Which e-reader is best for PDFs?

[nooneshotjr]

Hi,

I am a doctoral student and I really want an e-reader for my PDFs. I have a LOT of eBooks in PDF format but more importantly, I need to read a lot of World Bank (etc) reports which are published as PDFs, as well as the standard academic journal articles.

Currently I either print out the article or struggle through it on my laptop but neither really works. I don't like the waste of paper in the first instance, and I find it really hard to concentrate in the second. (Monitors kill my eyes!) This means that the iPad is out for me - I need/want an e-ink reader.

Whilst I would love to be able to make notes on the PDF and highlight this and that, that's really not my primary concern. I just want to be able to read and to read with ease. What would you suggest? If I can get both, that's great, but if I must pick one or the other (ease of reading vs. note taking), the first is most important.

I'm in the UK, so the Kindle DX isn't an option and anyway, I'm not much keen on buying a Kindle as it is locked to Amazon's store and can't read ePub books. What else is there for me in the UK?

Many thanks in advance!

[Noah98]

Sony prs-950.

[Latinandgreek]

Originally Posted by nooneshotjr

Hi,

I am a doctoral student and I really want an e-reader for my PDFs. I have a LOT of eBooks in PDF format but more importantly, I need to read a lot of World Bank (etc) reports which are published as PDFs, as well as the standard academic journal articles.

Currently I either print out the article or struggle through it on my laptop but neither really works. I don't like the waste of paper in the first instance, and I find it really hard to concentrate in the second. (Monitors kill my eyes!) This means that the iPad is out for me - I need/want an e-ink reader.

Whilst I would love to be able to make notes on the PDF and highlight this and that, that's really not my primary concern. I just want to be able to read and to read with ease. What would you suggest? If I can get both, that's great, but if I must pick one or the other (ease of reading vs. note taking), the first is most important.

I'm in the UK, so the Kindle DX isn't an option and anyway, I'm not much keen on buying a Kindle as it is locked to Amazon's store and can't read ePub books. What else is there for me in the UK?

Many thanks in advance!

I'm in the same boat as you, and I'm leaning toward the Sony PRS-950 or the upcoming Pocket Book 903. To be honest, I'll probably pick up the 950 or the 650 regardless of whether or not I get the PB 903, as they seem like the perfect upgrade for my 505.

[nooneshotjr]

thanks to both of you.

i had a google and is the Sony PRS-950 going to be released in the UK or europe? i can't find any reference to a release date this side of the atlantic.

the pocketbook 903 looks good though (albeit pricey!) - does anyone have an experience with either reader? i'd like to get user experience of PDFs.

[eriksnoopy]

No, the sony prs-950 is US only, but it is possible to order it form either http://www.adorama.com/ or http://www.bhphotovideo.com/ at the moment neither seems to have the product in stock.. which probably means its very popular..

[Latinandgreek]

I believe that the Sony PRS-950 will only be sold in the U.S., but some shops will ship it overseas, such as B and H, which has it on sale for the next week or so:

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/produc...y_Edition.html

I don't think that the Pocketbook 903 is selling yet. I'm waiting to see some reviews and videos of the product before I make a decision.

Here is a good video review of the 950 handling PDFs:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6sYTLtYPh90

I haven't had a chance to use the 950, nor the new 650. I do read PDFs on my 505, the reflow works better than I had hoped when I originally bought the device. My PDFs are mostly text based, though. The 950 has pretty much all of the features that I had felt would make the 505 a perfect device, so I'm really looking forward to picking it up. My husband has a lot of technical PDFs with charts, graphs and the like, and I imagine that he would be better off with a large screen, so he would be better served with the PB 903.

I hope some of this has helped!

The PB 903 will sell for less in the States (I imagine that it will cost in dollars in the U.S. the same that is costs in Euros in Europe), so if you have any friends going to the U.S. any time soon you might want to see if they can pick it up for you, as it might save you some money.

I hope this helps.

[paaThaka]

I'm in the same boat. Waiting for reviews on PocketBook 902/903.

Pocketbooks have slightly better resolution, which is a plus for viewing technical/small typeset PDFs.

Sony has the later generation Peal screen, which offers better contrast.

It remains to be seen how the special features on the Pocketbook work (pen, battery life, etc).

This slow wait is really tireing me out. I don't want to buy, sell, buy, sell a new eBook reader very 6 months, but the way the market is moving right now it looks like one almost has to do that, as there really is not a good offering yet for full-size pdf reading without constant scrolling & zooming.

[Latinandgreek]

Originally Posted by paaThaka

I'm in the same boat. Waiting for reviews on PocketBook 902/903.

Pocketbooks have slightly better resolution, which is a plus for viewing technical/small typeset PDFs.

Sony has the later generation Peal screen, which offers better contrast.

It remains to be seen how the special features on the Pocketbook work (pen, battery life, etc).

This slow wait is really tireing me out. I don't want to buy, sell, buy, sell a new eBook reader very 6 months, but the way the market is moving right now it looks like one almost has to do that, as there really is not a good offering yet for full-size pdf reading without constant scrolling & zooming.

The wait is tiring me out, too. I suppose I could have bought a Kindle DX or a iRex 1000, but the Kindle is missing many of the features that I want, and the iRex was very expensive and the battery didn't last very long (so I read in some reviews). I want to get a device that I will use for a few years, not pay quite a bit of money for something that only somewhat fits my requirements. The PB 903 looks very promising, but I would like to at least read a few reviews and watch some video reviews before ordering it.

There is also the Entourage Edge, I forgot to mention that. It has a double screen in a clam-shell case (LCD on one side, eink on the other).

