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Hi Traye,
All the readers unfortunately have limitations. These include restrictions as to which formats they'll read, how awkward some are to get content on and off, ease of general management, etc.
The iRiver Story plugs into a regular computer via a USB cable and you can then drag and drop, which suits me. It reads ePub files and PDF (although most readers do a pretty crummy job with PDFs that have complex formatting, such as some technical manuals, magazines with fancy layout, etc).
If the books have copy protection (DRM) then sharing can be a real pain. You can usually 'authorise' more than one device at the store where you buy but this is generally designed to cater for a single licenced user, not to make it possible to share. So I can download the same DRM protected Kindle format book more than once - onto my iTouch, or either of my computers, because they run Kindle apps/software (but not onto the iRiver because that doesn't). I suppose it might be possible in theory for somebody to authorise a friend's device but that could cause problems in practice, quite apart from any legal issues.
If I put a protected book file onto a device that has not been authorised to my account then it won't open, even if the device could read other books in that format.
If your friend's books are DRM free then you should be fine, and the most you might need to do is run a book through a program like Calibre, which can change the format.
My preference is to use a small cheap net-book style computer for most of my reading, because they are more versatile and can run software to read all the formats, plus read all the online stuff, and so on. They are similar in price to many readers, but they do tend to be heavier and of course have computer style screens which not everybody likes. For my money they represent the best range of present and future options for the least amount of downsides. But other people's preferences and requirements will be very different from mine, so it's a person by person thing with no clear champion in the field.
Good luck with choosing.
Cheers,
Chris
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