Ebooks on Mobile Phones?

BillSmithBooks · 03-28-2010, 03:38 PM

Saw this article on teleread.org:

http://www.teleread.org/2010/03/28/4-ways-to-turn-your-mobile-phone-into-an-ereader-by-piotr-kowalczyk/

Does anyone have any relevant experiences with reading ebooks on their cell phones they'd like to share? Screen shots? How difficult is it to adjust to the smaller screen?

Do you just put the ebooks on a datacard? Email them to your phone? How else do you get ebooks on your phone?

I'm particularly interested in how well this tech works for older/lower-end cell phones that cannot run the Kindle, B&N, Stanza or other dedicated ebook apps.

What formats do people use? Can you store HTML webpages on your phone? Plain text? java jar files? Use some of those funky programs that convert text or html to a series of jpegs?

Is there a future for ebooks in this particular type of device?

My thinking is that there seems to be a ton of potential -- there are only a few million dedicated ebook readers out there but a bazillion cellphones that in theory ought to be able to read ebooks (either off the mobile web as html or as txt or java jar apps).

Cellphone adoption is growing by leaps and bounds every year...it seems that this could be the biggest market in terms of devices in use if only publishers can appeal to users.

Cell phones are often the main tool of choice for younger people -- they may not have a PC at home, but they have a cell phone for SMSing, photos, etc. Not only that, people have their cell phones with them at ALL times, within easy reach.

How should publishers and authors encourage ereading on these devices since they are everpresent? Or will it just naturally happen on its own?

Options, ideas and commentary, anyone?

zelda_pinwheel · 03-28-2010, 06:57 PM

i have an LG Viewty which can read books packaged in java apps from the site http://www.booksinmyphone.com/. i don't have much experience with this method of reading ; i installed a few books about 2 years ago, because at the time the only dedicated device i had was an ebookwise, which weighs about half my weight and therefore never left home with me. my cellphone was small, light, and always in my bag so it was a good backup for métro rides. however, now that i have a sony, i carry that around with me and it's very rare that i end up reading on my telephone these days.

personally, i found the experience only partially satisfactory. it was nice to know i had a selection of books always available to me whatever the circumstances. however the interface was not as comfortable as i would have liked, and the tiny screen made it sometimes hard to immerse myself in the story (i tried reading moby dick on it, and discovered that it's not easy to get lost in the story when one sentence sometimes spans 2 screens worth of text ; it was frustrating to try to take in this epic text broken down into tiny blocks). personally, except possibly for very simple texts, i think i need a larger display so that the text has more room to "spread out" and breathe.

on the other hand, i've seen stanza on an iphone and it's esthetically a LOT nicer than the very basic txt display of the .jars i have, plus i think the screen is a bit larger. i don't have enough experience with it to know whether it would make much of a difference to me, but i suspect that the reading experience would be at least marginally better, maybe significantly better.

i do agree that the ubiquity of cellphones makes them a good first device or backup device, and i also think that a lot of casual readers who might not see the point in investing in a dedicated device will nonetheless be perfectly happy to use stanza or aldiko (or whatever) to read a book now and then on their phone, which will certainly help with the democratisation of ebooks, and their popularisation.

i imagine that the best way to encourage reading on these devices is first, to make it easy and accessible ; stanza and aldiko with their connection to opds catalogues are an excellent example. make the interface simple and as attractive as possible, and most importantly, make content available, easy to find, easy to get onto the phone (i admit i struggled a bit getting the java apps installed), and get the word out. i wouldn't be surprised if many people don't read on their cellphones mainly because they have no idea they could, or where / how to get books.

