I am still wondering about the market of E-Reader,just like SONY PRS500,Jinke V2,iRex.... My friend bought a Nokia 770. It's very good. It's based on the real linux OS and you can develop software on that. Real color screen and high resolution (800*600) and so on. The price about Nokia 770 and E-reader are around 350USD. the only big difference between them is E-ink screen. In my opinion, if the e-reader is under 250USD, I maybe buy it. If under around 150USD, I will buy it.

what do you think about that?

I own a N770 and I think that the 770 should not be considered an ebook reader. The screen is great but its an LCD screen and consumes a lot of power.
Reading books on this device is not very good. However, it is a rgeat device to read RSS feed and visit news sites.

I have uploaded a couple of pdf books. Every page turn, takes long and scrolling is a hassle.

thanks,
What do you think of the price?

I own a N770 and I think that the 770 should not be considered an ebook reader. The screen is great but its an LCD screen and consumes a lot of power.
Reading books on this device is not very good. However, it is a rgeat device to read RSS feed and visit news sites.

I have uploaded a couple of pdf books. Every page turn, takes long and scrolling is a hassle.

I beg to differ regarding the Nokia 770. I also have recently purchased one (on sale at $299) on the basis of this recommendation (http://www.teleread.org/blog/?p=3994) and my own perceptions. I have previously used a eBookwise 1150 which I love but which my wife has taken over. Rather than buy a second one, I thought I'd try the Nokia. It's wonderful. Highly legible with instant page turning. I use the FBReader, which enables a wide range of font and type size formatting. In advance, I decided againt the upcoming eInk readers, as they have reported to have quite slow page turning and no back lighting. I can read for over seven hours without recharging the battery. And of course I can surf the internet with it and read email with it. But the eBookwise is excellent also, at a third the price.

I would think that the 6" screen of the Sony or V6/2 ereader devices would be more important than a color display--the Nokia has just a bit over a 4" screen.

I also was initially dubious regarding the screen size, vis a vis the EBookwise (and Sony). However, I agree with the web recommendation I cited: it's not the size of the screen but the clarity of the image (type). I, surprising to myself, do not in any way feel disadvantaged in my reading comfort by the use of a smaller screen. In the portrait mode, I have the feeling I'm reading a full sized-page.

Really? Hmm. Maybe I'll take a look at the Nokia, though I think I'd prefer the longer battery life of an eink display, as well as the passive display technology (less straining on the eyes).

Your concerns are certainly viable. Unfortunately, you're probably going to have a longer wait than anticipated to be able to personally have a hands-on look at the eInk readers. I will look forward to learning your eventual findings.l

Hi,

I have several questions about book reading on the Nokia 770?

1. Did you try pdf's and how they display?
2. What about images (say jpg but any format will do), what is the maximum resolution they can have?
3. How do you turn pages? Button or pen?
4. How do you access the books? Open then from a folder like on a pc, and then they stay in something like a taskbar until closed?
5. When reading do you have anything else on the screen (e.g. taskbar) or automatically you get only the full text like in Ebk1150?

As mentioned before, I am looking for another reading device outside my Ebk1150 (which I really like) for various reasons and I am excited about the new eink devices, but price, refresh rate, unclear conversion tools (for the Sony) as well as unclear availability make me very willing to consider alternatives.

Thank you,

Liviu







I beg to differ regarding the Nokia 770. I also have recently purchased one (on sale at $299) on the basis of this recommendation (http://www.teleread.org/blog/?p=3994) and my own perceptions. I have previously used a eBookwise 1150 which I love but which my wife has taken over. Rather than buy a second one, I thought I'd try the Nokia. It's wonderful. Highly legible with instant page turning. I use the FBReader, which enables a wide range of font and type size formatting. In advance, I decided againt the upcoming eInk readers, as they have reported to have quite slow page turning and no back lighting. I can read for over seven hours without recharging the battery. And of course I can surf the internet with it and read email with it. But the eBookwise is excellent also, at a third the price.

To answer your questions in order:

1. No, I have not tried pdf files. I have been able readily to convert all my downloads (from their initial formats if necessary) to some variation of .txt or .html file. These work fine.

2. I have not tried images, but with the high quality screen, I would expect no problem. I may be wrong on this, though, as I haven't tried it, and really have not too much interest in it.

