I scanned in a document into Paper Port and saved it as a pdf file. I have tried Rasterfarian, libprs500, PDFLRF GUI, and the quality of each of these programs leaves a lot to be desired that I can't read the lrf files clearly. Is there any other way to try convert a scanned pdf file into a intermediate format and then one of the above so I can read it on my PRS-500 without hurting my eyes ?

I made 75 pages and combined all of them in Acrobat 8.0 and made one pdf file

ambertape

Saving as PDF after the scanning is a relaly bad idea. Best to OCR to some other format such as RTF. Then you can load into Book Designer to make an LRF eBook.

I have also scanned documents into Paperport and then had Paperport convert them to Word. I have then used this Word file to edit and then load either directly to the Reader or convert it to LRF via BookDesigner.

I used 300 dpi scans on a Visioneer USB Strobe Pro, stacked the scans in Paperport, and then moved the document icon to the Word icon at the bottom (I'm still using Paperport version 9) and was well pleased with the results. The scanner is about 8 years old and still works great. I'm running the scanner and Paperport under Win2k and BookDesigner under WinXP.

I'm going through this myself, mostly as an exercise to see how it's done, and how to get good results. Here's what I'm doing:

- Scan each page to text & format the text with a single line per paragraph. This helps greatly with controlling paragraph flow when moving formats around.
- Edit using Wordpad, save as text. This does preserve emdash as well as accentsd characters.
- Import into Word. I have a template set specifically for the prs500. I edit the documet using minimal formatting. The front page has a picture of the cover and a seperate title page.
- Each chapter gets a 'Heading 1'
- Download the 'sony.pdf' file from feedbooks.com It's a font test document. This will help you set your point size & font settings. You can also make one yourself easily.
- Print to PDF (many free tools for this as well as Adobe's). If you're using Adobe's you can put a TOC in there and it will convert to links in the PDF. That may be useful for some of you.

Overall, I'm very happy with this. The files are a bit bigger as a PDF, but you have complete control over the appearance. If you're happy with the built in font, you have the text source formatted in a way that's easy to bring into Book Designer to make an .lrf

- Ed

Hi edembowski,

What do you mean scan each line to text and format the text with a single line paragraph ?

I have a lot of pdf files already made. Would it pay to convert them using pdftoword and then use Wordpad ?

I am not sure I have prs500. Where is it ?

Each Chapter gets a Heading 1. Please explain this to me. How might I use this ?

Thanks

Ambertape

The prs500 is the Sony e-reader (two models, prs500 & prs505. I have the 500.)

When I scan the pages, I don't save to word or anything else, I save to a plain text file. I open this file in Wordpad and turn off 'wrap text'. This is so that I can easily see where the line breaks are. With word wrap, this is not so obvious. Once I'm there, I remove all line breaks that do not separate paragraphs.

From PDF files, I've done this as well by saving the pdf to text, opening in wordpad and following the same method.

Let's take some text from Project Gutenberg for an example:

This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or
re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org

The would then become:

This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org

It may be difficult to see the difference in the browser. If you hit 'quote' and then copy/paste this to a wordpad window (with word wrap disabled) you should see what I mean.

- Ed