Polyglot27 · 03-28-2010, 07:26 PM

Actually, reading books on a mobile phone is all the rage in Japan already. People actually write short stories targeting this medium.
The new Android system for mobile phones have free e-book reading software with which one can read existing e-book formats. My partner just bought a new HTC mobile with Android and the display of e-books look very good indeed.

zelda_pinwheel · 03-28-2010, 07:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Polyglot27

Actually, reading books on a mobile phone is all the rage in Japan already. People actually write short stories targeting this medium.
The new Android system for mobile phones have free e-book reading software with which one can read existing e-book formats. My partner just bought a new HTC mobile with Android and the display of e-books look very good indeed.

i've heard that actually, in fact isn't it also all the rage to actually *write* books on telephones ? (that would drive me crazy, i don't even like to write textos very much, but if memory serves i think i read it was because the simplified keypads actually make it easier to type).

animedude01 · 03-28-2010, 11:19 PM

Actually, an article I read specifically stated that there are individuals that also write on their phones.

Anyway, I've read on my phones and actually started reading on my phone before I even got a reader. I've read on my Nokia E90 Comminicator, my Nokia E71x, and now my Nokia N900. The E90 and E71x were symbian based and there was actually and official Mobi reader for them. On the N900 I'm using fbreader which has much broader format support.

The screens are small, but very readable.

I've moved on, though, and prefer my PocketPro now.

Marseille · 03-29-2010, 09:30 PM

I never had to adjust to reading on a smaller screen, because my ereading affair started on a PDA in 2003. Far lower resolution and even a little smaller than the phone I have now. I look forward to someday having a nice media tablet too, but the specs still aren't quite right.

In the meantime, cell phones are a highly underrated reading device. My Touch Pro2 is the last thing I use at night (I eread to tire my eyes to help me fall asleep quicker, I also use the mp3 player on a sleep timer to provide white noise) and the first thing I use in the morning (G-Alarm, a program that not only lets me set up tons of alarms I need to rouse me, but also lets me tie snooze to math problems of varying levels of difficulty).

One way eink fails is for night reading. For years, I messed with booklights and batteries and bulbs and their attending bulk. One reason I've preferred ereading since trying it is avoiding all of that. There's one sidelit eink device, but the reviews weren't happy with it. Other ways eink fails is for cost and flexibility.

I always have my cell phone with me, so I always have my book collection with me too. If I were carrying around something larger like kindle or nook, I'd leave it behind regularly. Even when I do get a good media tablet (LCD, not eink), I don't plan to carry it with me (a kindle + iphone is a great combo since they sync pages). It'll mainly be a home reader and my cell will still be my goto mobile device. Life is full of lines and waiting rooms, and I don't like to end up in one without a nice book selection.

As to lower end phones, if you are referring to dumbphones, I doubt I would enjoy reading on many of those. Even though I'm happy with a 3.6" screen, I do have a lower limit. I wouldn't read on my old razr unless it were an emergency. For pleasure reading, I want high resolution, and I want decent reading applications.

xxkiela · 04-02-2010, 02:20 AM

I eread from my mobile phone all the time.
Although I do admit that it's a lot smaller.
But in desperate times, calls for desperate measures.
Quite handy though.

Fat Abe · 04-02-2010, 08:11 PM

The following is my opinion only, and not meant as a slight against the iPhone and iPod. First, I have to read technical documents as part of my profession. These are predominantly in pdf format. Now, both the Apple iPhone and iPod have fairly functional pdf readers. Namely, the one built into the Safari browser. This is also true of the Motorola Droid. However, the Droid offers an SD card, and an easy path to side load a pdf file from your computer (Windows, at least). Of course, you need to mount the file system from the phone, so that windows can see it. Anyway, once you see it in Explorer, you can drag and drop to your hearts content. Eject the Droid by right clicking the USB "Safely Remove Hardware" icon on your taskbar, and finger drag the menu bar on the top of the Droid screen to dismount the Droid file system. Use a free Droid app like ES Explorer to browse the sdcard, and double tap the file of interest. The zooming is natural (intuitive) on the Droid, and with the device in landscape mode, you can browse the document with the scrolling pad. No touchscreen manipulations are necessary to go from page to page.

Have I ever loaded big books into the Droid? Yes, a 40+ MB art book!

Now, you might be interested in what the Droid can do with non-DRM epub books. The small amount of experimentation I have done has involved the free Aldiko reader. It's not the greatest thing since edible pages, but at least it is free and undergoing improvement:

http://www.aldiko.com/support.html#faq987438943

Chapter navigation is flaky, but text rendering is excellent. I have a massive book edited by Otto Penzler that gives the Sony and Amazon readers a fit.