3. I turn pages with the toggle button wonderfully positioned on the side. And the pages turn instantly, as I mentioned.

4. When I bring up the FBReader application, the last book I was reading comes up on the screen, at the place where I left off (the same as with the eBookwise 1150). When I want to read another title, I click on the library icon with the stylus, and the list of book titles on my memory card is listed (again, the same as on the 1150). I can then tap on a different title, and that then appears on the screen.

5. On the screen, you have your choice of having a taskbar present or to push a button on the side to get a full text screen eliminating the task bar, to maximize screen space. I also designate a 90-degree roatation so I can read the book in portrait mode. When the taskbar is not present, you can accomplish similar commands using the keys on the front or side.

In summary, based on my current experience, if you like and are comfortable with the features of the 1150, you should feel comfortable using the Nokia. I understand that designers of the FBReader are in the process of making improvements, such as search and highlight functions, which at present are not yet incorporated (but which are in the 1150). I hope this is useful. Let me know if there's any other information I can provide. Jim

for me screen size is important. those tiny PDa screens are really uncomfortable for reading. You either have to make the fonts very small, move your nose up to the touchscreen so close it almost touches or you make the font larger and thenyou have to turn pages every 3 sentences.
I'm hoping for e-ink...pricing is an issue, availability too, but I guess I can wait a bit....it won't kill me...I still have enough paper book slying around.
The slow display is not really a problem. Turning a page in a book also takes a second...I'm sure nobody is complaining about that. I haven't seen it "live" yet, but from waht I've read and seen in the vids it appears to be acceptable. You probably won't notice the delay after a couple of days.

My only real concern is, that content has to be made available...I don't want to be forced into "pirating" my books just because ebooks are scarce and priced on par with hardcovers.
As for the Nokia and similar devices...taking into account how much I read, it would probably not be a good idea to use one of those. battery-life would be my first concern. Even if the battery is great, it'll be flat after 2-3 days at most (my PDA can hardly manage 3 hours of reading) and that's not what I want, especially if I take my "book" with me on vacation or read it on the train where there is not necessarily an AC output available at all times...

Hi,

Thank you for answering me promptly. The Nokia sounds interesting though I am not sure I would be comfortable to a screen that small, however good the fonts. Fortunately they have one in store at my local CompUsa so I can go and check it out by this weekend.
The other concern I have is more "philosophical", namely that Nokia is designed as a Net tablet so most of its features are geared towards that, so it is like buying a BMW to drive to my grocery store. For net, though I use the tablet in bed, I am too used to a 3 monitor setup that I have been using now for 7 yrs or so, so even a laptop seems so small...
The good part about Nokia is that from what I read in the Teleread review kindly provided earlier, I can write my scripts to run on it, so if I have enough energy to do it I will probably be able to get/hack software to take a pdf/djvu book and convert one page at a time in readable format like people did it with the Librie, if the natively provided pdf reader is not good.

Thank you again,

Liviu




To answer your questions in order:



In summary, based on my current experience, if you like and are comfortable with the features of the 1150, you should feel comfortable using the Nokia. I understand that designers of the FBReader are in the process of making improvements, such as search and highlight functions, which at present are not yet incorporated (but which are in the 1150). I hope this is useful. Let me know if there's any other information I can provide. Jim

One (hopefully) final observation on the Nokia screen size. I gave up years ago trying to read my ebooks on my PDA (Dell Axim) as the screen size was just too small. The Nokia screen size, in my estimation, is just enough larger than that of a PDA to make the difference. I recognize that it's a fine line between a screen being too small and not too small. For me, obviously, the Nokia has crossed that line. Good luck in your quest. Jim

A correction to an earlier statement I made regarding the FBReader -- that it did not yet have a search function. I'd forgotten: it has a very good "find" function. So for now it's only lacking the highlighting and dictionary look-up functions that the 1150 has.

Hi,

I want to thank you for recommending the Nokia 770. I went to CompUsa on Thursday (4/6) and when I saw it, I immediately bought it. I had a problem in that the display failed after several hours (seems to be a relatively common problem this display failure in the first several days of use, once you pass the 10th or so boot, it seems that you are safe - as mentioned on a Nokia forum), but I exchanged it without hassle on Friday and it's been working great since then.

