Which one of these ebooks are best for pdf reader?

[dnoh]

I have bunch of pdf files that I want to carry around and read it. Which one should I get? I was thinking about Sony Ebook since it is the cheapest. However, I heard there's some issue with PDF file if the format is little bigger. Is there any ebook that I can put PDF files and it will automatically resized to fit in the screen and it reads easily? Please let me know ASAP. My budget will be around $300 to $400.

BTW, PDF isn't the only format I want to read. I would love to get the device which can support alot of different formats for future use as well.

Thanks.

[NatCh]

Welcome to MobileRead, dnoh.

Unfortunately, you're not going to like the answer to your question: none of the current devices do a very good job of reading A4/Letter sized PDF files.

They do just fine if the "pages" in the file are sized to them, but when you shrink something down from ~13' diagonal to 6" diagonal ... it's just not legible.

The Sony Reader (not "EBook" by the way) won't work for what you're wanting. The closest device to doing what you're after is the iRex iLiad with its 8" display, but it's twice your specified price range, and still requires some compromises.

The problem is that PDF preserves page layout above everything, so it just won't handle displaying on a screen below a certain size, unless there's a good way to zoom and pan, which present e-ink refreshes too slowly to do.

The only real suggestion I can offer is that you look into one of the smaller laptops or tablet PCs, a 10" display on one of those would work fairly well for you, but the trade-off there is the battery life, of course.

[dnoh]

Thanks. I was hoping there's any program where I can shrink it to fit in any of these ebooks. But I guess I am kind of out of luck.

I was looking into Jailbroken Iphone or Ipod Touch, and they seem to read PDF file just find however screen is just too small but they can easily zoom in and zoom out. Perhaps I should look into Ipod Touch instead.

Anyone has Ipod Touch to use it as ebook? How do you like it?

[NatCh]

There are a few that will Slice-N-Dice them into two chunks per page (top half/bottom half), and that may be satisfactory for somethings, depending on what you're willing to deal with, but anything more complicated than straight text starts getting ugly real quick.

[Jellby]

The Cybook zooms the page out to fit the screen. If the PDF is A4-size, the letters will typically be too small, and the margins too large. You can also display it in landscape (page width set to screen height), then each page will usually be displayed in 3 screens, although it would fit in 2.

If you manage to crop the margins out of the A4, it can be readable. But the best solution is to customize the PDF for the actual screen size, so that the letters are the "right" size. The Cybook can display a PDF at full screen, with no status bar or similar, I believe other devices can't.

[JSWolf]

Basically, if you want to read PDF, you'll want to get an iLiad or wait for one of the 9.7" screen sized eink devices to come out if they can read PDF. The 505 & Gen3 are not all that wonderful for PDF in letter size.

[gmanacsa]

I've used an iPhone to read several full length pdf ebooks. It's a good experience, except for three rather significant gotchas. Screen size, surprisingly, is not one of the places where I have problems (though I admittedly am pretty tolerant of small text sizes). The iPhone's super-sharp, high dot pitch screen helps a lot, along with the infinitely resizable zoom and the ability to view some apps in landscape orientation.

The problems:
1. Getting files onto the machine is kludgy. You can post your pdfs to one of the free document hosting services like readdle.com and view the documents in Safari, but you have to be online. There are also a couple of somewhat messier methods for storing files locally to avoid the need for a net connection. I've used a couple of these -- they're functional, but they're definitely not ideal or carefree. You can also email a file to yourself, but the PDF reader in the mail program is much less suited to reading since it can't be turned to landscape orientation.

2. No bookmarking. You will have to manually page forward to wherever you left off. Not a problem with short documents, but a pain when you're looking at a full-length book.

3. Limited file size. Safari (which is the best built-in pdf viewer) has a file size limit of about 8 meg. Larger pdf files simply won't load.

I suspect all three of these issues will be solved once developers have full access to the machine's capabilities this summer.

If you'd like to see the iPhone in action viewing different kinds of pdf content, I posted a video along with instructions on how to store files locally:

http://wowio.wordpress.com/2007/08/0...oks-the-video/

[DDHarriman]

My advice:

1 - eBook reader, just one option here - the Iliad;
2 - a TabletPC - my personal choice, a 12" one if you can.

Unfortunately none are inside the limits of the budget you write above.

Hope you find a solution, best regards,

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by gmanacsa

The iPhone's super-sharp, high dot pitch screen helps a lot,

With the very greatest respect, I think you've been slightly taken in by Apple's marketing hype. The iPhone does not have a "super-sharp, high dot pitch screen". It has a completely standard 3.5" 320x480 LCD screen, identical to those used by many PalmOS devices, for example.

[gmanacsa]

Originally Posted by HarryT

With the very greatest respect, I think you've been slightly taken in by Apple's marketing hype. The iPhone does not have a "super-sharp, high dot pitch screen". It has a completely standard 3.5" 320x480 LCD screen, identical to those used by many PalmOS devices, for example.

I didn't mean to imply that the iPhone's screen is unique — as you mentioned, some handhelds share similar or better specs. But its combination of pixel density (163ppi), brightness and contrast looks quite good and comfortable to my eye, and it compares very favorably against typical laptop displays (about 100ppi and generally dimmer) or non-backlit e-ink displays like the Sony Reader (200ppi). The iPhone's display quality and zoom flexibility — along with its always-with-me portability — add up to one major reason that I wind up reading ebooks on the iPhone more often than on my Sony Reader.

In any event, as with all displays, a hands-on look is the only real test since specs never tell the whole story...