Pocketbook 360 test diary

[mtravellerh]

This happened yesterday:

My wife was clicking away on her side of the bed, reading with her Cybook, I was on the other side, reading with MM

"Do you sleep already?"
"Nah, I'm reading!"
"Since when are you such a slow reader? I haven't heard you turn a page for an eternity"

I showed her the new pageturning gesture on MM, fast and absolutely SILENT!

My wife:

[poshm]

That sounds fantastic - I am so looking forward to getting my PocketBook all the options are mind boggling, so cusomisable.

[orwell2k]

Originally Posted by mtravellerh

This happened yesterday:

My wife was clicking away on her side of the bed, reading with her Cybook, I was on the other side, reading with MM

"Do you sleep already?"
"Nah, I'm reading!"
"Since when are you such a slow reader? I haven't heard you turn a page for an eternity"

I showed her the new pageturning gesture on MM, fast and absolutely SILENT!

My wife:

I ordered the PB360 in Ivory, but agreed to hand it over unopened to my wife as it is my Xmas present - how's that for willpower!!

But she will love this silent feature as sometimes my clicking annoys her a little if she needs to sleep but is just not sleepy... another great reason to get a PB360.

I have dashed out and grabbed a Sandisk 4GB microSDHC card + USB reader (it's a "micro" size in itself - I hope I don't lose it!) - so I can't wait to get my hands on the reader now...

[kacir]

I could not make my PocketBook to flick-turn pages in bed. When I hold it in horizontal position I can turn pages with a small movement of the device - I have set the angle to 20 degrees. But when I am in a bed, I like to read lying on my side with PB in almost vertical position supported on a pillow. And I can't find a setting that would let me turn pages with reader on its side in vertical position.

[mtravellerh]

Originally Posted by kacir

I could not make my PocketBook to flick-turn pages in bed. When I hold it in horizontal position I can turn pages with a small movement of the device - I have set the angle to 20 degrees. But when I am in a bed, I like to read lying on my side with PB in almost vertical position supported on a pillow. And I can't find a setting that would let me turn pages with reader on its side in vertical position.

Just lift MM on the right side, then put her down again!

[SciFiFan]

I could not make my PocketBook to flick-turn pages in bed. When I hold it in horizontal position I can turn pages with a small movement of the device - I have set the angle to 20 degrees.

If you set the angle to 20 degrees, it means that you have to lift the PocketBook almost to its vertical position and back to turn the page when reading sideways. You may want to try 70 degrees instead. If you constantly switch between reading sideways and upright, you should try 45° as a compromise.

[emini_guy]

Originally Posted by mtravellerh

The newest firmware online is 14.2, Francesco. Try that. Adobe Reader works okay in that version (14.2), but I really like the option to use pdfviewer, too.

Nice thread, full packed with useful information.

Sorry to invade your turf, but I am having the same problem as Francesco despite having version 14.2 on my device. I am not seeing "Open With" only "Open" and the latter gives me no choice of the PDF reader. PDFs are what I bought this little thing mainly for and if I am not able to render them well, this neat device will be much less useful for me. I like it a lot and would hate to return it.

I bought it just a few days ago and so no wonder that version 14.2 was installed on it, yet it looks that this is some kind of incomplete version 14.2 or else I don't know what to think about it. Any ideas what could be wrong?

The thing is that PDFs are not rendered very consistently by the zoom. In some files, the zoom makes the text disappear from the screen. I guess it gets shifted outside the screen or something like that. Even in the 150% mode and in the 100% mode the text is just too small to read. Other PDF files are rendered okay, not as well as epub files but well enough.

Any help would be appreciated.

[poshm]

Re PDF files

Yes you should get Open With on a long press of the OK button but I have noticed that this only appears to work if you go to main menu / books i.e if you try this say from favourites or from the main menu itself it doesn't work on mine anyway

I don't read very many .PDFs but the reflow 150 option seems to work best for me in adobe viewer. If I activate that and then click on the up button on the d-pad, I get very large text - there are 5 sizes. Have you tried doing that?

Hope that helps some

[emini_guy]

Originally Posted by poshm

Re PDF files

Yes you should get Open With on a long press of the OK button but I have noticed that this only appears to work if you go to main menu / books i.e if you try this say from favourites or from the main menu itself it doesn't work on mine anyway

I don't read very many .PDFs but the reflow 150 option seems to work best for me in adobe viewer. If I activate that and then click on the up button on the d-pad, I get very large text - there are 5 sizes. Have you tried doing that?

Hope that helps some

Thanks for your prompt reply.

Yes, all my books are under main menu/books and it is where I cannot get "Open With" but only "Open" followed by "Information" on the menu that long holding of the OK button produces.

As I said, I can get the zoom to work okay on some PDF files with 5 sizes of font as you noted, but it's pretty useless on other files, usually the ones in which the text in the 100% mode is too small to read.

[poshm]

Reading through this forum it seems that .PDFs are a problem for the majority of ereading devices unfortunately. I'm guessing you've tried landscape mode as well as portrait. The only other thing I'm wondering is if there is a way of increasing the base font of the problem PDF files say in Calibre?

Hopefully someone with more experience on PDFs will get back to you soon.

[poshm]

Originally Posted by emini_guy

Thanks for your prompt reply.

Yes, all my books are under main menu/books and it is where I cannot get "Open With" but only "Open" followed by "Information" on the menu that long holding of the OK button produces.

As I said, I can get the zoom to work okay on some PDF files with 5 sizes of font as you noted, but it's pretty useless on other files, usually the ones in which the text in the 100% mode is too small to read.

you might also want to try the PDF forum seeing as this isn't just related to the PB and I found one useful thread for you on the first page

https://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=69393

[emini_guy]

Originally Posted by poshm

you might also want to try the PDF forum seeing as this isn't just related to the PB and I found one useful thread for you on the first page

https://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=69393

Thanks for this link and the previous post.

Yes, it's true that many ereaders are still struggling with PDF files, but reading this thread and many others in the Pocketbook section gave me the impression that this device did a better job handling these files than most.

And perhaps it does a better job with the other PDF viewer that I oddly enough don't have access to (no "Open With" option) and that's what bothers me quite a bit as this may mean that there is something is wrong with my device.

[Forkosigan]

Originally Posted by emini_guy

Thanks for this link and the previous post.

Yes, it's true that many ereaders are still struggling with PDF files, but reading this thread and many others in the Pocketbook section gave me the impression that this device did a better job handling these files than most.

And perhaps it does a better job with the other PDF viewer that I oddly enough don't have access to (no "Open With" option) and that's what bothers me quite a bit as this may mean that there is something is wrong with my device.

Please provide a firmware update, it should solve your problem:

https://www.mobileread.com/forums/att...8&d=1263473704

https://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=62973

[emini_guy]

Originally Posted by Forkosigan

Please provide a firmware update, it should solve your problem:

https://www.mobileread.com/forums/att...8&d=1263473704

https://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=62973

It's W101.14.2. I would think it's the latest one. Isn't it? I ordered my unit just a week ago, exactly last Sunday. Any idea what could be wrong with it?

Thanks for your response.

[mtravellerh]

Originally Posted by emini_guy

It's W101.14.2. I would think it's the latest one. Isn't it? I ordered my unit just a week ago, exactly last Sunday. Any idea what could be wrong with it?

Thanks for your response.

Please just do the update. On some PocketBooks, the original firmware has not been well installed. If this does not work, please report back!