CyBook & A4 PDFs

[GeoffC]

Originally Posted by Halk

Many of us have been waiting for the fabled folder support from Bookeen - which is just around the corner, I'm sure... But Bookeen still haven't come out with it.

...ah, but which corner ...

[ErwinOtten]

Originally Posted by GeoffC

...ah, but which corner ...

The one in the circular room........

[Andro]

Originally Posted by kleykenb

Let's just cut to the chase :

Reading A4 PDF's on paper is far more pleasureable than reading them on a Cybook Gen 3 or any other eBook reader with a small screen.
In fact, many PDF's simply can't even be read on the eReader because they require extra fonts (all you get are blanc pages !).

Sure you can use special software to convert this and do that and if you add extra fonts to the eReader you may not get the blanc pages, but the end result will never be as-good as paper and you may find yourself spending more time making your documents readable than reading !

Right now the best device for reading A4 PDFs is the iRex DR1000S but it's really expensive and because of it's size it's very fragile (if you buy one then make sure to get extra protection).

Kley, I fully agree with you - I have pretty much every wall of my office shelved floor to ceiling, and love paper print. That being said, I also spend 30+ weeks a year on the road, and between my professional needs, education needs and entertainment needs, I could either haul around 2 suitcases of books, or try to find a solution that'll let me make the most out of my pdf collections.

Right now, I use the MotionComputing PC tablet; it's great for PDF reading, except that I can count on ~4 hours of reading before battery dries out - such is the fate of active LCD devices.

[kleykenb]

Originally Posted by Andro

Kley, I fully agree with you - I have pretty much every wall of my office shelved floor to ceiling, and love paper print. That being said, I also spend 30+ weeks a year on the road, and between my professional needs, education needs and entertainment needs, I could either haul around 2 suitcases of books, or try to find a solution that'll let me make the most out of my pdf collections.

Right now, I use the MotionComputing PC tablet; it's great for PDF reading, except that I can count on ~4 hours of reading before battery dries out - such is the fate of active LCD devices.

Yes but I think the point was still missed :
the Cybook Gen 3 is great for reading A5 size eBooks, but it is not good for reading A4/Letter size PDF eBooks and it never will be. I love the device but it has its limits.
Whereas the DR1000S is really no good for reading A5 size eBooks (to big) it is great for reading A4 size books. So read your A5 books on the Cybook and print out your A4s is the best advice I can give... I bought the Cybook for the sole purpose of reading A4 PDFs only to find I loved the device but it was no good for my purposes : as soon as it became availalbe I bought a DR1000S and now I have a device for A5 and one for A4 size eBooks. Now if you are looking for a second hand Cybook Gen 3 then maybe we can talk ... ;-)

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by kleykenb

Yes but I think the point was still missed :
the Cybook Gen 3 is great for reading A5 size eBooks, but it is not good for reading A4/Letter size PDF eBooks and it never will be. I love the device but it has its limits.
Whereas the DR1000S is really no good for reading A5 size eBooks (to big) it is great for reading A4 size books. So read your A5 books on the Cybook and print out your A4s is the best advice I can give... I bought the Cybook for the sole purpose of reading A4 PDFs only to find I loved the device but it was no good for my purposes : as soon as it became availalbe I bought a DR1000S and now I have a device for A5 and one for A4 size eBooks. Now if you are looking for a second hand Cybook Gen 3 then maybe we can talk ... ;-)

I find your post somewhat puzzling.

The DR1000's screen is A5-sized, so how can the DR1000 be "too large" to read A5 documents? A5 is much larger than the size of the the CyBook's screen: fold a piece of A4 paper in half and compare it with the size of the CyBook - it's considerably larger than the entire CyBook, let alone the screen!

[kleykenb]

Originally Posted by HarryT

I find your post somewhat puzzling.

The DR1000's screen is A5-sized, so how can the DR1000 be "too large" to read A5 documents? A5 is much larger than the size of the the CyBook's screen: fold a piece of A4 paper in half and compare it with the size of the CyBook - it's considerably larger than the entire CyBook, let alone the screen!

