Paperwhite Second Gen: First Impressions

[aceflor]

Originally Posted by sirmaru

I use the stock Helvetica font on my PW 2012, PW 2013, HD 2012 and HDX 2013. I find it dark and thick enough to read clearly.

Frankly, I don't understand why so many folks here are even using Calibre. I don't use it at all and my Amazon eBooks work just fine. Its possible that Calibre is causing its own problems and wasting lots and lots of time for too many users.

I don't think you will ever understand why we are using Calibre, which is why I won't get there, but it is very, very useful for all sorts of reasons. It is not causing problems, it is solving many, one of which being for instance the complete lack of sorting by series or tags for instance in the Amazon Cloud.

If you are doing fine without it, don't start using it, but please stop assuming stuff when you evidently have no idea whatsoever about what you are talking about, and don't make an excellent freeware look bad to potential users, this is not fair to Kovid, who is Calibre developer.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by sirmaru

What advantages do you get with Amazon eBooks by processing them through Calibre that are not available without using Calibre?

I only buy my eBooks from Amazon and cannot understand why they may need Calibre processing.

I use the vanilla Helvetica font and couldn't imagine using anything better.

Lots of reasons. Among them:

1. I have thousands of ebooks; Calibre makes it easy to locate and organise them, and to add and delete books from my Kindle.

2. Many books come from the publisher or author with poor metadata; Calibre lets me edit the metadata into a consistent format.

3. Many books have formatting I don't like, such as large spaces between paragraphs, or a font size which is too large or too small. Calibre lets me easily fix such problems.

4. Calibre stores series information, and allows me to automatically prefix the title of a book with that information, making it easy to arrange books in series on the Kindle. Eg "Miss Marple 01 - The Murder at the Vicarage"; "Miss Marple 02 - The Body in the Library", etc.

5. Using the tools that must not be named, which are Calibre plugins, DRM is stripped from my books in a completely transparent manner. I never have to concern myself with DRM.

I could think of a lot more reasons, but that will do for now.

[Yolina]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Lots of reasons. Among them:

1. I have thousands of ebooks; Calibre makes it easy to locate and organise them, and to add and delete books from my Kindle.

2. Many books come from the publisher or author with poor metadata; Calibre lets me edit the metadata into a consistent format.

3. Many books have formatting I don't like, such as large spaces between paragraphs, or a font size which is too large or too small. Calibre lets me easily fix such problems.

4. Calibre stores series information, and allows me to automatically prefix the title of a book with that information, making it easy to arrange books in series on the Kindle. Eg "Miss Marple 01 - The Murder at the Vicarage"; "Miss Marple 02 - The Body in the Library", etc.

5. Using the tools that must not be named, which are Calibre plugins, DRM is stripped from my books in a completely transparent manner. I never have to concern myself with DRM.

I could think of a lot more reasons, but that will do for now.

^^^ that ^^^

I would really hate having to make do without Calibre.

[devx]

My first impressions are mixed..
The text on the screen seems to be really crisp and lit very well, but..
I've recieved it with the shining pinhole. I've asked for the replacement.
The second one came also with the pinhole, second replacement is on the way...
Fingers crossed for the third device. AZ has really poor quality control when it comes to the KPW screens...

[Josieb1]

Calibre is THE most important software I have.

[FacebookVirus]

One reason to use calibre was illustrated to me recently: Sony has basically left the US market, at least for its newest reader.

For me, that means a move to another ecosystem. calibre has allowed me to convert the epubs and Sony format books I own for use on Amazon's hardware. Without calibre, my Sony formats and epubs would be inaccessible to me once my Sony hardware dies.

For you, not using calibre is perfectly fine, but it comes with the disadvantage of being stuck in Amazon's formats when their market undergoes a major change - as it certainly will in time.

[Stringer]

That series matching would be nice. Does it also keep track of books already read? I also wonder why the Kindle cannot suggest next book from the author. Unless I just don't know how, then I think it needs searching with author's name and trying to remember what you already got.

[sirmaru]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Lots of reasons. Among them:

1. I have thousands of ebooks; Calibre makes it easy to locate and organise them, and to add and delete books from my Kindle.

2. Many books come from the publisher or author with poor metadata; Calibre lets me edit the metadata into a consistent format.

3. Many books have formatting I don't like, such as large spaces between paragraphs, or a font size which is too large or too small. Calibre lets me easily fix such problems.

4. Calibre stores series information, and allows me to automatically prefix the title of a book with that information, making it easy to arrange books in series on the Kindle. Eg "Miss Marple 01 - The Murder at the Vicarage"; "Miss Marple 02 - The Body in the Library", etc.

5. Using the tools that must not be named, which are Calibre plugins, DRM is stripped from my books in a completely transparent manner. I never have to concern myself with DRM.

I could think of a lot more reasons, but that will do for now.

