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Old 02-01-2011, 09:12 AM   #1
LadyLou
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Almost Giving Up!

I have had my Sony Touch for just over a year now! and have yet to read a book!!

The device itself is fine and I know as much as I need to know about using it for reading books.

I use Calibre and have a collection of about 100 books at present, all converted to e-pub format. I can transfer them to my reader and open them to read, but this is where the problems start!

The sentences and paragraphs are all over the place. There are gaps in pargraphs; every time there should be a double 'l' one is missing and replaced by a gap in the word.

Sometimes there are only a few words on a page, etc. etc.

I took a break for a few weeks to clear my head and started reading up again.
I have had quite a bit of help on this site, and have decided I need Sigil which I have downloaded, but it appears to be totally beyond my 'grasp' on computing and editing.

To me, it appears that I have to actually read the book page by page and correct each and every fault mannually.

This is just too much for me to cope with.

Is it really that complicated, I am a 'silver surfer' but have managed to conquor i-tunes, but sigil and to a point Calibre just seem to need much more knowledge of computing than I have.

I just thought, buy an e-book, transfer it to the Reader and read!!!
Obviously that is just not so, so, I am about to throw in the towel, sell it on e-bay and return to paperbacks.

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Old 02-01-2011, 09:31 AM   #2
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Quote:
Originally Posted by LadyLou View Post
I have had my Sony Touch for just over a year now! and have yet to read a book!!
[...]
The sentences and paragraphs are all over the place. There are gaps in pargraphs; every time there should be a double 'l' one is missing and replaced by a gap in the word.

Sometimes there are only a few words on a page, etc. etc.
[...]
It seems to me that you have probably obtained PDF format ebooks, and have tried converting them to ePub with Calibre.

This is not going to work very well, as you have found, as PDF is not very good as an intermediate format - it's very difficult to convert it into another ebook format without errors.

I suggest that you try with an ebook that's actually an ePub by design, rather than a conversion from a PDF.

There are lots of free ePubs here at mobileread you could try, to see what ePubs should work like on your Sony. Why not give my Omnibus of Kidnapped/Catriona a go: https://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=58419
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Old 02-01-2011, 09:47 AM   #3
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Why put yourself through that? first, download a good quality ePub to your DESKTOP, noy into Calibre.

1. Go to "my computer" and open the drive that your Sony is plugged into.

2. Find the "media" file.

3. Drag a good quality ePub into that file.

4. Disconnect from your computer.

5. The book should be there in the alphabetical list.

Calibre is great for organizing, but absolutelynot necessary. I never used any library software with my Sony.
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Old 02-01-2011, 09:48 AM   #4
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If pdurrant is correct and you are trying to convert .PDF's - you need to get rid of all the white space. There is a way to do this inside of Adobe Acrobat if you own the full version (not the viewer).
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Old 02-01-2011, 10:20 AM   #5
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What pdurrant said. I wouldn't read a book that horribly formatted either. Your experience will be significantly different when starting with a properly formatted file.

I love Calibre because it let's me organize my ebooks, but as DixieGal says, it's not necessary. It can be good at converting some file types, but PDF is a notoriously difficult one to handle because of it's rigidity.
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Old 02-01-2011, 11:04 AM   #6
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And the SOnys are suppose to do a great job with PDF.

If you have the original versions of the books, the versions before you converted them, try loading those on to your Sony and see how it goes.

I am impressed that you are still working on this a year later. That is some serious perserverence.
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Old 02-01-2011, 01:52 PM   #7
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Many thanks for your replies, I must admit that my work on this has not been continuous but I would take a rest for a week or two and try again. I learnt my lesson in that my computer failed and I lost everything in Calibre so spent quite a time getting that right again.

I sometimes feel that rather than try and rescue or work around what I have, that it is better to start completely from the word go again.

As suggested I am going to open a fresh location to put all my e-book files, and perhaps not use Calibre, I had worked very hard organising and downloading missing covers etc. and was proud of my achievements until I loaded some onto the Sony. I have bad eyes and arthritis in my hands so making the font large was a good idea, but when only a few sentences appear on each page turning pages can be a pain too.

