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Old 07-07-2010, 03:50 AM   #1
Ixilyn
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ereader virgin buying a Sony reader

Hi!

I am currently looking at owning my very first ebook reader. After much careful research I have finally set my eyes on the prs-600. Not only does it look brillant for note taking during university lectures, it also looks as thought it may satisfy my curiosity and love of reading some classics that looks to be available free in elibraries!

Now, I am afraid of sounding like silly. As a "not that tech savy" person, I was just wondering if the sony readers would be able to read PDFS that I create by myself? or free epubs? or must they be DRM coded ones? all these terms are pretty new to me, even though I had tried looking them up my best around the forums as well as all over the wikis. Im not quite able to graps in full if the ebooks that I want to put on to the sony PRS-600 has to be DRMed or if im able to put regular epub books into it?

Also... If these books I get are so called DRM must they be purchased only from Sony website or would I be able to buy an ebook from borders? I am from Australia and is aware that the service that Sony offers is only out for US and UK.

I hope someone will help this lost lamb! Thank you
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Old 07-07-2010, 05:02 AM   #2
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The Sony PRS-600 is my first and only ebook reader too. I love it and I even decided on it sight unseen.

It can read PDFs you make as well as free epubs and even .rtf files. It can read any DRMed books as long as they are from the Sony store, or they use the Adobe DRM, providing you have authorized the reader with Adobe Digital Editions. So no Amazon or Barnes and Noble ebooks if they have DRM (there's no way to tell till you buy and download it, so best not to waste your money).

I think books from any other source besides Amazon and B&N will be usable on the Sony Reader.

The Borders ebook store used to just redirect to the Sony store, I don't know if that is still true.

One more thing: You can trick the Sony store. Say you are in the US when you download the software. I think you also have to use a credit card with a US address, but you might be able to just put some random address and skate past that. People say bad things about the Sony software but their store is good for bestsellers, and I haven't had any major issues with their software but one, which I won't scare you with now but you might find out about it later, since it seems like everyone does.

Last edited by banjobama; 07-07-2010 at 05:06 AM.
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Old 07-07-2010, 07:19 AM   #3
Ixilyn
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Im glad to read that it would be able to read other pdfs and epub files.

The tricking sony store bit sounds pretty interesting. I have seen a few threads of people telling others to use whitepages to find an address, im guessing that the credit card might not need to be a U.S. one??

Im aware that there seem to be quite some many threads regarding their sony readers not disconnecting and what not, pretty sure all the readers have their good and bad bits. hehehe!

I also read up that the PSP charger works with them sony book readers, can anyone confirm that this works in Australia too? that would be wonderful

lastly, does anyone happen to have any reccomandation on accessories? Since it is a touch screen, would I need a screen protector? I would love to get a cover/case thing but so far I have only found the standard sony ones. I saw the "Eat/Pray/Love" boxset for Sony Pocket reader and the case just looks adorable. Sadly, I couldnt find any for touch.

*edit
If I do want to purchase it with extra memory are there any reccomandations? are the SD cards better or is it more worth it getting one of those sony pro sticks? I read somewhere in this forum that they slow down when the memory sticks are full, does this happen only with 16gbs or do they slow down even if 2gb is full?

Last edited by Ixilyn; 07-07-2010 at 07:25 AM. Reason: forgot to write the last bit
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Old 07-07-2010, 08:05 AM   #4
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Ixilyn View Post

lastly, does anyone happen to have any reccomandation on accessories? Since it is a touch screen, would I need a screen protector? I would love to get a cover/case thing but so far I have only found the standard sony ones. I saw the "Eat/Pray/Love" boxset for Sony Pocket reader and the case just looks adorable. Sadly, I couldnt find any for touch.
A lot of people here like M-Edge cases for their ebook readers. I have the purple executive jacket for mine and it is really sturdy, looks great, and protects the Reader.
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Old 07-07-2010, 09:25 AM   #5
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It sounds like you did your research and I don't want to sound like a cheerleader/marketer, but for academic use, you might want to look into the PRS900. The slightly bigger screen makes a big difference when it comes to PDFs.
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Old 07-07-2010, 09:44 AM   #6
delvestoodeep
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I love the 600, but I'm not sure how effective note-taking with it would be. I've found the stylus note taking to be a bit sluggish, and wouldn't want to take extensive notes with it. Don't expect to take notes on books as easily as you would a paper textbook, at least.

Maybe I'm just doing it wrong? *shrug*
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Old 07-07-2010, 09:50 AM   #7
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The PRS-600 should be able to read PDF that you created. Also you can shop anywhere they sale an ePub version of the book not just the Sony store. You might even want to check your local library's website to see if they carry ebooks. Your reader will read both ePub & PDF library books.
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Old 07-07-2010, 10:19 AM   #8
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As the folks above have said, the Reader is perfectly happy to read any PDF files you create. I've got one that has my search list of history books on mine, for handy use in used bookstores.

You don't want to get me going on DRM-restricted files; suffice it to say that I'm one of those who thinks DRM is an abomination. Its entire stated purpose is a lie -- it doesn't even slow down piracy, it just enforces platform lock-in.

As for where else to get books: I buy from Baen/Webscriptions, BookView Cafe, BeWrite, etc. There are quite a few DRM-free bookstores out there. Plus there are all sorts of places to get free ebooks, especially if your taste in books runs to the bestsellers of 100 years ago (now called "classics") as mine does.

