I'm planning on getting one of these (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000FI73MA/ref=amb_link_6369712_4?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=center-1&pf_rd_r=0DH37JP0DGCB683D9NE4&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=435656501&pf_rd_i=507846)
Below are the hard-selling points (direct from their site). Anyone have any thoughts on these things? I like being able to essentially carry my entire library around with me-- and I like not filling up my house with books I read once every few years (if that).
What'ya all think?
Product Overview
* Revolutionary electronic-paper display provides a sharp, high-resolution screen that looks and reads like real paper.
* Simple to use: no computer, no cables, no syncing.
* Wireless connectivity enables you to shop the Kindle Store directly from your Kindle—whether you're in the back of a taxi, at the airport, or in bed.
* Buy a book and it is auto-delivered wirelessly in less than one minute.
* More than 160,000 books available, including more than 98 of 112 current New York Times® Best Sellers.
* New York Times® Best Sellers and New Releases $9.99, unless marked otherwise.
* Free book samples. Download and read first chapters for free before you decide to buy.
* Top U.S. newspapers including The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and Washington Post; top magazines including TIME, Atlantic Monthly, and Forbes—all auto-delivered wirelessly.
* Top international newspapers from France, Germany, and Ireland; Le Monde, Frankfurter Allgemeine, and The Irish Times—all auto-delivered wirelessly.
* More than 350 top blogs from the worlds of business, technology, sports, entertainment, and politics, including BoingBoing, Slashdot, TechCrunch, ESPN's Bill Simmons, The Onion, Michelle Malkin, and The Huffington Post—all updated wirelessly throughout the day.
* Lighter and thinner than a typical paperback; weighs only 10.3 ounces.
* Holds over 200 titles.
* Long battery life. Leave wireless on and recharge approximately every other day. Turn wireless off and read for a week or more before recharging. Fully recharges in 2 hours.
* Unlike WiFi, Kindle utilizes the same high-speed data network (EVDO) as advanced cell phones—so you never have to locate a hotspot.
* No monthly wireless bills, service plans, or commitments—we take care of the wireless delivery so you can simply click, buy, and read.
* Includes free wireless access to the planet's most exhaustive and up-to-date encyclopedia—Wikipedia.org.
* Email your Word documents and pictures (.JPG, .GIF, .BMP, .PNG) to Kindle for easy on-the-go viewing.
* Included in the box: Kindle wireless reader, Book cover, Power adapter, USB 2.0 cable
Quote from: Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith on September 07, 2008, 11:39:37 PM
* Includes free wireless access to the planet's most exhaustive and up-to-date encyclopedia—Wikipedia.org.
Should that be exhausting and not necessarily accurate encyclopedia? ;)
There was a major hype here in the weekend newspapers for some new electronic book or other. Can't remember if it was the one you are looking at.
Books, real books, as of old, are one of my greatest loves so not for me.
But, in themselves, electronic books may be useful.
I've spent most of my adult life staring at a computer screen all day long (or all night long) (or both) (well actually once for a solid three days and nights) and it never harmed me (as in the schoolteachers used to beat us and it never did us any harm)..... but there seem to be a considerable number of people I know who blame such activity for all sorts of things..... how about joining a trial for testing whether these products are safe? :mrgreen:
Oh, by the way, you know the answer to this kind of question..... wait for the posts to roll in telling you to buy a different brand :bees: :ROFL:
Quote from: Griffin NoName on September 08, 2008, 12:32:07 AM
Oh, by the way, you know the answer to this kind of question..... wait for the posts to roll in telling you to buy a different brand :bees: :ROFL:
Speaking of... ;) I have the Sony reader which doesn't have the wireless capabilities of the Kindle but then again downloading data on a cellular network is still slow and you will be paying for that content.
I regularly download books from the project Gutenberg (http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Main_Page) and get some manga from different websites. :mrgreen:
For a geek its the perfect toy but more importantly it can be very useful if you need to pack lots of schematics on your daily job provided you can live with the size of the screen. I got it for our trip to Europe last year and having tens of books in your pocket while doing lines or riding in planes & trains is very cool. ^__^
I gather that in the UK Sony are charging the same price for downloaded books as for the hardback, which seems mad, but other than that both the Sony and Amazon devices look interesting.
Griff: touche. ;D
Zono: I've looked at the Sony, and it seems to be the nearest competitor. The thing I like about the Kindle is that it's screen is NOT an LCD, nor a plasma, nor an OLED or anything that consumes power. It's based on that "electronic paper" tech that I read about, oh, 10 years or so ago.
It works by encapsulating in a matrix particles that can be black or white, depending on which way they "face". The matrix is passive, and the particles remain facing with no power applied. Thus, the only use of power is to change the "face"/orientation of a particles as needed.
This means, if you turn off the cell-phone thingy*, this only needs charging once every two weeks or so. It also means that you MUST have an external light source (unlike most electronic displays, which work well in the dark). It also means that bright sunlight is just as good as common reading lamps to see the display.
I like this aspect of it's display: it's "off" when displaying a page, and does not turn "on" until I click for the next page-- then it's only "on" briefly.
I also like that you can change the font/character size to suit your tastes and eyesight.
How does your Sony compare to the above?
Free books can be easily downloaded into a Kindle. If it's tethered to an internet-aware PC, the cost is free. If you elect to e-mail it through the cell-thingy, it's $0.10/book. There is a totally free e-mail address, if it's tethered to an internet-aware PC as well.
So, aside from the direct-from-Amazon method, there are three other methods to get content, two of which are completely free.
There is also software that converts most E-book formats into the Kindle format.
Some cons: It does not do color graphics at all (It's black-and-white).
It apparently does not do B&W graphics very well, either.
It is heavy according to some (for what it is).
None of these bother me at all-- most of my reading is fiction, and does not come with pretty pictures anyway....! And it's not as heavy as a hard bound full-sized book, so that's not an issue, either.
_________
* the cell-phone is not really a cell-- you cannot make calls, not even 911. It's based on Sprint. You don't need a contract or any subscription-- the cost of sending you the book/magazine/newspaper is inherent in the cost of the subject matter sent. Delivery is within minutes (assuming you're within the Sprint's data network-- overseas, it does not work well or at all, I'm told. That's okay-- you can still read the books you already have inside it). With the "cell phone" turned to on, battery life is similar to a premium cell-- 2 to 5 days according to reviews.
Obviously, if one elects to subscribe to a daily newspaper, the cell thingy must be left on, to get the daily paper.
Quote from: Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith on September 08, 2008, 07:20:31 AM
Zono: I've looked at the Sony, and it seems to be the nearest competitor. The thing I like about the Kindle is that it's screen is NOT an LCD, nor a plasma, nor an OLED or anything that consumes power. It's based on that "electronic paper" tech that I read about, oh, 10 years or so ago.
[snip]
How does your Sony compare to the above?
It's exactly the same epaper, in fact it is exactly the same screen.
Quote from: Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith on September 08, 2008, 07:20:31 AM
It apparently does not do B&W graphics very well, either.
It is heavy according to some (for what it is).
I read manga on it (which comes in B&W) and it works perfectly, mind you, 'white' is really a kind of gray so photographs will never look as good as a print but for what you need it is quite good. Re: weight, I don't know how heavier the kindle is compared to the sony but I can tell you than mine is slightly lighter than the book I'm reading right now (which is about an inch longer than the reader).
Quote from: Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith on September 08, 2008, 07:20:31 AMThe thing I like about the Kindle is that it's screen is NOT an LCD, nor a plasma, nor an OLED or anything that consumes power. It's based on that "electronic paper" tech that I read about, oh, 10 years or so ago.
It works by encapsulating in a matrix particles that can be black or white, depending on which way they "face". The matrix is passive, and the particles remain facing with no power applied. Thus, the only use of power is to change the "face"/orientation of a particles as needed.
This would be a major selling feature to me - I get tired of looking at backlit screens all the time.
Quote from: Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith on September 08, 2008, 07:20:31 AM
It works by encapsulating in a matrix particles that can be black or white, depending on which way they "face". The matrix is passive, and the particles remain facing with no power applied. Thus, the only use of power is to change the "face"/orientation of a particles as needed.
Sense a spin off oportunity here where no power requirements to turn a page etc; iron filings with letters on either end and a magnet. Would work for short two page books.
Quote
None of these bother me at all-- most of my reading is fiction....
If you don't really read, why do you need one? ~ForumIrritatingSubEditor
Quote from: Griffin NoName on September 08, 2008, 09:15:50 PM
If you don't really read, why do you need one? ~ForumIrritatingSubEditor
For the subliminal messages, of course. Why else?
Quote from: Sibling Zono (anon1mat0) on September 08, 2008, 02:11:08 PM
Quote from: Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith on September 08, 2008, 07:20:31 AM
Zono: I've looked at the Sony, and it seems to be the nearest competitor. The thing I like about the Kindle is that it's screen is NOT an LCD, nor a plasma, nor an OLED or anything that consumes power. It's based on that "electronic paper" tech that I read about, oh, 10 years or so ago.
[snip]
How does your Sony compare to the above?
It's exactly the same epaper, in fact it is exactly the same screen.
Quote from: Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith on September 08, 2008, 07:20:31 AM
It apparently does not do B&W graphics very well, either.
It is heavy according to some (for what it is).
I read manga on it (which comes in B&W) and it works perfectly, mind you, 'white' is really a kind of gray so photographs will never look as good as a print but for what you need it is quite good. Re: weight, I don't know how heavier the kindle is compared to the sony but I can tell you than mine is slightly lighter than the book I'm reading right now (which is about an inch longer than the reader).
I just read in another review, that the Sony has very limited license on which books can be loaded into it-- this would be a deal-breaker for me. Can you confirm/contradict this?
The Kindle has converter software that lets you move existing E-books, text, PDF, etc into the Kindle format (so that the text-resizing works properly). Thus the host of free books is available to the Kindle as well as purchased ones.
Converting books for the sony is relatively painless, so that wouldn't be a concern.
Re: catalog, sony has it's own bookstore (BTW beagle, indeed they charge the same for book & ebook which certainly is idiotic), but I would lie to you if I knew how good or bad it is because to this day I have NOT bought a single ebook there (in fact the only 'ebook' I've bought was a multi-language dictionary for my palm pilot somewhere else). There is a good potential for Amazon going forward but at present time I wouldn't be completely sure of the present state, nor the ability of Sony to get a good catalog. Again I personally don't care because given that the price of the ink & paper version costs the same, I much rather get the real thing and a dodgy txt version from the net (and I refuse to pay for works on the public domain).
I guess you can go to their eBook store (http://ebookstore.sony.com/) and review the catalog and compare it to Amazon's.
At present time the kindle sells for $360 while the sony reader goes for $300 but certainly the ability to get newspapers or wireless access to wikipedia is a plus for the kindle.
Bob in a quantum state of ebooks - to assist you in continuing to dither - you can see a little video of the Sony (http://dennis.cerosmedia.com/iGIZMO/1L489c0c6131ce0012.cde).
kindle - is that sort of like hoover is to vacuum cleaner?
Well, I just ordered an Amazon Kindle. Should be delivered by Friday, if their website is honest. The extra shipping was trivially more than the total cost, so why not?
No purchases for books, yet...I'll dump my current E-book collection in there first, and I already have a 4gig SD card I can use, too.
Will review here, if anyone's interested.
I see the current "Views" is 80. If that number increases significantly (other than my own lurking) I'll post a review, or if anyone asks.
We shall see. Amazon has an amazing return policy--which I have verified.
The Sony ultimately lost to the wireless book purchase option, and that if my Kindle breaks, all the books I purchased from Amazon can be instantly (relatively) re-downloaded into the replacement Kindle. This from JE Pournelle's blog (http://www.chaosmanorreviews.com/oa/2008/20080908_col_338-a.php). He's been reviewing computer-related electronics since the '80s. Was a regular contributor to Byte print magazine and the Byte on-line, too. Still writes a monthly column.
Well, it came in a smallish-box. I was moderately surprised how modest the packing-box was, roughly the same size as when I ordered the last Harry Potter book.
Inside the outer box was an inner box--which vaguely looked like a hardback. Sturdy cardboard case, left side had a slide-tray (made entirely of recyclable fiber material, I was gratified to see) containing the "universal power supply" and a USB to mini-USB cable. There was a modest printed manual, too. Both cables were "iPod White". The power supply is basically a digital switching device (no heavy transformer inside) that takes a fairly wide input range, digitally/switching steps it down to the voltage the Kindle likes. I do not know that that is, but likely 5v. I'll post once I have a definitive answer. The USB cable appears to be a standard one (even though it's white, instead of "traditional" black.. :mrgreen: ).
On the right side of the cardboard case is another slide tray made of the same material, and contains the kindle itself, and a nice heavy folding cover.
The kindle was lightweight, and had the battery already installed. A "sticky-note" cover protected the screen, and had super-basic "turn me on, plug me in" instructions. I did both-- and the battery showed nearly full charge, and was full within 10 minutes (even though the sticky said 2 hours). There's a helpful "charging" light, which also indicated a USB connection.
The size? Well, the screen itself is roughly the same footprint as a single page in a paperback book. There is roughly an inch (2 cm) margin on the left and right sides that contain the very large "next page" and smaller "back page" buttons. These are duplicated on the left and right sides. The top edge is thinner, and contains nothing interesting. The bottom is roughly 2 1/2 (6cm) wide, and contains a tiny QWERTY keyboard made up of tiny cell-phone-sized buttons. There are several specialty buttons along the bottom, roughly the same size except for "space" and "search" which are larger.
Above, and to the right of the "keyboard" is a roller-wheel. Along the right edge of the reading screen is a "cursor screen". There is a sliver box-cursor, controlled by the roller wheel (which is about 1/2" or 1 cm in diameter). You basically roll the cursor-box up and down, and depress the wheel to operate the device--else you press one of the specialty buttons.
The back is mostly covered with a rubber material. At the top of the back, there is a tapered area containing 2 slide switches: ON/OFF and WIRELESS ON/OFF. This is cleverly designed so that these are unlikely to be accidentally changed while using the device, even not in it's "portfolio cover", yet if you put it into it's case, you can still reach the switches without needing to remove it.
At the very bottom edge are 3 connectors, and two buttons. Earphone, mini-USB (Sony-style) and power jack. The buttons are volume up and down.
The whole thing is tapered from the left edge to the right edge, I noticed, and the overall color is "near-" white. Tapers from roughly 1/2" thick at the left to roughly 1/4" thick to the right, with the right-hand buttons tapering to a thin edge. This thing is pretty thin, even housed inside it's protective cover.
The cover is nicely made, sturdy. Made of what appears to be simulated leather "pleather? naugahyde? I thought those naugas were extinct...) on the outside, and a suede-like stuff on the inside. Black on outside, grey on inside. There's a heavy elastic band attached to the back, so that you can draw it around the cover to keep it closed, and to trap any paper you may have inserted in there, too... ;D
No provision for pens, cards or other miscellanea though.
...
Display is very, VERY crisp: more so than even the best LCD computer monitors, and more than most LCD panels I've seen. In fact, I've seen printing-on-paper that was not as crisp as this thing. No backlight, so adequate lighting is a must. Sunlight, room light, etc...all equally crisp.
Font is typical of San-Serif or Ariel style, and size is adjustable. I can read it without reading glasses, if I set it larger. Right now, I've set it one "notch" smaller than default, and am using fairly weak readers (1.5x). I may elect to go smaller still-- more text before a next page is needed.
Page change is a bit slower than I expected, but not unreasonable. A rapid-page-turner might find it a bit slower than turning an actual page in a book, but most people won't notice, I predict. The display "blinks" from all-black for an instant, then the black-text on white appears all at once. I suspect that after a few hundred pages, your eyes won't even process this anymore. OTOH, if blinking bothers you or your vision, this may well be an issue for you.
...
Inserting a 4gig microSD card (inside a micro-to-standard adapter sleeve) proved a snap: slide open the battery cover (on the back) to expose the standard SD slot. It appears to understand SDHC, too, as this 4gig card was that type. From a tip I'd read on-line, I formatted the card in my PC first, making sure it was completely blank, before inserting it into the Kindle. It reports all 4gig is available for use.
...
I found how to convert your existing e-books on Amazon's site, with a bit of searching. Not falling-forward simple, but once explained, easy enough.
When you purchase this thing from Amazon, they ask you if it's a gift (I said no...it's a gift to ME! :mrgreen: ) and they automatically register your Amazon-associated e-mail address to your new Kindle. This does a couple of things.
* it creates 2 Kindle-specific e-mail addresses (name_at_kindle.com and name_at_free.kindle.com obviously, _at_ is really @ )
* it creates an association between your Amazon-associated account e-mail address and your Kindle.
This is important for a couple of things: announcements and new content has notices sent to your associated address. You can send your own content to the _at_kindle.com addresses. The first one is sent wireless directly to your kindle, with a $0.10/US per item charge. The second one "bounces" through their conversion software, and comes back with a notice to your associated address. You download that to your PC, and then put it on your Kindle via the USB cable.
There is also a filter at Amazon, so that nothing gets to your kindle (and thus being charged) unless you specifically enable that e-mail address in "Manage My Kindle" at Amazon. Normally, the only inbound messages that _at_kindle addresses receive is the one you associated initially. This completely eliminates SPAM or unwanted charges.
I decided I wanted a kindle-only and specific e-mail address, so I activated one of my dormant addys with my cable internet provider, and using Manage My Kindle, changed the associations and names. Now only Kindle-specific traffic will come on these addresses.
....
Reading on the Kindle. So far, the only thing I've read on it is the already-loaded instruction manual, and a nice "welcome" letter from Amazon.
There's a built-in dictionary, already loaded too. You can elect to highlight a line of text, click the roller, move to and click "look up" and every word in that line is defined. Nice.
You can add annotations and highlights if you like-- I've not experiment with that, except to practice highlighting. That consists of not changing the background color (as would be traditional) but drawing a fine box around the highlighted section(s). Quite workable. Have not tried the notes-- not something I do or am likely to do.
As I write this, I'm waiting on some conversion software to change my Micro$oft Reader LIT files into something the Kindle can digest, via the on-line conversion software.
Will write more, as I learn more.
---
Edit: added some missing details.
Quote from: Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith on September 19, 2008, 09:56:28 PM
I suspect that after a few hundred pages, your eyes won't even process this anymore. OTOH, if blinking bothers you or your vision, this may well be an issue for you.
Volunteers required to see if flicking through several pages (like fanning a paper book) can induce an epileptic fit :mrgreen:
Let us know about battery life. My sony (which is the older model whose battery life is supposedly shorter) could last a good amount of hours without a charge and would only eat more battery if you were changing pages too quickly (and still last for hours). Given that the kindle uses a cellular network it could potentially eat more battery, hence my curiosity.
Quote from: Sibling Zono (anon1mat0) on September 19, 2008, 10:44:51 PM
Let us know about battery life. My sony (which is the older model whose battery life is supposedly shorter) could last a good amount of hours without a charge and would only eat more battery if you were changing pages too quickly (and still last for hours). Given that the kindle uses a cellular network it could potentially eat more battery, hence my curiosity.
Will do.
The cell thingy has a very convenient switch next to the main power...and I have it in the off position.
I had it on earlier, playing around with the "shop for books wirelessly" option...and it works. I wondered how well it might do that, but it's pretty clever. First, I used the "browse the web" under "experimental" (this way, if this currently free feature gets abused, they can always defeat it claiming it was not even beta-testing...) I tried the Weather Underground, as that was in the list of pre-loaded bookmarks.