I use Sans 20, yellow text on black background, portrait, default formatting for the Fbreader and indeed it is a pleasure to read, better than print in some ways. It is a bit quirky to set up the encoding of the text (I tried several books in all the languages I read in -english, french, romanian and I managed to get an encoding that works for any book, though sometimes it is different for the same language in different books - even english language etexts who work on US ASCII in general have funny mostly russian characters if they have french quotations say - for example the latest issue of National Review that I read last night; just a pity that The Economist does not allow me to download the whole issue as a file like NR does, even though I am a print subscriber since it would be so great to read it on Nokia, far better than on my PC). Page buttons are positioned acceptably, sometimes they seem small in comparison to Ebk1150, but I got used with them.

For pdf I installed Evince and it works nicely since it does portrait, though it is somewhat slow. Also images are a pleasure to view either in the image viewer or collated in a html file in Fbreader which allows to move through them with the buttons so in full screen mode. Once I get my 1 Gb card (48$ Ebay), I will try to implement the swap and later if I get the time/energy to implement the extended file system. For pdf's the swap seems to be necessary to get acceptable speed. I can read comfortably my math books, though I will wait for the card to decide if I keep them pdf's or do them jpg's for Fbreader, it will depend how fast Evince gets once I implement the swap.

The Net works ok, a bit slow due to memory, but I need a browser that does portrait. Since I do not really care about Net surfing on the Nokia right now (in bed I use the tablet which is pretty fast), I have not checked if someone provided one in the application list at maemo.org

Once again thank you for pointing me to this great device.

Liviu




One (hopefully) final observation on the Nokia screen size. I gave up years ago trying to read my ebooks on my PDA (Dell Axim) as the screen size was just too small. The Nokia screen size, in my estimation, is just enough larger than that of a PDA to make the difference. I recognize that it's a fine line between a screen being too small and not too small. For me, obviously, the Nokia has crossed that line. Good luck in your quest. Jim

Hi,

I want to thank you for recommending the Nokia 770. I went to CompUsa on Thursday (4/6) and when I saw it, I immediately bought it. I had a problem in that the display failed after several hours (seems to be a relatively common problem this display failure in the first several days of use, once you pass the 10th or so boot, it seems that you are safe - as mentioned on a Nokia forum), but I exchanged it without hassle on Friday and it's been working great since then.
...

Wow ... I must say I like what you did. Just get it! ;) ... I guess handling it in person and having it in your hand beats looking at pictures any time. Too bad I'm out of US for awhile ... will be difficult for me to get a Nokia 770 as they do not seem to sell them in Asia. :(

Got to pull some favors and get one shipped ... say, anyone? :D

DELETED

LIVIU: Pleased that you're enjoying your Nokia. In formatting for ebook reading, I prefer the traditional black on white screen. As previously reported, I haven't had occasion to try the .pdf format yet. From what source did you download your Evince reader? On product dependablilty, I myself have had no problems to date and will keep my fingers crossed. Regards, Jim

ascherjim ... I suppose you do realise that I do not have a Nokia 770? ;)

though I must say that after all the posts and threads, I'm considering it probably a better deal than the ebk. :)

Snappy: Sorry for my initial oversight in inadvertently sending my reply/query to you instead of to LIVIU, which I have since rectified. I wish you luck in acquiring a Nokia, if that should be your intent. JIm

No worries ascherjim, no harm done, no offense taken. :D ... I just thought you may want to remove the content and replace with a *deleted*. ;)

Snappy: Thanks. Done. Jim

Hi,

You can find all the applications available at maemo.org, specifically here

www.maemo.org/maemowiki/ApplicationCatalog

Another useful site is:

http://nokia770.com/

For evince you need to download another package too and install it first (libgnomeprintui), and then the evince package, they are both available on the same site. There are many interesting applications at maemo.org and depending on my usage of the device I will check them out, right now since I use it only for reading those too (Fbreader and Evince) are good enough, but there are xterminals to access the "inner structure on the device", games, tools, graphics, office, lots of cool stuff and since it is Linux it is very easy to install

In many ways I think that Nokia 770 is the opposite of Ebk1150 and presumably of the Eink readers which try to get close to print, this is pure LCD screen but amazingly beautiful. So reading on it is very different than on Ebk1150 or print for that matter, but I find it so compelling that I plan to rearead a lot of my favourite books that I have in e-form (of course time permitting :)), and probably I will scan/ocr some that I would not have done otherwise just for the pleasure of reading them on this device. When I want to read traditionally I will do it either print or on Ebk1150.

