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Nimrod
Sep 20, 2003
I'm considering getting an ebook reader soon, but does anyone know how well things like the Comptia/CCNA books look on any of the popular readers? Would it be necessary to get a large screened reader for this?

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GoldenNugget
Mar 27, 2008
:dukedog:
So I think I may have an issue with my kindle 3.

It won't come back from sleeping. It was last at around 2/3 battery. I never turned it off so it went to the splash screen that comes up. I slide the power switch, it lights green, and then nothing happens and the splash screen remains. I've held the power switch until it blinks green and turns off. Nothing happens. Wireless is off.

I do have it in the non lighted amazon cover which I heard shorts the unit but I've done all of the above with the kindle out of the cover and it does the same. Any tips on what to do?

If it matters, I got the kindle about november/decemberish.

maxnmona
Mar 16, 2005

if you start with drums, you have to end with dynamite.
Why are people asking questions about broken kindles here? Amazon has possibly the best customer service department in the world. Give them a call.

Vertigus
Jan 8, 2011

maxnmona posted:

Why are people asking questions about broken kindles here? Amazon has possibly the best customer service department in the world. Give them a call.

People are so used to being dicked around on everything that the idea of Amazon offering customer service beyond telling people they can repair their Kindle for $100 isn't believable.

April
Jul 3, 2006


Vertigus posted:

People are so used to being dicked around on everything that the idea of Amazon offering customer service beyond telling people they can repair their Kindle for $100 isn't believable.

I assumed that since this thread is to discuss the pros & cons of each device, the issues people are having would be on topic. Of course Amazon will fix problems, but wouldn't this be the place to talk about those problems with other potential buyers?

Vertigus
Jan 8, 2011

April posted:

I assumed that since this thread is to discuss the pros & cons of each device, the issues people are having would be on topic. Of course Amazon will fix problems, but wouldn't this be the place to talk about those problems with other potential buyers?

That's true, and I think I mentioned in this thread that it's retarded to tell people "Call Amazon and get them to ship you a new Kindle" before attempting to troubleshoot a problem. Amazon's customer service will only stay good as long as it's profitable.

Syrinxx
Mar 28, 2002

Death is whimsical today

Vertigus posted:

People are so used to being dicked around on everything that the idea of Amazon offering customer service beyond telling people they can repair their Kindle for $100 isn't believable.
Amazon will literally overnight you a new Kindle and pay for you to return yours. It's true that they have the best customer service of any retailer, period.

Muddy Terrain
Dec 23, 2004

by Y Kant Ozma Post

OneArmedScissor posted:

My mom just bought me a kindle as a birthday present, because I travel and move around a lot. So far it's great and stuff, but there's one little issue.
Whenever I take it off the charger, this warning/alert box pops up saying that my battery life is low and that I should hook it up to the charger, etc.
This seems pretty strange considering I just got it and left it on the charger for like 24 hours, etc. and now apparently the thing says it's about to die any moment.
But the battery life seems to be totally fine and no problems at all.

Is this some sort of bug or is it indicative of some larger problem I don't know about?

Overall, though, the thing is pretty sweet. I can upload all my .pdf files on it and is basically a portable pdf reader. It's pretty much the poo poo.

An update.
There is nothing wrong with the actual Kindle.
The problem was a faulty charger thing that you attached to the cable and then to the socket in the wall. All is well and I'm loving my new Kindle :D

Muddy Terrain
Dec 23, 2004

by Y Kant Ozma Post

Syrinxx posted:

Amazon will literally overnight you a new Kindle and pay for you to return yours. It's true that they have the best customer service of any retailer, period.

This is 100% true. I called them up about the adapter/charger thing and they said would just send me an entirely new Kindle and I could take whatever parts I wanted from the new one. Then all I needed to do was just repackage the leftover stuff and send it back, no problems.

Ziir
Nov 20, 2004

by Ozmaugh
How do the following websites work on the browser? Google Reader, Facebook, Twitter, hell SA even.

blue squares
Sep 28, 2007

Amazon sent me a new Kindle and said absolutely nothing about sending the broken one back. Not sure why but now I have two, one good one and one half broken one.

lunar detritus
May 6, 2009


Ziir posted:

How do the following websites work on the browser? Google Reader, Facebook, Twitter, hell SA even.

If you use their mobile interfaces all of them work just fine.
You can also sync Google Reader's unread items through Calibre.

Muddy Terrain
Dec 23, 2004

by Y Kant Ozma Post

blue squares posted:

Amazon sent me a new Kindle and said absolutely nothing about sending the broken one back. Not sure why but now I have two, one good one and one half broken one.

Well... I think it's sort of implied. They told me if I didn't send the "broken" one back, I would be charged. They never gave me a time frame or anything, just as soon as possible.

blue squares
Sep 28, 2007

OneArmedScissor posted:

Well... I think it's sort of implied. They told me if I didn't send the "broken" one back, I would be charged. They never gave me a time frame or anything, just as soon as possible.

They didn't tell me that.

bunnyofdoom
Mar 29, 2008

Jaxxon: Still not the stupidest thing from the expanded universe.