That pretty quickly took me to a text-based version, with a little box, center-stage for keying in your location, and a button underneath. Since there's no mouse, and only the "line-by-line" scroll-cursor, I moved opposite the text-box, and clicked.... a sub-context menu pops up, allowing text entry. Put in my city, state as [tulsa, ok] and clicked on the wheel. Then I went down a line to the "search" button and clicked again-- another sub-context menu pops up (generated by the Kindle's software) asking me which to click? Box of text (for editing) or the button....I chose button.
It trundled a bit, and a local, current forecast/weather conditions pops up...again, all text which is fine.
Too cool.
So, how is the shop-for-books experience?
Not bad, not bad at all-- even has black-and-white representations of the book jacket's cover art.
Presented me with my familiar "recommended for you" list, filtered for books and filtered for kindle format. Nice.
I browsed several titles, ended up downloading a few "trial pages" for free, and bought Pratchett's latest Discworld title, "Making Money". Haven't opened any of those, will report later.
I wanted to use a search-specific of titles _I_ was thinking about, not recommended (and possibly pre-fetched).
Keyed in author: "l neil smith" and there was one book by that author on the Kindle-format. I got the sample text for that, too.
This is where I noticed at the bottom of the screen are some indicators I had not previously noted. There was a cell-strength meter (showing full bars-- I was lying in bed during all this). And a "all downloads are complete" message.
So I navigated back out of book-browsing, to the "home" screen, which is a list of the current files/books on the machine, including the SD card. I turned the cell off, and the signal-strength bars went away, and a "off" symbol replaced that, telling me I'd turned off the cell.
I sorted by "newest first" and all the recent titles appeared, including "Making Money".
At that point, I put it away, and picked up the novel I was finishing....this one is in the Traditional Dead Tree and Lamp Black version....... ;D
Here's some comments I posted in another forum. There may be some overlap, but most is new.
Well, I've had it for a day so far. Battery life is holding up well-- but I always turn the cell off, unless I'm actually using it.
The cell-network is Sprint, so it has excellent major US coverage (rural areas may not work). Overseas? It won't work at all-- Sprint is non-existent outside the US.
I've used the "experimental" functions several times, now. There is a primitive browser, that uses the Sprint data net. Mostly, I've looked at the local weather (I made a bookmark for that...!)
The Kindle apparently only understands a single format: Kindle-specific. It is closely tied to your Kindle's serial number, and the books are encrypted with that number.
Thus, if you already have books, you must e-mail them through Amazon's servers, back to either your PC (free) or through the cell-thing ($0.10/book) directly to the Kindle.
So far, I've converted 58 E-books that were in the LIT format-- I had to google a utility which converted these to DOC (microsoft word) and then, I e-mailed them via the free process back to my PC.
Putting these on the Kindle is as simple as adding files to a USB drive--for that is how your PC sees it: two USB drives, with letters (on a Windoze machine. On a Mac, would be similar I imagine). Drag-and-drop, cut-and-paste, open a command-line and use XCOPY, each of these methods works (I've used all 3 so far).
The e-mail conversion takes roughly 1 to 3 minutes between the "send" and the "you have mail". Downloading is quicker than the send, because it uses FTP within your browser, not e-mail ASME conversion. The returned E-mail contains a clickable link to each of the books you sent for conversion.
I'm not that happy with the conversion of the DOC files, so I will locate the CD's that I got those books from-- they were included in a couple of Honor Harington (David Weber) hardbacks. I had copied the LIT files into my pocket PC, and that is what I started with. The original CD's had various other formats-- and I plan to experiment (the DOC format does not preserve title and author tags, for example).
I also converted roughly 30 PRC files-- (some pocket pc/palm format, I forget which) that I had from the Gutenberg Project. These converted quite well.
There appears to be a way to publish your own content, which I'm thinking about doing-- the best seems to be convert to Moby Pocket version, then having Amazon convert that to the Kindle. There is free software that lets you publish in the Moby format, with proper tags and such.
So far, I've enjoyed it immensely!
As J.E. Pournelle has said in the past, "recommended"
It doesn't read plain .txt format? With Project Gutemberg files in the sony, the only trick is to remove the carriage returns and the book is understood immediately (in fact is understood with the CRLFs but it may look like carp on screen), also with PDFs although the format can be a pain at times.
Sounds capable but convoluted. :-\
Quote from: Sibling Zono (anon1mat0) on September 21, 2008, 06:39:15 AM
It doesn't read plain .txt format? With Project Gutemberg files in the sony, the only trick is to remove the carriage returns and the book is understood immediately (in fact is understood with the CRLFs but it may look like carp on screen), also with PDFs although the format can be a pain at times.
Sounds capable but convoluted. :-\
It reads DOC format, if you send it off to be converted. I haven't tried simple ASCII text, though--- worth a shot.
And, no, it only understands it's native, highly compressed and encrypted format. A drawback if someone already has a huge library, as the conversion process takes some time, and is limited to the size of file you can send as an attachment. You can ZIP them up (which I did), but they are "delivered" via a series of one-click per title in return (via FTP-link from within the e-mail)
I wish there was stand-alone software, but I think this is just a matter of time...Amazon has not made a serious effort to hide what they are doing. Loads of conversation on various forums.
Discovered an interesting twist re: the buttons.
It seems that I had the large buttons wrong.
On the right, is a large page-advance button. below that, is a small "back to previous menu" button.
On the left is a large page-back button, and below that, is a duplicate page-advance button.
Other than that, I'm enjoying it immensely.
More on the Kindle....it's like learning to program all over again...FUN! (no, I thought learning to program was fun...if you don't think so, use another analogy instead... ;D )
I discovered quite by accident that the Kindle reads plain ASCII files just fine-- no need to convert them via the E-mail process (unless you wanted to send via wireless to the kindle, @$0.10/item).
Just dump into the memory a plain vanilla text file and it reads it just fine. Of course, that file is not compressed in any way, but quite useful for putting your own notes about various things onto the Kindle.
For example, I have all of the Honor Harrington Universe by David Drake on E-book. Whenever I drag those out to re-read, I always want to read them in order-- so I have a list of the order they are to be read in (which is basically the published date, but the Kindle does not sort by that). Anyway, I made this list in good old NOTEPAD as a simple text (.TXT) file.
I dumped it into the Kindle-- and it hit me, what would it do with that file? Answer: it displays it just fine, no worries. Useful.
I will now have to experiment with other format files, to see if I may skip the e-mail/convert step. Will post here my findings.
How tech savvy is the AB?
:bees:
I thought it was kindling you could get via mail (post) now.
Quote from: anthrobabe on September 23, 2008, 08:37:12 AM
How tech savvy is the AB?
:bees:
I thought it was kindling you could get via mail (post) now.
Uuuhhh....sorry? (you may safely assume I'm dense....what's 'AB'?)
I'm going to guess it is herself, the AnthroBabe.
However, I may be wrong. It has happened once before.
For project Gutenberg files I suggest you to download notepad++ (http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=95717&package_id=102072) and use the unwrap text plugin (under TextFX Edit). Given that the size of books isn't that big compression isn't really that necessary much less if you have a 4Gb card.
Try placing a pdf in it too. The sony reads them with no problem.
Quote from: Sibling Zono (anon1mat0) on September 23, 2008, 04:32:12 PM
For project Gutenberg files I suggest you to download notepad++ (http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=95717&package_id=102072) and use the unwrap text plugin (under TextFX Edit). Given that the size of books isn't that big compression isn't really that necessary much less if you have a 4Gb card.
Try placing a pdf in it too. The sony reads them with no problem.
Excellent idea-- but the e-mail/compression routine is not onerous at all, and I do like the compression-- loads faster.
PDF is specifically not supported directly according to Amazon's blurbs. However, no harm in trying....will post results.
I found "The Complete Works of Sam Clemens" in a honkin' huge text file (Gutenberg, natch...I already have a bookmark for that). I like the idea of all-in-one doc. But, the text file lacks chapter tags and hyperlink tags.
I'm thinking of editing that file, and adding start-of-books hyperlinks in the contents pages, and adding chapters and sub-chapters. Moby pocket reader has a free "publish yourself" program, and the moby files convert nicely.
I'll do a small project-test, just to see, obviously.
And...if I'm successful, I intend to send the finished project back to the fine people at Gutenberg Project...someone ELSE might appreciate a "chapter-aware" copy.
Quote from: Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith
I'm thinking of editing that file, and adding start-of-books hyperlinks in the contents pages, and adding chapters and sub-chapters. Moby pocket reader has a free "publish yourself" program, and the moby files convert nicely.
I'll do a small project-test, just to see, obviously.
And...if I'm successful, I intend to send the finished project back to the fine people at Gutenberg Project...someone ELSE might appreciate a "chapter-aware" copy.
Let me know how that goes, Bob.
I downloaded Beirce's
Devils Dictionary, which I am reformatting and A-Z illustrating in an (extremely) dilatory fashion. I never thought of offering it back to them with a little improvement.
Hey Bob,
I don't know if you have access to anything comparable, but my library offers eBooks (generally PDF format, some Mobipocket) which can be downloaded for a limited time period (3 weeks). Might be worth looking into in your area.
I'm not one for buying 'toys', but I like the sounds of the Kindle. Keep updating us on how it performs and if there's anything that gets on your nerves.
Quote from: Agujjim on September 24, 2008, 07:19:39 PM
Hey Bob,
I don't know if you have access to anything comparable, but my library offers eBooks (generally PDF format, some Mobipocket) which can be downloaded for a limited time period (3 weeks). Might be worth looking into in your area.
I'm not one for buying 'toys', but I like the sounds of the Kindle. Keep updating us on how it performs and if there's anything that gets on your nerves.
Thanks, I'll look at my local library... but the problem with me is that 2 or 3 weeks is usually not enough time to read something...my reading's too sporadic. I like to borrow from friends or purchase.
My idea behind the Kindle is that I can purchase new books, but not add to the mass/volume in my limited house.
The electronic "paper" is getting better (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7671528.stm) apparently.
Slightly more info here (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7631596.stm).
Think this is something that I heard of locally a couple of years ago (but all the shares were privately owned by people happy to hold them as I recall).
Love the men in black. Always wondered why SOCO wear white suits ;)
Here's a couple of opinions by some "bookish" Brits on the subject
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7656513.stm (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7656513.stm)
There's more e-readers out there than I realized by far.
I still think Amazon's instant download of a new book trumps the others, though.
_________________________
More thoughts on my Kindle.
The download to purchase a new book has become the defining feature, I think. The experience of reading a book on it has become completely transparent-- I don't even realize I'm clicking the buttons anymore-- seamless reading (just as you--if you're an avid reader-- do not process the motions to turn a page in a dead-tree book).
I even used the "basic web" feature to navigate to Amazon's mobile website (the default mode) and ordered a car-charger for it-- non-book accessories do not appear in the standard Kindle store, it seems.
I have a number of ideas for improvements, and I will likely e-mail those to Amazon at some point. But none are deal-killers--enhancements only. Nits-to-pick.
Yesterday, I was in a store looking for a new TV (yes, my 15 year old box finally croaked. I had purchased it on a whim, to tide me over until I could get a really nice one-- 15 years ago. Best bang-for-the-buck $$ I ever spent. $200 in early 1990's.... Sanyo brand...) and I noticed that Target is selling the Sony e-book readers. I liked what I saw-- but the Sony's lack the wireless delivery feature. I helped a striking woman and her smart daughter compare it to Amazon's. She will be ordering the Amazon one, mainly because it will be a gift, and the receiver loves daily newspapers...a feature the Kindle has wirelessly. (Sorry about that, Target/Sony...) ((and no, I didn't buy a TV at Target, either....))
I didn't think the instant (nearly-- 2-5 seconds) delivery would matter-- but I finished a book in a series, and was able to order, and begin reading within 5 minutes the next book, without even getting out of bed... nice!
So convenient, that I now consider it the defining feature of the technology.
I've also made use of the sample read feature extensively, too. I browse the Kindle store (from bed, my easy chair, while waiting on my lunch-order to be completed...anywhere it strikes me and I have time) and if a book seems interesting, I download a sample, and within minutes, start reading. If I like? All samples (so far) have a nice convenient linky at the end to "buy whole book now".... too easy.
How else can I, at 2am on Saturday Night, purchase a book to read that suits my mood, all without leaving the comfort (and warmth) of my waterbed?
.............
Okay, enough of that aspect. Some of the quirks that I would fix. The cover that it ships with is very sturdy, and I like it a lot. Except the "fastening" method they came up with to keep the kindle in it doesn't. At all. It's just too easy for the Kindle to fall out of the factory cover. I'm going to get some industrial-strength velcro strips to overcome this (after reading several forums on the subject). There are a couple of after-market covers, but these are either too expensive (even if they are made of excellent quality dead-animal skin) too clunky (cannot hold one handed) or are so popular that they are perpetually out of stock (no, really---I found one querky site that only sells hand-made covers of excellent quality, mostly fabric (typically not dead animal skins...not that there's anything wrong with dead animal skin covers, especially if the animal in question was eaten anyway...) and holds the kindle by 4 corners securely. But, alas, the maker only churns out a few of these a month, and is currently completely out.
So, I intend to address the falling out issue with velcro.
Next quirk: the "next page" button on the right is way too easy to click, if you are handling the kindle (and not reading). That is, it's too easy to press that button while picking it up and putting it down. Now, there is a "sleep" function, which locks the keys, and I try to utilize it to address the issue. Or, I close the cover, which protects the keys. But sometimes, I just want to put the kindle down for a bit (go refresh my water glass or something) and when I return, it's too easy to page-forward several pages. Not fatal-- you can back-page just as easy: rapid clicks on the back and it blinks only 1 time, but silently goes back several pages. Not unlike dropping your paperback book accidentally, and loosing your place. You page back and forth a bit, til you find where you were.
Next quirk: charging. Why did they create yet another device-specific charging port? Why not utilize the trend set by Motorola cell phones, and use the mini-USB port for charging and sync? They have to have the port anyway... and in that way, any compatible USB port (i.e. powered) could charge the device, too. I understand the Kindle 2 will have it this way.
Next quirk: battery. As long as I'm just reading, I can go 2 weeks or so before needing a charge. If I shop/browse the bookstore very much at all, I need to charge every couple of days, not unlike a high-tech cell phone (like iPhone or similar). But, the kindle itself is large enough, they could have put in two battery bays-- the added weight would be negligible, and the 2nd battery could be optional.
Next quirk: the user ought to be able to re-define the main keys; that is, those keys that surround the main screen ought to be user-selectable, instead of locked-in. That way, whatever quirky way a user elects to hold and read, she/he could program the "next page" button to be next to, or just underneath the fingers/thumb. AND, I would have a pressure-adjustment feature on these buttons, too, from super-sensitive to having-to-press-pretty-hard. That would be simple, if the switches were replaced with pressure sensors.... you could even provide audible or visible "click" as needed (or not--again user programmable).
Lastly, I would add an external "next/previous" page option. That is-- connecting an external trigger to a port would let someone use this thing, who cannot move their fingers, but could move their head or eyes or even say a trigger word. The possibilities would be endless.... I suppose, this could easily be hacked by someone with expertise, but you'd void the warranty.... then again, if the person benefiting was in such a situation? I would go ahead, myself. Carefully, of course...
____________
On re-reading this--Edit: "quirk" and "quirky". Obviously, my word of the day....
Update:
I finally cured the original cover with white velcro tape. I used some acetone on the back of the kindle itself, to be sure it was extremely clean, and to tack-up the plastic. Stuck the "smooth" strip. Then, when I applied the "sticky" strip with the idea to locate the position on the cover, I discovered I needed to move it a bit towards the other side, but it was stuck fast.... so I added a 2nd strip beside the first (after acetone again). Too wide is better than ruining and wasting the first strip I reasoned....
Then, I could locate where I wanted the sticky part on the cover, and cleaned that with acetone. It covered in microfiber simu-suede, but I cleaned it anyway.
I knew from past experience the velcro wouldn't stick to that without help, so I masked off the area with blue masking tape. Then I carefully applied a thin layer of polyurethane glue (gorilla glue) and worked it deeply into the cloth with a small flat blade. Next, I peeled the protective film and applied the sticky velcro strip, and smoothed it with a spatula. Next, I covered it with more blue tape to hold it in place, and clamped gently for 1 hour.
After curing out, I cleaned up the excess glue (it foams as it sets) and the blue masking tape helped this process.
Finally, I tested the whole, and it holds the kindle very securely. I thought I might need a 2nd piece in the lower-right corner (this one was along the left edge on the back) but it's going to hold well enough, I think. But it's springy enough that I can still easily get to the switches on the back.
Your feedback on Kindle 1 is really good to know. I'm going to watch out for Kindle 2 - I wonder how to find out exactly what issues it addresses - be nice if they issued a "bug Fix" list not for the s/w but for the usage features like you've described.
I wonder if you could sell your Velcro solution consisting of the velcro cut to size and an A4 sheet with a diagram. I know the market would be miniscule, but the pleasure I get from discovering these solutions are available is always enormous. You could make a few people very happy !
I discovered the Velcro website when desperate for a remedy for some odd thing I was "fixing" and was beguiled by Velcros I never knew existed. It's a wonderful world out there.
I'm getting some techno-lust from the new iRex digital readers:
http://www.irextechnologies.com/
Being able to scribble notes on pre-loaded forms would be GREAT for field work (provided a waterproof, operates-to-30-below version was made available). Even limited to summer conditions, this would be a huge plus for site inspections, which require juggling masses of paper.
I might consider something like this for taking notes at school next year, actually - would beat lugging binders around. Then again, my WPM is probably much better with a keyboard than a stylus these days (legibility certainly is) and I'd like to play the market in class :mrgreen: so a netbook or laptop might be better.
Seriously, though - good writable e-readers may make tablet computers obsolete before they catch hold.
Caught a serious case of techno-lust (sort of) last week and picked up this little beauty this week (demo model at 55% of retail price!):
(http://www.cobbcanada.ca/images/sidebar_004.jpg)
I'm obsessed with charcoal (various uses, not just cooking) - call me a charpunk if you will. ;)
Quote from: Agujjim on September 24, 2009, 01:13:56 AM
I'm getting some techno-lust from the new iRex digital readers:
http://www.irextechnologies.com/
Being able to scribble notes on pre-loaded forms would be GREAT for field work (provided a waterproof, operates-to-30-below version was made available). Even limited to summer conditions, this would be a huge plus for site inspections, which require juggling masses of paper.
I might consider something like this for taking notes at school next year, actually - would beat lugging binders around. Then again, my WPM is probably much better with a keyboard than a stylus these days (legibility certainly is) and I'd like to play the market in class :mrgreen: so a netbook or laptop might be better.
Seriously, though - good writable e-readers may make tablet computers obsolete before they catch hold.
Ya had me going, there.....e-paper display (excellent readability), etc. Then I dug and found out how much.... *whew*. $860US is a bit steep for my budget. I thought the Kindle was too high.
:)
But, I agree- the ability to write directly into forms would be too cool.
Well, it's a new product - the last (and I do mean last) time I bought cutting-edge technology was my Diamond Rio, and I haven't bought a mp3 player since (because they might come down in price ::)). So I might give it a look when it's sub-$200 - perhaps when I'm finishing my doctorate? ;D
The new Sony one allows notes and have a touchscreen (http://www.sonystyle.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?catalogId=10551&storeId=10151&langId=-1&productId=8198552921665921180).
Quote from: Sibling Zono (anon1mat0) on September 24, 2009, 05:11:44 PM
The new Sony one allows notes and have a touchscreen (http://www.sonystyle.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?catalogId=10551&storeId=10151&langId=-1&productId=8198552921665921180).
Yes, but no cellular network delivery of books-- you *have* to install Sony's proprietary software (contaminating your computer*) to get books onto it, as far as I can find out.
Still, as a backup to my Kindle, it might be a way to go....it does support PDF format directly (so you could have pre-made forms to fill out, etc.)
