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frabjous · 03-12-2009, 03:29 PM

The problem with NitroPDF and Acrobat is that they're not free.

There are a whole bunch of free applications available here at MobileRead that work great for making PDFs easier to read on a Sony PRS-505. I've been experimenting with a bunch of them.

Here's a list of the ones I've tried (with links):
PDFLRF
Rasterfarian
PDFread
SoPDF
PaperCrop

All of these can remove the margins and other whitespace.

Some of those convert from .PDF to .LRF; some leave in .PDF format. Either format works on the Sony, so that doesn't matter much to me personally. Some of them convert the text to images, which can multiply file size, but some will only use images if you begin with an image-based .PDF (e.g., from a scan).

Personally, I've mainly been using SoPDF for text-based .PDFs, since it doesn't automatically convert it to images (though it does remove the margins) -- I even made a Windows GUI for it, which you'll find in the thread. It's also blazingly fast compared to some of the others, including Acrobat itself, which does this rather slowly.

I've been using PDFLRF for .PDFs that are already image based, especially two-column ones. It works very well.

I occasionally use PaperCrop if the original has more than two columns, or uneven columns.

03-12-2009, 03:29 PM	#5
frabjous Wizard Posts: 1,213 Karma: 12890 Join Date: Feb 2009 Location: Amherst, Massachusetts, USA Device: Sony PRS-505	The problem with NitroPDF and Acrobat is that they're not free. There are a whole bunch of free applications available here at MobileRead that work great for making PDFs easier to read on a Sony PRS-505. I've been experimenting with a bunch of them. Here's a list of the ones I've tried (with links): PDFLRF Rasterfarian PDFread SoPDF PaperCrop All of these can remove the margins and other whitespace. Some of those convert from .PDF to .LRF; some leave in .PDF format. Either format works on the Sony, so that doesn't matter much to me personally. Some of them convert the text to images, which can multiply file size, but some will only use images if you begin with an image-based .PDF (e.g., from a scan). Personally, I've mainly been using SoPDF for text-based .PDFs, since it doesn't automatically convert it to images (though it does remove the margins) -- I even made a Windows GUI for it, which you'll find in the thread. It's also blazingly fast compared to some of the others, including Acrobat itself, which does this rather slowly. I've been using PDFLRF for .PDFs that are already image based, especially two-column ones. It works very well. I occasionally use PaperCrop if the original has more than two columns, or uneven columns. Last edited by frabjous; 03-12-2009 at 03:37 PM.