I’ve since borrowed a Mac to see if I could circumvent the eBook Library system: no such luck.

It was possible to install Digital Editions on the Mac, and downloading library ebooks was ]]> Not long ago, I wrote about OverDrive Media Console for Macs, and how Sony Reader users still couldn’t borrow library ebooks on their Macs.

I’ve since borrowed a Mac to see if I could circumvent the eBook Library system: no such luck.

It was possible to install Digital Editions on the Mac, and downloading library ebooks was easy. The trouble came when I plugged in my Reader: Adobe simply couldn’t recognize it. I guess Digital Editions needs eBook Library to introduce the Reader to it, and eBook Library won’t work on Macs.

Yet another shame, and another thing that will have to change before the Great eReader Adoption can begin. Mobipocket ereaders like the BeBook work fine on Macs, and you can still get almost all the same library books in Mobi as you can in PDF. Just don’t buy a Sony.

The good news is that Calibre works on Macs, and talks to the Reader with no trouble. You can even transfer the (non-DRM) books already on your Reader onto different hard drives with Calibre. So you can at least use non-DRM ebooks with the Reader on a Mac. Small consolation.

The PRS-700 can read BBeB (.lrf – Sony), PDF, EPUB, .txt, .rtf, and .doc (as long as you have Word installed). That means that ]]>

I haven’t had my Reader for long, but thanks to a talent for obsessiveness, I’ve managed to flesh out a pretty efficient system for finding ebooks for it.

The PRS-700 can read BBeB (.lrf – Sony), PDF, EPUB, .txt, .rtf, and .doc (as long as you have Word installed). That means that certain websites and ebook providers are better than others, simply for the fact that they offer more compatible files. For instance, I appreciate Fictionwise‘s attempt to provide DRM-free, “MultiFormat” ebooks, but every book I’ve gone to their site looking for was in their “Secure” section, and often they didn’t have it in a Sony-compatible format. So I generally have to stay away for now.

(Note: Even though this guide frontloads finding books for free, I’m not against paying for them. I am, however, against paying as much (or more) for an ebook as I would for an ink and paper version, and I’m especially against paying for a DRMed book that might not survive a backup intact. So, until publishers catch on and start rewarding ebook readers instead of punishing us, I try to give them as little money as possible.)

Anyway, onward.

STEP 1 — Look for the ebook for free (and minus DRM)

If the book’s old enough, you might be able to find it on Many Books or Project Gutenberg. I’ve also found a few websites to get literary fiction and science fiction for free. Most books in both places are by big-name authors, so I don’t feel very bad getting them for free while their publishing houses figure out ebooks in their hamfisted way.

If you’re feeling ambitious, there are also PDF search engine sites. Google them, I’m not going to link to any; they’re usually useless.

If you can’t find it for free, the next option is, well, finding it for free.

STEP 2 — Check the library for free (with DRM)

Next, check out the ecollection of a progressive public library, like Seattle or Ottawa. If your local doesn’t have an ecollection, it might be worth it to give another one a call. Librarians are cool. They’ll probably understand.

In my brief experience, the library has an impressive variety of new ebooks, but usually minimal copies. If a lot of people start checking them out, though, they’ll adjust.

STEP 3 — Deign to pay for it (with or without DRM)

If you haven’t found the book by this point, you’ll have to decide whether it’s worth paying the current ebook premium for. If it is, my favorite new ebookstore is A1Books. A1 usually has prices competitive with the Kindle Store (although sometimes there are big discrepancies), they have a great selection, they take PayPal, and they sell books as PDFs.

I think PDF will be the most compatible format with most other ereaders for at least the next few years, [CLARIFICATION: DRMed PDF isn't compatible with many other ereaders. However, of the DRMed formats compatible with the Reader (LRF or PDF), PDF has a much better shot of being supported in future devices, and devices not made by Sony] PDF is also my favorite because it has static pagination (page 164 is always page 164, no matter how big the text is).

So, if you have to buy an ebook before publishers start waking up, this is the least painful way to do it.

The one weird thing: The book I downloaded (The Gone-Away World by Nick Harkaway) came with the name “Timmy Tammy” in the author metadata. Calibre to the rescue, for now.

Whatever you do, don’t shop at Sony

The Sony eBook Store’s prices are among the most expensive on the internet for most books. To make matters worse, the .lrf proprietary books you get from them come with fat, unnecessary margins that take up screen space. I don’t get that, because the border of the screen is already designed like a margin. Sony’s LRFs also repaginate books when you resize the text. For instance, if you start with a 389-page book in small type, medium type will make it 546, in large type it’s 882 pages, etc. This is annoying if you want to talk specifically about a book, say in a class or a book group, with people who have the ink and paper version. It also makes it impossible to cite for an academic paper.

Smart PDF versions, on the other hand, expand text to within about an eighth of an inch of the edge of the screen, the perfect distance. As I said above, the pagination also stays static, so it’s much easier to find passages when you’re talking with ink and paper readers.

Bottom line: Stay away from Sony software, including their ebooks.

That’s about it

Sony should be embarrassed about their software and their store. But publishers should be embarrassed about the way they’re handling ebooks. There are a few gold veins to be mined in the wide internet, though, if you look hard enough.

If you have other tips, tricks, or websites, let me know in the comments.

I really like Calibre, the open-source elibrary and ereader manager. I wrote a post not long ago extolling Calibre’s virtues as my new go-to ereader software after I gave up on Sony’s official program.

One of the things I liked was being able to edit ]]>

I'll forgive you, Calibre, even if it is your fault

I really like Calibre, the open-source elibrary and ereader manager. I wrote a post not long ago extolling Calibre’s virtues as my new go-to ereader software after I gave up on Sony’s official program.