The Sony one also supports PDF and other formats. To this day I haven't bought a book using their store, so it isn't a problem, at least to me.
The open connection from the Kindle is a double edge sword (http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/1468931/amazon-ban-1984). Having a backdoor that enables Amazon to delete books on your device at [their] will isn't a feature I feel remotely comfortable with.
Quote from: Sibling Zono (anon1mat0) on September 24, 2009, 07:46:43 PM
The Sony one also supports PDF and other formats. To this day I haven't bought a book using their store, so it isn't a problem, at least to me.
The open connection from the Kindle is a double edge sword (http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/1468931/amazon-ban-1984). Having a backdoor that enables Amazon to delete books on your device at [their] will isn't a feature I feel remotely comfortable with.
Doesn't bother me (the backdoor). The only time Amazon has used it, they refunded everyone's fees, so that doesn't really bother me. I'd rather see the publishers' happy, and continued support of E-books.
My beloved bought me a Kindle for christmas, and I've been immersed in it since then.
It's a KIndle 2 (the 6" global wireless version), and the interface is substantially improved. It appears that Amazon is seriously listening to their customers' comments, and that interface design is well driven by customer feedback. One reason I hd a KIndle on my wish list is that I have great faith in Amazon's customer relations. (hHey have publicly apologized for their notorious 'clawback' incident and promised to handle it differently in future (with explicit promises of more respect for their customers, and an affirmation of great efforts to avoidsuch a situation again.).
I was also sent an Amazon Gift card for $30 from my beloved's sister, specifically to purchase Kindle Books. Withiin 3 minutes aof logging on to Amazon.com, I had entered the Gift Card and purchased 7 much desired books - Nation, Unseen Academicals, The Amazing Maurice and his Educated Rodents, Only you can save Mankind, Johnny and the Dead, and two books from a newly discovered Author - Nicola Griffith). I had to pay an additional 63 cents... :) They were on my Kindle by the time I returned to my couch! ;D
The Kindle does not intrude as a 'device' between me and the book, but does require some 'retraining' of unconscious habits. It took a couple of days before I stopped reaching a finger up to the top right hand corner to turn a page. ::), the page turning buttons are sensibly placed and configured, but it will take me a couple more weeks before they become reliably unconscious. The new style of cover is easy and secure to attach and detach (no mods required).
The 'enhanced reading' features are extremely useful - the integrated dictionary in particular (who knew what a 'lambrequin' is?), but will require some time to become an 'automatic' resource. I won't go into detail on the redesigned interface, but the scroll function is vastly improved, and the little 'joystick' is a great improvement on the previous scroll wheel. I don't think I want a touch screen feature - sticky fingermarks on the reading panel?
Prices seem reasonable - roughly $10 - $15 for those still in hardback, and $4 -$8 for those in paperback, and there is the 'free sample chapter feature' for evaluating new-to-me authors, a large store of free books from Amazon (sort by price - lowest to highest in the KIndle store and browse...), several external sources for free and cheap books (Feedbooks.com can even send them wirelessly to the Kindle) to download via your PC, and CD's of book collections available cheaply on CD. I have the complete works of Dicken, Shakespear, Scott, Thackeray, the Brontes, Jack London, Mark Twain, Wilde etc. off one CD for less than $4. The KIndle now does PDF's in native format... I only wish I could magic my dead tree books onto my Kindle... And it all fits in a jacket pocket.
I completely recommend Kindle, siblings. I am now inseparable from mine.
Happy to see you enjoying your K2, Mero. :)
I've had an opportunity to play with a K2, and I'm not as impressed as others. Sure, there's a few (to me) minor improvements, but I'm used to the K1's way of doing, and I would not like to give up my infinite storage SD card slot-- I have tons of reference books on my 4gig I'd hate to give up. :D :P
I can highly recommend several collections from "MobileReference". I happily paid $5US for the complete Mark Twain, for example. I've had complete Twain's in the past for less, but they were literally horrible-- zero indexing, zero way to navigate aside from randomly paging. Contrast with the MobileReference's copy, which has nice clickable table of contents at the beginning, and at the start of each novel, series, etc. More than worth the $5.
I'm with you, Mero, on the finger-smudged touch screen-- I'd hate that. And? I've found that my cold, dry skin too often fails to register on these new "capacitive" screens like on my G1, and I have to lick my damn finger to make the stupid thing respond. Thank the stars my G1 has a trackball alternative...
---------------
In a final note? I can highly recommend Unseen Academicals and Wintersmith, both by Pratchett, both read in the last month by me.
Of course, for Wintersmith, I had to re-read A Hat full of Sky and The Wee Free Men. Tiffany Aching is one amazing witch: Granny Weatherwax is proud.
:)
Update/News.
Amazon's finally released a Kindle 3, with WiFi only (no cellular-- re-reading my initial post, it's amazing how I've changed my mind about instant access to new books in the past 2 years).
The US price is $139, and that was cheap enough, I bought one. It came today.
The keyboard is a reduced set, so entering number is problematic, but possible. It was a bit fussy at connecting to my secure WiFi, but a reboot (of the kindle) solved that, finally.
It's thinner and much, much lighter than my 1.
It reboots roughly 1000% faster-- all but instant-on, from dead-stop. Contrast, the 1 took over a minute.
Page turns seem to be instant, again a sharp contrast to my 1.
There is more control over the font/display, than on the 1, I can choose from a selection of fonts, the size, the spacing, the line-spacing, etc. Naturally, having excellent vision, I chose the next-to-smallest size, and the closest line-space as I could. This gets me more/page, making the reading a teensy bit smoother. Well, we'll see if I like it.
Currently, I'm downloading all my books-- once I got past a bit of frustration connecting the WiFi, it automagically registered itself to me, and downloaded the last couple of books I'd been reading, and a couple of Amazon's message-documents.
Alas, unlike the 1's superior content manager, I must painstakingly click each and every book on my Amazon Archive, and manually tell it to download-- a minimum of 5-6 clicks per book. But I can stack several in the que, and I'm getting adept at the sequence of buttons, so I stack up 10 or so, then lay it down for a bit, whilst it does it's thing. (Due to financial things, I've had to throttle my internet hook to a cheaper, slower connection.... alas.)
Once that's complete, I'll hook it to my PC, and copy through the USB cable, all my non-Amazon books (couple-hundred).
All in all, I'm pleased with this thing-- now I must go out and find some sort of case/cover... or I could just order one.
---------------
In a side-note, I'd like to point out a piece of software [calibre - E-book management] that I've found indespensable for all my non-Amazon content; it lets me adjust/edit the tags and such, so that these books sort properly on my Kindle. It's a bit over-the-top (too Nanny-automatic for my taste) but it does work well at editing the tags, which I've done. It also makes getting the cover-art a snap, if you have the ISBN of your book-- usually available on page 2 or 3 of the Ebook. And, it lets you use the Kindle-for-PC to view each book as you edit-- but you must open/view each book before trying to edit the tags. Having the book open to it's copyright page, makes putting in the proper tags a snap. If you put in the ISBN number, the program will fetch the cover art for you, if you like. I suppose it'd fetch other info, but I never tried that... manual entry is something I'm so used to doing, and being a fast typist, it was not bothersome [to me] to key in the missing info. It's freeware, link: http://calibre-ebook.com/ (http://calibre-ebook.com/)
Recommended.
http://www.irextechnologies.com/ are no longer trading.
Quote from: Griffin NoName on September 22, 2010, 02:50:01 AM
http://www.irextechnologies.com/ are no longer trading.
Okay. Who is/was 'irex tech"?
Hmmm.... never mind, Google to the rescue. I'd never heard of these things, must've been a European thing.
Damn apple/Jobs anyhoo ...
:)
Quote from: Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith on September 22, 2010, 03:00:47 PM
Quote from: Griffin NoName on September 22, 2010, 02:50:01 AM
http://www.irextechnologies.com/ are no longer trading.
Okay. Who is/was 'irex tech"? )
Aggie was looking at them in a previous post in this thread.
Boo. :P
In any case, I'm not looking at an e-reader any time soon. But I did find out that my library has many talking books available for download and even allows them to be burned to CD. Good for long drives, which I have plenty of. :)
Related tech issue: I seem to remember that my old computer allowed conversion from .wma to .mp3 with a right-click command - this now would seem to require a bit of freeware to do. Was this ever a feature of Windows Media Player (or can it still be done some other way?), or am I completely nuts?
Dunno about that, did you have a brand computer? Sometimes they bundle software with their HW that on rare occasion may be useful, but nor M$ wants his proprietary format changed nor is a straight thing to do.
Personally I never use windows media player, nor do I convert to wma. You can use Audiograbber with Lame to convert CDs to mp3, though.
Ah, perhaps that was it - it was an HP/Compaq, and newer than my 'new' machine.
Media player is - meh, it's OK. I don't use WMA, but lacked an onboard conversion function. I'll probably grab some freeware. I want to use the CDs in the truck, but not sure about the ability to read WMA discs.
My MS media player does CD => .mp3. What I need is a .flv => .mp3 (free) tool.
Does something like this work for you?
http://www.vidtomp3.com/
Resurrecting this thread.
I found out that The Guardian newspaper provides a Kindle version each day. Really cheap compared to the paper version. Thought this might be a good solution for me as I desperately need to reduce my outgoings.
Had a look at the Kindle in more detail than I had before and got very tempted to buy it.
But......... further in depth investigation revealed that the Kindle version of The Guardian is pretty basic, lots of content missing, plus no crossword, no puzzles etc etc. ............ disappointing.
The Guardian do a much better version for the iPad - but I don't want to be locked into the Apple Store, and the iPad is not designed as a dedicated e-reader so not so good for the purpose I am wanting.
Guess I need to wait a bit longer and see how the field develops. What I really want is a cross between a Kindle and an iPad I guess.
Don't forget you can try for free-- there is Kindle software on the PC
I got a Kindle for Christmas and I'm absolutely hooked - I've spent £10.10 of a £20 voucher and now have over 150 books on it, there being so much free stuff around. A few dozen old favourites and all sorts of odd stuff I always meant to look at.
Sorry to say, Griffin, that when we were abroad and my daughter got The Times on her Kindle, I found that it wasn't very suitable for newspapers. Maybe one would get used to it in time.
I agree-- Kindles don't do pictures very well.
I was given a Kindle by Mrs Blue for my birthday in November (which was only fair since I had given her one for her birthday in August). I find that I do most of my reading (of books) on it now. I read a mixture of the free stuff as well as newly released books. Overall I have found that the experience is very much like reading a paper book, that is, I become absorbed in the story and the media becomes transparent. In fact I have found a few situations where the kindle has a major advantage over a paper book (apart from the obvious things like proce etc) for example when I travel into the city to service my customers in there I usually go on the train. Because the station I usually use at that end is not the main city station on the way home it is common that I have to stand at least for the first 20 minutes or so of the journey. With the Kindle I can hang on to the overhead straps to keep my balance and happily read with the kindle in my other hand much more easily than tyring to read a book single handed (especially when turning pages).
Other advantages include the ability to travel with a library's worth of books in such a small and light package - great when on holiday. Long battery life, I have only just had to charge my battery for the second time since getting it in early November. All in all a very neat package and I love it!
I'll second Blue's experience with regards to Kindling.
I was an early adopter, and had a Kindle one, a Kindle 3, and through an accident, a Kindle 2. I was also given a lovely used Kindle DX, which was the last Kindle-specific device I used frequently. (I still have that).
But I found my Android tablet, with the Kindle app, the one I read all the time, now. Since I prefer the flexibility of the Android tablet over a Kindle, that's what I have when I'm out and about. And when I'm at home, habit sends me to the Android more often than not, rather than the venerable DX in the bedroom.
I'm looking at magazine subscriptions on it, via another app it came with. True, the dedicated Kindle 3 is lighter than the Android tablet, but I rarely find that an issue-- I'm typically reading while sitting down (and eating more than not).
And the color screen is better at doing PDF files, using an Office-type application. And for my job, I have an ever increasing library of PDF instruction sets. With color.
Can't believe this thread goes back 4 years!
Am thinking of using money saved by not smoking so far to buy a kindle. (ok I dont actually have the money as the reason for stopping smoking was I cant afford it but I deserve a treat).
Been looking at the kindle wifi 3g keyboard. Which I like. Was decided on this til saw Kindle Fire. Any comments?
..... ewait for the Kindle Fire to be released in the UK, apparently they are brining it forward and should be soon. But the Fire does not have 3g or keyboard. 3g useful as can get stuff anywhere, although I'd use wifi mostly I guess. Also stick-in-the-mud, like the keybaord which Fire doesn't have either. Must say colour is v.exciting. Comments please.
One other point. Re wifi. Unlike mosrt devices, Kindle seems to be like Apple devices which are stupid........ if you dont broadcast your SSID, Kindle won't connect (first connect obviously broadcast necessary). Can't for the life of me see why after initial connect it isn't designed so can always connect therafter with no broadcast - as I said all my other wireless devises do not need SSID broadcast after initial connect.
So, the question. There is a body of opinon that not broadcasting SSID is unecessary for secuirty, ie. waste of time ie. may as well broadcast it - some IT secuirty sites say it even makes systems more insecure not to broadcast it! Personally I don't broadcast mine, I just feel safer with my neoghbours not knowing it's there (unless they are hackers in which case they wiill find it regardless). Purely emotional really. Comments?
And finally, is the Kindle 3G Keyboard better for reading books than Kindle Fire? ie. has being fabulous for Books been compromized by that changes incorporated into Fire (which does looking very appealing). Comments?
It's not really necessary to download via the wireless link. Amazon will let you download to your computer and then you can transfer via USB. A large proportion of the 417 titles I currently own have been acquired that way from all the many other sources. There's masses of good stuff available free in epub format which you then convert with Calibre (http://calibre-ebook.com/download), which is free.
Hi Griff, the big advantage I have found of the Kindle is the electronic ink screen. This works off ambient light (its fantastic in sunlight), just like reading a paper book and I have found that you very soon forget that you are using a Kindle and just get on with the text. My reservation about the Kindle Fire is that it is in effect just another tablet device with probably less functionality than say an Android 4 tablet and without the readabilty characteristics that make the Kindle so easy to read. Also, battery life is a lot less. I have only charged my Kindle three or four times since I got it in the beginning of November. As for the keyboard version, Mrs Blue has one of those I have the one without a keyboard. Mrs Blue uses the Kindle Store via her Kindle which makes having the keyboard handy, but I usually do my Kindle shopping on my PC. I have found not having the keyboard to be not a problem at all. (There is pop-up window soft keyboard that you use if necessary, eg for WiFi setup, but I don't have to use it much.) Both of ours are WiFi only, not 3g. This is not a problem as there are plenty of free hotspots around these days and besides, both our cell phones can be configured as WiFi hotspots so in an emergency they could be used. I am going away for a couple of weeks in the second half of March and will be pre-loading my kindle with a few books, I doubt not being able to download a new one will not be an issue.
Blue already covered the real differences between Fire and "regular" kindles, so I won't go what he said-- but I totally agree with his observations, re: keyboard & such.
Apart from this-- the Fire is specifically designed to work within Amazon's "world" and it does that quite well. Surfing "outside the playground (amazon)" may not work as expected, as they have deliberately limited it's abilities (or so I've read-- I do not own a Fire myself). So if you are looking for a general Android tablet device, the Fire isn't it.
However, if Amazon's new netflix-like movie offerings appeals to you, and you do not wish to use your PC? The Fire is just the ticket for those.
Or if you wish to subscribe and read any modern magazine? Again, the Fire with it's full-color spread, is better at magazines' photos than the greyscale of the "regular" Kindles.
Or if what you really wanted, was access to your multiplicity of Amazon's MP3's up in the cloud? Again, the Fire is your choice-- it's a much better MP3 player than the other Kindles. However, the Fire only has 6gb of available storage-- which is paltry for side-loaded MP3's-- that is insufficient for your non-amazon MP3's for the majority of folk, unless you don't mind constantly shuffling your music. But if you limit your MP3 to WiFi access? And whatever is in your Amazon Cloud storage? It's effectively unlimited (for a price, of course-- I won't go into that here).
Another downside, is, as with any full-color device these days, direct sunlight will blow it's screen out of the water-- that is, you just can't watch this in sunlight without an umbrella. That is just the way it is. As Blue already noted, this is in direct contras to the E-Ink kindles, which read exactly like printed paper-books in the sun-- that is, beautifully.
---------------------------
As for broadcasting your SSID? These can be had easily enough, with a WiFi "sniffer" program, and even though the SSID is "silent" the WiFi can easily be hacked by a determined hacker-- few have rigorous password timeouts, such that the hacker can keep hitting the log-in until success. Or can capture the handshake communications between a device already authenticated and the WiFi, and simply wait until that device goes off, and use that same credentials.
Or so I'm told-- I never tried any of these myself, I just don't care-- there's nothing in there that would compromise either me or my ID anyway-- I always clear the Cache after going to my bank anyway, and I do not allow the browser to memorize my bank's password or anything for that matter. That's the best I can hope for these days anyway-- if they really want my meager funds, it's not that hard to get at them, really. And no, I never use wireless to access my bank either-- secure or otherwise. Not that it matters all that much either way.
So the short bus here: I broadcast my SSID, just as my many neighbors do. It makes it simpler for my many devices to reconnect. I'm on the highest level of secure that also works with all my toys, but even those are easily broken according to the pundits, so what the hey? I'm just keeping that creepy kid from downloading aname bondage prawn using my wifi ... in short? The same reason why I bother to lock my front door when I leave-- to keep out casual (or stupid) thieves.
YMMV.
___________________
One more edit:
In the interests of full disclosure? I do still own a Kindle 3 (grey, WiFi, with kb), and a Kindle DX (grey, 3g, with kb) and have access to a white DX (which I seem to never use, apart from charging it occasionally). All of these I got one way or another, mostly used from pawn shopping.
Whereas I love the size of the DX? I find I rarely use it these days, but use my Asus Transformer 101 Android 4 tablet+keyboard dock instead.
I had some mild annoying issues with syncing books across the devices, so rather than fix that, I would more than not, just get out the Asus tablet instead-- it's full-color, similar to the Kindle Fire.
Even reading in bed before sleep, the last bastion of Kindle use, I find the backlit screen of the Asus is better in low light than the E-Ink, and the resolution is easily as good on my tablet as the E-Ink. I just cannot read it in full sunlight-- but I seldom have opportunity for that, these days. Perhaps when full summer rolls around, I may change my tune.
But the nature of the Android tablet (Ice Cream Sandwich, currently) allows me to do a boatload of different things besides read-- and sometimes, I'm just not in the mood to read-- perhaps it's my current crop of books I've selected on my "to read" list just hasn't grabbed my attention, perhaps it's just me, getting older. I do not know-- but sometimes, I just want to play a mindless game on the tablet instead, and listen to an MP3 album too.
Sure, I can listen and read-- but I don't really pay attention to the music that way. But a nice mindless game of Jewels, or MaJong or other simple game does not occupy my brain much, so I really listen to the lyrics. And I like that occasionally. Currently, my little Asus has 16gb internal memory (which I reserve for books & documents), a 32gb microSDHC card, mostly backup, photos & misc, and a nice 64gb full sized SDXC card with my entire music collection, among other stuff. I like not having to shuffle what music I have with, and what I must leave behind.
So the transformer is the one I grab, when I'm out the door-- too useful a tool, than just for reading.
Again? Your Mileage May Vary.
:)
Bob - are you saying you no longer use a kindle, but the acer. Is it as good for books. What I want is books so best reading screen important.
Bye the way, thread wins the ask about x, suggest buy y :mrgreen:
Quote from: Griffin NoName on March 01, 2012, 04:02:04 AM
Bob - are you saying you no longer use a kindle, but the acer. Is it as good for books. What I want is books so best reading screen important.
