01-18-2019, 01:10 PM | #1 |
Nameless Being
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Mediocre user experience with new Clara HD
Just got a Clara HD this week. Nice device: great size and weight, easy to setup, gorgeous screen, super easy to side-load all books from my Calibre library, and also love the Overdrive/library integration.
But...I've noticed 2 significant issues impacting the usability.
Has anyone else noticed these? Is there a potential fix for either one, besides waiting for software updates? |
01-18-2019, 02:22 PM | #2 |
Wizard
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I don't have a Clara, but generally when I have noticed slow navigation within a book it is because of a problem with the book itself. Most common problem being that the internal HTML files are too large, usually because the publisher has put multiple chapters into one html file, or the book was converted to ePub with Calibre and Calibre couldn't locate the chapter breaks.
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01-18-2019, 02:59 PM | #3 | |
Nameless Being
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01-18-2019, 03:12 PM | #4 | ||
Nameless Being
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I'd be interested in doing that. This reader has so much promise for my use, I hate to return it. If somebody has a good tutorial on doing this, would love to see it. Also, I'd wonder these additional tech spec details:
Last edited by maximus83; 01-18-2019 at 03:16 PM. |
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01-18-2019, 04:38 PM | #5 |
Bibliophagist
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People have posted about using cards up to 128GB. The critical point is testing the card to make sure the small block read/write speeds are good. Too many higher speed cards are optimized to streaming video and not for operating system that read/write small blocks. My preferred program for testing is Crystal Diskmark. Generally, I've had good experiences with SanDisk and Samsung SD cards.
Last edited by DNSB; 01-19-2019 at 01:05 AM. |
01-18-2019, 04:56 PM | #6 | ||
Gentleman and scholar
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Device: Clara HD; Nook ST w/Glowlight, (2015) Glowlight Plus, Paperwhite 3
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Anything like that, I tend to make a project of cleaning it up in Sigil myself. |
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01-18-2019, 05:20 PM | #7 | |
Nameless Being
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So the only other thing I wonder: Have folks who've installed the new cards in the Clara noticed that--besides the increased storage (which honestly, I don't really need)--it actually made a difference in the perf and responsiveness? |
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01-18-2019, 05:49 PM | #8 |
Wizard
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The only differences I noticed when I tried a faster card on my Glo was a slightly reduced boot time and faster USB transfers.
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01-18-2019, 06:00 PM | #9 |
Nameless Being
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Interesting. Searching a few threads about this, I see folks repeating the same comment: it adds storage, but doesn't drastically improve the page rendering and responsiveness issues. If that's consistently the case for most who have tried this, I probably won't bother with the storage upgrade. I don't own nearly enough ebooks to make the storage thing an issue, and for other mobile device tasks I have better devices.
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01-19-2019, 08:46 PM | #10 |
Guru
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Shakespeare's Complete Works isn't a "good-sized book," of course; it's a MASSIVE book -- the Folio Society edition is in three volumes. Nonetheless, I suspect a poorly formatted ebook, not a general problem. Which edition of the Complete Works is giving you trouble?
All best wishes. |
01-20-2019, 11:48 AM | #11 | |
Nameless Being
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https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/wil...complete-works However, this was just a handy example. The same issues occur with other large books, one example being the Bible. I suspect most of the issue is simply the limited RAM and CPU of the Kobo versus large books. My android phone does better with the same books, but it has a LOT better hardware specs. |
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01-20-2019, 12:25 PM | #12 |
Zealot
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If you're looking for a large book, here is a rather VERY large book.
https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/the...-of-the-fallen It's some 10,083 pages long! Actually the number of pages changes. In the link I provided, it actually states 11,927 pages, the description on amazon says 10,083 pages. And in a couple of epub's from the library one is 8,344 pages and the other is 8,244 pages. I think it's just the font sizes selected for the books that are causing the differences and not (hopefully) missing pages. Regardless, that's one massive book. Last edited by christopher22; 01-20-2019 at 12:43 PM. Reason: added info |
01-20-2019, 01:32 PM | #13 | |
Wizard
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Quote:
The device only needs to have one or two html files loaded into memory at once, the one containing the page you are reading, and perhaps the one containing the page a link leads to if you are activating the link. If the book is broken up into lots of small html files then limited RAM is no problem no matter how long the book. But if the book consists of a small number of very large html files then there will be problems. (Some devices will simply crash, others will be slower.) If the publisher is competent then they will break the large book up into many small html files, but if not then the only real solution is to edit the book and fix the publisher''s mistakes yourself. (If the book has been converted from another format then it might not be the publisher's mistake but the converter's mistake.) |
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01-20-2019, 02:28 PM | #14 |
Resident Curmudgeon
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@maximus83, is this in ePub or kepub format? There are two different renderers on a Kobo and one could be faster then the other at links for rather large eBooks.
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01-20-2019, 03:13 PM | #15 |
the rook, bossing Never.
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Yes, Calibre has a setting for internal file size, default about 260K.
That said, quite obviously Kobo test their sw better on kepubs than epubs, but it's also obviously buggy. |
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