Help?

[zhandele]

I don't know a lot about these mobile readers, which is why I need help. On this forum, I see people talk about "reflow," but I don't know what means. I gather there are ways to change ebooks from one format to another (Nook to Kindle, and Kindle to Nook for example?) but I don't know what program one might use or what might be lost in the conversion. I appreciate you guys' advice, especially if you keep it simple. I have some questions for which I find no answers on the sales sites.

Well, I'm thinking of buying an ereader of some kind.

I could use mp3, but I don't care about video or wifi (I can load any content through an SD card or a USB).

I'd prefer a user-replaceable battery. If the battery isn't user-replaceable, well, how do you get it replaced? Or do you just buy a new reader when the battery won't hold a charge anymore? This seems like a real problem to me, but maybe there's a reasonable solution I don't see.

As for the reading ... I'm afraid I do need pdfs, and I need to be able to read charts, tables, and diagrams (I'm a math type). I also need to display Chinese characters.

I saw a post that said no reader will do illustrations well on pdfs? If that's true, maybe I'll have to give up the whole idea. Sometimes I look at a mathematical graph for a solid half hour, pondering what it means. Oh, I'd like to have a color display, but I could live without it.

On my computer, when I read pdfs, I can change the zoom and view part of a page, and navigate left and right as well as up and down. Can I do that on any of these readers? I confess I'm puzzled how that would work, if you didn't have a mouse.

One other thing. These readers often say they support Word files? Does that mean I need to load fonts? I'm talking Chinese fonts. The font I like best is 7.92 M, and some are over 8 M. BTW, there are only about 30 Chinese fonts large enough to be useful, and I have them all.

[Billi]

Originally Posted by zhandele

I don't know a lot about these mobile readers, which is why I need help. On this forum, I see people talk about "reflow," but I don't know what means.

In general it means that the text adapts itself to the screen. doc or txt are reflowable formats. A non-reflowable format is pdf. It means that the layout of pdf-files is static and doesn't adjust itself to the size of the screen - you can't change font size or the font itself. Some eReaders like the Sony offer pdf-reflow. That breaks up the layout of, for example, an A4-sized pdf page to be readable on a 6" device.

I gather there are ways to change ebooks from one format to another (Nook to Kindle, and Kindle to Nook for example?) but I don't know what program one might use or what might be lost in the conversion.

Almost all ebooks are published as epub (for instance Nook) or mobi (Kindle) files. For conversion you might use a program called Calibre whose developers are very active in this forum, too.

I'd prefer a user-replaceable battery.
As for the reading ... I'm afraid I do need pdfs, and I need to be able to read charts, tables, and diagrams (I'm a math type). I also need to display Chinese characters.
I saw a post that said no reader will do illustrations well on pdfs? If that's true, maybe I'll have to give up the whole idea.
One other thing. These readers often say they support Word files? Does that mean I need to load fonts? I'm talking Chinese fonts..

Given the above I would advise you to investigate tablets or the Pocketbook or Onyx/Bebook devices. They have user-replacable batteries, support a very wide range of formats, have pdf-reflow and you can load your own fonts. They are available as 6" or 9,7" devices (no color). For reading pdf files using a 9,7" device is almost a must but they are lot more expensive than the "little" readers.