Bye the way, thread wins the ask about x, suggest buy y :mrgreen:
:)
Sorry about that-- I've been busy updating my various devices fast and furious, and they were on my mind.
Best reading of
books? In any light? (provided you have a book light for the dark) is still E-Ink, i.e. a Kindle or one of the non-Amazonian equivalents.
But in messing around the web late last night (in bed, using my Acer) I have discovered that the K-Fire is selling very, very well.
And you just won't get that, with a product that doesn't Just Work-- so that's a kind of testimonial right there.
Okay, bottom line:
Kindle Fire is an Amazon-specific device, meaning they control it 100%, including the OS (it's a very custom version of Android, but is not pure Android).
Amazon seems to be seriously behind it, in terms of support, and has updated it recently. CNET Review (http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-19736_7-57361539-251/kindle-fire-updates-to-bigger-browser-better-e-mail/).
But, being as it's Amazon-specific, you'll need to get Apps directly from Amazon's market, and not the Traditional Android Market-- this could be good or bad, depending on your personal idea of how you want to do things.
(For example, most of my apps on my Acer come from Android Market, the normal gateway, but not a few come from Amazon's Market-App, an alternative application/media/etc engine.)
So, if you're not a fan of closed architecture (think: apple/itunes), then you may wish to look at a different Android tablet-- because the Fire is an Amazon Device, much as the Kindle is.
For example, none of the Kindles will read EPub without conversion, even if you side-load the book (i.e. load the book via USB cable after having downloaded it to your PC). However using the PC program Caliber (recommended, by the way) it's falling over easy to convert non-DRM EPub to MOBI, and having Caliber load it automatically for you onto your Kindle. So it's not all bad.
The E-Ink Kindle will never (it appears) be capable of reading EPub directly-- but the Fire could theoretically do so, with a 3rd party reader from the Amazon App store-- usually free or nominal cost ($1 or so).
I know I have several non-Kindle reading apps on my Acer-- the Cool Reader being the best, mainly because you can customize it so very-very much-- I'm into making the thing do exactly what I want, how I want.
I say "theoretically" because I do not own a Fire, and I cannot say if this is possible-- but I'd be seriously surprised if it wasn't.
Bottom line:
The Fire is inexpensive for what it is-- to the tune of $100-$150 cheaper than the equivalent non-Amazon tablet, and that's making them fly out the doors. The likelihood of these being hacked away from Amazon-specific OS is very, very high-- running Ice Cream Sandwich (the latest Android) is very good in the near future. (But it would likely void any warranties).
But there is nothing like E-Ink for reading words-in-a-row-- text. If that's your bailiwick, and you don't anticipate wanting to watch YouTube, or play games, or do E-mail, or surfing the web from your tablet? Ever? (for the reasonable future)
Then save yourself $100 and get whichever E-Ink you like best-- my money's on the Kindle E-Ink touchscreen, because occasionally I do like to look up obscure words, and on a non-touch screen, you have to navigate to the word using little cutsy buttons-- kinda tedious. But on a touchscreen? You simply (and carefully, if you have small fonts like I prefer) touch and hold the word in question, and a little box pops up giving you the definition.
Obviously, the cheapest E-Ink has no keyboard, and is WiFi only-- no random, over-the-cellular downloading of books on that one-- you must be within a friendly WiFi network, or else you connect it to the PC and side-load your books (either one works quite well).
If you have no keyboard, using Book Categories will be a pain-- this is an nice little feature that lets you organize your books into collections-- but you seriously need a real keyboard to create that. Once created, you >>can<< share that collection with all your Kindles (if you have more than one), and I expect 3rd party applications to be able to access this soon, so you can create these on a PC, and push it out to the kindle device.
However, if you do not anticipate or need such a level of organization (the Kindle natively lets your sort by Author, by Title and by Last Accessed), then a lack of keyboard won't bother you (there is a virtual one, but you must navigate to each letter via buttons, and click "select" one painful character at a time-- fine for passwords and other setups. Painful for hundreds of entries).
I have a friend who's been a Kindle reader since Kindle 2, and has had a Kindle 3 w/keyboard and now has the latest, cheapest Kindle and loves it's tiny size and light weight. He does not miss the keyboard in the least, and prefers the super-light weight-- easier to hold while reading. I can pass that
"Recommended" on without conditions.
I'm more anal-retentive, and really use the crap outta those collections, so a real keyboard is a must, for me-- but I do have several Kindles, and could easily push my collection out to a keyboard-less one, if I wanted, bypassing the need...
... one more thing, re-keyboards. If you have, as I do, 400+ books on your device, even sorted by Author, I have several pages of listings-- and I can "quick jump" from the A's (page 1) to, say, the M's simply by pressing the "M" on my keyboard. For the keyboard-less one, you'd need to invoke the virtual keyboard, navigate to the "M" and press "select", and it'll jump directly to the start of the M's . Possible, but a bit awkward.
However, there really is no need to carry 400+ books, if you have WiFi-- just keeping, say, 20-50 books you are currently interested in, on the "main" menu, and the rest in Archive? Is another way to organize your collection. The archive will helpfully keep all your Amazon-purchased books (even the $0 ones) up on the "cloud" for you-- easily accessed within seconds-- so long as you are on WiFi, of course.
The non-amazon books would require you to connect via USB to your PC/laptop, and I'd recommend using Caliber for managing those.
________________________
You will note that I've said little about actually
reading the books.
This is deliberate-- as this is a very personal thing-- some people really hate backlighted screens, as on the Fire/Asus. Others do not mind. Still others prefer it, for reading in dim or no light.
On the flip side, no backlighted device works in direct sunlight-- unless you have shade, and even then, many are still too dim. But the E-Ink really shines in full-on sun-- just like a printed book.
Reading in bed? The backlighted devices let you do that in the complete dark, if you like. But for the E-Ink, you're going to need a reading light of some sort-- a lamp, a book-light-- something. Not a big deal, if you are used to printed books-- just use whatever you would have for them.
________________________
The last word-- recharging. The E-Ink kindles need a mizer's use of electricity-- charging once a week, if you like a schedule, works supremely well. Many even if the WiFi is left on-- the latest Kindle OS puts that to sleep automatically, to help with battery life. If you opt to turn off the WiFi manually? (easy on all devices) It can last several weeks before needing a recharge.
The tablets? Just like a cell phone, daily recharging is the best solution here-- LiIon batteries do not like spending time at a low charge, and these devices are power-hungry, and will typically drain a battery flat in 6 to 12 hours, depending on various things. (Alas, I cannot testify as to the Kindle Fire's battery life myself-- my Acer has 2 batteries, and can easily go 18 hours). But a daily top-up is recommended, plug it in at night, just like that old cell phone, so it'll be ready come morning.
If constant recharging bothers you? Avoid the tablets-- the E-Ink devices win this one, hand's down.
If nightly plug-in of your device is no big deal? Then this is not an issue.
If you read indoors and you don't tire reading from a screen then the Fire will be more attractive, and you shouldn't need the 3G as wifi should be enough. If you plan to read outdoors then the regular eInk screen is going to be better.
As for broacasting the SSID what Bob said applies, it's a minor security feature, whomever is trying to hack a wifi will try first, open networks, those still using WEP instead of WPA/WPA2/TKIP etc, and a tooled hacker (one with the tools to hack WEP or WPA 1) will be able to see the network anyways so as security goes it really isn't too effective.
Lastly the Amazon market is not that different from the regular from Google, and the Fire will be able to use apps for Gingerbread (I imagine they filter out apps that only work on Honeycomb or Ice Cream Sandwich) so I don't think it's something terrible.
Quote from: Sibling Zono (anon1mat0) on March 01, 2012, 06:28:03 PM
Lastly the Amazon market is not that different from the regular from Google, and the Fire will be able to use apps for Gingerbread (I imagine they filter out apps that only work on Honeycomb or Ice Cream Sandwich) so I don't think it's something terrible.
Oh, I agree-- it's quite a workable solution. And you can always side-load apps that are not on the Amazon market anyway-- this is done by downloading the APK file (it'll have an .APK extension) onto your internal memory, usually called "SDCARD" in the little pathway.
Then you go into the settings and install it, after enabling "non-market install"-- but that menu bit is probably hidden in the Fire, come to think of it... nevermind.
:)
And yes, the Fire does have an SDCARD memory-- it's just that it's fixed and pre-mounted internal to the device-- all Android devices have one of one stripe or another. Many have multiple ones-- unfortunately? The nomenclature for the first one is standardized (SDCARD) but the others? Not so much.... could be... anywhere in the Android's file pathways... but anyone familiar with Linux will quickly figure this out....
:devil2:
Quote from: Sibling DavidH on February 29, 2012, 08:36:09 AM
It's not really necessary to download via the wireless link. Amazon will let you download to your computer and then you can transfer via USB. A large proportion of the 417 titles I currently own have been acquired that way from all the many other sources. There's masses of good stuff available free in epub format which you then convert with Calibre (http://calibre-ebook.com/download), which is free.
Looked at Calibre - wondering which op sys Kindle has - checked kindle on amazon and nowhere can I find any spec of the op sys.
wimdows linux os X = choices for Calibre download.
Re. which Kindle, the keyboard version is only 3 ounces more in weight, is this really significant?
You would run Calibre on your PC, convert to MOBI format for the Kindle, save just the MOBI format in a specific 'library' on your PC, and side-load by author from that library to your Kindle.
HTH
Mero's correct: Calibre is for your PC, to help you organize the plethoria of books you got for free from the Gutenberg Project.
;D
Or, perhaps, from Many Books (http://manybooks.net/)? I like this one better, as most of their content has already been converted to Mobi (the Kindle format).
It should be noted, Kindles don't do EPub-- the most popular EBook form in the world these days. But with programs like Calibre? Conversion from EPub to Mobi only requires a couple of mouse-clicks...
... Calibre will even helpfully install (side-load via the physical USB cable) the non-DRM books on your device for you... and keep track of what's on there and what's not.
The latest, or so I'm told, can even access those Collections-- but I have not tried that-- I haven't needed to run Calibre in several months. Busy doing other things, and mostly using non-Kindle apps for my non-Amazon books on my TF101.
I really ought to check that out.... now that you mention it.
______________________________________________________________
By the way? Kindles run on a highly-customized Amazon-only version of either Linux or Android (they are really very much alike in many respects).
And yeah, the kindles have been hacked or "jailbroken" by various persons-- some geek even managed to hack a Kindle Fire and put on Ice Cream Sandwich (the latest Android). But it reports to be "pre-alpha" meaning it's just a hack, a proof-of-concept, and very unstable (translation: not usable to non-geeks, and likely not even for them).
Why jailbreak your Kindle?
Various reasons: running non-Amazon apps. Replacing the stock non-user changable screen saver pictures (some of which are ... unpleasant) or even removing the ads on the ad-supported Kindles.
That last one, I think, is not ethical-- not until you've owned it for at least a year, to pay for your discount. But that's just me, I suppose.... YMMV
Interesting.
Neither of you has commenteed on the weight!!!!!!!!!!
To a female of course this is most important. Like the size of the side pockets in a car. LoL!!!!!!!!!!!
I have worked out what HTH means but admit am stuck on YMMV. More LoL !!!!
Quote from: Griffin NoName on March 06, 2012, 10:28:27 PM
I have worked out what HTH means but admit am stuck on YMMV. More LoL !!!!
HTH: Hope This Helps
YMMV: Your Mileage May Vary (you may get different results)
Here (http://www.squidoo.com/kindle-4-specs#module154941697) are the specs of the keyboard-less model.
I get books from many sites, in various formats. Having to convert some via Calibre is no trouble - my way is to assemble all titles for side-loading into one folder and load them when there's five or six waiting. I've pretty well squeezed Amazon dry for free stuff now, though I keep an eye out because new stuff is always coming in. Therefore almost everything goes in through the USB.
Quote from: BobHowever, there really is no need to carry 400+ books, if you have WiFi-- just keeping, say, 20-50 books you are currently interested in, on the "main" menu, and the rest in Archive?
Well, I've got space for a lot more than 400 - probably more like 1,400. Most of mine are not from Amazon, so I need to store them somewhere - why not on the Kindle? There are a few Amazon titles I've banished to the archive, but only ones I'm never likely to want again. If you divide them into collections, finding them is not a problem.
Hi Griff, comparing my keyboardless Kindle with Mrs Blue's keyboard one the weight difference is not particulalry noticeable. The main difference is the overall size which is smaller for the keyboardless one - although the screen is the same size. Also, if you want to do a cover, the keyboard unit attaches to its cover using some special clips that fit into the side of the unit and thus it works like a book, opens side to side. However the keyboardless unit does not have these fittings and sits into its covers using small diagonal straps that fit over the corners. I got a third party one (from the Amazon site) that flips over the top rather than the side. This has a hand "grip" or elastic sleeve at the back so that when it is open you can slip your hand in to hold the Kindle easily with one hand. This is really handy when reading in otherwise difficult circumstances such as if you need the other hand to hold on when using public transport. Also, you can use it like a book stand when you want to read with the device say on a table while you do something else with your hands, like eat breakfast <grin>.
Quote from: Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith on March 06, 2012, 07:04:20 PM
Or, perhaps, from Many Books (http://manybooks.net/)? I like this one better, as most of their content has already been converted to Mobi (the Kindle format).
How come they are free? And why are the
banned books (http://manybooks.net/categories/BAN) banned? They are just classics.
Thanks everyone for all the info. Really helpful.
Blue, do you buy from US amazon? I just bought a toy for my grandaughter in Sydney from amazon.com, having checked they shipped toys to Aus. - delivery failed, notified don't ship toys to Aus. even tho says they do on web page.
Quote from: Sibling DavidH on March 07, 2012, 09:49:04 AM
Here (http://www.squidoo.com/kindle-4-specs#module154941697) are the specs of the keyboard-less model.
I get books from many sites, in various formats. Having to convert some via Calibre is no trouble - my way is to assemble all titles for side-loading into one folder and load them when there's five or six waiting. I've pretty well squeezed Amazon dry for free stuff now, though I keep an eye out because new stuff is always coming in. Therefore almost everything goes in through the USB.
Quote from: BobHowever, there really is no need to carry 400+ books, if you have WiFi-- just keeping, say, 20-50 books you are currently interested in, on the "main" menu, and the rest in Archive?
Well, I've got space for a lot more than 400 - probably more like 1,400. Most of mine are not from Amazon, so I need to store them somewhere - why not on the Kindle? There are a few Amazon titles I've banished to the archive, but only ones I'm never likely to want again. If you divide them into collections, finding them is not a problem.
Oh, I agree-- on my Kindle DX, I have a couple of hundred collections to organize my books-- I usually use the "hack" method of naming them-- I put a couple of non-characters, which always sort before "A", so that if I sort by title, the collections are first on the list.
I use a few logical groupings, such as "reference" as I have few of those. The majority of mine are authors, and so I have a collection for each author who I have more than one book for. And I have some "general fiction" at each 4 groups of alphabetic letters, for authors that I only have a single volume of.
Yeah... I'm anal retentive when it comes to sorting/organizing. Too many years as a programmer/data analyst I suppose...
;D
But my TF101 (transformer tablet) uses the Android Kindle app, which does not support collections. That's okay-- I only have 200 Amazon-only books, so it's not that bad (sort by author, as I'm used to in a Library). My non-Amazon books, I have elsewhere, and use a different reader app-- (Cool reader, if you're interested, mainly due to it's customization features). I also use iReader to read some really old books I bought back in 2000-2001 to read on my old Palm-- it will read palm DOC files.
Quote from: Griffin NoName on March 08, 2012, 06:56:30 AM
Quote from: Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith on March 06, 2012, 07:04:20 PM
Or, perhaps, from Many Books (http://manybooks.net/)? I like this one better, as most of their content has already been converted to Mobi (the Kindle format).
How come they are free? And why are the banned books (http://manybooks.net/categories/BAN) banned? They are just classics.
Thanks everyone for all the info. Really helpful.
Blue, do you buy from US amazon? I just bought a toy for my grandaughter in Sydney from amazon.com, having checked they shipped toys to Aus. - delivery failed, notified don't ship toys to Aus. even tho says they do on web page.
They are free, because the copyright has run out, and nobody renewed them-- public domain.
Banned? I did not know there were any such... I'll have to check.
Re: weight, I was checking my old sony reader (about the size of the keyboardless kindle) and it weights slightly more than a paperback, my new tablet (10" larger than the DX) weights about as much as a big hardcover (say, a Harry Potter book), and for what I remember the last time I handled a DX, it isn't as heavy.
Quote from: Griffin NoName on March 08, 2012, 06:56:30 AM
Blue, do you buy from US amazon? I just bought a toy for my grandaughter in Sydney from amazon.com, having checked they shipped toys to Aus. - delivery failed, notified don't ship toys to Aus. even tho says they do on web page.
Yep, I buy from Amazon US. I think that you have run into the thing that not everything on the Amazon site actually comes from Amazon, and some of the stores that list there will not ship to Aus. I have no idea why, I am quite prepared to pay the postage if it's something I want.
Actually, it annoys the hell out of me. Surely it is no more work to address it to Aus, pay the appropriate postage (paid by the customer, so they're not out of pocket) and send it just like everything else they send out. IMHO, it should be a condition of being allowed to list through Amazon that you will ship anywhere that Amazon ships to. >:( [/rant]
Quote from: Griffin NoName on March 08, 2012, 06:56:30 AM
And why are the banned books (http://manybooks.net/categories/BAN) banned?
Because each and every one of them mentioned something that someone Did Not Like and thus they were banned, to protect the rest of us from the depravity contained therein.
Quite right, too. Black Beauty is well known for the subversive anarchist message lurking behind the pornography. :mrgreen:
Quote from: Bluenose on March 08, 2012, 11:32:32 PM
Actually, it annoys the hell out of me. ............................... IMHO, it should be a condition of being allowed to list through Amazon that you will ship anywhere that Amazon ships to. >:( [/rant]
I am not surprised. And yes, they should.
Quote from: pieces o nine on March 09, 2012, 06:14:47 AM
Quote from: Griffin NoName on March 08, 2012, 06:56:30 AM
And why are the banned books (http://manybooks.net/categories/BAN) banned?
Because each and every one of them mentioned something that someone Did Not Like and thus they were banned, to protect the rest of us from the depravity contained therein.
But that's ridiculous. I don't like eating kidneys, but I don't stop anyone else doing it.
Quote from: Sibling DavidH on March 09, 2012, 12:33:33 PM
Quite right, too. Black Beauty is well known for the subversive anarchist message lurking behind the pornography. :mrgreen:
Might as well ban Bill and Ben. :o
I have decided on a Kindle Keyboard, just have to decide whether 3G.
Quote from: Griffin NoName on March 09, 2012, 11:17:36 PMQuote from: pieces o nine on March 09, 2012, 06:14:47 AM
Quote from: Griffin NoName on March 08, 2012, 06:56:30 AM
And why are the banned books (http://manybooks.net/categories/BAN) banned?
Because each and every one of them mentioned something that someone Did Not Like and thus they were banned, to protect the rest of us from the depravity contained therein.
But that's ridiculous.
Well, yes. And that is *always* obvious to everyone except the Concerned Parent, Concerned Politician, or Concerned Clergyperson.
On a related note, I periodically check the (historical (http://www.aloha.net/~mikesch/ILP-1559.htm)) Index (http://www.cvm.qc.ca/gconti/905/BABEL/Index%20Librorum%20Prohibitorum-1948.htm) to pick another book to add to my library...
Quote from: pieces
[On a related note, I periodically check the (historical (http://www.aloha.net/~mikesch/ILP-1559.htm)) Index (http://www.cvm.qc.ca/gconti/905/BABEL/Index%20Librorum%20Prohibitorum-1948.htm) to pick another book to add to my library...