Aldiko offers a menu page to download ebooks from internet sources. I have not tried this yet.

And that, in a nutshell, is my summary of the Droid's document capability vs. the iPhone/iPod.

georgian · 04-03-2010, 03:56 PM

I used first a Tungsten T 5 Palm but recently I have purchased a Toshiba Tgo1 wich I find it much better because it has a bigger & brighter screen. I like them al so because when my fiance sleeps I can read with the light of because of the backlight (this is a minus for the ereaders dedicated). But I can tell you guys, if you want o reed you do it nomather on what screen. My uncle started to read on the I rive small screen. Than I have upgraded his Nokia N70 wich has a smaller screen than the Iriver but this time I installed for him Mobipocket wich he loves it. So as a conclusion, depends on taste, monney and determination.

Steven Lyle Jordan · 04-08-2010, 11:26 AM

I just switched to an HTC Touch Pro 2 myself. I've tested a number of reading apps, and I'm a few days away from publishing my results on MR (I've been waiting for some of the iPad hype to cool off).

Bottom line, the TP2 is a great reading device, depending on the app you use: Some apps (like MobiPocket) haven't been properly updated to run on the touch-centric device; and Windows Mobile is so low on most developers' lists that many apps being developed for other smartphones (like iPhone and Android) will probably never see WinMo versions.

Marseille · 04-08-2010, 05:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

I just switched to an HTC Touch Pro 2 myself. I've tested a number of reading apps, and I'm a few days away from publishing my results on MR (I've been waiting for some of the iPad hype to cool off).

Bottom line, the TP2 is a great reading device, depending on the app you use: Some apps (like MobiPocket) haven't been properly updated to run on the touch-centric device; and Windows Mobile is so low on most developers' lists that many apps being developed for other smartphones (like iPhone and Android) will probably never see WinMo versions.

I can't remember if I've asked you this before, but have you used book form yet? While reading while laying down, I've found it to be the most comfortable way to hold the device and easily turn pages. I slide out the keyboard, tilt the screen up, manually revert the screen orientation to portrait (using Rhodium Keyboard Controller, but other programs can do this), place my index finger between the back of the screen and the base of the device, and place my thumb on the arrow keys.

I hadn't anticipated this use of the form factor when I bought the device, even though ereading was one of my primary reasons for buying it, but now I can't imagine having a device that doesn't tilt as it's a really comfortable way to hold the device, especially when holding it while laying down.

As to WinMo development, winmo6.5 has been effectively killed by WinPho7, but there is still a huge group of enthusiasts developing independent apps for the platform, and many of them rival their less indie brethren. On top of that, the TP2 is one of the devices supported by the XDAndroid project, so you can get android 2.0x on the TP2 today.

Steven Lyle Jordan · 04-08-2010, 07:31 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by David Marseilles

I can't remember if I've asked you this before, but have you used book form yet?

I don't think you've asked before, but Yes: I find it's absolutely the only way I can read MobiPocket and MS Reader books on the TP2 (if you know of a way to do it without the keyboard, let me know... I haven't found it). Which is okay as far as it goes, but I don't necessarily find it more comfortable than reading with the keyboard closed... and the keyboard orientation only works for my right hand, thumb on the arrows. The orientation just doesn't work for my left hand... very awkward... so, if my right hand gets tired, I'm SOL.

I much prefer reading without the keyboard and using my thumb to swipe, or hit a screen arrow, to advance the book. Since both ePub apps allow me to do that, I expect to be using them for reading more in the future.

Marseille · 04-08-2010, 07:52 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

I don't think you've asked before, but Yes: I find it's absolutely the only way I can read MobiPocket and MS Reader books on the TP2 (if you know of a way to do it without the keyboard, let me know... I haven't found it). Which is okay as far as it goes, but I don't necessarily find it more comfortable than reading with the keyboard closed... and the keyboard orientation only works for my right hand, thumb on the arrows. The orientation just doesn't work for my left hand... very awkward... so, if my right hand gets tired, I'm SOL.