[jbcohen]

I must disagree with the crowd here. All ereaders that I have come across will read PDFs like pros. I think that you need to need to be a tad more picky then simply PDFs. My Aluratek can do that just as well as the Sony PRS readers, however there are a lot of features that you will probably want that my Aluratek will not provide.

[SkyDream]

Originally Posted by paaThaka

I'm in the same boat. Waiting for reviews on PocketBook 902/903.

Pocketbooks have slightly better resolution, which is a plus for viewing technical/small typeset PDFs.

Sony has the later generation Peal screen, which offers better contrast.

It remains to be seen how the special features on the Pocketbook work (pen, battery life, etc).

This slow wait is really tireing me out. I don't want to buy, sell, buy, sell a new eBook reader very 6 months, but the way the market is moving right now it looks like one almost has to do that, as there really is not a good offering yet for full-size pdf reading without constant scrolling & zooming.

Me too.
Also still waiting for the MReader (here) which sounds like been able to compete with the 902/903.

[nooneshotjr]

i've found some videos on the pocketbook 903/902: http://blog.the-ebook-reader.com/201...eaders-at-ifa/

and they are definitely on sale here: http://www.pocketgoods.de

i think i am leaning towards this one over the sony, however that mreader looks good as well! (the entourage edge is too extra for me.) ack! i've gone from none to too many.

@jbcohen - what kind of PDFs do you read on your reader? i've read a lot of PDF specific reviews and you are a very lone voice.

[hidari]

Originally Posted by jbcohen

I must disagree with the crowd here. All ereaders that I have come across will read PDFs like pros. I think that you need to need to be a tad more picky then simply PDFs. My Aluratek can do that just as well as the Sony PRS readers, however there are a lot of features that you will probably want that my Aluratek will not provide.

A vote for MR. Cohen. I think the Sonys and Hanlins read PDFs quite well.. if the ereader has pdf re-flow it usually reads most pdfs adequately. If you are an academic in science or tech with lots of graphs, charts, equations, etc... then I would go for one of the large screens like the Pocket Book 902...if it passes the mustard test or the 950. For most texts a 5 inch or 6 inch screen with re-flow works fine...My Pocket Pro and 505 read PDFs decently.... again if you are one of those who is picky about wastes space, strange looking paragraphs and what not then go for the larger screen. If you need only read general texts no worries..

I just finished a Masters and read most of my readings and some books with my 505 and PP with no problems....

[Latinandgreek]

Originally Posted by hidari

A vote for MR. Cohen. I think the Sonys and Hanlins read PDFs quite well.. if the ereader has pdf re-flow it usually reads most pdfs adequately. If you are an academic in science or tech with lots of graphs, charts, equations, etc... then I would go for one of the large screens like the Pocket Book 902...if it passes the mustard test or the 950. For most texts a 5 inch or 6 inch screen with re-flow works fine...My Pocket Pro and 505 read PDFs decently.... again if you are one of those who is picky about wastes space, strange looking paragraphs and what not then go for the larger screen. If you need only read general texts no worries..

I just finished a Masters and read most of my readings and some books with my 505 and PP with no problems....

I do read PDFs on my 505, some reflow with no problems, some don't. The ones that didn't were mostly scanned journal articles. The one's that don't I flip into landscape view, but I find that the print is just barely large enough for me to read. I feel that a 950 would be much easier to read from, as it sections the page into three and has the extra inch. Then again, I don't have the best eyesight and tend to bump up the font even when reading novels, so that factors in as well. At the time that I bought a reader, the 505 was the best choice for me. For a first time buyer, though, who plans on reading mostly PDFs, I think a larger screen would probably be a better choice, unless money were a huge factor in the choice, in which case I say get the PRS-650 or even a Kindle 3 if totally strapped for cash.

[hidari]

Originally Posted by Latinandgreek

I do read PDFs on my 505, some reflow with no problems, some don't. The ones that didn't were mostly scanned journal articles. The one's that don't I flip into landscape view, but I find that the print is just barely large enough for me to read. I feel that a 950 would be much easier to read from, as it sections the page into three and has the extra inch. Then again, I don't have the best eyesight and tend to bump up the font even when reading novels, so that factors in as well. At the time that I bought a reader, the 505 was the best choice for me. For a first time buyer, though, who plans on reading mostly PDFs, I think a larger screen would probably be a better choice, unless money were a huge factor in the choice, in which case I say get the PRS-650 or even a Kindle 3 if totally strapped for cash.

I too had PDFs that were mere crap scans that the person did not take the time to make. Even at my Uni many of the readings were cheap scans so I got this: http://pdftransformer.abbyy.com/ IT works. great. It extracts the text from the crap PDF and gives you a search-able PDF...you can also put it in RTF. HTML, and Text. Then you don't need the larger screen. I put most of my Readings for my courses through this program. Then, my reader had no problems with the re-flow

[varelov]

Originally Posted by jbcohen

I must disagree with the crowd here. All ereaders that I have come across will read PDFs like pros...

And to this I will strongly disagree, I have nook Classic, it turns my PDF's into jumbled and drunken mess, anything beyond plain and simple text will not be displayed as originaly intended, bullet points go on for pages followed by the actual text, tables are hopelessly broken, text formatted in different fonts looses fonts (and therefore the meaning)...
If you have anything remotely resembling structured text in PDF format, you can comfortably forget about nook.
It seems PDF is the most popular format and yet every single e-book reader on the market has an issue or two with this format. Don't vendors have at least SOME common sense to test the gadget they order from manufacturers on the most popular format BEFORE they start selling the darn thing to us?!