In terms of screen size, with the fonts described as above I get ~160 words per page, while on Ebk1150 I get ~100 words per page on large font (and the small one is just too small for me). And this is another reason that this device is great that even at smaller size (say in a full screen pdf page or 480x800 jpg image of a pdf page) the beautiful screen makes it readable with pleasure as opposed to Ebk1150 where I read with pleasure only in the large fonts.

Since I budgeted 400$ for another ereader I will probably wait on the eink devices for a while though I will check them out. I probably could budget another 400 in several months but only if those readers will give me the same pleasure to read as this one (and even then the lack of backlight is annoying since I do most reading at night and I'd rather not use a booklight).

I include a picture of the Nokia (unfortunately not as clear as the one of Ebk1150, the size is right but the actual picture is far brighter and clearer) for people to have a sense of how text shows on it.

Liviu


LIVIU: Pleased that you're enjoying your Nokia. In formatting for ebook reading, I prefer the traditional black on white screen. As previously reported, I haven't had occasion to try the .pdf format yet. From what source did you download your Evince reader? On product dependablilty, I myself have had no problems to date and will keep my fingers crossed. Regards, Jim

Liviu: Thanks for the download references. I've loaded Evince and tried it out in comparison with Nokia's build-in pdf reader, and definitely prefer the Evince, if for no other reason than the option of portrait format. Thaks for steering me to it. Your description of your situation vis a vis the Nokia, eBookwise and eInk readers mirrors mine exactly, including even the budget(s) set aside for such purchases. Who knows what the immediate (or maybe not so immediate) future will bring in the field of email readers. Although I join you in your obvious pleasure and satisfaction with the Nokia. Even though, as I believe I earlier reported, I download most of my books in txt or html formats, I want to be "up to snuff" on reading pdf texts as efficiently as possible. However, I know nothing about the effecting of "swapping" and "flashing" to render pdf files quicker to retrieve and read, as referred to by earlier contributors to this thread. Do you know much about this, or can you refer me to an appropriate learning source? Regards and thank again, Jim

Hi,

As far as I understand (and my tech knowledge is limited to basic unix/linux, as mentioned I avoided dual boot since I killed a hard drive many years ago, so before colinux I have not used linux, just cygwin ocasionally, and I used Unix profesionally many years ago only in graduate school and for several years after, though only at a simple shell scripts/awk user level) you have to partion the rs-mmc card, then format one partion in linux format as swap memory, use a tool from maemo to switch it on/off and you add "extra internal memory" to your Nokia 770, as much as you put in that partition, for example I would do 64 or 128 Mb out of a 1 Gb card. On a linux box it is very easy to do it, but I am not sure with my colinux, though I mount easily my hard drive, I did not try to mount other drives (I have cd, mmc, cf, sm, sd). I will do more research as soon as my 1 Gb card arrives. I have a spare older pc, so in extremis I would just install Linux on it, but I'd rather not do it for the time and energy required.
To get root permission and do the extended file system thing there are detailed instructions at maemo.org, though again you need a linux/mac access to an usb port this time as far as I understand it and that one may or may not be trickier/possible to do on colinux, I will just do the research if I feel I need it.
For the moment just getting more internal memory would make me happy, so I will try the swap thing as soon as I get my card.

Liviu

However, I know nothing about the effecting of "swapping" and "flashing" to render pdf files quicker to retrieve and read, as referred to by earlier contributors to this thread. Do you know much about this, or can you refer me to an appropriate learning source? Regards and thank again, Jim

Liviu: Many thanks for your explication of the swap process. My wife is a programmer/analyst, but she doesn't know linux -- and is not too interested at this stage of her busy professional programming load to really look into it for me. However, I will show her your message if for no other reason than her explaining it in further detail to me. Anyway, I will be most interested in anything further you learn or work out when you get your new memory chip. Thanks again and regards, Jim

Hi,

I will post my experiments in creating swap memory for Nokia 770 on a mmc card here, as explicitly as I can.