If you're willing to tinker a little, left-handed is possible as well. As to book form, I generally only prefer it while lying down because it's easier to hold the device upside down. While sitting, I use various other methods and even sometimes swipe to turn pages.

Rhodium keyboard controller is a powerful button remapper, and it contains the ability to remap keys with context sensitivity. So I can switch to my left hand, manually flip the screen, and my thumb happens to rest on the C and F buttons, which I have set to up and down in my ereading program (freda) only, and they are C and F as normal everywhere else. I actually spend as much time reading left-handed as I do right. The same program could probably help you read with the keyboard closed -- you'd just do a context remap for the home and back keys, so that in mobipocket they were up and down.

I've also moved over to an epub reader entirely. It was a big time investment for me since my fairly large library was in another format, but I'm happy with the decision both for today and the future as epub seems to be the predominant format readerware is being made for nowadays.

Steven Lyle Jordan · 04-11-2010, 10:31 PM

I've posted my evaluation of e-book apps on the Touch Pro 2 in this section.

ondabeach · 04-12-2010, 12:22 AM

Hi Steve,

I started reading on a succession of PDA's (all iPaqs) about seven years ago and went to my HTC Touch Diamond about 18 months ago and I don't have any problem reading on the small screen. Reading is a very personal experience and people's preferences for smaller or larger screens are many and varied. The good news though is that there are multi- function devices and dedicated readers in every shape and size these days so everyone can find a device that suits their needs.

Even if you only intend to use a device for reading I still strongly recommend multi-function devices like smartphones and MIDs (Mobile Internet Devices) over dedicated readers because multi-function devices give you more choice of where you get your eBooks from. With a multi-function device, when there is an update for the reader app it is a lot simpler to update then it is to install a frimware upgrade on a dedicated device and also a lot less likey that you'll turn it into a brick.

For me a smartphone is an excellent reader because I always have it with me, I can download eBooks directly from the net, as well as check email etc etc. Also, small devices are a lot easier to hold aloft for extended periods when reading in bed (unless you're Popeye that is).

Other means of getting eBooks into your Mobile are via Bluetooth or Wifi from someone else's mobile or laptop, direct cable connection to your laptop or using the removeable memory card.

Whether or not you want to store your eBooks in your main memory or not depends on how much memory you have to play with. As a general rule though I find it best to install apps to the main memory and use your memory card to store the eBooks themselves as this seems to give the best overall performance.

You can read pretty much any format eBook on your HTC. Out of the box it can read html using one of the included browsers, txt, rtf and doc with Word or Word Viewer both of which seem to come on all Win Mobile based handsets. For the proprietary formats like mobi you can download the assocoated app (as you already have) and there are apps for reading other proprietary formats, you just need to google them.

For ePub on Win Mobile and Win CE there is only ZuluReader and Freda that I know of.

I uploaded an update to ZuluReader for Win Mobile and Win CE to the site yesterday. That update fully supports the WVGA (480x800) format in both portrait and landscape modes. Make sure you try the new version before you finalise your review

Links to the ZuluReader download pages are in bold in my signature.

Cheers,

Steve.

03-28-2010, 03:38 PM	#1
BillSmithBooks Padawan Learner Posts: 243 Karma: 1085815 Join Date: May 2009 Location: www.OutlawGalaxy.com, Foothills of NY's Adirondack mountains Device: My PC...using Puppy Linux (FBReader, Calibre, Kindle Cloud Reader,	Ebooks on Mobile Phones? Saw this article on teleread.org: http://www.teleread.org/2010/03/28/4-ways-to-turn-your-mobile-phone-into-an-ereader-by-piotr-kowalczyk/ Does anyone have any relevant experiences with reading ebooks on their cell phones they'd like to share? Screen shots? How difficult is it to adjust to the smaller screen? Do you just put the ebooks on a datacard? Email them to your phone? How else do you get ebooks on your phone? I'm particularly interested in how well this tech works for older/lower-end cell phones that cannot run the Kindle, B&N, Stanza or other dedicated ebook apps. What formats do people use? Can you store HTML webpages on your phone? Plain text? java jar files? Use some of those funky programs that convert text or html to a series of jpegs? Is there a future for ebooks in this particular type of device? My thinking is that there seems to be a ton of potential -- there are only a few million dedicated ebook readers out there but a bazillion cellphones that in theory ought to be able to read ebooks (either off the mobile web as html or as txt or java jar apps). Cellphone adoption is growing by leaps and bounds every year...it seems that this could be the biggest market in terms of devices in use if only publishers can appeal to users. Cell phones are often the main tool of choice for younger people -- they may not have a PC at home, but they have a cell phone for SMSing, photos, etc. Not only that, people have their cell phones with them at ALL times, within easy reach. How should publishers and authors encourage ereading on these devices since they are everpresent? Or will it just naturally happen on its own? Options, ideas and commentary, anyone?