As I say, I am going to persevere with all the help that I have been offered.
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Old 02-01-2011, 02:02 PM   #8
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Hello LadyLou

no need to give up, there are millions of books on the net for you. There is a library here on the forums that has different formats available. Personally I like BBeB/lrf better than epub as the font size steps aren't as big as in epub so here is the link to the library.

Or you go with the more modern books that you will find in our Freebie section. A good example is this link that I found there.

This should do for starters, shouldn't it? And next time, when you come back here, you can tell us how much you enjoyed your read
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Old 02-01-2011, 02:05 PM   #9
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May be a good idea to start with professionally formatted ePub's right from the beginning.

Becoming your own book formatting specialist can be a daunting job.
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Old 02-01-2011, 04:00 PM   #10
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Dealing with PDFs is, IMO, for the more experienced converter - they do what they do well, but weren't designed for use on eBook readers. I'd advise avoiding them like the plague until you get the hang of the simpler reader format to reader format conversions (mobi-ePub, Lit-ePub, etc.).

Or, as already said, download books that are already ePubs.

Stick at it though, there's a certain satisfaction in having done the conversion yourself.

I'd suggest ignoring pdb & txt files as well - again it's harder to get an acceptable end result from these.
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Old 02-01-2011, 07:33 PM   #11
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If you just want to buy books, put them on the reader, and then read, then you need to buy books which are already designed for your Sony.

If the books you are reading are only available in PDF format that you almost certainly have the wrong eReader. PDF and 6" screens are just not a match made in heaven. You'd be much happier with a 9" screen or a tablet.

A year is a very long time.
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Old 02-01-2011, 09:15 PM   #12
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ProfCrash View Post
And the Sonys are suppose to do a great job with PDF.
I'm not a big fan of PDFs, but I really think it depends on how the PDF is made.

Some PDFs are nothing more than a collection of pics. Those you have to use the zoom and you have to "pan-and-scan" to read across the page. Yuck.

Some PDFs have a "carriage return" or "paragraph return" at the end of every PDF line (rather than at the end of only the actual paragraphs). Those are the ones that end up with the OP described (I believe).

Then again, some are properly designed for reflow - they have paragraph returns only at the end of every paragraph. Those are the ones that people talk about when the praise how the Sony handles PDFs.
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Old 02-03-2011, 12:32 PM   #13
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Following on from the excellent advice given above I have downloaded - and installed! several books from your library.

I also had a look at the Kobo site and purchased a book on there - now this is going to make me sound like a real 'no hoper'. Clicked download and a file of sorts appeared in my download file. I cannot open that file and windows does not recognise it!. Did some more reading around and realised I needed Adobe Digital Editions so I downloaded that too. However, it would not let me set up an account as it said I already had one - which I do remember vaguely from December 2009 when I first bought the Sony. Now the fun starts, I think I now have 2 versions of ADE because I got totally confused with getting forgotten and 'changed' passwords with both the old and new ADE programs trying to set up an account. Any way I now have (I think) ADE downloads. Now I am stuck - how do I get my download from Kobo into ADE and then onto my Sony.

I am soooo embarassed.
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Old 02-03-2011, 12:58 PM   #14
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That file that you saved from Kobo is most likely the acsm file.

It is NOT the book. It is a "key" to authorize you to download the book

You need to set your computer to choose "Adobe Digital Editions" as the program that will open that file. You don't want to save the acsm file to your computer, you want to open it with Adobe Digital Editions. Adobe will then take that ACSM file and use that to retrieve your book for you.

Once you have the book as viewable in Adobe Digital Editions then you can load it into Calibre like usual.
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Old 02-03-2011, 01:18 PM   #15
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LadyLou,

have you opened a book and actually read it now?

If getting ADE working is a problem don't try to, just load the book via Sony Reader Library. That works with books bought at other stores as well as books from the library. Procedure is the same as with ADE. When the little window pops up you check "open with" and choose the Reader Library. The book will transfer itself to the Library like a charm. You can download all your books via the Reader Library and forget about Calibre alltogether if you like to. Or you load them using the "file" 'upload' in the menue from your download section.

Last edited by Poppaea; 02-03-2011 at 01:46 PM. Reason: Forgot to say something
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