So, I was thinking of taking an old used paper back, and somehow converting it into an awesome cover for my kobo. Ideas, thoughts?

Ape Gone Insane
Dec 10, 2010

Is a Kindle DX really worth the extra buck for the larger screen? Is it a great difference and advantage over the Kindle 3? Pretty happy with my Kindle 3 but I can't help but feel a DX would have been better.

Fire In The Disco
Oct 4, 2007
I cannot change the gender of my unborn child and shouldn't waste my time or energy pretending he won't exist
I will say, I love the bigger screen on my DX. I've never once thought, "Gee, I wish I had a smaller Kindle." It's not a pain to carry or anything.

Muddy Terrain
Dec 23, 2004

by Y Kant Ozma Post

blue squares posted:

They didn't tell me that.

Ok cool. Go ahead and keep it. Nothing will happen.

GoldenNugget
Mar 27, 2008
:dukedog:
Well I solved my issue with my kindle. Somehow it ran out of juice so I guess I might have left wireless on (but I'm certain I turned it off).

Anyway, figured out how to get free news with calibre and send it to my free kindle account so I can download through a wireless network. I also found mangle and now I can read comics on my kindle (apparently entire series are only ~200 mbs :)).

McCoy Pauley
Mar 2, 2006
Gonna eat so many goddamn crumpets.
I suspect the answer to this is "you can't do that," but in case I'm missing something, is there any way to reorganize "Collections" on the Kindle so that the books are listed in a specific order you want, rather than just by the three options that seem to be available (most recent, title, and author). Point being, if I want a collection that contains a particular series to be listed in the order the series should be read, can I make that happen (without renaming the books so they have numerical prefixes). I realize there's a work around where you could just call each book, in order, "1 [title of book]" "2 [title of book]" etc., but is there a better way?

Fire In The Disco
Oct 4, 2007
I cannot change the gender of my unborn child and shouldn't waste my time or energy pretending he won't exist
I don't know; I do what your last sentence states and put the numbers of the books in the series in front of the title (with 0's if there are more than 9 books in the series).

McCoy Pauley
Mar 2, 2006
Gonna eat so many goddamn crumpets.

Fire In The Disco posted:

I don't know; I do what your last sentence states and put the numbers of the books in the series in front of the title (with 0's if there are more than 9 books in the series).

Can you rename a book once it's on your Kindle? I see you can rename a collection, but I can't figure out how to rename a book once it's on the thing.

blue squares
Sep 28, 2007

McCoy Pauley posted:

Can you rename a book once it's on your Kindle? I see you can rename a collection, but I can't figure out how to rename a book once it's on the thing.

Do it by plugging it into your computer and opening its documents folder.

Fire In The Disco
Oct 4, 2007
I cannot change the gender of my unborn child and shouldn't waste my time or energy pretending he won't exist
That, or since I use Calibre, I do it from there.

Contra Duck
Nov 4, 2004

#1 DAD

Fire In The Disco posted:

I will say, I love the bigger screen on my DX. I've never once thought, "Gee, I wish I had a smaller Kindle." It's not a pain to carry or anything.

I agree with all of this. If you can afford it I'd always recommend the DX over the 6" kindle.

Obligatory Toast
Mar 19, 2007

What am I reading here??

bunnyofdoom posted:

So, I was thinking of taking an old used paper back, and somehow converting it into an awesome cover for my kobo. Ideas, thoughts?

If you're crafty, it's certainly easy and very much a neat idea. I've personally made my own with chipboard from an old ratty binder and some quilting fabric I got on sale at Jo-Ann's. I'm planning on making another with fancier fabric from a specialty quilting shop when I go down to Decatur in the next couple of months.

... That was a lot of words. Anyways, I think using a paperback cover is a great idea, but you'll need to reinforce the cover with something more durable, like chipboard. I wouldn't use cardboard though - it bends way too easily.

McCoy Pauley
Mar 2, 2006
Gonna eat so many goddamn crumpets.

Fire In The Disco posted:

That, or since I use Calibre, I do it from there.

Is there something specific you have to do in Calibre to rename a file that is already on your Kindle? Does changing the name in your Calibre library cause that change to be made in the file on the Kindle? It doesn't seem so. Do you have to change the name on the Kindle (using Calibre) and then make the same change to your Calibre library (that is, by hand, rather than there being some automatic way to conform the changes)?

butt baby
Nov 4, 2009
Is it possible to edit the margins of an ebook on a kindle if its kind of messed up? I downloaded one of the free books and theres this large empty space on the left thats really bothering me.

lunar detritus
May 6, 2009


butt baby posted:

Is it possible to edit the margins of an ebook on a kindle if its kind of messed up? I downloaded one of the free books and theres this large empty space on the left thats really bothering me.

I have only tried this from EPUB to MOBI but from MOBI to MOBI should work too. Start converting the book, go to 'MOBI output' and click 'Ignore margins'.

Vertigus
Jan 8, 2011

butt baby posted:

Is it possible to edit the margins of an ebook on a kindle if its kind of messed up? I downloaded one of the free books and theres this large empty space on the left thats really bothering me.