All those reasons help with non-Amazon eBooks. Specifically for Amazon eBooks, what benefits does Calibre confer when using Kindles? As I stated, the Helvetica font from Amazon satisfies me so font changes would not be an advantage for me.

[sirmaru]

Originally Posted by Stringer

That series matching would be nice. Does it also keep track of books already read? I also wonder why the Kindle cannot suggest next book from the author. Unless I just don't know how, then I think it needs searching with author's name and trying to remember what you already got.

As I remember on the PW 2013, when an eBook is finished, a screen appears with a rating choice and recommendations for similar eBooks by the same author and same genre if WiFi is on.

[Josieb1]

Originally Posted by Stringer

That series matching would be nice. Does it also keep track of books already read?

I use a rating to determine the books I've read, plus I move them from an unread collection into a read collection.

[ProfCrash]

I use Calibre to take care of unnecessary infections that my ebooks might come with. I have fixed the metadata so that series are labelled how I want them labeled and to get the authors names uniform. But I tend to read my Amazon books in their original undoctored format on my Kindle.

(shrugs)

I want to be prepared if something were to happen to my Amazon account.

Call me silly but I would kind of chuckle if my Amazon account was hacked and I got a gift card from Amazon to buy back my old books. I really wouldn't have to do that and that would give me a lot of money to spend on new books and other fun things...

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by sirmaru

All those reasons help with non-Amazon eBooks. Specifically for Amazon eBooks, what benefits does Calibre confer when using Kindles? As I stated, the Helvetica font from Amazon satisfies me so font changes would not be an advantage for me.

No, all the reasons I listed are equally applicable to Amazon books.

Originally Posted by ProfCrash

I use Calibre to take care of unnecessary infections that my ebooks might come with. I have fixed the metadata so that series are labelled how I want them labeled and to get the authors names uniform. But I tend to read my Amazon books in their original undoctored format on my Kindle.

(shrugs)

I want to be prepared if something were to happen to my Amazon account.

Call me silly but I would kind of chuckle if my Amazon account was hacked and I got a gift card from Amazon to buy back my old books. I really wouldn't have to do that and that would give me a lot of money to spend on new books and other fun things...

I remember when Sony changed the format of their eBooks from whatever it was (cannot remember name now) to ePub. Fortunately they gave us plenty opportunity to exchange them as the ePub versions became available, but some of mine never got reformatted into ePub. Amazon, or any store, could suddenly change formats like Sony did. We need to be ready and have our books liberated in case that ever happens. More recently the demise of Fictionwise caused me to lose a few books I could no longer liberate for whatever reasons.

[ProfCrash]

Yup, agreed. I have not messed around with the formatting stuff, I doubt that I will. I have not ran into any problems in the books that I have read. I wouldn't mind a thicker font but I don't want one so badly that I am changing fonts.

It really is an individual choice.

I ignore the folks who keep preaching that their way is the only way. I get tired of folks who insist that everyone else is wrong.

Who cares if it is a small percentage of people with e-readers who liberate their books or convert their books, or mess with formatting? Let them do it and stop assuming that your way is the only way. It annoys the crap out of me.

[Katsunami]

Originally Posted by jswinden

I remember when Sony changed the format of their eBooks from whatever it was (cannot remember name now) to ePub.

Previously, they used LRF.

Fortunately they gave us plenty opportunity to exchange them as the ePub versions became available, but some of mine never got reformatted into ePub.

That's the number one reason to use Calibre. It allows you to move books out of their original eco-system, onto a reader they would normally not be compatible with.

Amazon, or any store, could suddenly change formats like Sony did.

As far as I'm concerned, they already did. I think AZW3/KF8 is now the default format, and the only reason to still support MOBI is because of older Kindles. At some point, the MOBI-format will probably be dropped.

We need to be ready and have our books liberated in case that ever happens. More recently the demise of Fictionwise caused me to lose a few books I could no longer liberate for whatever reasons.

Indeed. Even if Calibre had been a simple ADE-like program, but with DRM-removal capabilities (on itsel or through plugins), it would already be worth it to use it.

===

As JosieB said earlier in the thread: "I wouldn't be reading on an e-reader if it wasn't for Calibre." For me, that would be true for bought books. I would never ever ever buy a DRM-ed book from Amazon or anyone else, if I didn't have a way to remove DRM.

After that, I could live without Calibre, but it makes life much easier. Imagine having a folder with 4000 MP3 files, all tagged and named in different ways. (Or even not at all, just named "Track_001.mp3".) Then try to pick out the onces that belong to one album...

Calibre is to ebooks what iTunes (or FooBar or MediaMonkey) is to MP3, even if you buy Amazon books.

There are a million music players and organisers, on every operating system, but then again, MP3 is already 20 years old. e-books as we know them now only exist since 2006 or so. In 2026, there will be more e-book managers alongside Calibre, no doubt.