04-02-2010, 08:11 PM	#8
Fat Abe Man Who Stares at Books Posts: 1,816 Karma: 10606722 Join Date: Mar 2010 Location: 50th State, USA. Also, PA, NY, CA, and elsewhere. Device: All of the Above	Droid vs. iPhone and iPod The following is my opinion only, and not meant as a slight against the iPhone and iPod. First, I have to read technical documents as part of my profession. These are predominantly in pdf format. Now, both the Apple iPhone and iPod have fairly functional pdf readers. Namely, the one built into the Safari browser. This is also true of the Motorola Droid. However, the Droid offers an SD card, and an easy path to side load a pdf file from your computer (Windows, at least). Of course, you need to mount the file system from the phone, so that windows can see it. Anyway, once you see it in Explorer, you can drag and drop to your hearts content. Eject the Droid by right clicking the USB "Safely Remove Hardware" icon on your taskbar, and finger drag the menu bar on the top of the Droid screen to dismount the Droid file system. Use a free Droid app like ES Explorer to browse the sdcard, and double tap the file of interest. The zooming is natural (intuitive) on the Droid, and with the device in landscape mode, you can browse the document with the scrolling pad. No touchscreen manipulations are necessary to go from page to page. Have I ever loaded big books into the Droid? Yes, a 40+ MB art book! Now, you might be interested in what the Droid can do with non-DRM epub books. The small amount of experimentation I have done has involved the free Aldiko reader. It's not the greatest thing since edible pages, but at least it is free and undergoing improvement: http://www.aldiko.com/support.html#faq987438943 Chapter navigation is flaky, but text rendering is excellent. I have a massive book edited by Otto Penzler that gives the Sony and Amazon readers a fit. Aldiko offers a menu page to download ebooks from internet sources. I have not tried this yet. And that, in a nutshell, is my summary of the Droid's document capability vs. the iPhone/iPod. Last edited by Fat Abe; 04-02-2010 at 09:05 PM. Reason: technical correction

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03-28-2010, 06:57 PM	#2
zelda_pinwheel zeldinha zippy zeldissima Posts: 27,827 Karma: 921169 Join Date: Dec 2007 Location: Paris, France Device: eb1150 & is that a nook in her pocket, or she just happy to see you?	i have an LG Viewty which can read books packaged in java apps from the site http://www.booksinmyphone.com/. i don't have much experience with this method of reading ; i installed a few books about 2 years ago, because at the time the only dedicated device i had was an ebookwise, which weighs about half my weight and therefore never left home with me. my cellphone was small, light, and always in my bag so it was a good backup for métro rides. however, now that i have a sony, i carry that around with me and it's very rare that i end up reading on my telephone these days. personally, i found the experience only partially satisfactory. it was nice to know i had a selection of books always available to me whatever the circumstances. however the interface was not as comfortable as i would have liked, and the tiny screen made it sometimes hard to immerse myself in the story (i tried reading moby dick on it, and discovered that it's not easy to get lost in the story when one sentence sometimes spans 2 screens worth of text ; it was frustrating to try to take in this epic text broken down into tiny blocks). personally, except possibly for very simple texts, i think i need a larger display so that the text has more room to "spread out" and breathe. on the other hand, i've seen stanza on an iphone and it's esthetically a LOT nicer than the very basic txt display of the .jars i have, plus i think the screen is a bit larger. i don't have enough experience with it to know whether it would make much of a difference to me, but i suspect that the reading experience would be at least marginally better, maybe significantly better. i do agree that the ubiquity of cellphones makes them a good first device or backup device, and i also think that a lot of casual readers who might not see the point in investing in a dedicated device will nonetheless be perfectly happy to use stanza or aldiko (or whatever) to read a book now and then on their phone, which will certainly help with the democratisation of ebooks, and their popularisation. i imagine that the best way to encourage reading on these devices is first, to make it easy and accessible ; stanza and aldiko with their connection to opds catalogues are an excellent example. make the interface simple and as attractive as possible, and most importantly, make content available, easy to find, easy to get onto the phone (i admit i struggled a bit getting the java apps installed), and get the word out. i wouldn't be surprised if many people don't read on their cellphones mainly because they have no idea they could, or where / how to get books.