Right here on MobileRead is a good start -- the ebooks are built by hand by MobileRead members, and in my opinion they have the best formatting. There are a lot of other good ebook sites out there. Here's my personal free ebook source list:

Public Domain

MobileRead - best formatting, limited selection (hand-built by MobileRead members)

ManyBooks - PG scraper, but sometimes has books from other sources, good formatting

Feedbooks - mostly scrapes PG, improves formatting

Project Gutenberg - the granddaddy of them all, phenomenal selection

Munseys - painful to use, but has books nobody else does

the Internet Archive - generally only the scans are readable

Google Books - most of the time, what's good isn't free, and what's free isn't good

Free non-PD

Baen Free Library - amazing selection; also, they will tempt you into buying books

5th Imperium - Baen CD collections

Other Things

Search: Inkmesh. Sadly, it's not a very comprehensive search engine, at least when it comes to free ebooks - it misses a lot of them - but as far as I know, it's the only ebook-specific one out there.

If you're using free ebooks, it's only right to give something back: proofread a page a day at the Distributed Proofreading Project.

P.S.

I almost forgot: get calibre. Its support forum is a few boards down from here.
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Old 07-07-2010, 07:15 PM   #9
Ixilyn
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Wow, firstly thanks for all the replies. I went to sleep and woke up with a page full of it!
The Medge cases does look good, I might get either a GO! or executive, lots of choices and colours to decide on.

I have researched on the PRS900 and found that the price is too high. Especially that If Im using it in Australia that I wont know if the 3g or wifi would even work. I think the size maybe abit too big even for my big handbag.

I was wondering if the book readers are able to zoom in past 100% on the pdfs? The slides that I generally make the pdfs from are originally powerpoint slides.

About the stylus, is it about 1-2 seconds delay from when you scribble/highlight it? or do you just get the funny feeling like when you draw on a nintendo DS?

Thank you Worldwalker for the list of places that I can get ebooks from, and I'll have a look at calibre too. Ive been visiting Baen Free library often myself to get reads on my PC, great website.
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Old 07-08-2010, 02:16 AM   #10
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About the stylus, is it about 1-2 seconds delay from when you scribble/highlight it? or do you just get the funny feeling like when you draw on a nintendo DS?
It's pretty much like the DS. There's a slight delay but not as long as 1 or 2 seconds. I think the highlighting feature is a little faster than the handwriting feature.
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Old 07-08-2010, 02:35 AM   #11
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I have an M-Edge Executive for my 505, and I couldn't be happier with it.

As I tend to shove it into things where the leather would be likely to get scuffed up, I spent a while looking for, well, a cover cover. What I found that works perfectly is a stretchy fabric cover (Book Sox knockoff) normally used to protect textbooks. When it's in place, it covers the unit with two layers of fabric, which will protect it from normal backpack wear. It was $1 at a discount store (I bought several in different colors). I'd also highly recommend the Lexol cleaning wipes and conditioning wipes if you get a leather case. I've been using Lexol products for ages, and they're the best thing that ever happened to leather.
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Old 07-08-2010, 09:26 AM   #12
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Ixilyn,
An Australian PSP charger will work just fine with the Sony Reader. The important thing is not the country, or input voltage, or frequency, it's the output voltage. All PSP chargers should put out ~5 volts DC.
Regarding memory cards: The readers internal memory will hold a lot of books. You should not need an expansion card unless you intend to load your entire library. The downside to having a lot of books on the reader reveals one of Sony's quirks. They have the reader perform an automatic scan of the readers memory, internal and cards, every time the device is disconnected from the USB. The time required for this scan is dependent on the number of books you have loaded. It can take from less than a minute for a few books, say less than 100, to hours if you have the memory full. Just because you can load thousands of books into the expanded memory does not mean is is a practical thing to do. I limit myself to about 100 books at a time. Since I'm one of those people that only reads one book at a time, delete it, and start on the next book, 100 is still more than I can justify carrying around. I use Calibre to maintain my source files on my PC.
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Old 07-08-2010, 08:01 PM   #13
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Ahh, thanks for clarifiying MSJim! My initial idea was to easily upload my nursing text/slides onto the SD card as they need to be updated/ changed frequently and leave my leisure books on the reader's own storage. I suppose I could stick with just the book readers's storage and see how it goes first.

Is it hard to delete stuff off the reader? I remembered when I used to have an Ipod, it would delete my songs permanantly even from my song library if I had attempted to remove it from my ipod. I am hoping that the readers won't have this similar problem of deleting stuff or "syncing" every book from my library in the computer?

*placed my order, be waiting for it to arrive squee*
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Old 07-08-2010, 08:40 PM   #14
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Hi Ixilyn. I got my PRS-600 last month and I love it! It's been easy to delete books and I've not had any 'syncing' issues with either the Sony software or Calibre. Plus with Calibre you can add tags so all of your nursing files would be together in one collection and easy to find. Hope yours arrives soon!
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Old 07-08-2010, 08:47 PM   #15
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Is it hard to delete stuff off the reader? I remembered when I used to have an Ipod, it would delete my songs permanantly even from my song library if I had attempted to remove it from my ipod.
I'm not sure what the Sony Library software does, because I quit using it not long after I got it so I'm many versions out of date, but Calibre understands the difference between its private library, your device, and your original files wherever you left them. It's very well-behaved that way.
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