The screen of the DR1000S may be A5 but add the (plastic) frame to that and you've got a really big eBook reader. Whereas the Cybook Gen 3 may fit in the pocket of your coat the DR1000S most definately won't. So for reading a Novel in the park the Cybook would be great, the DR1000S less so (although do-able).

Comparing one to one A5 paper size with A5 eBook screen size is not correct because an A5 paper page will have a (blanc) margin around it whereas when you read on an eBook that margin will be removed and the full screen will be used for text. That's why an A5 eBook screen can fit an A4 PDF near perfectly, nearly no scaleing needs to be done to make the text fit. And it is why a 6" eBook screen (Cybook) is perfect for reading A5 size Novels.

[EowynCarter]

Well, if you mean to use pdf, the irex could be a better choice becauce of the larger screen.

An other alternative is convertion.
Pdf, at least the non-crypted one, can be converted. Get the mobipocket reader for pc, and see if you can get someting of these.

[triwy]

Hello Everyone! I am learning so much on this website. Finally I made up my mind and I have bought a Cybbok....as the original idea was....Originally I had oredered one from WH Smith in the UK (and if I can tell you the truth I will never buy something again from WH Smith on line....first they ask me a adress proof so I had to fax them a copy of my bank statment and I had to do it twice because the first time I faxed it they say they did not recive the fax, it took a week with me having to call them....waiting on the phone...as usual....for many times to make sure the fax was received and then for them to tell me htat the were out of stock and I had to wait for they did not know how long...when on the website at the time I ordered the Cybook is was writtent "in stock"....)....anyway I ordered a Cybbok yesterday with pixmania and I should have it very soon and i cannot wait....!
I would like to download on my cybbok a lot of books I have at home and as long as I travel a lot It will be great for me to have them on one device...this is the main reason why I bought a ereader....which is the best way to download the books (do I have to scan them first and then....?) Can sombody help me?
Thanks a lot and happy reading to everyone!

[GeoffC]

Originally Posted by triwy

Hello Everyone! I am learning so much on this website. Finally I made up my mind and I have bought a Cybbok....as the original idea was....Originally I had oredered one from WH Smith in the UK (and if I can tell you the truth I will never buy something again from WH Smith on line....first they ask me a adress proof so I had to fax them a copy of my bank statment and I had to do it twice because the first time I faxed it they say they did not recive the fax, it took a week with me having to call them....waiting on the phone...as usual....for many times to make sure the fax was received and then for them to tell me htat the were out of stock and I had to wait for they did not know how long...when on the website at the time I ordered the Cybook is was writtent "in stock"....)....anyway I ordered a Cybbok yesterday with pixmania and I should have it very soon and i cannot wait....!
I would like to download on my cybbok a lot of books I have at home and as long as I travel a lot It will be great for me to have them on one device...this is the main reason why I bought a ereader....which is the best way to download the books (do I have to scan them first and then....?) Can sombody help me?
Thanks a lot and happy reading to everyone!

A good choice, if I may say so... For further info on the Cybook, go here.


No need to scan anything, unless you really really want to....

Free books are available on this site, you mainly need to look out for .prc/or mobi files (at the moment). Look under the E-books heading on the blue bar at the top of the page....(alongside User CP)
Purchased books, many stores to choose from, my main ones are fictionwise and booksonboard....again suggestions, here .

[triwy]

Helo GeoffC, thanks a lot you gave me a lot of usefull information. I do not understad how I put new fonts into the Cybook and why should I? Also, if I have a book at home that I do not want to buy as an ebook or I do not find anywhere I will have to scan it if I want to have it on my Cybook...it is right? And I will have to be carefull because they say that PDF on the Cybook are not so easy to read? It is so? How long have you had your Cybook for? Are you happy about iy?