So did Sir Thomas Bodley - everything he found on it went into the Bodleian Library.
Quote from: GriffinMight as well ban Bill and Ben.
Of course! We don't want to encourage druggies and welfare cheats.
Mark Twain is and has been a notorious target for book bannings.
In case of Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn the attacks come from both the Right and the Left. The latter critics claim that the rather accurate descriptions in those books amount to racism because they are not condemned on page. The Right never liked that godless ex-river pilot in the first place even without the foul language.
For that matter, Grimm's FairyTales have been targets for the most silly reasons, e.g. that Little Red Riding Hood carries a bottle of wine to her sick granny because that would give kids the impression that alcohol consumption is healthy (not to forget the silly psycho anal cysts that claim that the bottle must be a symbol of LRRH's hymen).
Quote from: Bluenose on March 08, 2012, 11:32:32 PM
Quote from: Griffin NoName on March 08, 2012, 06:56:30 AM
Blue, do you buy from US amazon? I just bought a toy for my grandaughter in Sydney from amazon.com, having checked they shipped toys to Aus. - delivery failed, notified don't ship toys to Aus. even tho says they do on web page.
Yep, I buy from Amazon US. I think that you have run into the thing that not everything on the Amazon site actually comes from Amazon, and some of the stores that list there will not ship to Aus. I have no idea why, I am quite prepared to pay the postage if it's something I want.
Actually, it annoys the hell out of me. Surely it is no more work to address it to Aus, pay the appropriate postage (paid by the customer, so they're not out of pocket) and send it just like everything else they send out. IMHO, it should be a condition of being allowed to list through Amazon that you will ship anywhere that Amazon ships to. >:( [/rant]
Blame stupid and paranoid gub'ment tariffs and prohibitions of exportation of "strategic stuffs"....
... meh.
Quote from: Sibling DavidH on March 10, 2012, 09:34:35 AM
Quote from: GriffinMight as well ban Bill and Ben.
Of course! We don't want to encourage druggies and welfare cheats.
:ROFL: .....apologies for UK references
http://www.bbc.co.uk/manchester/content/images/2006/02/06/bill_ben_350x250.jpg
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flower_Pot_Men
[youtube=425,350]hcF9JSxkUSE[/youtube]
I watched this every week as a young child. Oddly in my memory it was in colour but of course it was black&white as in YouTube vid. above - no colour TV in those days. The picture from the BBC above is of 2002 remake, and in colour, and matches pretty well the colours in my mis-remembered memory which only goes to show how b&w was not really a problem and perhaps we didn't need to invent colout TV. :D The wiki article is accurate and quite amusing.
Quote from: Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith on March 10, 2012, 09:16:25 PM
Quote from: Bluenose on March 08, 2012, 11:32:32 PM
Quote from: Griffin NoName on March 08, 2012, 06:56:30 AM
Blue, do you buy from US amazon? I just bought a toy for my grandaughter in Sydney from amazon.com, having checked they shipped toys to Aus. - delivery failed, notified don't ship toys to Aus. even tho says they do on web page.
Yep, I buy from Amazon US. I think that you have run into the thing that not everything on the Amazon site actually comes from Amazon, and some of the stores that list there will not ship to Aus. I have no idea why, I am quite prepared to pay the postage if it's something I want.
Actually, it annoys the hell out of me. Surely it is no more work to address it to Aus, pay the appropriate postage (paid by the customer, so they're not out of pocket) and send it just like everything else they send out. IMHO, it should be a condition of being allowed to list through Amazon that you will ship anywhere that Amazon ships to. >:( [/rant]
Blame stupid and paranoid gub'ment tariffs and prohibitions of exportation of "strategic stuffs"....
... meh.
But why prohibit toys FFS ? Does Aus. have stricter standards for toys than US? or CA? or UK?
BTW, excellent topic drift :mrgreen:
That was an interesting look back, Grif, thanks. I can't imagine any kids I know now sitting still long enough to watch the entire clip!
Vaster than empires and more slow... yeah? ;)
Quote from: pieces o nine on March 11, 2012, 05:05:26 AM
I can't imagine any kids I know now sitting still long enough to watch the entire clip!
Vaster than empires and more slow... yeah? ;)
No, nor can I. It's amazing to realize how slow life was 60 years ago, with the highlight of the day often being the
Rag and Bone man (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rag_and_bone_man) going past with his horse and cart saying "any old iron" in a deep nasal atonal shout.
I read these flower pot men were voiced by the same guy wgo did the Daleks.
I smell a plot in that pot/d.
Quote from: Swatopluk on March 12, 2012, 02:06:53 PM
I read these flower pot men were voiced by the same guy wgo did the Daleks.
I smell a plot in that pot/d.
How ridiculous. They have completely different voices. :irony:
Quote from: Griffin NoName on March 12, 2012, 09:13:41 PM
Quote from: Swatopluk on March 12, 2012, 02:06:53 PM
I read these flower pot men were voiced by the same guy wgo did the Daleks.
I smell a plot in that pot/d.
How ridiculous. They have completely different voices. :irony:
GERMINATE! GERMINATE! GERMINATE! (http://www.thescifiworld.net/img/smilies/doctorwho/daleks/dalek01.gif)
:ROFL: :ROFL:
:ROFL:
I know I will not get much sympathy, but I am still agonising over whether I want a Kindle E-ink (ie. NOT the Kindle Fire) or a tablet some other one than Kindle Fire. I just keep dithering. The only key fact is I want it mainly for reading books because I want to eliminate space and cost issues. So that says original Kindle. But then I think.... wouldn't it be nice to have other capabilities.... and then I am quite envious of people with iPads - except no way do I want to get tied into Apple, iTunes etc. And then I think can I be bothered to keep all this equipment charged, etc etc. everything comes with overheads....... maybe it's easier to just keep buyinh books and using my laptop.
<sigh>
edit:
oh, by the way, main reason in favour of buying a Kindle is my son told me not to, and everything he has told me not to buy, which I have bought, has been really useful............. :mrgreen:
Edit:
Yet another question, and this may sound stupid, but one of the things they don't tell, is how basic Kindle without keyboard is operated - ie. can see it has buttons or whatever, but does it have any touch screen functionality, assume not as surely it would say if it did, and on the US market (BUT NOT the UK ) there is a Kindle Touch. Why can't the UK and US be the SAME:? But if it doesn't how do get alphabetic characters in without a keyboard or a virtual keyboard. This then begs the question about the keyboard version, does that have touch screen or not, and actually what real benefit is the keyboard, and do you do things differently on the keyboard version than the original non-keyboard version. It's amazing really, they tell you so much, really helpful stuff, but leave out some fairly basic info. A bit like my father trying to learn MS Word not knowing documents don't exist beyond the final non-space character even if he can see a large expanse of white screen like a blank piece of paper beyond that last character.......
IMHO if you want to use the Kindle mainly for reading books, then go for the e-ink. You have a PC for doing the other stuff. As for battery life, I only have to charge my Kindle every three or four weeks or so. Even if you use it much more than I do, the battery life of the e-ink Kindles is very good. The Kindle Fire would probably need to be charged more or less daily.
I have the keyboardless Kindle. There is a soft keyboard that pops up when you press the keyboard button. You move the selection around by pressing the outer rim of the sqaure navigation control (i.e. up, down, left, right) and then make your selection using the centre button of that control. I only use it for joining wireless networks or when I want to shop from the Kindle store when I don't have access to a PC. It is a bit clumsy but in fact works a lot better than I thought it would. The trick is to buy your books using your Amazon account via your PC n(or your smartphone app ;)). Using the Kindle is exactly the same as the keyboard model (Mrs Blue has one of those). I thought that having no keyboard might be a bit of a pain, but in reality I don't miss it at all and my Kindle is little smaller as a result of having no keyboard.
Thanks Blue. I think I am more interested in the keyboard version. Does Mrs Blue like having the keyboard?
Yes, I've caught on to the use PC to download books scenario. That's fine. No probs.
Kindle Fire is quite a bit smaller than iPad - I think if i went for a tablet, I would want it to be more the size of the iPad than the Kindle Fire. It was quite a leap for me to go down to the 12 inch laptop I now use :) from my old 19" screen. Things can get too small. Like the virtual keyboard on my iTouch which I constantly mistype things due to clumsy fingers. I find it really irritating.
Yes, hmm, I don't think I am going for a tablet anyway, at least not unless my son tells me not to buy one. :)
Well, Mrs Blue generally shops on her Kindle rather than using the PC. The "keyboard" is really just a set of buttons in the good old QWERTY format. It's not really designed for typing but does the job fine for browsing the Kindle store. I agree about the Kindle Fire. If I want a tablet, something bigger than the KF would be my choice. In this case I would rather have a device that does one function really well - and the Kindle is a great e-book reader - rather than end up with something that does not really do either of its main functions as well as dedicated devices. Sometimes the compromise in a multi function device is not worth it.
Besides, with an android tablet you can download the kindle app and read the same books in the tablet if you buy them from Amazon. I recently bought a 10" tablet (http://www.amazon.com/Le-Pan-II-9-7-Inch-Tablet/dp/B0067XX3AI/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1331819976&sr=8-1) and I'm very happy with it but it was cheap. If you can get something equivalent in the UK that might be a possibility, although it's really a nice toy for light browsing and touchscreen games more than anything else.
Most of the questions have been covered already.
I'll just add this: have you considered used equipment?
With the event of "get the latest and greatest.... NOW" attitude so common in electronics these days, there is a pretty good market for "yesterday's stuff" at mark-down prices.
The only caveat is that Amazon can blacklist stolen Kindles-- and does, at the owner's request. A blacklisted Kindle cannot be registered, and therefore cannot read Amazon content (but can do just fine for side-loaded non-DRM books in the MOBI format). A quick check with Amazon will let you know if it is, or so I've been told. I currently own several used Kindles myself-- all work just fine.
The Android tablets are all pretty new, so finding a used one of those is more problematic-- but a nice factory refurbished one would be the way to go here-- these can be had from various places, including Amazon's resellers. The nice thing about going through Amazon's storefront, is Amazon's buyer protection, obviously-- so if you get a lemon, you simply send it back for a refund, even if the seller is uncooperative. Within the mandatory 30 days trial, obviously. (that's an Amazon thing-- some sellers have longer warranties of course).
In my experience, you can determine if it's a lemon within a few minutes, and that just leaves the battery-- the next most likely failure system. That can be determined (good or bad) within a couple of days, so the 30 day limit is usually sufficient.
Thanks. Yes that answers all my questions nicely.
Quote from: Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith on March 15, 2012, 02:33:53 PM
In my experience, you can determine if it's a lemon within a few minutes, and that just leaves the battery-- the next most likely failure system. That can be determined (good or bad) within a couple of days, so the 30 day limit is usually sufficient.
I'm happy to buy new and avoid any hassle. Is the rechargable battery not replacable if it will no longer recharge? (My Flip Video battery cannot be replaced). If so, and one has downloaded direct to Kindle rather than PC, then one loses everything. That's nuts.
I just replaced the battery of my sony reader, but it's not very friendly to do so, if you don't mind taking things apart then there is no issue but some may be squeamish about it. I don't know about the kindle itself but I wouldn't be surprised if it isn't that easy either.
Quote from: Griffin NoName on March 15, 2012, 08:21:55 PM
Thanks. Yes that answers all my questions nicely.
Quote from: Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith on March 15, 2012, 02:33:53 PM
In my experience, you can determine if it's a lemon within a few minutes, and that just leaves the battery-- the next most likely failure system. That can be determined (good or bad) within a couple of days, so the 30 day limit is usually sufficient.
I'm happy to buy new and avoid any hassle. Is the rechargable battery not replacable if it will no longer recharge? (My Flip Video battery cannot be replaced). If so, and one has downloaded direct to Kindle rather than PC, then one loses everything. That's nuts.
If you bought books from Amazon, you can re-download them free for ever to any new kindle you get
If you got them somewhere else, TAKE BACKUPS onto your PC...
HTH :)
Quote from: Griffin NoName on March 15, 2012, 08:21:55 PM
Thanks. Yes that answers all my questions nicely.
Quote from: Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith on March 15, 2012, 02:33:53 PM
In my experience, you can determine if it's a lemon within a few minutes, and that just leaves the battery-- the next most likely failure system. That can be determined (good or bad) within a couple of days, so the 30 day limit is usually sufficient.
I'm happy to buy new and avoid any hassle. Is the rechargable battery not replacable if it will no longer recharge? (My Flip Video battery cannot be replaced). If so, and one has downloaded direct to Kindle rather than PC, then one loses everything. That's nuts.
None of the newer devices will have user-replaceable batteries. Alas, blame Apple for this one-- in an effort to forcefeed form over usefulness, they stripped out anything they could-- and packaging a LiIon battery in an idiot-proof package (more or less) requires extra weight, size, etc. But putting just the guts? Is easy-- the actual LiIon pack can be as thin as 5 or 7 playing cards, and even flexible. They use silver mylar packaging for non-user replaceable battery packs-- something even a semi-idiot could easily cut open with a knife or a pair of scissors-- and blow their frikkin' hand off in the process. Not good. Even with a mighty label: "If you cut into this it will blow your frikkin hand off! Don't cut into it!"
Some sub-human J.A. will do it anyway... and then some lawyer-type will sue... and win... so...
... to save size, Apple declared you simply are not godlike enough to be trusted with replacement of the battery. Apple will happily replace it for you. For a price, of course.
And they saved ever so much thickness and weight by doing so-- think of it: no special battery compartment-- that's two layers of extra plastic, gone. And the extra-sturdy case around the battery itself: gone. And the extra fiddly-bits for the hatch: gone. And the extra connections that are as idiot-proof as you can get them: gone. You could shave 80% of the thickness just by eliminating near-idiot-replaceable batteries in stuff.
Unfortunately? Everyone else saw the advantages (to Apple-- not to the user) Apple paved the way with, and quickly followed suit.
Now, the newest cell phones have lost the user-replaceable packs...
... okay, okay... rant over. :soapbox:
__________________________________
As it turns out? If you are not one of those people who cut stuff up just because you can? You can actually replace batteries in these things yourself-- plenty of non-official resellers willing to risk selling you a flat-pack battery, built to OEM specs or even better-- frequently, you can find packs with more punch (amp-hours-- translation: longer "on" time). You'll also need a set of specialized tools, too-- typically very tiny TORX type screwdrivers, and more and more, the "security" ones (who's screws sport a little pin in the center, needing a coosponding tool with a matching hole...).
Apple went to a 5-lobed screw, which was quickly copied by the tool-makers. Kindles use TORX as far as I know, and these can be had nearly anywhere that sells precision tools. Often the battery re-sellers will sell you one specific for your device. For a price, of course.
As it turns out, I already own a set of TORX bits-- even ones with the holes-in. Being the tinkerer that I am, and I've replaced "non-replaceable" batteries on several things. It's not hard-- if you are unsure you can remember how all the little fiddly-bits fit together? Take camera-phone snaps at each step-- with step 1 being your device before anything has been removed, and a snap for each screw you take-out--- including the screw/part/fiddly-bit you just removed. Use PAINT to label your snaps if you need to.
You can always delete unneeded photos later. But you cannot un-delete what you never snapped....
... and a nice bench-mounted magnifying glass is a plus-- one with a good, strong light. And several types of tweezers is a must-- some of those parts are too small for ordinary human fingers. Oh, and a nice, small flat screwdriver, to use as a miniature prybar.
Finally? Steady hands is an absolute necessity-- or you'll be dropping the fiddly-bits too frequently. Usually bouncing on your table, off onto the carpet-- wherein it immediately does a
Predator-fade and hides..... until you find it later, painfully embedded in your bare foot...
:mrgreen:
So, yeah-- it turns out you can replace batteries in nearly anything.
But, naturally, it voids any and all warranties....
... but it's damn fun!
;D
Especially when you are successful, and you can "stick it" to Da Man... take THAT Mr Knows-Better-Than-Me Manufacturer-Overlord!
:devil:
Quote from: The Meromorph on March 16, 2012, 01:34:00 AM
If you bought books from Amazon, you can re-download them free for ever to any new kindle you get
If you got them somewhere else, TAKE BACKUPS onto your PC...
Doh! I don'y know what I've got between my ears these days.
Bob, if I ever need to replace a battery, I'll send it over to you!!
Quote from: Griffin NoName on March 16, 2012, 04:02:20 AM
Quote from: The Meromorph on March 16, 2012, 01:34:00 AM
If you bought books from Amazon, you can re-download them free for ever to any new kindle you get
If you got them somewhere else, TAKE BACKUPS onto your PC...
Doh! I don'y know what I've got between my ears these days.
Bob, if I ever need to replace a battery, I'll send it over to you!!
I'd be delighted! You pay the shipping & battery? I'll be happy to fix it for you for gratis-- just for the experience of having preventing yet one more item from going into a landfill (if nothing else).
:D
Quote from: Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith on March 16, 2012, 04:14:54 AM
Quote from: Griffin NoName on March 16, 2012, 04:02:20 AM
Quote from: The Meromorph on March 16, 2012, 01:34:00 AM
If you bought books from Amazon, you can re-download them free for ever to any new kindle you get
If you got them somewhere else, TAKE BACKUPS onto your PC...
Doh! I don'y know what I've got between my ears these days.
Bob, if I ever need to replace a battery, I'll send it over to you!!
You pay the shipping & battery?
Of course.
Be interesting if it is still not superceded by something I consider better by the time the battery won't recharge any more - and I haven't even bought it yet. And if I go for the original Kindle, it's already old hat!
I don't have a Kindle, but I do have a Sony PRS-600. It has a large screen and a good user interface, although the battery life isn't as good as touted, but then i'm usually somewhere I can charge it up before it runs out. It was a present, so I don't know how much it cost, but I did by an SD card for it (8GB, I think), and have thousands of ebooks ready to place onto it, although to be frank, I haven't touched the sides of what's on the internal memory, yet. :o
I prefer traditional books, especially the smell and feel of them, but find the eReader to be quite versatile in its uses. It makes a great appliance to take on holiday with you, as you can store more books than would fit in your suitcase, and if you get bored of one, you can always just choose another to read without having to move, especially if you're laid out with a beer in one hand! ;)
Quote from: Roland Deschain on March 19, 2012, 02:22:12 AM
I prefer traditional books, especially the smell and feel of them
Never ever thought I'd consider eBooks, as real books have been a huge part of my life...... I love them, I have thousands, I could never throw any out, etc etc etc.
But. I have no more room for books and find it hard taking them to the charity shop and I can't afford them new any more. So, the Kindle would pay for itself over about 3-4 years I reckon, and solve the other two problems.
Quote from: RolandI prefer traditional books, especially the smell and feel of them, but find the eReader to be quite versatile in its uses. It makes a great appliance to take on holiday with you, as you can store more books than would fit in your suitcase, and if you get bored of one, you can always just choose another to read without having to move, especially if you're laid out with a beer in one hand!
I used to say I preferred real books, but now I have a Kindle I find there's a vast advantage I never thought of, and that's the
range of literature I now have access to.
Quote from: Sibling DavidH on March 20, 2012, 09:23:08 AM
Quote from: RolandI prefer traditional books, especially the smell and feel of them, but find the eReader to be quite versatile in its uses. It makes a great appliance to take on holiday with you, as you can store more books than would fit in your suitcase, and if you get bored of one, you can always just choose another to read without having to move, especially if you're laid out with a beer in one hand!
I used to say I preferred real books, but now I have a Kindle I find there's a vast advantage I never thought of, and that's the range of literature I now have access to.
