I couldn't set up a Sony account as they required a US address and could not therefore access their e-book store.

In the UK I notice that Waterstones website allows you to purchase e-books compatible with the Sony reader but what I'm not sure about is whether the readers themselves are region locked (much like DVD players used to be) or whether a reader bought in the US will work with books pulled from Waterstones website etc.

The reason I'd rather purchase in the states is that - as normal - the prices are much cheaper than in England.

Does anyone in the UK have a Sony reader and , if so, where do you get your e-books from ??

Thanks.

[Darkwatch]

Tamilyrn, on Aug 10 2009, 06:17 AM, said:

I was over in the states last week and went to the Sony store to buy the reader. However, they told me that I couldn't set up a Sony account as they required a US address and could not therefore access their e-book store.

In the UK I notice that Waterstones website allows you to purchase e-books compatible with the Sony reader but what I'm not sure about is whether the readers themselves are region locked (much like DVD players used to be) or whether a reader bought in the US will work with books pulled from Waterstones website etc.

The reason I'd rather purchase in the states is that - as normal - the prices are much cheaper than in England.

Does anyone in the UK have a Sony reader and , if so, where do you get your e-books from ??

Thanks.

They require a U.S. address?
I live in Canada, and the store works, though some books are U.S. only.
Besides the online sony store isn't that great.

[teholbeddict]

Darkwatch, on Aug 11 2009, 09:02 PM, said:

Tamilyrn, on Aug 10 2009, 06:17 AM, said:

I was over in the states last week and went to the Sony store to buy the reader. However, they told me that I couldn't set up a Sony account as they required a US address and could not therefore access their e-book store.

In the UK I notice that Waterstones website allows you to purchase e-books compatible with the Sony reader but what I'm not sure about is whether the readers themselves are region locked (much like DVD players used to be) or whether a reader bought in the US will work with books pulled from Waterstones website etc.

The reason I'd rather purchase in the states is that - as normal - the prices are much cheaper than in England.

Does anyone in the UK have a Sony reader and , if so, where do you get your e-books from ??

Thanks.

They require a U.S. address?
I live in Canada, and the store works, though some books are U.S. only.
Besides the online sony store isn't that great.

I think he means that the sony store in the mall would have required a U.S. adress to set up an account. Not the online book store.

Tamilyrn- You could try buying it at sony online I think they are all the same price on there, no matter what country you're in. They also offer free shipping for purchases over $100.

[Tamilyrn]

I spent a while looking at this yesterday and reading reviews of various readers (Kindle, Sony, Iliad, Cybook, Bebook); thought I would share the info in case anyone else is thinking of purchasing.

Basic conclusion is that the Iliad is the best at present but also the most expensive by some way.

The Sony's are good but have no wireless streaming and they have also mysteriously pulled the PRS700 from the website. Rumours about the launch of a PRS300 (entry level) and PRS600 (PRS700 replacement) shortly are all over the net. Those interested in a quick purchase of the PRS505 can find UKP100 off at play.com right now - selling for UKP149.

Couldn't find much good in the Cybook so discounted that completely.

Bebook seems to support the most formats of them all but the UI is a bit clunky. Since the open source Calibre software is capable of most format conversions anyway I discounted this.

Kindle 2 is looking good for release in the UK shortly. Apparently the problem/hold up has been to find a wireless provider to partner with but they have now engaged Qualcomm in the process and are aiming for launch by Xmas.

Seiko/Epson have also just launched one in Japan only at present but this is to roll out in the coming months.

Whispers about Apple joining the game shortly as well. To me this would be really exciting - if there is one thing they do really well it's user interface and I bet their reader would be very slick.

Generally speaking it seems that there is an effort to hook up readers with particular online stores and force a customer tie-in. In the UK we would have :

Amazon -> Kindle.
Sony -> Waterstones.
Borders Reader -> Borders.
etc.

This sucks. I know you can get books from neutral sites or even acquire / un-DRM if necessary but it's all a major hassle.

My conclusion is to wait for a few months and see what happens with Kindle in the UK. I'd probably take this as Amazon is my preferred online store, I like the idea of buying and streaming a book while on the train for example and, although DRM'd you at least have a permanent backup history under your account on the Amazon servers.