Cheap e-book readers discussion

moneylover

I am a librarian and can perhaps clear something up about e books and public libraries.
In spite of the general shortage of funds more and more libraries are buying e books in the spirit of a library being available 24/7. However it is now virtually impossible to legally use a library's e books unless you are a member who lives or works in the area. At the beginning you could, but publishers (who haveVERY mixed feelings about e books in libraries) have clamped down heavily over the last few months and no library wants to lose its e books licences.
Just to re-iterate, you cannot down load any library e books onto a Kindle.

Littlemissmuppet

I used the link to buy myself one of the refurbished Kindles for £80 - I'd been put off before because of the format limitations but with the sale on at the moment I've now got loads to read. I'd also recommend obooko.com and BooksOnBoard.com for free ebooks - I'm going to give calibre a try as the books I'd already downloaded from there I can't read on my Kindle. But as they were free I'm not too bothered!
But big thank you for the heads up on the Kindle deal!

cariad2

I've not followed all of this thread, so apologies if this has been posted before. Amazon has hundreds of out-of-copyright classics for free, but it also has quite a lot of more recent books for free.. However, the prices change frequently. A book could be free one day, and revert to full price the next day.
If you subscribe to Jungle Search then you get daily email alerts to let you know of any new free books for the Kindle on the Amazon site. It's free to subscribe and there's no catch. I check every morning, and have had loads of freebies.
As a new user, I couldn't post the link, but if you post "Jungle Search Kindle UK"

Happy Reading! :j

cariad2

Littlemissmuppet wrote: »

- I'm going to give calibre a try as the books I'd already downloaded from there I can't read on my Kindle. QUOTE]

It is possible to read books on the Kindle that have been downloaded using calibre - just make sure that you are exporting using the MOBI format.
Go to the TES website, look in the bookclub forum, and there is a thread called "The Kindle Club" - you'll find a detailed explanation of how to download calibre, and how to export books to the Kindle.
Calibre is also great for getting free newspapers - there are loads more to choose from than there are on the Amazon website, including many foreign language ones.

Algolthedemonstar

If you're into fantasy and/or science fiction, try the Baen Free Library site.

Badger_Lady

I've made the decision to buy eBook readers for my parents this Christmas. I often travel to the US for work, so I'll probably buy them there where conversion rates etc make them cheaper.

After a lot of research, this is where I'm at:

Mum - Kindle 3G

My mother isn't the most tech-savvy person in the world - she still isn't sure how to use the old Nokia I gave her 8 years ago. But she does travel a lot, mostly between the UK and France and usually without WiFi access. And she does use eMail very frequently to keep in touch with us and to keep on top of her holiday rental business.

I think that she'll enjoy the eInk screen, particularly when she's out and about in Mediterranean sunshine, and will be comfortable with the simple formatting and downloading. It might not always be the best deal available, but at least it won't confuse her.

My only problem is I've heard a rumour that, despite promises, the 3G network access on the Kindle has never actually worked in France?? Which would be a terrible shame.

Dad - which Android tablet?

Now my father is much more interested in gadgets. From an IT background, he has endless patience with finding work-arounds and spending time reformatting files and playing with them until he's happy. He hasn't had an app-enabled gadget before and I think he'd really get some benefits from some of the other features in Android, as well as the eBook reader (I actually prefer Stanza to Kindle, but can only find Stanza on Apple..?).

So he needs something that:
- Has a reasonably long battery life for when he's off travelling,
- Can be paired with a 3G PAYG dongle for use where there's no WiFi,
- Runs Android operating system.

Any suggestions for the latter welcome! It's my intention to set up both the readers and load them up with books I think they'll be interested in before giving them over at Christmas. The pair of them are avid readers and get through at least one a week, so these will save them having to carry around the stacks of books they currently do, and also save them from the disaster of running out of reading material!

Dustsucks

In case anyone is having the same problems I had in accessing the picture display facilities within the Kindle as outlined in the Cheap Kindles and e-book readers page (http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/deals/cheap-ebook-readers-kindles#secrets), you may care to try making the first directory listing as 'pictures' rather than 'Images'. I couldn't get the Kindle to recognise the Images directory at all.

Former_MSE_Becca

Dustsucks wrote: »

In case anyone is having the same problems I had in accessing the picture display facilities within the Kindle as outlined in the Cheap Kindles and e-book readers page (http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/deals/cheap-ebook-readers-kindles#secrets), you may care to try making the first directory listing as 'pictures' rather than 'Images'. I couldn't get the Kindle to recognise the Images directory at all.

Thanks for this Dustsucks - will add it to the suggestion now.

MSE Becca

lmcevoy

ksh123 wrote: »

Anybody got one of the cheap ones? Are they any good?

yes, i bought one a month ago. i can't find any fault in it. i've never read as much as i have done on this machine. would recommend.
plus, it does all the little tricks suggested on this site (web browsing, playing music, etc...)

Kimmy58

Elonex 500EB 5" Colour TFT eReader Reduced to 49.99 @ Waterstones, only catch £4.95 Delivery Charge.