Reading large PDF files

[the_apotheosis]

I'm considering buying an Iliad to read textbooks and technical journals, as I already have a Sony Reader for my fiction. Some of my texts are scanned versions of the original paper copy, so they are very large in size (some up to 700 mb). I've heard that the Iliad--with its small amount of RAM and processor capability--is slow to handle files. So, how will the reading experience be like with these large files? Can you guys give an approximate of how long it will take to open the file or to flip each page.

Looking forward to joining the Iliad community.

[Gogolo]

60MB was the biggest I have. Opens in one Minute, page turn is as fast as with smaller sizes.

I think 700MB is far to big. Ever tried Abby Finereader? You get quite good results if scanned with 400ppi.

Greetings
Gogolo

Other option: Split the pdfs in sub100MB files...

[the_apotheosis]

If a 700mb file is too big, then do you know of any tools/programs (preferably freeware) that can convert it to a smaller size (lesser dpi)?

[DaleDe]

Originally Posted by the_apotheosis

If a 700mb file is too big, then do you know of any tools/programs (preferably freeware) that can convert it to a smaller size (lesser dpi)?

If you can print it then you can use a PDF creator as the print destination and go from there to print partial documents.

Dale

[the_apotheosis]

How about page-turn times? Since the file is so long, I probably have to make many page turns before getting to the page I want. Considering that it takes ~1-2 seconds for an e-ink screen to refresh (Sony Reader), then does it take around ~3 seconds to turn a pdf page?

[DeathtoToasters]

Originally Posted by the_apotheosis

How about page-turn times? Since the file is so long, I probably have to make many page turns before getting to the page I want. Considering that it takes ~1-2 seconds for an e-ink screen to refresh (Sony Reader), then does it take around ~3 seconds to turn a pdf page?

From what I have experienced page turns are the same rate once the document is loaded.

[daudi]

Originally Posted by the_apotheosis

How about page-turn times? Since the file is so long, I probably have to make many page turns before getting to the page I want. Considering that it takes ~1-2 seconds for an e-ink screen to refresh (Sony Reader), then does it take around ~3 seconds to turn a pdf page?

You can click on the page progress bar at the bottom of the page to go forward or backwards many pages at a time, you don't have to turn each page to get to the one you want.

Also I have experimented a little with adding elements to pdf pages to improve navigation. You know how some large books or address books have cut-outs at the side (e.g. the moleskine address book), or are perhaps coloured right to the edge of the page so that you can see different sections by looking at the spine. It is possible to emulate this with PDFs by adding hyperlinks with discreet numbers or even labels in the right-hand margin that are repeated on every page of the pdf. It does not add much to the file size. It is a bit like having a clickable table of contents available on every page (but without the long titles).

I have a script that processes a PDF and adds these marks. It is not ready for others to use (unless they are happy editing bash scripts). It also kills any existing hyperlinks which is a shame. But if you have scanned PDFs it could work nicely for navigating between sections of a large PDF. I need to find time to finish this off. Ah, Christmas is coming . . .

There are other things that could be done with this. I was thinking this could be used to create a hyperlink index. The idea would be to supply a list of words to index, use pdftohtml -xml and some scripting to get the page number that has each word, then create an index that is added to the PDF with the index entries and with numbers that are hyperlinks for each page where the word occurs. Not exactly a search option, but a way of pre-processing PDFs to make it easier to find specific items of interest.

I have also used this to create hyperlink thumbnails of each page of the PDF.