[gerraldo]

Originally Posted by triwy

I do not understad how I put new fonts into the Cybook and why should I? Also, if I have a book at home that I do not want to buy as an ebook or I do not find anywhere I will have to scan it if I want to have it on my Cybook...it is right? And I will have to be carefull because they say that PDF on the Cybook are not so easy to read? It is so? How long have you had your Cybook for? Are you happy about iy?

With PRC/MOBI, HTML and TXT files you can change the font to use and its size (not with PDF - this you must read as it is, with zoom and/or landscape mode making it a bit easier).

As there are much better fonts available for reading on the eInk-Display, you can find lots of info on good free fonts here in the forums. You can use TTF and OTF fonts and you just copy them in the font directory on the reader (its best to have all 4 styles of the font - regular, italic, bold and bold-italic). And you must delete the ".fonts.cache-1" file in the system directory (will be created newly by the reader) to avoid errors.

If you scan a book you can either use the pages as picture files or use an OCR program to transfer the scanned pictures to text (which usually needs some work for corrections). With OCR is better, cause you can convert the text to any format you like.

PDF format is originally made for the print process (to asure a file is displayed exactly as the creator wants to) and therefor is the opposite of what is needed for an eReader (reflow, font and size adjustable). I convert all my PDF-eBooks to PRC before using them on the CyBook (which can be easily done with Mobipocket Reader itself on the PC).

BTW: I simply LOVE my CyBook and wouldn't be without it anymore. When you stick to just reading eBooks in PRC/MOBI format it works like a charm.

[GeoffC]

Originally Posted by triwy

Helo GeoffC, thanks a lot you gave me a lot of usefull information. I do not understad how I put new fonts into the Cybook and why should I? Also, if I have a book at home that I do not want to buy as an ebook or I do not find anywhere I will have to scan it if I want to have it on my Cybook...it is right? And I will have to be carefull because they say that PDF on the Cybook are not so easy to read? It is so? How long have you had your Cybook for? Are you happy about iy?

I've had a cybook now for just over a year, I had to return my original, and they replaced it with their (at the time) latest model....

It does what I want it to do, which is hold my library and allow me to read whatever I want, when I want, without having to worry about breaking my back carrying tomes. I also find the library lookup extremely useful.

It does have some faults - but these pale into insignificance, there are more positives than negatives with the device.

[Snuffi]

My experience with PDF is as follows:

A5 PDFs are no problem (unless the font size is very, very small) at all, for A4 it is possible to change to landscape and it splits the page into three parts. I think it's not really great if the majority of your books is A4 PDFs but for the occasional PDF it is perfectly acceptable and I had no trouble with it.
Another thing you should keep in mind is that - at least in my case - it never remembers the last position in the PDF. Whenever I had to stop reading suddenly and didnt take note of the page I was on, an orgy of jumps and page forwards ensued to find back to the page I had left off.

I have no idea how the Cybook reacts to large images and tables, though. I had very few and rather small illustrations in my PDFs, they were fine but fit fully onto the one-third split page. I have no idea what the Cybook would do with images larger than the split-page size.

If you have too many PDFs to convert manually (which is the case, you say) you could give "calibre" a try. What is especially handy for your necessities is that it doesn't just convert all your PDFs. It leaves them in place and only converts those documents you send to the Cybook on the fly without changing your library. So you wouldn't have to spend hours converting, wouldn't lose files due to a bad conversion and have always the option to change to something else with your original PDFs if the opportunity arises.
I have tried to convert a PDF via calibre and it seemed to work fine (haven't read the entire thing on the Cybook as it was only a test but I checked various pages throughout the document on the device). That, however, was a text-PDF (not scanned pages). I have no idea what the result would look like if it's all just graphics but I assume that it would reduce the images in size so they fit onto the screen in portrait orientation and that they would probably end up unreadly due to size. I would give it a try, however, the program is impressive considering that it's just a few people spending some of their spare time on it. There are more features than in any commercially available software solution I am aware of and especially the conversion works very well (not perfect, mind you, but neither do the other converters and most of them are specialized to handle only a very limited number of formats).

Other than that I doubt that there is much you can do short of a screen the size of the A4 images in your PDFs...