Yes, to pay peanuts for rubbish that one might enjoy seems quite attractive :mrgreen:
It's not mainly rubbish. I get a lot of history written close to the event; eg an account of Gettysburg written a few months after by a staff colonel who fought in the thick of it, and similar accounts of WW1 battles. These are things you never normally come across. I've got loads of classic stuff in English and German, such as the complete works of EA Poe, HP Lovecraft and JS Le Fanu. I've got every single Hornblower novel, ditto Sherlock Holmes; all 3 Stieg Larsson novels; all 3 'Hunger Games' books and a load of other favourites. Also, 122 good SF titles. And so on .....
In almost all cases I didn't pay 'pennies' for them: I paid nothing at all. ;D
Seriously, the range of stuff out there is astonishing.
Quote from: Sibling DavidH on March 20, 2012, 02:52:23 PM
In almost all cases I didn't pay 'pennies' for them: I paid nothing at all. ;D
Seriously, the range of stuff out there is astonishing.
mmmmmmmm now I can't wait
but I've promised myself I will wait until I have finished my university course (as I can't afford to spend time playing with it). Not long now I hope.
I must echo David's comments: I have in excess of 400 titles on my Android pad (and my Kindle too, come to think of it).
More than 1/2 of these I got for free-- if I thought that one day, I might just want to read something? (mostly from ManyBooks website-- google) I would download it, convert it to MOBI (via Caliber) and stuff it onto my devices.
I have loads of books, hopefully to suit my every whim, for when I end one book, I really like to start the next one immediately.
I've been resisting the Kindle. :hide:
I usually have about 6 books from various genres going at any given time, picking them up and setting them down as the mood strikes. Noob question: can you "bookmark" several different electronic books that way?
When you re-open any document on Kindle, it automatically goes to where you last closed it.
Quote from: pieces o nine on March 21, 2012, 02:10:51 AM
I've been resisting the Kindle. :hide:
I usually have about 6 books from various genres going at any given time, picking them up and setting them down as the mood strikes. Noob question: can you "bookmark" several different electronic books that way?
As DavadH pointed out, the Kindle software helpfully remembers your progress in each and every book. There are various ways to reset these progress indicators, if you like, but the automatic process works pretty good.
You are also free to manually mark each book as much as you like, too-- by adding notes, mark-ups, just a "bent over page" (on the Kindle, it actually looks like you've bent over the corner)-- as many as you like-- you could theoretically bend over each and every page in each and every book on your device-- it stores this info in associated files along side the E-book's original file, no problem. (size isn't an issue, here-- not really-- we are talking of mere kilobytes of size, on a device with giga-bytes of room.... and no, I won't insult you by explaining those terms, either... :) )
Even the Kindle application running on Android or Apple's OS on the iPad/iPod/iPhone easily does this too.
As do the many and varied non-Amazon reading apps you can run on your PC laptop, Android tablets/phones or Apple stuff-- they all have various ways to "mark up" your virtual book with notes, bookmarks and so on.
But basic progress is always saved-- good for linear books such as novels. Kinda useless in a "Complete Works of Mark Twain" or All The Recipes of Yugoslavia books, though. :) That's where the manual bookmarking really shines.
On the Kindles? Referencing your manual bookmarks takes you to a summary page, listing each mark, and a helpful paragraph or so from the page you marked. You can add notes too, if you like.
I read about these features somewhere or other and was impressed.
If one can scribble notes in the margins, why don't newspaper eReader versions include crosswords and sudokus?
There is no real technical limitation to do so, and I'm sure sooner rather than later it will be implemented.
Quote from: Griffin NoName on March 21, 2012, 09:36:47 PM
I read about these features somewhere or other and was impressed.
If one can scribble notes in the margins, why don't newspaper eReader versions include crosswords and sudokus?
There are some limited Apps that run on the Kindle, from Amazon's kindle store-- I think they have both of these you mentioned. I'm not into either one, so I did not pay much attention to such things myself.
I know there are a slew of crossword/sodoku games for Android, and MaJong too (I have two of the latter). I suspect the Kindle could easily handle that one, too.
I'm probably being dense but I forget what uses Android, etc etc. My mind won't keep hold of the information. It's like selective blindness.
Quote from: Griffin NoName on March 21, 2012, 10:21:01 PM
I'm probably being dense but I forget what uses Android, etc etc. My mind won't keep hold of the information. It's like selective blindness.
Don't sweat it-- the Kindle Fire is an example of a tablet device, and it uses a special Amazon-specific Android. I only mentioned it for completeness.
There are quite a few simple games for the Kindle (B&W) device-- go to Amazon's Kindle store, and check which apps are compatible with which devices-- they will say.
Quote from: Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith on March 21, 2012, 10:28:12 PM
Quote from: Griffin NoName on March 21, 2012, 10:21:01 PM
I'm probably being dense but I forget what uses Android, etc etc. My mind won't keep hold of the information. It's like selective blindness.
Don't sweat it
But I do. These sorts of things would be dead easy and easily remembered in my former life. It is distressing when cognition and memory start failing. Also, one constantly weighs up whether it is normal aging or the beginnings of dementia. Although in my case it is most likely to be the CFS.
Join the club, Griffin. :mrgreen:
I think I'm getting like that, but I can't remember what I used to be like.
Quote from: Sibling DavidH on March 23, 2012, 11:09:43 AM
I think I'm getting like that, but I can't remember what I used to be like.
:)
You might all be relieved to know I finally bought the wretched object! ;)
They are releasing the Kindle Touch 3G on the UK market on 27th April, so I have pre-ordered it.
I had made my mind up on getting the Keyboard version, but on reading up on it, they are aiming at making that pretty redundant - no more updates etc.
So decided might as well go for latest technology, even if actually it probably is not quite as good aas the keyboard version was in several areas (I have been reading hundreds of reviews and customer opinions to come to these conclusions) (why does improving technology mean things get worse?).
This is my gift to myself for stopping smoking. Everyone has been telling me to give myself a treat.
Good for you! You do indeed deserve a treat.
Woot!
The touch is the one I would get today, if I was buying a kindle-- small, light, but the virtual keyboard is "touchable". I also like the fact that with the touch, you can highlight a word (for it's meaning) by a simple touch-and-hold.
Of course the cynic in me reminds you you have 30 days no questions asked return with Amazon as always-- so if it turns out you hate the thing? Don't forget that. ::)
I predict you won't though.
Cheers!
Quote from: Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith on April 08, 2012, 04:32:34 PM
..........small, light, but the virtual keyboard is "touchable".
Yes, it looks ok. But I have also ordered a case that comes with a stylus so if my fingers are too big the virtual keyboard won't be an issue. I can't type on my iTouch's virtual keyboard at all, I never get the right character, odd as I have little fingers.
I've used a stylus on touch screens-- results are variable. But I have very dry skin most times, and have some issues with the screen ignoring my fingers.
One of many reasons why I purchased the Transformer-- it has a physical keyboard (like my phone). I bypass the whole issue.
But if you don't have that problem, the stylus ought to work quite well for you-- many folk like them.
Sounds like a nice Kindle. I looked it up on Amazon UK, and I must say that its features are quite impressive. I couldn't see if it has this feature, but my friend has a Kindle that displays an image on the screen when it's turned off, as if the ink has "stuck" there, making it look less like a screen, which is cool. The only drawback with Kindles is that they support limited file types, but then you can download the Calibre converter, which will convert .doc, .epub, etc, into .AZW or .mobi, so if you acquire books from elsewhere, there shouldn't be an issue.
If you have small fingers, but you never seem to get the right key, it's most likely due to your finger positioning, by which I mean the angle with which you "press" the keys. If you look at what keys you press incorrectly the most, you may see that you are getting ones to the left or right too much, in which case, all you need to do is adjust the positioning of your finger. Hope that helps.
Tried different finger angles etc etc on my iTouch, nothing works, it is too small for me. Juat can't get the knack.
Received the first bit of my kindle today. = plug adaptor with USB port, very neat. I already have a similar plug (actually it's a travel plug - very handy considering I never travel) but now I can recharge two gadgets at once.
Oh, I get it-- this is a one piece at a time, user-assembly process?
:ROFL:
Yes. Of course, one starts off thinking I'll just buy this thing, and before you know it you've accessorized :mrgreen:
So......v.exciting. Got the second parcel today. My snazzy Kindle cover, black shiny mock crocodile (odd as I don't believe there are any black crocodiles) with a neat little light* that folds away on the back cover in a litttle pocket, really clever, a wrist strap (detachable), a screen cleaner with a loop string so can attach and so not lose and three stylos for virtual keyboard, very smart, stylish, and can hook onto cover which has enough room on the inside margin to accomodate one. Anyway, it also comes with those screen cover thingamies, supposed to keep your screen from getting scratched. Surely if you stick one on, and eventually it needs changing, when you peel it off, doesn't it leave residue from the stickyness? Does anyone use these?
There is life after depression. I can be cheered up by something so trivial, and at about a quarter of the price of a "Kindle" designer cover! (The actual "real" Kindle covers seem ridiculously over-priced to me). Who pays £50 for a cover for a £90 item?.
*and two batteries, one needed, one spare!!!
So a la Bridget Jones, v.v..v.excited, 0 cigs, 2 glasses wine.
I can testify that using screen protectors is a good thing-- I've had one on my smart phones for quite a bit, and I have one on my Kindle keyboard edition.
Moreover, I even put one on my Transformer (Android tablet) to cut down on the glare, even though it has gorilla glass (allegedly scratch-proof).
I got into quality covers when I scratched my smartphone (not gorilla glass)-- and bought a Zagg brand cover for it. These are guaranteed to not leave residue, and if you buy one, and have to remove it (due to a scratch or other blemish) if you write to the maker, they'll send you a replacement cover...
... as for my Kindle keyboard? I had a major blemish on that, and a cover not only covered up the blemish (my fault) it made the E-Ink have better contrast than before... my next e-Ink kindle will have one, for sure.
But. You have a touch, right? Although the Zagg brand works very well with the touch screen (that's what's on my Android tab) you do have to wait 24 hours to use your device, after installation (it's a wet application). I cannot say if the dry protectors work with touch screens or not-- I have no experience at all on these.
However, none of the ones I've read about seem to leave residue behind if you do install them-- go to Amazon and look at the reviews.
Thanks. Interesting.
Keep wanting to play with the new case and all its bits.
Perhaps I should have my IQ tested.
Quote from: Griffin NoName on April 20, 2012, 02:54:59 PM
Thanks. Interesting.
Keep wanting to play with the new case and all its bits.
Perhaps I should have my IQ tested.
Indeed. Curiosity is indicative of a superior mind after all.
:)
I was rather fearing the worst, what with my childlike delight.
Looked Zugg or Zegg or whatever they are , they do screen covers for all except my model, but there are others that look just as good.
Quote from: Griffin NoName on April 20, 2012, 03:33:20 PM
I was rather fearing the worst, what with my childlike delight.
Looked Zugg or Zegg or whatever they are , they do screen covers for all except my model, but there are others that look just as good.
Most of the dry-install protectors (likely the ones you got are dry-install) use that "post-it" type glue and so won't leave any residue upon removal.
Still-- I would clean carefully the screen beforehand, using any eyeglasses cleaning product and microfiber cloths (or other soft, lint-free cleaning cloth).
But before you do that? Wash your hands... twice... and dry with a lint-free cloth (or put on latex gloves-- brand new ones).
If there is a plastic "squeegee" use that to rub the protector flat-- or a credit card works very well here.
And... yaaay! A no-smoking location.... which you have already taken care of. Again, yaaay!
:)
Quote from: Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith on April 21, 2012, 12:35:42 AM
Most of the dry-install protectors (likely the ones you got are dry-install) use that "post-it" type glue and so won't leave any residue upon removal.
Mine are from China ;)
In fact, it's all from China. And it's all very good quality and well designed. Excellent value for money. Except I can't help wondering how many peasants died to provide me with this bargain.
Well.... it is what it is.
Some kid's eating a meal because of it.... at least.
Quote from: GriffinI can't help wondering how many peasants died to provide me with this bargain.
I think if you look closely you'll see it's plastic, not real skin.
They make plastic from woodpulp these days, why not from bloody pulp or dried-up human remains? Let nothing go to waste and greenwash yourself in the process. Kindle Green(TM) is dead people!!!
:ROFL: @ all
Just realised my filofax (v.v.ancient) is likewise black crocodile (except the crocodile pattern has worn off in places :o:)). So they match. This could be the start of an overhaul of all my possession so everything matches.
Glad you're liking your new toy, Griffin (have you received it yet?). I love things like this too, and incessantly press buttons I know I shouldn't, just to see what they do. ;D
Project Gutenberg is dangerous. The first time I went there, shortly after receiving my eBook (ok, so it was the same day), I ended up spending 2 hours browsing their website, and downloading quite a few books. I also concur with some of you that the formatting of some leaves a lot to be desired, especially with books i've found on other websites. I have an awful lot of books which need the correct tags adding to them, but i've yet to make the time to do so. My eBook collection is a bit of a mess, and it annoys my mild OCD, so a huge clear-up session is on it's way, I think. Once this is done, I can finally start filling my 8GB SD Card with ordered literary greatness.
Quote from: Roland Deschain on April 22, 2012, 03:48:50 AM
Glad you're liking your new toy, Griffin (have you received it yet?).
.............
Project Gutenberg is dangerous.
Not received yet.... due on 25th according to email today, which is a little odd as they don't go on release til 27th. Still I won't complain if it arrives early. All I can do at present is fondle the accessories :D
Think I'll stay clear of Project Gutenberg !
But -- Project Gutenberg has some *great* stuff! :D
Yes, I know, but if it's dangerous...................... :o:
* quietly nudges the cd with un millón de ilustraciones antiguas under the desk * ::)
Zono: it's been a long, long time since I took Spanish. Some phrase fragments still float to the top of my mind now and then, and I apologize if that ^ is wrong!
I've now selected the first book to download from Amaazon. A saving of about £2 over the cheapest real book format. At that rate it will take a while to recoup costs.
The program Calibre (spelling correct: google) is indispensable for keeping order with my P.G. ebook collection. Without it, I could not begin to keep things straight.
User's manual here: http://manual.calibre-ebook.com/ (http://manual.calibre-ebook.com/)
Download here: http://calibre-ebook.com/ (http://calibre-ebook.com/)
__________________
Quote from: Griffin NoName on April 23, 2012, 12:19:24 AM
I've now selected the first book to download from Amaazon. A saving of about £2 over the cheapest real book format. At that rate it will take a while to recoup costs.
Until you locate many of the classics for free, elsewhere.
Here's a good place to begin: http://manybooks.net/ (http://manybooks.net/)
;D
Thanks for the links !
Quote from: pieces o nine on April 22, 2012, 07:00:07 PM
* quietly nudges the cd with un millón de ilustraciones antiguas under the desk * ::)
That works beautifully, you even got the accent on the ó. :thumbsup:
It's arrived!!! Several days early. Haven't opened parcel yet...............
Oh, deepjoy!
More good sources: www.TUEBL.com (http://www.tuebl.com)
http://www.epubbud.com/browse.php (http://www.epubbud.com/browse.php)
http://www.epubbooks.com/ (http://www.epubbooks.com/)
http://www.free-ebooks.net/ (http://www.free-ebooks.net/)
Anything from these needs converting with Calibre.
I suspect we won't be hearing from our beloved Griff for a bit...
:D
______________
Quote from: Sibling DavidH on April 23, 2012, 02:36:41 PM
Oh, deepjoy!
More good sources: www.TUEBL.com (http://www.tuebl.com)
http://www.epubbud.com/browse.php (http://www.epubbud.com/browse.php)
http://www.epubbooks.com/ (http://www.epubbooks.com/)
http://www.free-ebooks.net/ (http://www.free-ebooks.net/)
Anything from these needs converting with Calibre.
Yes--- I go both ways, as I use my Kindle for Kindle content, and I use Cool Reader (on my Android tab) for any non-DRM stuff-- and I prefer epub format for that.
And Calibre lets me have both (MOBI for Kindle and ePub for Cool Reader) formats at the same time, no fuss, no muss.
Quote from: Sibling DavidH on April 23, 2012, 02:36:41 PM
Oh, deepjoy!
More good sources: www.TUEBL.com (http://www.tuebl.com)
http://www.epubbud.com/browse.php (http://www.epubbud.com/browse.php)
http://www.epubbooks.com/ (http://www.epubbooks.com/)
http://www.free-ebooks.net/ (http://www.free-ebooks.net/)
Anything from these needs converting with Calibre.
Presumably all books (free) on these sites are either out of copyright or submitted by the author? I'm not quite clued in as to whether US Copyright expired means ok in thee UK, or if the UK copyright has not expired but US has, what's the deal?
I still have not opened the package yet, I am making myself wait til I fiinish my essay* !
*
actually it is finished but have to get it through the cr*ppppyyyy plagiarism s/w
Quote from: GriffPresumably all books (free) on these sites are either out of copyright or submitted by the author? I'm not quite clued in as to whether US Copyright expired means ok in thee UK, or if the UK copyright has not expired but US has, what's the deal?
Dunno. Who cares? :devil2:
Agree with DavidH here.... especially if the author has passed on.
The copyright was specifically set up to promote authors and the public (not their deadbeat heirs), and was designed to let the works of deceased authors automatically go into the public domain.
Copyright was hijacked by greedy corporations (Disney, among others) and corrupted to the mess it is today.
As such, I feel zero compunction at getting for free any book by any author that has died, regardless if it's legit or not-- the spirit of copyright says it should be.
But I do take great pains to try to find legit copies of ebooks, if the author is still among the living-- even then, however, if the work in question cannot be had legitimately in ebook form? I then look to illegitimate sources, if it's a book I've read previously (and owned a dead-tree copy of).
So, what about books I legitimately purchased in dead-tree editions, and I'm given an opportunity to get a questionable ebook version for free? I usually go ahead, if the author in question is successful (i.e. not hurting for money).
Ain't I a situational ethicist?
:ROFL:
Quote from: Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith on April 25, 2012, 06:13:49 PM
Agree with DavidH here.... especially if the author has passed on.
The copyright was specifically set up to promote authors and the public (not their deadbeat heirs), and was designed to let the works of deceased authors automatically go into the public domain.
Copyright was hijacked by greedy corporations (Disney, among others) and corrupted to the mess it is today.
As such, I feel zero compunction at getting for free any book by any author that has died, regardless if it's legit or not-- the spirit of copyright says it should be.
But I do take great pains to try to find legit copies of ebooks, if the author is still among the living-- even then, however, if the work in question cannot be had legitimately in ebook form? I then look to illegitimate sources, if it's a book I've read previously (and owned a dead-tree copy of).
So, what about books I legitimately purchased in dead-tree editions, and I'm given an opportunity to get a questionable ebook version for free? I usually go ahead, if the author in question is successful (i.e. not hurting for money).
Ain't I a situational ethicist?
:ROFL:
Nothing like making up your own laws.
This delights me: http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2012/apr/22/academic-publishing-monopoly-challenged
I do care about copyright, not for dead people, but definitely for live people, regardless of the law - so happens the law agrees with me. I've had software I've written stolen by a customer and used for free - made me v.cross (there was a contract).
Oh, I most certainly agree-- copyright should be highly protective of living authors.
This was the intent by the US copyright framers, back in the day-- to encourage authors to be... authors.
Unfortunately? Greed has ruined that since then, and publishing has been all about the publishers, not the acutal authors themselves.
But I'm not making up the laws myself-- I'm using the spirit of the original copyright framer's intent. And ignoring the greedy-guts leeches who only wish to make money off the backs of authors, while contributing exactly nothing in the process.
Great article. Looking at the cost of some of those journals, especially when coupled with the fact that a university would need to subscribe to a great many, it's shocking how much money must be going to them. Scientific research isn't about making a profit, it's about increasing knowledge, and it's the profit incentive that can quite easily ruin the integrity of academic research.
