nigelp
11-20-2002, 06:28 AM
Some questions about E-books and there use with a Psion (have a 5mx). Have looked on various sites but many either have crap books or seem to offer them in a huge array of formats!
What soft ware do you need and which is the best sort?
Can you get any books or only old ones?
How do you go about obtaining a book?
Does this really offer a alternative to real books?
What are they like to use?
many thanks Nigel
Hi Nigel,
When I find a bit of time :rolleyes: I plan to write a bit of a howto on this subject and bung it in my FAQ. Keep checking there for updates...
Mark Kenepp
11-22-2002, 01:37 PM
Hello Nigel,
I guess the software you would use is a matter of preference. I personally chose MobiPocket (http://www.mobipocket.com) simply because it was the first free reader I found that I could use on both my Palm (Visor Edge) and my Psion (MC218). I just stuck with it, even though there are probably better ones out there.
Most of the books I downloaded have come from the MobiPocket (http://www.mobipocket.com) site. At the time, there were a number of free books available, mostly classics that have become public domain. I only read ebooks to keep me occupied during my commute so I am not too interested in buying any ebooks. That may change someday.
As far as the selection goes, publishers seem to be starting to embrace the ebook format so you will see more and more ebooks coming out, in some cases the ebook will come out before the official hard copy release and it should be cheaper too. You will find that many classic books, that have become public domain (i.e. the copyright has run out) can be found for free. I have been into reading Edgar Rice Burroughs recently and I have found a number of his books just by searching on Google for Edgar Rice Burroughs.
The quality of ebooks can vary quite a bit, at least with the free ones I have downloaded. Some have a number of typos (far more than you would experience in a normal hard copy), some have parts that seem to be missing, others are not formatted into paragraphs properly (each chapter is just one big paragraph making it difficult to read) and some have line breaks that make the whole ebook choppy. I would imagine that ones that you pay for would have fewer of these problems and if they do, since you paid for them, you have some right to complain to the publisher.
As an alternative to real books and how they are to use, it is certainly a space saver. You can carry around a whole library in your pocket. Also, for me, it is much easier to whip out my Pocket PC to read one handed on the train than it would be for me to open a book, remove the paper bookmark and use a second hand to flip pages. The same would not apply for a 5mx as it would be more awkward to use one handed.
I personally am the kind of person who likes to keep books on my shelf as "trophies." I don’t see myself ever replacing real books with ebooks in the near future.
Cheers,
Mark Kenepp
San Francisco, CA