[travger]

Hello everybody.
I've lurked and browsed around here, but still have some questions I hope you calibre gurus can help me with. Like, what is the best way to start?

If I enter folder 'Asimov' into Calibre, then it copies all the files from that folder, one of every format, yes?
So if I have (for example) same book in mobi, rtf, and 3 x pdf; it copies them and keeps them somewhere I'm not supposed to look into. (I suppose I can make a note or use rating coloumn to mark multiple pdf-s).
But - how then will I locate .mobi for tranferring onto SD? Must I always fire up Calibre? (I have and will not have dedicated reader). Same for rtf - if I see a need to edit a mistake, where is the file? If I'm at last happy with my .mobi, how to delete all others (should I?)?

I have more than 20 GB of books, so I really need some organizer (especially I am lured by bulk downloading metadata), but you can see why I'm not overjoyed about copying them all.
My ebook folder now has some x-thousand pdf-s I have yet to read and decide about, same books occur in several subfolders (like 'Asimov', '3000+ books')...

If I already have Foundation.pdf in Calibre, and I add a 'mixed books' folder containing file Asimov-Found.1.pdf - what happens? Can I compare them to decide? What if both .pdf-s are in same folder?

Or maybe I should enter into Calibre only read and approved files? -though it seems somewhat...less than optimal. After all, I hope that with it I can not only keep track of what I have, but also where I have it and in which formats.

Second, I know nothing about formatting. So, what does .mobi (or ePub) have that word lacks? (I'm trying to unify my books). Is it a loss to convert pdf to .mobi?
Now I'm using mobi Creator, it makes html and I use that to get word file - so I can edit.
Is it ok if I end up with only .doc (or .rtf) and .mobi files? If I convert them in the future, can I lose something that original .pdf had?

Thank you!