Quote from: Roland Deschain on April 26, 2012, 12:24:05 PM
Great article. Looking at the cost of some of those journals, especially when coupled with the fact that a university would need to subscribe to a great many, it's shocking how much money must be going to them. Scientific research isn't about making a profit, it's about increasing knowledge, and it's the profit incentive that can quite easily ruin the integrity of academic research.
The real sick thing about all this?
Is that in these modern times of virtual publication via the world wide web? Actual costs to publish could be nearly zero. If you factor in that any typical University would already have a large pipe to the interwebs
anyway, the only real cost to publish would be editing fees. For the peer-review is already on a volunteer basis (no cost). So these editing tasks could easily be done in-house, or ... imagine this.. a committee of grad students
for free. Spell checking has long since been reduced to software anyway. So all the real editing is about content and presentation. Easily done by the submitting professor back to his crew for impact/analysis.
The final publication could take place on the web itself, in a subscription-based website location hosted by the University itself. Then, anyone with credentials could easily have access...
... and a paper-based journal is nearly as inexpensive: gone are the laborious hand-set typesetting processes. Gone are the by hand layups of each page, painstakingly done by hand with proofs and copy and scissors. It's all done virtually using layup software that feeds directly into the computer-driven printing press. An article could be published for 1/1000'th of what they charge.
Just look how cheap it is to do a "glory press" book! A coupla hundred dollars, and you can have your "novel" published with a hundred copies to foist upon your unsuspecting friends.... ::)
The real costs of publishing these days? Is promotion and advertising.
And there is
none of that in academia press.
It is sick. I have been using my uni.'s journal articles extensively and am really shocked at how many they have to subscribe to at utterly stupid prices. Of course, that's partly why we all pay excessive fees to the Uni. I found and article in a journal they did not subscribe to and it would have cost me over £300 just to look at that article on the journal's website and get the pdf. I can't understand how none of that payment goes to the author. It's totally werd.
^ That's ridiculous. £300 just for one article? How on earth is the average student meant to be able to afford that, or most people, come to think of it? It's a licence to print money, effectively, and something that desperately needs to be weeded out from the halls of academia for good.
It wasn't actually £300+ for the article, it was £300+ for 1 day's subscription to the journal......... in order to read one article............
::)
I wouldn't have paid that even when I was working and had a good income.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
So, I finally opened my Kindle package and found a Kindle inside.
I fitted one of those screen shields, couldn't get the air out at the corners, irritating. (I think I'm not strong enough ::)).
Have had a look around. Charged it up -very quick.
Frustrating that you can't set the wi-fi to the network and retain it as I run mine not broadcasting its name (only so I am not visible to all the other people livinng around me, unless they deliberately look for me.......... ie. I know it makes no difference security wise). Anyway, I have 3G on the Kindle so there's not a problem, just wi-fi is faster for downloads, if I do them on the Kindle rather than the PC.
As far as I can see, one only needs the Kindle email address for sending documents to the Kindle from somewhere other than one's own PC? (or whatever one has the Kindle pplugged into). ?
I haven't got the "touch" aspect working very well. I am having trouble getting it to do what I want, where I want, when I want. Ridiculous. My two yr old grandaughter can work their iPad. Feel ancient and incompetent. Using the stylus is good though.
Have not yet done anything other than look around, and set my personal settings.
I wouldn't worry about the download speed issue. E-books are pretty small and I have found downloading them via the WiFi hotspot on my cell phone (ie through 3g) subjectively to be just as fast as when I'm at home using my normal Internet connection.
The Kindle e-mail addy should match the one you use for Amazon, I seem to recall--- basically you "log in" using your Kindle to your Amazon account, just like you would on a pc.
There's another place to choose an e-mail addy too-- this one is what Amazon uses to communicate certain types of EBook conversions-- I only used that a tiny bit initially, as I soon discovered I could convert EBooks much easier using Calibre instead, and side-load them via the USB cable. Faster, better, cheaper: Amazon charges you a slight fee everytime you convert.
There's one more e-mail addy, but I forget what that one's actually for-- I ended up creating a brandy-new one specifically for my Kindle stuff-- that way all the Amazon Kindle ads/notices/etc come directly to that addy, keeping my usual business/shopping e-mail addy relatively clutter-free.
Quote from: Bluenose on April 27, 2012, 04:33:16 AM
.............I have found downloading them via the WiFi hotspot on my cell phone (ie through 3g) subjectively to be just as fast as when I'm at home using my normal Internet connection.
:mrgreen: says more about speed of yr home internet connection... :mrgreen: seriously tho' - thanks for tip. Saves me bothering to time it.
BoB, totally confused about emails.
This from Amazon Kindle account settings:
Approved Personal Document E-mail List
To prevent spam, your Kindle will only receive files from the following e-mail addresses you have authorized. Learn more
E-mail address - <currently my login to amazon email address>
Send-to-Kindle E-Mail Settings
You can e-mail personal documents to the following Kindle(s) using the e-mail addresses shown. Learn more
Name E-mail Address
<mykindle_name> <myname@Kindle.com>
Does this mean, I use <currently my login to amazon email address> to send docs to <myname@Kindle.com> which will arrive on my Kindle?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Annoying, the Kindle support page, user guide etc, all say can connect to hidden wi-fi networks by typing in the name - well you can't - I can connect providing it is not hidden, but the moment I hide it, it won't connect............. what annoys me is that it says you can...... I know I don't need to connect so this is academic....I just don't like mis-information.
Forget the "authorized mail to kindle address". There is really no need for you to remember or use that-- use Calibre to convert-to-Mobi (Kindle) and side-load them via the USB cable. If you use the email? It will cost you $0.10/book (unless they've upped the pricetag). It's only to let Amazon "convert" a book format that is not Mobi/Kindle for you automatically.
As for the hidden network? I have no idea why it won't work-- I leave mine broadcasting the name, as any sniffer can easily get that info anyway. I do use the highest level of encryption my modem supports, though.
If you're content to use the 3G (cellular), then forget about it; since you didn't get a Kindle Fire, you likely won't need or notice the high speed WiFi stuff.
Another thing: you can greatly improve your Kindle's battery life, by disabling both the WiFi and the 3G radios-- it's in the menu/settings somewhere. You only need to enable it to download new book purchases. If you're side-loading via the USB cable (from your PC), you don't even need it then.
Leaving it off, does remove the automatic sync option, but who cares if you don't have 2 or more devices? You don't, so auto-sync is not a feature you'll use.
One final think you'll loose if you leave the radios off: automatic backup of your notes, bookmarks & other commentary you may make on a book. This is no big deal, really, as the Kindles are quite robust devices (not prone to crashes or drop-outs, unlike many of the newer Android tablets) so it's very unlikely you'll care about that, either.
That being said? Once every couple of days, you could turn on your radio, and tell it to sync-- it'll backup to Amazon your bookmarks, notes, etc, and your current reading position too. Then if the e-Fairies steal your Kindle, you can get back to where you were...
... meh.
One more thing: Categories.
This is the feature that Amazon put on the kindle readers that let you create groups of books using any criteria you like, and you may add/remove any or all your books to any or all of your different categories. When I was still reading on the traditional Kindle all the time, I had hundreds of categories.
Basically one per author, wherein I would add all that author's books-- I also had several misc to cover single-book authors... I have more than 400 books on my original Kindle, and I had to find a way to keep order.
I discovered a trick to the category thing: All of mine start with a > symbol, followed by a space, then the last name, comma, first name (or the letter A followed by MISC, etc).
This makes the Kindle sort these first, if I sort by title. Then, within each category, if I open it, I only see what books it "contains", sorted however I like (usually by title also).
If your mind works in alphabetic order when dealing with lists, as mine does (too many years of sorting-by-alpha to stop now) then this will appeal to your since of order.
Obviously, you can do whatever you like with categories, including ignoring them for now.
:D
Quote from: Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith on April 28, 2012, 02:32:41 AM
As for the hidden network? I have no idea why it won't work-- I leave mine broadcasting the name, as any sniffer can easily get that info anyway. I do use the highest level of encryption my modem supports, though.
Yes, so do I (WPA). I only have the wi-fi hidden so neigbours can't see me. Obviously if they sniff they'll find me, but how many neighbours know how? I just like to maintain a discrete presence :D
Quote from: Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith on April 28, 2012, 02:32:41 AM
Another thing: you can greatly improve your Kindle's battery life, by disabling both the WiFi and the 3G radios--
Assume you mean - wireless off/on setting. Yes have found that. It's off for now.
Quote from: Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith on April 28, 2012, 02:32:41 AM
I discovered a trick to the category thing: All of mine start with a > symbol, followed by a space, then the last name, comma, first name (or the letter A followed by MISC, etc).
This makes the Kindle sort these first, if I sort by title. Then, within each category, if I open it, I only see what books it "contains",
I get the > space being sorted first, but if all start with > space then I don't understand.
Quote from: Griffin NoName on April 28, 2012, 04:00:08 AM
I get the > space being sorted first, but if all start with > space then I don't understand.
Play with categories, and then sort by book title, and it will become clear: if all your category names start with "> " then these will always sort first, ahead of all the individual books themselves, which won't show up until after all your category entries.
It's an old filing trick in programming: use a special character to "float" certain types of entries to the first or last position in an automated sort routine.
I prefix some directory names with underscore _ to bring them to the top of the list in Widow Exploder. It works on my phone, too.
There you go-- my usual Windoze fix is an exclamation mark "!" but underscore is equally effective.
I settled on the > mark for the Kindle, as it did not sort out the ! mark as expected. The alphabet as used by Kindles is not ASCII coded, or else the sort program is not using ASCII codes.
I've always used a space (#20), any character before "A" (#41) works.
Why does the Kindle have to use a different number system? And eBook coding? I do wish there was standardisation across the whole electronic machine industry - I've always beefed on about it.
I dunno why Kindle's sort engine does what it does-- but I have tried a variety of special characters to force-sort items to the top (or bottom) of the sort stack.
They are doing something weird in there, for sure-- and it ain't ASCII-- not even the "sort alphabetically, but ignore capitalization" method.
Yes, I've written hundreds of sort engines over the years, and have added all sorts of different tweaks to get it to sort exactly how I wanted it to-- my usual method was to force all letters into all caps (in a semp buffer) and sort that, then push the new index back onto the original text strings. I've also used the strip out all spaces, punctuation and numbers method as well.
But clearly the Kindle is doing something odd, here, and as it's a locked-down OS, I could not find anyone who knew (or could say) what it was.
Yeh, I have a history in "sorts". I maintained the Cobol "Sort" compiler (in machine code - hex) for about five years (amongst other things). Think the upper case trick is pretty well universal.
So far, I do like the Kindle, but it seems a bit clunky. Have to get used to the menus being so limited :o:
Of course, all I've tried to read on it is the user guide (and i got bored).
What? You did not like the Mexican Novel about a kid named Manual? ::)
Over all, I think the limited menus is a positive thing-- no needlessly complicated stuff to bother with.
OTOH? I do wish Amazon had opened up the folder structure such that we could replace the stock screen saver junk with our own pics. Oh well, you cannot have everything.
:)
I like the screen saver on my Kindle.
I did not post about my amusing experience when I was trying to squeeze bubbles out of the screen shield. It was the first thing I did (put on the screen shield) after taking the Kindle out of the box. Anyway, I was scraping away with the little cardboard thingy they give you, and must have accidently switched the on/off switch on. Suddenly the Kindle sprang to life, but I did not immediately realise, so went on scraping. Of course, every time I hit a part of the screen that had a function, the kindle carried out that function. It was like a run away train. It got in the most awful tangle. When I realised what was happening I had to guess how to use it as instead of being at the beginning of the user guide, it was on some random page deeper into the system. So by trial and error, pushing at random bits of screen, I eventually worked out enough about it to operate it.
A lesson learned while simultaneously trying to stay afloat often does not need repeating.
:D
Quote from: Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith on April 28, 2012, 10:16:49 PM
What? You did not like the Mexican Novel about a kid named Manual? ::)
Over all, I think the limited menus is a positive thing-- no needlessly complicated stuff to bother with.
OTOH? I do wish Amazon had opened up the folder structure such that we could replace the stock screen saver junk with our own pics. Oh well, you cannot have everything.
:)
There is a simple and safe hack to do that. I've done it... Would you like me to unearth the instructions for you?
Quote from: The Meromorph on April 30, 2012, 06:48:29 PM
Quote from: Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith on April 28, 2012, 10:16:49 PM
What? You did not like the Mexican Novel about a kid named Manual? ::)
Over all, I think the limited menus is a positive thing-- no needlessly complicated stuff to bother with.
OTOH? I do wish Amazon had opened up the folder structure such that we could replace the stock screen saver junk with our own pics. Oh well, you cannot have everything.
:)
There is a simple and safe hack to do that. I've done it... Would you like me to unearth the instructions for you?
Ooooo! Yes please.
^^ Me too, please, Mero.
I'd be interested myself, even though my kindles are mostly back-burner these days
Just wasted about three hours playing with my kindle. Silly. I got a newspaper subscription and will try it out tomorrow. Wi-fi (as opposed to 3G) will deliver an enriched image version (to do with download times, and stopping and starting etc). So have had to unhide my network to get wi-fi. Amazon tried for about an hour and a half to get the Hub and the Kindle to connect when hidden (which it should do with manual input of SSID and password). But they couldn't get it to work. They did confirm everything was set up correctly. They gave up eventually. I tried BT (for the Hub) but they just said it should work. So everybody is saying it should work. But it isn't. So I have to unhide.
I'm not sure whether I'll like getting the newspaper via Kindle. I like doing the crossword and the Sudoku every day and that doesn't seem to be in the Kindle version. Trouble is the Kindle version is a quarter of the price. Plus I am fed up with having piles of newspapers to clear out. Sudoku for Kindle,,,, are a few, but none are interactive.
I'm told there are some very good crossword puzzles on the web... but as I'm no fan of these things, I cannot confirm.
No interactive crosswords for the Kindle either...........
Yes, there are online.
http://wiki.mobileread.com/wiki/Kindle_Screen_Saver_Hack_for_all_2.x_and_3.x_Kindles
Quote from: The Meromorph on May 02, 2012, 07:22:54 PM
http://wiki.mobileread.com/wiki/Kindle_Screen_Saver_Hack_for_all_2.x_and_3.x_Kindles
Alas, you must jailbreak it (root access).
Oh well.
Quote from: Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith on May 03, 2012, 04:22:22 AM
Quote from: The Meromorph on May 02, 2012, 07:22:54 PM
http://wiki.mobileread.com/wiki/Kindle_Screen_Saver_Hack_for_all_2.x_and_3.x_Kindles
Alas, you must jailbreak it (root access).
Oh well.
Why is that a probem?
Once you've done it, you can gets kindlets ;D
Of course the warranty is invalidated, but if
you are your kindle is out of warranty it's irrelevant.
True enough. [re: warranty]
I suppose I worry a wee bit, that the Kindle will become blacklisted by Amazon, and you won't be allowed to use any DRM books on it.
And that worry is slightly bigger than my need for a custom screensaver photo.
So....
It would be useful to find out about that ^.
Anyway, it seems the hack doesn't cover my Kindle 4. I don't care to risk it, anyway.
Thanks anyway, Mero.
How did you get a Kindle 4? They only just brought out the Kindle 3 here???
It came out with the iphone Π and the nook √2
:P :mrgreen:
I dunno. If I go to SETTINGS it says on the bottom:
Version: Kindle 4.0.1 (1331440003)
So I spose it's a Kindle 4. I bought it from Tescos in Telford.
EDIT: I found this (http://www.techradar.com/reviews/gadgets/portable-video/portable-media-players-recorders/amazon-kindle-1034630/review).
Quote from: Sibling DavidH on May 06, 2012, 10:54:12 AM
So I spose it's a Kindle 4. I bought it from Tescos in Telford.
David, that may just be the firmware version, and not the Kindle version.
My granddad was born and grew up in Oakengates, and it's where my dad's family are from. I still have family there. Small world. Ever been to the Wrekin or the Iron Bridge?
Quote from: RolandDavid, that may just be the firmware version, and not the Kindle version.
No - follow my link or just Google 'Kindle 4' - it's definitely called that.
QuoteMy granddad was born and grew up in Oakengates, and it's where my dad's family are from. I still have family there. Small world. Ever been to the Wrekin or the Iron Bridge?
Many times. My daughter & family lived in Ironbridge for a while, in a flat from which you could see the Iron Bridge if you leaned dangerously out of the window. Now they live in Telford.
Under settings my Kindle Touch says Firmware version 5.1.0 - so assume I have a Kindle 5 :mrgreen:
Just Google 'Kindle 4'. Here's the first 3 results
QuoteAmazon Kindle review | from TechRadar's expert reviews of Portable ...
www.techradar.com/reviews/gadgets/portable...kindle.../review
Rating: 4 - Review by Stuart Anderton
18 Oct 2011 – The Amazon Kindle 4 (aka Kindle 4th Gen, Kindle Touchless or just plain Kindle) was announced as a sidenote to the colour Kindle Fire and ...
Performance - Amazon announces Kindle ... - Amazon Kindle Keyboard review
Amazon Kindle 4 review | T3
www.t3.com/reviews/amazon-kindle-4-review1 Nov 2011 – Amazon's new Kindle is harder to navigate, has less storage capacity and the experimental web browser is still awful.
New Kindle 4
www.squidoo.com › Computers & Electronics › EReaders › KindleClick Here For The Amazing Kindle 4 Price! There is no doubt that the new Kindle 4 is a lot more popular than the Kindle 3. Although with the new Amazon tablet ...
Here's part of an entry in Wiki:
QuoteKindle 4
6.5 in (170 mm) H
4.5 in (110 mm) W
0.34 in (8.6 mm) D
Weight Kindle 1, 2
10.2 oz (290 g)
Kindle 3
8.7 oz (247 g)
Kindle 3 Wi-Fi only
8.5 oz (241 g)
Kindle DX 2
18.9 oz (540 g)
Kindle 4
5.98 oz (170 g)
And yes, it is available in the UK:
QuoteKindle for £79 at Tesco Direct using e-coupon - Expired - Hot UK ...
www.hotukdeals.com/.../kindle-for-79-tesco-direct-using-e-coupon-1...6 Mar 2012 – Kindle for £79 at Tesco Direct using e-coupon. Find more deals, discounts & voucher codes at Hot UK Deals.
There is a Kindle 5 - at least, googling for it finds cases for it -
http://www.trait-tech.com/product/T-Kindle5-5002A__lichee-pattern-leather-case-for-amazon-kindle-touch-5-hot-pink.html
Makes sense, but ignores the Kindle DX series, which really should have been K3, as they came after the K2.
Which would bump-up all the numbers by one... but the DX seems to be a sort of second cousin nobody much talks about...... even though there are 2 versions of it.
::)
Quote from: Sibling DavidH on May 06, 2012, 06:54:46 PM
QuoteKindle for £79 at Tesco Direct using e-coupon - Expired - Hot UK ...
www.hotukdeals.com/.../kindle-for-79-tesco-direct-using-e-coupon-1...6 Mar 2012 – Kindle for £79 at Tesco Direct using e-coupon. Find more deals, discounts & voucher codes at Hot UK Deals.
That link has expired. Not surprising if offer expired.
I think the Kindle Fire and the Kindle Touch are both referred to as Kindle 5, except the Kindle Touch is also often referred to as a 3. I think trying to follow their numbering system leads to madness. :o
This (http://wiki.mobileread.com/wiki/Kindle_Serial_Numbers) says
QuoteB001 = Kindle 1
B002 = Kindle 2 U.S. (Sprint)
B003 = Kindle 2 International (AT&T)
B004 = Kindle DX U.S.