03-28-2010, 07:26 PM	#3
Polyglot27 Addict Posts: 231 Karma: 5588994 Join Date: Dec 2008 Location: Paris, France Device: Cybook Gen3, Archos 80 G9, Sony PRS-650, Sony T1, Asus MemoPad.	Actually, reading books on a mobile phone is all the rage in Japan already. People actually write short stories targeting this medium. The new Android system for mobile phones have free e-book reading software with which one can read existing e-book formats. My partner just bought a new HTC mobile with Android and the display of e-books look very good indeed.

03-28-2010, 11:19 PM	#5
animedude01 Addict Posts: 254 Karma: 1200 Join Date: Jul 2009 Location: Los Angeles Device: DR1000S, ILIAD2, Nokia n900, Kindle for PC, Astak EZReader Pro	Actually, an article I read specifically stated that there are individuals that also write on their phones. Anyway, I've read on my phones and actually started reading on my phone before I even got a reader. I've read on my Nokia E90 Comminicator, my Nokia E71x, and now my Nokia N900. The E90 and E71x were symbian based and there was actually and official Mobi reader for them. On the N900 I'm using fbreader which has much broader format support. The screens are small, but very readable. I've moved on, though, and prefer my PocketPro now.

03-29-2010, 09:30 PM	#6
Marseille Guru Posts: 687 Karma: 5700000 Join Date: Dec 2009 Device: kindle	I never had to adjust to reading on a smaller screen, because my ereading affair started on a PDA in 2003. Far lower resolution and even a little smaller than the phone I have now. I look forward to someday having a nice media tablet too, but the specs still aren't quite right. In the meantime, cell phones are a highly underrated reading device. My Touch Pro2 is the last thing I use at night (I eread to tire my eyes to help me fall asleep quicker, I also use the mp3 player on a sleep timer to provide white noise) and the first thing I use in the morning (G-Alarm, a program that not only lets me set up tons of alarms I need to rouse me, but also lets me tie snooze to math problems of varying levels of difficulty). One way eink fails is for night reading. For years, I messed with booklights and batteries and bulbs and their attending bulk. One reason I've preferred ereading since trying it is avoiding all of that. There's one sidelit eink device, but the reviews weren't happy with it. Other ways eink fails is for cost and flexibility. I always have my cell phone with me, so I always have my book collection with me too. If I were carrying around something larger like kindle or nook, I'd leave it behind regularly. Even when I do get a good media tablet (LCD, not eink), I don't plan to carry it with me (a kindle + iphone is a great combo since they sync pages). It'll mainly be a home reader and my cell will still be my goto mobile device. Life is full of lines and waiting rooms, and I don't like to end up in one without a nice book selection. As to lower end phones, if you are referring to dumbphones, I doubt I would enjoy reading on many of those. Even though I'm happy with a 3.6" screen, I do have a lower limit. I wouldn't read on my old razr unless it were an emergency. For pleasure reading, I want high resolution, and I want decent reading applications.

