unexpected Hardware Squee - Sony e-book reader

[akk]

Since this Wednesday, I'm the proud owner of a Sony PRS-505 e-book reader (in silver). I've been wary about e-book reading devices for a long time - expensive, incompatible proprietary formats, horribly overpriced e-books in Germany, DRM, intrusive companies (Amazon deleted bought books on the fly!) - but recently, Sony dropped the price for the key-operated device by a hundred euros, adopted the open standard epub along with its proprietary formats and - let's face it - the lack of inbuilt WiFi (in comparison to the Amazon devices) comes as a large plus with respect to my books & privacy, so...

Squee!
Why the squee?

1. the reading experience is truly comparable to a paperback novel (don't compare it with netbooks or smartphones, it's so much easier on the eyes!) and when reading in bed, it is actually superior to a paperback novel, because the background of the reader page is better than the average yellowish paperback page, changing pages takes about the same (or less) time than turning a paper book page, and you can do it one-handed!

2. a lot of the books I read are one-timers - that is: I read them and never read them again, because I remember the story precisely - so my bookshelves clutter up fairly fast (and recycling books is something, I do but loathe, because - let's face it - giving away a book you had a positive experience with is like tossing a good friend out into the drizzle).

3. with using the free book-managing software calibre, instead of Sony's clunky stuff, I can download article feeds of my favorite news sources (Spiegel, Heise, Welt, BBC...) onto my reader before getting on the train in the morning, thus being paperless up-to-date without killing trees for a morning paper (or squeezing comp time into my coffee breaks at work)

4. there are a couple of freeware solutions for turning html- and open office documents into epub ebooks. I think, I'm going to put my favorite fanfics onto the device. No more propping of A4 lever-arch files onto my pillow (and getting my face slapped, when falling asleep, reading in one of them)!

5. my preferred reads are science fiction, fantasy, and dark fantasy books and novels, which are nicely available in a couple of online stores. For example at Baens Free Library for free and at Fictionwise for decidedly less than what the German ebook stores demand (a lot of the books are available for international customers; prices are typically well below 10€!).
And if you are into classics (Shakespeare, Sherlock Holmes & co.), you'll find most (if not all of them for free at Project Gutenberg or at the mobileread forum, which holds a lot of extremely well and meticulously designed free e-books. I've started on their illustrated Sherlock Holmes and... just wow!

and the ultimate SQUEE:

6. reading scanlations comfortably in book form!
(which means, I won't buy much books for the time being, anyway ;) ).
I've just discovered how to convert CBZs and picture folders with minimal effort into ebooks. The page loading time is about the same as with most other ebooks (~1-2 seconds, which is NOT longer than when I have to switch pages in a paperback novel - and really, that's what the device should be compared to, not to a computer or smartphone!) and it takes less than 5 minutes to do so (now, I need a 16 GB SD card, though):

I'm sure most e-book geeks laugh at my "discovery", but I'm still happy it works for me, because I currently can't put time into this:

(1) turn your scans into a .cbz file by putting all the images into a folder (make sure they sort correctly by file name) and zipping the folder, then rename the folder.zip into folder.cbz
(2) import the cbz file into calibre (above) and convert it into epub (make sure calibre's default conversion format is "epub" and it uses the profile for your reading device; the software recognized mine automatically)
(3) edit the meta data (author, title, publisher, tags for sorting, etc.) using calibre's change meta-data
(4) upload to the reader :)))

Comments

[killthwight.livejournal.com]

That's so cool! I was thinking of getting a Sony ebook too. I didn't know you could read scanlations on it, that's a MAJOR plus. I thought of getting one at first so I could read fanfic without wasting A4s, but having scanlations on the go in book format is fantastic. I'm glad you are happy with your purchase!

[akk]

Just be wary of the touch screen version. It's much more expensive and the screen isn't as sharp, because of the pressure sensitive layer above the e-ink paper.
There are other devices beside Kindle and the Sonys, as well. Just do a google for e-book readers. Some of them have the same features or even more than mine has (but they have plastics cases and I love the aluminum coolness under my fingers). :)

[solo]

Hey, I have one of those! It never occurred to me to put scanlations on it. (I don't even know what .cbz format is... what is it?)

But yeah, apart from the horrible file management (which I gather it shares with any ebook reader on the planet) I love the Sony. For the same reasons you do: no DRM, reads docs and stuff, and who needs wifi anyway?

[solo]

And OMG I need to check calibre...

[akk]

cbz is one of the comic book archive files (german link, the English entry isn't that informative).
Basically, cbz is "comic book zip" file, cbr is "comic book rar" file, etc. All just renamed normal zip / rar files, holding jpg or png images.
But cbz & cbr are recognized ebook file formats in calibre, thus... :)))

[akk]

Do so. After I looked into it, when I was told my sony was shipping, I never bothered to install sony's stuff at all.
Do you have experience with adding SD cards to the reader? Esp. the type / manufacturer of the SD card? scanlations are a tad more sizier than "text" epubs...

[killthwight.livejournal.com]

I thought Sony was a good choice due to the fact it's a well known brand for electronics. Kindle really rubbed me the wrong way, even if they are releasing it here in 2010. I'm between the PRS-505 and the Pocket edition. The pocket is better for me to take on the bus, but now that I know one can read scanlations on them I'd probably like a bigger screen... Oh, the dilema. XD

[akk]

The PRS505 is like a thin paperback novel in hand & bag. I'd recommend it's screen size with respect to most ebooks & scanlations, because it's roughly the same size.
Maybe when the device comes to a store near you, you can make a hands-on test of how it works for you. :)

[killthwight.livejournal.com]

So the PRS505 is the size of a paperback? That's not too bad. Actually seeing their sizes and their feel in the hands is important, though I'm not putting too much faith on the Sony reaching us anytime soon. Sony released the PS2 here last month--a ten year delay is ridiculous.

[akk]

A thin paperback (but the weight is more that of a medium sized one) and I second the annoyance about the delay. I was curious about the Samsung device, which is currently restricted to Korea for whatever reason.
It might also help if you sketch the screen size on a sheet of paper and compare? Maybe you can order it online. :)
The local store issue is mostly if you want to buy (DRMed) local books, but if international or free ebooks do for you, you are fine without it (I sure am). :)

[killthwight.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I'm not looking to buy local ebooks (don't think we even have any ebooks here officially), I'm more than happy with internation releases, what we can find online for free or in pdf. I'll end up in the US sooner or later in 2010 and I'll get the ebook there.

[solo]

I simply used an old one which I still had from my Palm (but then took it out again because my documents weren't really so big that I needed it). Anyway, just a normal Kingston. A 2GB micro SD with adapter also worked.