One of the things I liked was being able to edit the metadata of books, such as the author’s name that shows up in my Reader’s library. It’s a great feature for when you get a book from Gutenberg or elsewhere, you convert it to a different format and your name becomes the author’s. Or the file title itself is in weird_annoyin_forma3212. This is also easy to do and intuitive (you just double-click on the title or author that you want to change).

The problem is that it doesn’t appear to be permanent. A few times since I renamed my problem books, they’ve spontaneously regrown their old names, which is weird.

I have yet to replicate the problem in a control setting, and so I can’t pin down the culprit (I really want to blame you, Sony eBook Library, but I can’t just yet).

More news as I figure it out.

Like a brick of lavender vomit

eBook Library is not just the clunkiest, ugliest, and worst ereader management software I’ve used, it’s the worst that I can imagine. eBook Library came bundled with my PRS-700; it’s Sony’s standard ereader software, and also the primary link to Sony’s eBook ]]>

Like a brick of lavender vomit

eBook Library is not just the clunkiest, ugliest, and worst ereader management software I’ve used, it’s the worst that I can imagine. eBook Library came bundled with my PRS-700; it’s Sony’s standard ereader software, and also the primary link to Sony’s eBook Store, which also sucks.

What follows is not for the weak of heart. It’s a tale of woe, and there is much gnashing of teeth. (And I’m a Reader fan.) But if you’d like to hear about a software catastrophe of historic proportions, come along.

Out of the box: The nightmare begins

From the start, eBook Library is bad. Often, “the user interface appears to freeze,” as an actual email from Sony Support reads. There’s no status bar for working jobs, it often just stops reacting to you while it does whatever it’s doing. Not good.

Granted, I am using Windows 7, and I had to troubleshoot the compatibility to get the program to even run. So maybe that’s one of my problems. However, Calibre and Adobe Digital Editions both work perfectly.

The eBook Store, where you actually buy books from Sony, looks like it was designed by somebody who’s heard descriptions of Apple’s iTunes Store, but never actually used it. Browsing is a chore, and the Categories are annoying to figure out. If you want to cash in on the 100 free classics they advertise, you have to go to a specific section to find the books that qualify. I accidentally got a non-classic copy of some Percy Shelley poems, and they charged me, so clearly their organizing system is beyond the ken of mere mortals.

Plus the whole interface is very, very ugly.

Actually buying books: I still get chills

The real trouble began when I actually bought books from the store. I bought 2, and got another 25 or so free classics. While I was syncing my Reader, trying to get these new books on it, the software froze and refused to cooperate. It wouldn’t talk to the Reader anymore, and wouldn’t even work without the Reader plugged in.

I contacted Sony Support, and they sent me a list of things to do. Eventually I had to wipe my Reader’s hard drive, reinstall its drivers, and uninstall and reinstall the Library software. Then, with another workaround to get the books I’d paid for, I managed to get the DRM content on my Reader.

I sent Sony Support another email, saying the program still wouldn’t work, and thanks, but I wouldn’t be using it anymore. They wrote back saying I should call in. I didn’t; it seemed like an awful lot of trouble just to be allowed to pay them more money for their books.

Essentially, what seems to happen is that Sony’s own DRM bogs down their own software to such an extent that it becomes unusable. Maybe I’m wrong about this, maybe it’s my Windows 7. I doubt it. In any case, there’s good news.

Calibre: Thank the merciful gods

Calibre is a free, open-source ereader manager that works on Linux and OSX, as well as Windows (and Windows 7). It works quickly, and very well. It talks to my Reader, and the SD card in it, and lets me edit the titles and authors of books I get, which I could never do in eBook Library. Sometimes the metadata in files gets confused, such as if you save a .txt file from Project Gutenberg as an .rtf, and your own name becomes the “Author”; it’s nice to be able to fix that (listening Sony? Probably not).

The downside is that Calibre only works, I believe, with non-DRM files, which means you can’t buy ebooks from most stores. I haven’t yet solved the problem of how to buy DRMed ebooks and load them on the Reader, so I’m just not buying DRMed ebooks. I guess it’s kind of a workaround. [UPDATE: You can also buy DRM PDFs from stores such as Fictionwise and A1 Books, and transfer them to your Reader with Adobe Digital Editions. Check this post for more on getting book for your Reader without using Sony eBook Library.]

Adobe Digital Editions: This is how you do DRM

I believe this is Windows-only, but [UPDATE: Adobe DE works with Macs, too, but it has to talk to Sony's eBook Library software before you can transfer DRM PDFs to your Reader, and eBook Library doesn't work on Macs.] Adobe DE handles PDF DRM like a dream, so I at least have the option to buy DRM PDFs. It also lets you check out PDF ebooks from certain public libraries, which is phenomenal. I haven’t had my Reader for long, but I’ve been able to find plenty of reading material at the Seattle Public Library’s online collection.

Or don’t use anything

You can also just drag and drop files onto your Reader or SD card (non-DRM, I believe), and the Reader will find them on its own.

The whole thing mystifies me, honestly. It’s as if Sony set out to make its Library software both useless and redundant, so that the easiest course of action is to simply not use it. The whole project reeks of half-assing, which is not a good smell. It feels overwhelmingly like Sony doesn’t care about their customers after they buy the Reader. Which is fine; all in all, I still think the Reader is worth the money on its own.

Soon, I hope, more publishers will sell more ebooks in more places without DRM. Until that happens, I’m going to the real elibrary, or, failing that, I’ll get the hard copy before I go back to Sony’s eBook Store.

The good news is that the firmware on the Reader works well, and you can cut the software out of the loop with no downside. Even knowing about all the trouble with Sony’s eBook Store, I’d take a Reader over a Kindle without a second thought.