Personally I am very interested in spreading the ebooks message and from my interaction with people live and online, I found that a big obstacle is the technical aspect. People do not like reading long texts on pc/latops, at least not in pdf/html/word (scrolling is very unnatural in reading books, as is reading landscape unless you do it double page and then you need good reading software) and unfortunately right now we are in the "Tower of Babel" age with all formats, devices ... in the ebook world.

With music, you do it mp3 or itunes and pop it on your ipod or equivalent and that's that, with books...My opinion is that we need something like Fbreader for regular texts and djvu for images/professional books (I hate pdf so I may be biased but pdf is at least as of now good for printing or formatting but reading no way).

For me as for most people time is a constraint in doing all these conversions, my technical knowledge whille better than average is far away from expert status, so I try to do the things that I need in the simplest/cost effective way I can do it. Linux has so many wonderful free tools for manipulating files, while in windows similar software is expensive, so once I decided I needed file manipulation, I spent the 5-6 hours needed to install Colinux. If I will need a Linux box, I will spend the day or so to install it at some point and so on.

So while my postings about how to do things to help with the ebook experience may seem puerile to people in the know, I hope they help regular people pick up on ereading so we achieve critical mass for take off.

Liviu



Liviu: Many thanks for your explication of the swap process. My wife is a programmer/analyst, but she doesn't know linux -- and is not too interested at this stage of her busy professional programming load to really look into it for me. However, I will show her your message if for no other reason than her explaining it in further detail to me. Anyway, I will be most interested in anything further you learn or work out when you get your new memory chip. Thanks again and regards, Jim

Liviu: Thanks for the quick follow-up. I will remain an avid reader of your reports on further exploration into this issue. Regards, Jim

Hi,

After using the Nokia 770 for 2 weeks I started to really appreciate the device and I carry it with me almost everywhere. It improved my reading time considerably since I can snatch now minutes otherwise wasted. I still miss my 80 plus minutes of reading per day that I enjoyed for the past 8 years or so on my train commute (the disadvantage of working 5 minutes from your house :)) but finally I am getting to read 2 hours a day again. Ebookwise was and is still a big help, but it does not fit in my pocket so while I would carry it in my car, I would not take it with me say at the train table at B&N where my son can play for 30 minutes by himself :)
I installed the upgraded firmware from Maemo and indeed it improved my pdf/evince experience. I installed xterm and explored a little bit the internal structure. I installed the memory applet and took some nice screenshots. I got my 1 Gb card on Friday so I started experimenting with partitioning on the 64 Mb one and making a swap file. I finally managed to do it. However to run swap on Nokia you need to be root and unfortunately Colinux does not support USB as of now, so I will try to install some full Linux at some point.
I read 4 full novels and 2 magazines on the Nokia and the only complaint I have is that Fbreader is sometimes slow to load my library and also that I need to exit it to save the last configuration. In general I keep a book on and just slide Nokia from its cover when I want to read and back when I am done, and I charge it once a day. I rarely reboot it. For pdf's I like Evince, though it still gives me occasional memory problems, it is usable and the books are readable. Hopefully activating the swap will help there.
Outside of testing for functionality (it recognized my wireless router immediately and it discovered 2 more networks in my neighbourhood that the laptops in my house do not see), I have never used it to browse the net.
I include 2 screen shots exactly as saved on the device (they are about 3 times bigger than the device but they reflect very well the reading experience).

Liviu

My Jornada 720's keyboard decided to call it a day and so now I'm kinda without a proper eReader device ...

How I wish Nokia came out with a snap on keyboard attachment to make it into a clamshell handheld. :) ... Having an external folding bluetooth keyboard is a good enough solution for me (if I choose the Nokia 770) but its still a hassle and a bit too geeky for me right now. :p

I was looking at a Sharp C1000 ... its screen is a bit smaller ... and it has no wifi built-in. But it has keyboard, albeit thumbboard style.

Nokia770 ... the worse problem is that its not available directly in Asia. I just moved over from US ... *sigh* ... *twiddle thumbs*

Liviu: Am following your experiences and experimentation with great interest. I have just received my 1 gig memory card, but will hold off in trying it out until I familiarize myself with Linux a good deal more. (In fact, I'm an absolute beginner, but with some Windows capabilities, especially with a programmer wife at hand.) I've noted your problem with Colinex. I've just purchased Knoppix, which as you know is bootable from the DVD (or CD). Maybe this will work for me, without having to load a full Linux on a hard drive (preferably on another CPU). Anyway, keep up the reporting. Regards, Jim

Hi everybody

Liviu, I was looking at the attached pic of the nokia, and i noticed that the text is in romanian. Also your name is romanian too.
I am originally from romania also.

