Motherload of e-book questions

[Thrawn]

I'm looking into buying an ebook reader, and I'm having a heck of a time finding places to answer questions about them. Maybe I'm just dumb, but it seems like this stuff doesn't show up anywhere. I get lots of specifications advertising their beautiful e-ink screens and everything, but nothing about the following questions.

I'm looking at the Kindle or the Sony PRS-505.

1) Is text formatting preserved in all e-books? As in, do italics and section breaks, etc, appear intact? I assume they do nowadays; is this true of the earlier e-books as well?

2) Approximately how far back into the ST back catalogue do the e-books go? I can hunt around for individual books, but it's really time-consuming, so I'm hoping someone just knows.

3) Ok. Let's talk about formats. S&S offer Adobe, Microsoft, and Palm formats. I assume Adobe is .pdf, Microsoft is .lit I think, so what's Palm? Which of these formats is supported by the Sony? I take it ePub is a different format from all of these, and I assume the Kindle is its own format entirely, so that makes at least 5 completely different formats of ebooks, if I'm counting correctly. Am I right so far?

4) Can any of these formats, assuming I bought them and they're DRM-ed and everything, be converted into each other? Can any of them besides the Kindle format be used on the Kindle? Which ones can be used on the Sony?

5) I assume the answer to this is no, but just in case - is there any way whatsoever, on either the Sony or the Kindle, to take the file I've downloaded and put it on a friend's Sony or Kindle, and have them be able to read it?

6) Given the DRM, is it reasonably likely that if I buy an e-book reader now, and purchase a whole ton of out of print ST novels to complete parts of my collection, that the next release of e-readers from all these companies will render these files unreadable?

Thank you for your help, anyone that answers.

 

[JWolf]

I'm not sure all the answers you are looking for would be allowed here. So the best place to go to get the answers would be MobileRead at http://wwww.mobileread.com. It's the best place to find out about eBook readers.

 

[Thrawn]

Why would the answers not be allowed? At least, can someone answer the ones relating to the Star Trek line (1 & 2)?

And thanks for the link. I wish it were more systematically laid out, but I'll do some searching. I appreciate it.

EDIT: The wiki on that site is perfect. Thank you.

So that just leaves us with:

1) Is text formatting preserved in all e-books? As in, do italics and section breaks, etc, appear intact? I assume they do nowadays; is this true of the earlier e-books as well?

2) Approximately how far back into the ST back catalogue do the e-books go? I can hunt around for individual books, but it's really time-consuming, so I'm hoping someone just knows.

 

[JWolf]

See PM for my answers.

P.S. Is your avatar supposed to look like Charlie Sheen?

 

[Thrawn]

See PM for my answers.

P.S. Is your avatar supposed to look like Charlie Sheen?

My avatar is Mal, from the Serenity movie poster. I never thought he looked like Charlie Sheen...

And thank you for the comprehensive answer.

 

[Christopher]

1) Is text formatting preserved in all e-books? As in, do italics and section breaks, etc, appear intact? I assume they do nowadays; is this true of the earlier e-books as well?

Those basic things do, but things like font and text size are not preserved in eReader, at least. I assume they would be preserved in Adobe (.pdf) form.

 

[JWolf]

See PM for my answers.

P.S. Is your avatar supposed to look like Charlie Sheen?

My avatar is Mal, from the Serenity movie poster. I never thought he looked like Charlie Sheen...

And thank you for the comprehensive answer.

I think it looks a lot like Charlie Sheen. I knew it wasn't. But still.

Glad to help. Please let us know what it is you decide upon.

 

[ATimson]

1) Is text formatting preserved in all e-books? As in, do italics and section breaks, etc, appear intact? I assume they do nowadays; is this true of the earlier e-books as well?

As Christopher said, these are intact. (Though occasionally--mainly on older titles--the section breaks occasionally disappear due to a mistake in the OCR process. I haven't seen this on any newer titles, however.)

2) Approximately how far back into the ST back catalogue do the e-books go? I can hunt around for individual books, but it's really time-consuming, so I'm hoping someone just knows.

As far as I know, 27 novels are not available in any format (mostly Voyager numbered novels and TOS giant books/hardcovers). Some titles are only available in one or two of the formats (most often Adobe, with MS Reader being the second-most-common).

Of course, most, if not all, of the non-fiction titles are absent.

3) Ok. Let's talk about formats. S&S offer Adobe, Microsoft, and Palm formats. I assume Adobe is .pdf, Microsoft is .lit I think, so what's Palm?

Palm is also known as eReader; it uses a .pdb file extension, but that's a generic extension for any Palm database file.

Which of these formats is supported by the Sony?

As far as I know, none of them; the Sony supports PDF without DRM, but for ebooks with DRM you'd have to buy them from Sony's own ebook store.

I take it ePub is a different format from all of these, and I assume the Kindle is its own format entirely, so that makes at least 5 completely different formats of ebooks, if I'm counting correctly. Am I right so far?

ePub is technically different, though it only differs from Microsoft Reader in terms of the wrapper/DRM; both use a special "dialect" of HTML at their heart.

Kindle uses a format that Amazon purchased called Mobipocket; they have their own store at Mobipocket.com, and other vendors (including Fictionwise) sell Mobipocket titles. These Mobipocket titles generally work on the Kindle, once you find the Device ID (a unique identifier for each device that you have to enter at a store before downloading a title) and "fix" the file, though some vendors have problems with the asterisk found in Kindle Device IDs.

However, because of how Kindle purchasing works, it's not possible currently to buy a Kindle title and use it with another Mobipocket reader.

4) Can any of these formats, assuming I bought them and they're DRM-ed and everything, be converted into each other?

With DRM, no conversion is possible.

5) I assume the answer to this is no, but just in case - is there any way whatsoever, on either the Sony or the Kindle, to take the file I've downloaded and put it on a friend's Sony or Kindle, and have them be able to read it?

Not that I'm aware of.

6) Given the DRM, is it reasonably likely that if I buy an e-book reader now, and purchase a whole ton of out of print ST novels to complete parts of my collection, that the next release of e-readers from all these companies will render these files unreadable?

It's hard to say for certain; I would expect not. Your bigger concern would be the companies getting out of the ebook-reader business, leaving you without a way to read your titles once your current device dies. (This is where Mobipocket and Palm have a big advantage--their readers are available on many platforms, desktop and PDA and even iPhone now. You aren't tied to one specific device.)

 

[JWolf]

Actually, the Sony Reader PRS-505 can now read ePub with DRM and PDF with DRM.

The Kindle uses a variant of Mobipocket format for their DRM eBooks. The Kindle will allow Mobipocket format without DRM though.