B005 = Kindle DX International
B006 = Kindle 3 3G + WiFi Graphite/White (U.S. and Canada) NOTE: Some European cities may receive this serial number as well.
B008 = Kindle 3 WiFi
B009 = Kindle DX Graphite
B00A = Kindle 3 3G + WiFi Graphite (Europe)
B00E = Kindle 4 NoTouch (Europe?)
new: B00F = Kindle 3G Touch not clear if this is a kindle 3 or 4; Firmware version is 5.0.0 (store access via kindle only usable with amazon.com - not amazon.de)
B00F Kindle Touch 3G+WiFi Kindle 5 B011 Kindle Touch WiFi only Kindle 5 D01E = Kindle Fire Kindle 6
Mine's B00E.
Well, that's confirmed mine is a Kindle 5. Firmware 5.1.0 - newer than reported there. Serial no. prefix B010 not listed.
Last update was 12th April. The one I bought arrived in UK at end of April, so likely that page already out of date. :o
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
If we wanted to set aspiring Toadfish a "Task" in order to qualify, a fiendish one would be to read this thread in it's entirety. (unless they are a nerd). ;D
Quote from: Sibling DavidH on May 07, 2012, 12:01:52 PM
This (http://wiki.mobileread.com/wiki/Kindle_Serial_Numbers) says
QuoteB001 = Kindle 1
B002 = Kindle 2 U.S. (Sprint)
B003 = Kindle 2 International (AT&T)
B004 = Kindle DX U.S.
B005 = Kindle DX International
B006 = Kindle 3 3G + WiFi Graphite/White (U.S. and Canada) NOTE: Some European cities may receive this serial number as well.
B008 = Kindle 3 WiFi
B009 = Kindle DX Graphite
B00A = Kindle 3 3G + WiFi Graphite (Europe)
B00E = Kindle 4 NoTouch (Europe?)
new: B00F = Kindle 3G Touch not clear if this is a kindle 3 or 4; Firmware version is 5.0.0 (store access via kindle only usable with amazon.com - not amazon.de)
B00F Kindle Touch 3G+WiFi Kindle 5 B011 Kindle Touch WiFi only Kindle 5 D01E = Kindle Fire Kindle 6
Mine's B00E.
Cool.
What do they call the Kindle Apps that run on PC, Mac, Linnux, Android and iPxx I wonder?
:)
They call them Kindle Apps for PC. Kindle Apps for Mac. Kindle Apps for.......... abacus (ok I made the last one up).
mmmm I could run Kindle Apps for my iPod Touch - but why on earth would I want to read a book on such a tiny screen?
I wish there were Apps that ran on the Kindle.
edited for iPad -> iPod - typo
Quote from: Griffin NoName on May 07, 2012, 11:15:58 PM
mmmm I could run Kindle Apps for my iPad Touch - but why on earth would I want to read a book on such a tiny screen?
My thoughts exactly.
That's a lot of Kindles in such a short space of time (5 years). Will it end up evolving (through intelligent design) into a tablet PC?
Possibly, but then the niche currently occupied by the Kindle will be filled by the digital photo-frame.
Quote from: Roland Deschain on May 08, 2012, 09:28:21 AM
That's a lot of Kindles in such a short space of time (5 years). Will it end up evolving (through intelligent design) into a tablet PC?
It already has, it's called the Kindle Fire.
I'm more interested in
Pebbles (http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2012/may/07/pebble-wristwatch-email-apps?INTCMP=SRCH)
Quote from: Griffin NoName on May 08, 2012, 09:38:30 PM
I'm more interested in Pebbles (http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2012/may/07/pebble-wristwatch-email-apps?INTCMP=SRCH)
I saw that demonstrated somewhere or other. If I only wore a watch.... (skin doesn't take kindly to wristwatches)
My skin doesn't either. But I construct patches made from masking tape and tissue paper (surprisingly hard-wearing), cut them to the shape of the watch back, and attach them to the back of the watch. This stops my skin reacting, and also stops the horrible smell that accompanies my skin reaction.
Back to Kindles. I already love my Kindle. Even tho all i have on it is the Guardian - daily - v.v.quick download.
The only puzzle is, they say with wireless off the battery lasts about 2 months between charges. My battery is half used up (I fully charged it on receipt) and I don't keep wireless on and all Ive used it for each day is to read the Guardian, then switch right off - I don't keep it on screensaver. So bit of a puzzle why battery usage already down to half.
I wouldn't worry, re: battery-- cellular modems (which is what you are using, daily) does suck down quite a bit'o battery-juice.
1/2 down already sounds pretty normal to me.
I'm using it on wi-fi.
Just as bad as a cellular modem-- those wireless radios pretty much do a continuous-communication thing, whilst they are on.
Quote from: Griffin NoName on May 08, 2012, 09:38:30 PM
It already has, it's called the Kindle Fire.
So it's a little like the iPad, then. Or pretty much like it, from what I read just now.
Quote from: Griffin NoName on May 08, 2012, 09:38:30 PMI'm more interested in Pebbles (http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2012/may/07/pebble-wristwatch-email-apps?INTCMP=SRCH)
So we surpass Star Trek's vision in some ways, yet only just catching up to Dick Tracy in others? Lol. Neat idea, though.
Kindles do a lot of background processing (mostly building massive word search indices) in the first week or two. This dramatically increases battery usage at first, but it soon tails off and achieves the touted battery life.
I recommend de-fragging (plug it into your PC) the Kindle after a couple of weeks, and then every few months. 'Defraggler' (free) from PIRIFORM seems to do the best job on the Kindle.
http://www.piriform.com/defraggler
Wow! Mero you are a mine of information....... I am re-assured re battery and have downloaded defraggler - Thanks.
I've been having problems with my Kindle. It has not been responding to touch, either by finger or stylus, even thumps! Battery was showing about 1/4 full. So I recharged it, plugged into my laptop. Hibernated my laptop. Laptop then refused to restart until I unplugged the Kindle. Wierd. Anyone had this?
Then when I tried the Kindle (charged) I got Application Error. Did a hard reset. Got Application Error. Thumped it a few more times. As one does. Seemed to recover itself. Anyone had this?
At some point amongst all this I was looking at the directory structure on windows explorer. Inadvertantly I think I moved something. So I moved what I thought I'd moved back to where I thought it should be. Did a google for what the directory structure should look for, but no dice. Can someone verify (assuming all Kindles have same directory structure which they may no have) that ::::
/kindle/tts/data/common
contains two directories:
high-quality
low-quality
??
Sorry to hear of your problems with the Kindle. I don't know what's going on there, nor do I have any knowledge of the file system. This is what i've found on it:-
http://www.mobileread.mobi/forums/showthread.php?t=162062
http://www.kindleboards.com/index.php?topic=57855.0
The second link is to a forum which may provide further answers. Hope this helps.
Thanks for links. The first one showed I repaired my kindle structure incorrectly.
Quote from: Griffin NoName on May 12, 2012, 09:03:39 PM
Can someone verify (assuming all Kindles have same directory structure which they may no have) that ::::
/kindle/tts/data/common
contains two directories:
high-quality
low-quality
??
The above is wrong.
all three directories are subfolders of tts/data. ie. high-quality and low-quality are in tts/data not common.
Apparently these are used in book-> speech. So they won't have affected me as i havent been using speech.
Only prob. now is the Kindle is still getting stuck occasionally.
Try doing a cold-restart.
I don't know how the Touch does that, but on mine, you hold the power-off key for more than 15 seconds-- your manual should tell you how to do a cold-restart.
I find that cures quite a few things that just letting it sleep won't fix.
Quote from: Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith on May 14, 2012, 07:59:52 PM
Try doing a cold-restart.
I don't know how the Touch does that, but on mine, you hold the power-off key for more than 15 seconds-- your manual should tell you how to do a cold-restart.
I find that cures quite a few things that just letting it sleep won't fix.
I always switch my Kindle off completely when not in use. - ie. never leave it on screen saver. To do this I press and hold the power key for about 3 or 4 seconds. The screen goes sort empty like before I ever switched it on the first time ;) Is that cold enough? Or would 15 seconds be colder?
Got stuck again today, and another application error. Going to check out the forums. Good thing it's warranty is a year............. Bit fed up. My prescious.
Shut off an cold boot are not the same thing, I'm told... a cold reset refreshes various memory caches and stuff, that a simple turn-off does not.
Or so I'm told.
Looks like I have to hold the power key in for 30 seconds for cold restart.
But having hit the forums, looks like there are many people experiencing these issues with Kindle Touch. Some arer eturning them, Amazon replace, but some are just soldiering on. :(
I'm sorry you're having troubles with it.
Yes, after all the planning and working out if I really wanted it and then finding I totally adore it, and hvaing cancelled my hard copy newspapers in favour of a Kindle subscription (at 1/4 price) ------ bummer.
Has been ok since cold reboot but too early to tell probably.
My version went wobbly a few times, but in each case a hard reset cured it for a good while. In the end the USB socket went intermittent, so I returned it to Amazon for a replacement which has given no trouble at all. However I think the battery life is noticeably shorter in the new one.
On that evidence, there are good ones and bad ones - luck of the draw.
Luck of the draw seems to be the order of the day, with these things.
I have an Asus TF101 and the keyboard dock (with extra battery) and mine works about as well as an Android tablet on Ice Cream Sandwich does; which is to say, pretty good.
But according to various forums, there are about 20% or so that have gone horribly, horribly wrong under Ice Cream Sandwich (Android 4.x).
Luck of the draw seems to be the culprit-- or perhaps which shift the device was assembled on.... ::)
So am all ready now to start creating some categories. But I think I shall find it all very irritating. At present the home page displays (All) - so each book (2) and my daily newspaper, very convenient. But if I start filtering, I can only have "Periodicals" OR "Books" OR "New Category" when what I want is "Periodicals AND Books" and NOT New Category - for example. ie. I think the filter is too simple. Also, if books are in Books - what's the point of having them in a New Category? I don't quite get all this.
Quote from: Griffin NoName on June 12, 2012, 08:01:14 PM
So am all ready now to start creating some categories. But I think I shall find it all very irritating. At present the home page displays (All) - so each book (2) and my daily newspaper, very convenient. But if I start filtering, I can only have "Periodicals" OR "Books" OR "New Category" when what I want is "Periodicals AND Books" and NOT New Category - for example. ie. I think the filter is too simple. Also, if books are in Books - what's the point of having them in a New Category? I don't quite get all this.
Here's a tip: begin all your categories with a special character, such as ! or > or even _
Then?
Sort everything by the titles-- and magically, all the categories will "float" to the beginning of the sorted list (because of the special character is seen as "less" than A, and sorts first).
It's how I keep things going--
-- and I'm also anal retentive with these things, so I created a category of every author I have on the Kindle, last name first of course, but all beginning with > and a space, then the last name, comma, first name. And I put under that author's category, all his books, short stories and so on.
Luckily, you can put books into multiple categories, so double or triple author books will appear under each author's category.
Finally, I think Calibre will even manage your categories now, but I've never messed with that-- I enabled "backup categories and bookmarks to Amazon's servers", so they are preserved in case of Zombie Attack in which my Kindles are eaten...
:)
Still confused. Not by the > _ etc - been doing that since the 70's -- I know all that -- it is not what I am asking
There are two preset catagories "Periodicals" and "Books",
These can be used as a filter on the Home page. (either of them)
I have bought two books and a newspaper subscription. The filter will show the book titles if Book filter is used.
Currently my Home page lists
Book A
Todays Newspaper
User Guide
Book B
Welcome
Dictionaries
Periodicals: back issues
Archived Items
I want it to list:
Todays Newspaper
Books
User Guide
Welcome
Dictionaries
Periodicals: back issues
Archived Items
ie. I want the Home page to not display the two books individually, I want the Home page to display the preset category "Books". (and I don't mind where in the Home page list the item "Books" appears).
EDIT EDIT EDIT
Found out how to do it. Added a "collection" called "Novels". added Book A and Book B into "Novels"
then
-> Home Page -> Sort by "collection"
Get exactly what have listed above (except it's "Novels" in the Home Page list instead of "Books".... no way of getting "Books" there).
What I don't quite understand from what you say is if you have a category for every author, isn't your Home screen hugely long? Or can you create categories withing categories?
I assume "collection" is the same as "category"?
I could swear last time I looked it was called categories when I looked and also in the online user guide.......... but they have done an upgrade........ oh joy oh rapture they are trialling a full web browser instead of restricting us to wiki.
*sigh*
I haven't actually cracked my hardware Kindle in weeks, so I'm not at all surprised they changed the name... yet again. (This will be the 3rd or maybe 4th name-change from the original "groups", as I recall...)
And yes, I would also presume "collection" is the same as "category".
And yes, my home screen is very long-- I have in excess of 400 books on there. But I'm very used to perusing sorted lists by hand, provided they are sorted correctly -- not always the case with Kindle's buggy software (or maybe it's the book-tags that are buggy?) I dunno.
But by forcing all my books into at a minimum of one category/collection/association <snerk> and making sure that item is named as I wish it to be sorted? I essentially ignore the individual books themselves, outside of an individual author's list-- and whenever I open a collection (which then only shows what's in that), I simply sort by title, which seems to work moderately well, and even if unsorted, the lists are typically short enough, to do a once-over by hand to find what I'm seeking.
But, as I said, I now read nearly exclusively on my TF101 (an Android tablet/notebook).
I was on the verge of stripping out all the DRM's of all my books, so I could read on my TF using an app called "Cool Reader" (which is completely customizable), when the newest Kindle for Android came over the airwaves the other day-- and they, finally, fixed most of the major issues I had with it: two-page layout in landscape, mildly adjustable margins, adjustable inter-line spacing.
The only things still missing: smaller fonts, and collections within the app.
I can live with the current smallest font, but I've given up on collections-- I now use search to find the book I want. It does make browsing harder* as the books can appear in a near random placement, regardless of which sort method I choose (by date-installed, by author, by title).
Alas, if only the Kindle app was 1/2 as feature-rich as the actual Kindle ....
___________________________
* the sort engine on that app is all but totally busted-- it appears to sort by some randomized factor that is unknown--
-- for example, I have maybe 20 books by Alan Dean Foster-- and if I sort by Author? A couple sort to the front of the list with the "A", a couple sort to middle, with the "D" and the rest sort to the "F" where you'd expect them to be... idiots... sorting is not rocket science...
So, at present I have everything how I want it. The progression to <many> books may disturb my contentment. But I'm not in a hurry to download more than I can read.
Re. the "category" -> "collection" - I was logged on to amazon uk at 8 ish in the morning and the user guide referred to "categories". When I returned there at around lunch time, it had changed to "collections". Nothing wrong with "group". Nothing wrong with "category". Personally I think it is a bit amateur to constantly fiddle with namings.
If they progress the web browser and sort the current issues with it I will be extra happy. Useful to have a unit I could order my groceries on if my laptop or broadband go down. (My Kindle has wi-fi and 3G). My ipod touch is just to teeny weeny for me.
I'm sorry to hear of your problems, Griffin. A 20% failure rate is pretty bad, and something Amazon should have long ago fixed, but then they're selling so many of them, why should they worry about doing so quickly? I've not had the issues you've had with the menu system, but then I own a Sony eReader, so its issues will be different (none so far). With a failure rate that high, they go side-by-side with Microsoft on ridiculously faulty goods (Xbox 360).
Actually it has performed fine since I did the cold reboot.;D
After you've switched it off, if it just turns back on normally, it wasn't a cold reboot. If it starts up with a picture of a gnome under a tree, then visibly repopulates its lists, it was.
You have to press the on/off button for 30 seconds to get the gnome. I did.
Is he supposed to be the Gnome of Zurich?
I'm glad to hear that it's all working well for you now. I hope it stays fine for many years to come!
I'd be interested to see what Siblings make of this:
The Kindle has pre-loaded English and German dictionaries. When you place the cursor in front of a word, you get the entry in English in English books, but the German dictionary is automatically selected in German books. This I have long known, and assumed that e-books have a language tag in the header, or similar.
Recently I found a German poem on the net, cut-and-pasted it into Notepad and saved it into my
Kindle. Today I looked at it and, from curiosity, put the cursor before Hand, which is German for hand. It came up with the German dictionary. There cannot be any tags or markers in that file, and this was the first word I looked up. How does it do that?
^ They're watching you, Neo...
Dunno either, although have you set the main language as English or German?
---
On the subject, I bought a Kindle for my MIL and a Nook for my son, both touch & paper white. At this point I'm liking the Nook's interface much better than the Kindle's, the lack of buttons in the Kindle make you wonder how to do things if you don't know the touch areas, while the nook has buttons that will take you to the menu, turn on the backlight, and passing pages. Also, the advertisements in the Kindle are much more prominent and potentially confusing if you don't use a list.
Pity, because I like Amazon's catalog much better than B&N. :-\
I gues it does it the same way as MS WORD. It checks the text for similarities and guesses the language. In previous Word versions that could be quite troublesome since occsionally it tried to guess from single letters and one had to do several clicks to get back to work again.
Quote from: Swatopluk on January 29, 2013, 10:55:48 PM
........... and one had to do several clicks to get back to work again.
....like trying to undo automatic capitalisation......... my pet hate
I discover things about my Kindle by accident. It works for me !!!
Quote from: Sibling Zono (anon1mat0) on January 29, 2013, 10:26:17 PM
the advertisements in the Kindle are much more prominent and potentially confusing if you don't use a list.
advertisements? I don't get any advertisements........... ??
lists... ?? how do you do lists?
Yes, I also assume it analyses the text - after all, it's really the only possibility. But it seems very involved for such a simple device.
IIRC some kindles were sold cheaper if you accepted adverts.
When you hit Home, you have your library books on the first half of the screen and the advertisement in the bottom part, both sections as images, so that you could think that an advertised book is a book you already have/own. If you switch the view to a list view then the books you own take the bigger part of the screen and it's perfectly clear what is yours and what isn't.
when will society ban ads - they are evil
Actually the add supported Kindles are not available in the Land of OZ. They would be a bit cheaper, but in the end you would quickly forget the cost of your device and the ads would be there forever, so I would avoid those machines if I were a potential Kindle buyer and had the option to buy the cheaper version.
Quote from: Bluenose on February 06, 2013, 11:56:35 PM
Actually the add supported Kindles are not available in the Land of OZ.
Not in the UK either.
In the interests of ... ahem... "fair play", I must point out that there are any number of websites which contain "how to's" on how to hack your kindle.
Among the various reasons? Allowing non-kindle books to work, such as EPub (or so they claim), and to inhibit the advertising.
As for me? After owning the thing for a year, I'd consider hacking it and deleting the advertising capability-- Amazon more than got their investment money by then, and it'd be out of warranty anyway.
And you could install various other apps, some of which let you read ePUB books, such as from Barns & Noble. Ironic? You betcha! :D
But I wouldn't hack one that was still under warranty.. just in case. These do fail occasionally.
As long as Calibre is free and easy to use, I personally wouldn't bother to hack the Kindle to read epubs. I can see why you'd want to get rid of the adverts, though.
Calibre made a complete mess of converting my smart phone user guide (pdf) to Kindle formats (tried all). Shame the Kindle does not read PDF format.
Mine does. PDFs are not read properly so you get odd line-breaks, but it's OK.
Actually I never tried loading the PDF directly. At least I don't remember doing so.
All converted formats put so many line breaks in that whole sections consist of one word per line.
I use my stock standard Kindle to read PDFs all the time. It is not the same as proper Kindle books, you cant dynamically change the font size etc, but it has come in handy on a number of occasions when I wanted to study something, but did not really want to read it on the computer.
Hmmm. I shall have to test (or retest) PDF on my Kindle. May be better than a conversion.