A small review of the iRiver Story HD

[shootingMaNs]

I bought a Story HD today, and got to play around with it a little before I had to recharge it. It took me awhile to find my way around on it, guess I got spoiled by the touch screen on my 600. The display is much better than the 600. Nice contrast, and very little glare! Ever since I got out of the hospital. the glare on my 600's screen drove me nuts! It didn't show up in Calibre, but I'm using an older version.

[shootingMaNs]

Anyone else found the web browser on their Story HD? It's kind of a pain to use,but it does work

[Lost In Space]

Originally Posted by jaxsnop

There is a NEW firmware for the iRiver Story HD Basic (non-Wi-fi) in the oficial website but it's so curious because it looks like a downgrading. The fw is v. 1.00 and indicated like NEW firmware but nothing about features or changes.

P.S. Could anybody post an alternative link for downloading? The Europe download is terrible and impossible to get complete.

The 1.00 firmware is not new, it is the original firmware. There is a bug in the 1.10 firmware that makes it impossible to read drm-protected books if you authorized Adobe Digital Editions before you installed firmware 1.10. That's why they have put out the 1.00 version for download for those that ran into those problems.

It is almost impossible to download a file from Iriver here in Europe. I download my firmware from the Swedish agent. Here is the link to 1.00: http://www.canman.se/wp-content/uplo...storyhd1.0.zip

By the way: My verdict of the Story HD is that it is the best gizmo I have seen so far for reading books. Not much of bells and whistles, but really easy to use and the best display at the moment. Maybe they will add some more functionality to the firmware later, but if you want a reader for reading books, this is the one to get for now. I only wish they would improve their customer support.

[innowen]

Hey everyone...

I'm a current Sony eBook owner (and use Mac OS 10.7- Lion) who's just discovered that i can no longer add books to my eBook reader due to sony's horrible mac support. Since I buy almost all my books exclusively from the google store (and partner site Powell's), I'm VERY interested in this device.

Has anyone with the new Story HD used their device with a mac yet? I'd love to know if this would be a better eBook than the now... mostly useless PRS-650 I got only 8 months ago.

Thanks in advance,
/innowen

... who's' very put out by sony..

[jupstin]

Originally Posted by innowen

Hey everyone...

I'm a current Sony eBook owner (and use Mac OS 10.7- Lion) who's just discovered that i can no longer add books to my eBook reader due to sony's horrible mac support. Since I buy almost all my books exclusively from the google store (and partner site Powell's), I'm VERY interested in this device.

Has anyone with the new Story HD used their device with a mac yet? I'd love to know if this would be a better eBook than the now... mostly useless PRS-650 I got only 8 months ago.

Thanks in advance,
/innowen

... who's' very put out by sony..

I haven't used it with a Mac, but there's no PC software like there is with the Sony. You just connect it via USB, and it shows up as an external drive. I am 99.99% sure it would function the same way on a Mac. Target does have a 30 day return policy, so you could be the first MobileReader to report on Mac compatibility

[innowen]

Thanks jupstin,

I went ahead and purchased one the other week. It's a great little device and i'm happy I got it. It reads in all my ePubs both from google and non-DRM sources. It does load up on my mac just fine and i can use it with caliber. Unfortunately, I'm having the issue that others have with not being able to read DRM-ePubs from other sources.

I'm downloading the iRiver story 1.0 firmware but I wonder if that'll fix issues or if the Story HD just won't read ePubs from Booksamillion or Sony themselves.

Anyone have any other suggestions?
/innowen

[jupstin]

You may need to liberate those files so you can read them...

[innowen]

Wish I could but I'm not that technical...

[boren]

I finally bought the Story HD (for my mom) and I like it very much. I do have a few questions which hopefully some you may know the answers to:

1. Is it possible to set Reflow=On as a default for all PDF documents?
2. Is there a way to set default font size (preferably, per file format type)?
3. Any email address or website to report bugs or request enhancements from iRiver? The two items above may fall into this category, as would the following items:
- Holding navigation buttons should repeat their action as long as the button is pressed. This works when reasing books, but not in other screens.
- Spatial interface. Pressing Back should return the user to the same screen and position he/she was on before. For example, the book selection indicator should remain on the last selected entry, not reset to the first entry. Edit: For some reason this seems to work fine now.
- Option to specify network details manually (including SSID, IP address, Default Gateway and DNS servers), as well as proxy server.
- Option to set margins
- Dictionary improvements - an option to select a word from the text using the arrows instead of typing it; an option to increase the dictionary font size
- Global setting for minimum font size. PDF and DOC files frequently use a font that is so small on this reader that one would need a loupe to read it.

I wonder if any of these items are already in work for the next firmware revision. One can only hope...

[jaxsnop]

Hello, I recently bought this new device and I posted about it here. Well, mow I have a problem with him. Yesterday I introduced in the device jpeg files through USB/PC (manga files), then after disconnecting it safely the iriver began to update the database with the new files. The screen froze with the message "Updating DB. Please wait". It was 24h ago and it's not responding. The several resets were not effective and the PC can't recognize it.

What can I do?! I wrote an email to iriver support service and I'm waiting for.

[sgiessl]

Originally Posted by jaxsnop

Hello, I recently bought this new device and I posted about it here. Well, mow I have a problem with him. Yesterday I introduced in the device jpeg files through USB/PC (manga files), then after disconnecting it safely the iriver began to update the database with the new files. The screen froze with the message "Updating DB. Please wait". It was 24h ago and it's not responding. The several resets were not effective and the PC can't recognize it.

What can I do?! I wrote an email to iriver support service and I'm waiting for.

I recently experienced something similar during a failed attempt at updating the firmware. Luckily, rebooting fixed the problem. Maybe it solves your problem, too:

Just slide and hold the power button for 15 seconds. After releasing the power button, the device should reset itself (as far as I can remember).

[wilsonch]

My only suggestion is a reset as described by sgiessl. If that does not fix the problem then I am fresh out of ideas.

[jaxsnop]

Originally Posted by wilsonch

My only suggestion is a reset as described by sgiessl. If that does not fix the problem then I am fresh out of ideas.

Reset didn't work... nothing worked. So, I had to send my device to support service yesterday. I'll tell you the news.

Another question, anybody can put an alternative downloading link for the new fw 1.13 (basic)? From Europe is impossible to download because it's very slow and after 10 minutes iriver cuts the conection.

TYVM

[frostschutz]

Originally Posted by jaxsnop

Another question, anybody can put an alternative downloading link for the new fw 1.13 (basic)? From Europe is impossible to download because it's very slow and after 10 minutes iriver cuts the conection

The webserver is horrible but it supports resuming downloads. So it will work fine if you use any download program that resumes downloads automatically. In Linux, wget -c 'http://download/url' works fine. In Windows, if the browser doesn't do it by itself, maybe another browser will, or a browser plugin, or any freeware download manager.

[Roelo]

Originally Posted by jaxsnop

Reset didn't work... nothing worked. So, I had to send my device to support service yesterday. I'll tell you the news.

Another question, anybody can put an alternative downloading link for the new fw 1.13 (basic)? From Europe is impossible to download because it's very slow and after 10 minutes iriver cuts the conection.

TYVM

Here is an alternate download link,

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/24944123/201...7331069226.zip

(Thanx to a nice user of GoT Sc0rPi0N for uploading this)