I'd like to ask you where do you get romanian content(ebooks) from.

thanks!

Hi,

I think it is a good idea to try Knoppix, I am inclining to go that route for Nokia that way.
Colinux is great because I use it to manipulate image files, pdf's, djvu's, in large numbers/size (I use a 1GB swap file since I have 1.5GB Ram on my xp and it works very nicely) and do microedits under xp. I use 5 monitors on my system so I can do lots of stuff simultaneously.
I used to use cygwin but it is limited. I use Colinux only in console mode (I installed an X server and I use it rarely since I have to launch cygwin, disable my firewall and connect to my pc like in a network) so the capability to use both it and Xp simultanoeusly is essential.
With Knoppix I plan to use my USB external hard drive as a main drive and some flash cards as secondary depending on what it will recognize from my hardware and hopefully I will be able to get root on Nokia.
For the moment I use the 1Gb card just as is, I put my books on it, add to Fbreader library as needed and I really enjoy it.

Liviu



Liviu: Am following your experiences and experimentation with great interest. I have just received my 1 gig memory card, but will hold off in trying it out until I familiarize myself with Linux a good deal more. (In fact, I'm an absolute beginner, but with some Windows capabilities, especially with a programmer wife at hand.) I've noted your problem with Colinex. I've just purchased Knoppix, which as you know is bootable from the DVD (or CD). Maybe this will work for me, without having to load a full Linux on a hard drive (preferably on another CPU). Anyway, keep up the reporting. Regards, Jim

Hi,

Yes, I am originally from Romania, though I have lived (almost) all my adult life here (I came here when I was 21 in 1990 to do my Ph.D. in math, but I moved away from academia for many years).
These days I tend to read mostly in English but there are some books (Ioan Dan, Radu Tudoran, Vintila Corbul, a lot of Dumas) that are available only in romanian or french from various sources (Abe books, romanian gift shop, Amazon.fr, relatives in Romania..) and I tend to scan/ocr my print copies (there are free romanian or french modules for various ocr software and they work as well as for english).
There are also online forums like the yahoo group cartionline, or the Romania based forum romaniainedit.3xforum.ro, but you have to decide for yourself whether to use such.
Also here in the NYC area there is a Romanian cultural center with a very extensive library that I used to borrow from a lot when I worked in the city.


Liviu

Hi everybody

Liviu, I was looking at the attached pic of the nokia, and i noticed that the text is in romanian. Also your name is romanian too.
I am originally from romania also.

I'd like to ask you where do you get romanian content(ebooks) from.

thanks!

Personally I am very interested in spreading the ebooks message and from my interaction with people live and online, I found that a big obstacle is the technical aspect. People do not like reading long texts on pc/latops, at least not in pdf/html/word (scrolling is very unnatural in reading books, as is reading landscape unless you do it double page and then you need good reading software) and unfortunately right now we are in the "Tower of Babel" age with all formats, devices ... in the ebook world.
Microsoft Reader is a free product on pc/laptops that has none of the limitations you describe. It shows a single page equivalent to a book page, and hitting the space bar causes the next page to display.

Furthermore, some of the same people who say that they prefer paper books to reading on a PC, nevertheless can be found for hours in front of their PC, reading emails from friends, Forum discussions like this one, news sites, chat room messages, etc. No one says " Gee, I wish those Forum discussions were delivered on paper. "

The difference is just what people are used to. It's like DVRs and Broadband - you have to use it, in order to realize how useful it is.

PS Of course, MS Reader cannot be used on Nokia 770, but I was responding to the more general comment quoted above.

Hi,

As it happens on my PC I like MsReader as much as any other software that I use to read books (uBook, Gemstar viewer, Adobe, Moby, Firefox), and on my tablet in portrait full screen mode it is my favourite reading software since you can move pages pressing with your finger at the bottom which comes very naturally to me. My point is that it is hard to read long fiction books in front of the PC and even on a tablet/laptop. Sure, I spend my workday and a considerable part of time before and after, in front of 5 pc screens, I read news, blogs, occasionally even short fiction, contribute in a forum or 2 and so on, but all these activities do not require more than superficial involvement with what I do, can be done in parallel and so on.