04-02-2010, 02:20 AM	#7
xxkiela Junior Member Posts: 2 Karma: 10 Join Date: Apr 2010 Device: DSi, Mobile Phone [LG KS360]	I eread from my mobile phone all the time. Although I do admit that it's a lot smaller. But in desperate times, calls for desperate measures. Quite handy though.

04-03-2010, 03:56 PM	#9
georgian Junior Member Posts: 1 Karma: 10 Join Date: Apr 2010 Device: Toshiba TGO1	I used first a Tungsten T 5 Palm but recently I have purchased a Toshiba Tgo1 wich I find it much better because it has a bigger & brighter screen. I like them al so because when my fiance sleeps I can read with the light of because of the backlight (this is a minus for the ereaders dedicated). But I can tell you guys, if you want o reed you do it nomather on what screen. My uncle started to read on the I rive small screen. Than I have upgraded his Nokia N70 wich has a smaller screen than the Iriver but this time I installed for him Mobipocket wich he loves it. So as a conclusion, depends on taste, monney and determination.

04-08-2010, 11:26 AM	#10
Steven Lyle Jordan Grand Sorcerer Posts: 8,478 Karma: 5171130 Join Date: Jan 2006 Device: none	I just switched to an HTC Touch Pro 2 myself. I've tested a number of reading apps, and I'm a few days away from publishing my results on MR (I've been waiting for some of the iPad hype to cool off). Bottom line, the TP2 is a great reading device, depending on the app you use: Some apps (like MobiPocket) haven't been properly updated to run on the touch-centric device; and Windows Mobile is so low on most developers' lists that many apps being developed for other smartphones (like iPhone and Android) will probably never see WinMo versions.

04-11-2010, 10:31 PM	#14
Steven Lyle Jordan Grand Sorcerer Posts: 8,478 Karma: 5171130 Join Date: Jan 2006 Device: none	I've posted my evaluation of e-book apps on the Touch Pro 2 in this section.

04-12-2010, 12:22 AM	#15
ondabeach Groupie Posts: 193 Karma: 192 Join Date: Apr 2009 Location: Vanuatu Device: HTC touch Diamond, Ipaq 3115	Hi Steve, I started reading on a succession of PDA's (all iPaqs) about seven years ago and went to my HTC Touch Diamond about 18 months ago and I don't have any problem reading on the small screen. Reading is a very personal experience and people's preferences for smaller or larger screens are many and varied. The good news though is that there are multi- function devices and dedicated readers in every shape and size these days so everyone can find a device that suits their needs. Even if you only intend to use a device for reading I still strongly recommend multi-function devices like smartphones and MIDs (Mobile Internet Devices) over dedicated readers because multi-function devices give you more choice of where you get your eBooks from. With a multi-function device, when there is an update for the reader app it is a lot simpler to update then it is to install a frimware upgrade on a dedicated device and also a lot less likey that you'll turn it into a brick. For me a smartphone is an excellent reader because I always have it with me, I can download eBooks directly from the net, as well as check email etc etc. Also, small devices are a lot easier to hold aloft for extended periods when reading in bed (unless you're Popeye that is). Other means of getting eBooks into your Mobile are via Bluetooth or Wifi from someone else's mobile or laptop, direct cable connection to your laptop or using the removeable memory card. Whether or not you want to store your eBooks in your main memory or not depends on how much memory you have to play with. As a general rule though I find it best to install apps to the main memory and use your memory card to store the eBooks themselves as this seems to give the best overall performance. You can read pretty much any format eBook on your HTC. Out of the box it can read html using one of the included browsers, txt, rtf and doc with Word or Word Viewer both of which seem to come on all Win Mobile based handsets. For the proprietary formats like mobi you can download the assocoated app (as you already have) and there are apps for reading other proprietary formats, you just need to google them. For ePub on Win Mobile and Win CE there is only ZuluReader and Freda that I know of. I uploaded an update to ZuluReader for Win Mobile and Win CE to the site yesterday. That update fully supports the WVGA (480x800) format in both portrait and landscape modes. Make sure you try the new version before you finalise your review Links to the ZuluReader download pages are in bold in my signature. Cheers, Steve.

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