For me reading novels which has been my primary mode of relaxation for 30 years and more, requires involvement with the text, moderate privacy and reasonable comfort and I found that very hard to achieve standing on a chair in front of the PC, and even in bed with the relatively bulky tablet on my knees. I read on the go on Nokia, but that is just to fill unproductive time, while on my PC I try all the time to fill my unproductive time reading books and do not succeed.

Personally I think that on a PC it is intrinsically hard to maintain concentration and read from the same document for a longish time whether from an ebook, a forum note, a newspaper article, an official report, and novels by and large are not suited for "chunking".

I happily read books on Ebookwise, on Nokia and on paper, and magazines online or on my devices (I have only electronic subscriptions these days at about 6 magazines both fiction and nonfiction, and including rereads I probably got to 100 novels read as ebooks), and I read news and contribute to forums exclusively online, being very happy to have all these choices.

And of course anything you can read with MsReader you can convert to opf and read on Nokia with FbReader, and with one more Librarian conversion from opf to imp, you can read on Ebookwise too.

Liviu




Microsoft Reader is a free product on pc/laptops that has none of the limitations you describe. It shows a single page equivalent to a book page, and hitting the space bar causes the next page to display.

Furthermore, some of the same people who say that they prefer paper books to reading on a PC, nevertheless can be found for hours in front of their PC, reading emails from friends, Forum discussions like this one, news sites, chat room messages, etc. No one says " Gee, I wish those Forum discussions were delivered on paper. "

The difference is just what people are used to. It's like DVRs and Broadband - you have to use it, in order to realize how useful it is.

PS Of course, MS Reader cannot be used on Nokia 770, but I was responding to the more general comment quoted above.

Its not the size of the display that makes the sony appealing (over the nokia), its the technology. Sony's is e-ink based, not an LCD.

-d

I have purchased 3 handheld devices to use as ebook readers: The Nokia 770, ebookwise 1150, and the Cowon A2 PMP. Much to my dismay, I am unable to download any of the Adobe pdf or Mobipocket ebooks from my local library on to any of them. Library ebooks are encrypted which does not prevent me from reading them on my WinXP PC or my Mac, but I can’t take them out of the office. Does anyone have any suggestions (other than to just give it up)? Is there a handheld device that will work with encrypted Adobe PDF or Mobipocket ebooks? Or, is there a software program which will make them readable on a handheld?

I have purchased 3 handheld devices to use as ebook readers: The Nokia 770, ebookwise 1150, and the Cowon A2 PMP. Much to my dismay, I am unable to download any of the Adobe pdf or Mobipocket ebooks from my local library on to any of them. Library ebooks are encrypted which does not prevent me from reading them on my WinXP PC or my Mac, but I can’t take them out of the office. Does anyone have any suggestions (other than to just give it up)? Is there a handheld device that will work with encrypted Adobe PDF or Mobipocket ebooks? Or, is there a software program which will make them readable on a handheld?

For encrypted Mobipocket books you can use the Cybook v3 from Bookeen or the iLiad from iRex. They're both e-ink devices.

There is a version of Mobipocket for the Nokia 7710. I don't know if it would work on your Nokia 770.

The Nokia 770 (and N800/N810) are Linux-based, and they don't support any encrypted e-book formats. Nokia cell phones don't run Linux, and many support MobiPocket e-books - for a list see The Mobipocket Reader for Symbian OS (http://www.mobipocket.com/en/DownloadSoft/application.asp?device=SymbianOs).

[QUOTE=wallcraft;110481]The Nokia 770 (and N800/N810) are Linux-based, and they don't support any encrypted e-book formats.

Thanks for the straightforward answer. Now I can finally stop trying to make my Nokia 770 into a reader of ebooks from my local library.

I know there are plenty of excellent free non-encrypted ebooks sites. Although I love to read a great variety of materials, I prefer reading books relating to current events and politics (as sick as that is). Guess I will purchase a Palm Lifedrive or a Palm TX.

I really appreciate all the support I received from this site. Thanks to you all.