You can edit everything about an eBook if you use calibre, include the margins, font size, and regex stuff for changing specific bits of text and markup.

Fire In The Disco
Oct 4, 2007
I cannot change the gender of my unborn child and shouldn't waste my time or energy pretending he won't exist

McCoy Pauley posted:

Is there something specific you have to do in Calibre to rename a file that is already on your Kindle? Does changing the name in your Calibre library cause that change to be made in the file on the Kindle? It doesn't seem so. Do you have to change the name on the Kindle (using Calibre) and then make the same change to your Calibre library (that is, by hand, rather than there being some automatic way to conform the changes)?

So I finally had a minute to gently caress around with this, and yeah, it looks like the way I was doing it was numbering the books before sending them to the Kindle. Sorry for the confusion; my brain only half functions these days on my lack of sleep.

Totally Huge
Mar 10, 2006

Cold brew got me like...

College Slice
My Kindle 3 has developed a hairline crack in the case at the lower right hand corner of the screen. It looks like a similar crack is beginning to appear on the left side as well. This seems to be a fairly common issue, there are threads about it on the Amazon support forums. I plan to RMA it, but I was thinking about waiting a while in case this is a defect that they may repair. I only bought the thing a few weeks ago.

Anyway, my question is, does Amazon ship NEW kindles as replacements, or refurbs? I don't like the idea of getting a refurb for something I just bought.

Ara
Oct 18, 2003



Chaglby posted:

My Kindle 3 has developed a hairline crack in the case at the lower right hand corner of the screen. It looks like a similar crack is beginning to appear on the left side as well. This seems to be a fairly common issue, there are threads about it on the Amazon support forums. I plan to RMA it, but I was thinking about waiting a while in case this is a defect that they may repair. I only bought the thing a few weeks ago.

Anyway, my question is, does Amazon ship NEW kindles as replacements, or refurbs? I don't like the idea of getting a refurb for something I just bought.

Oh hey I have the same crack in the lower right! It's gradually gotten longer over the past month or so, but I'm kind of worried about how long it'll take for an RMA to Japan. I use the thing for a couple hours every day, so I don't really want to be without it.

I think that crack might be there because I generally hold it upside-down over my head with my thumb right under the screen, which would put pressure on the right spot to make a crack like that.

Totally Huge
Mar 10, 2006

Cold brew got me like...

College Slice

Ara posted:

I'm kind of worried about how long it'll take for an RMA to Japan.

They do it the right way and send you the replacement first. You then have a month to ship the old one back.

Clara
Feb 7, 2004

Chaglby posted:

Anyway, my question is, does Amazon ship NEW kindles as replacements, or refurbs? I don't like the idea of getting a refurb for something I just bought.

If it's still within your return period you get a new one, otherwise refurb.

Ziir
Nov 20, 2004

by Ozmaugh
What's the Amazon return/exchange policy? How many days/months do I get?

What's the best way to get foreign language translations of classic works? Gutenberg?

Traxis
Jul 2, 2006

Chaglby posted:

Anyway, my question is, does Amazon ship NEW kindles as replacements, or refurbs? I don't like the idea of getting a refurb for something I just bought.

My DX that I bought in November had a busted screen and the replacement I got was new.

IRQ
Sep 9, 2001

SUCK A DICK, DUMBSHITS!

Ara posted:

Oh hey I have the same crack in the lower right! It's gradually gotten longer over the past month or so, but I'm kind of worried about how long it'll take for an RMA to Japan. I use the thing for a couple hours every day, so I don't really want to be without it.

I think that crack might be there because I generally hold it upside-down over my head with my thumb right under the screen, which would put pressure on the right spot to make a crack like that.

Huh, I just noticed I have a crack there too on mine. Must be a design flaw.

I didn't really notice until you guys posted about it though so I'll hold off on RMA until they fix it.

Space Harrier
Apr 19, 2007
GET READY!!!!
I just picked up a Sony Pocket Reader with a bunch of store credit from a used bookstore, and I have kind of mixed feelings on the thing so far. I was particularly interested in a Sony or Nook because it is compatible with Overdrive books from my local library, but the more time I spend on my library's Overdrive page, the more underwhelmed I become. On a quick glance, there seems to be a good selection of books available, but almost all of the books I am interested in are on some kind of wait list. The checkout policy is also a little more restrictive than I had hoped; books deactivate in two weeks, which is less time than a regular library checkout. Oddly, it also seems that my library has a lot more audiobooks than e-books.

Sony's store seems to have as good of a selection of books as any, but outside of bestsellers, the prices seem a little high. I guess I'm just not that comfortable spending the price typically asked for a book that only works on one brand of hardware. In any case, I don't see myself doing a lot of reading on this thing in the near future which is sort of a bummer because I love gadgets. The store I bought it from has a seven day return policy, so I may just return it.

I like e-readers. I like their nifty paper-like screens, I like their compact size... but I'm thinking that they aren't the best fit for how I like to read. Didn't mean to make this a rambling post making GBS threads on e-readers, but maybe its something to think about for people who are currently in the market for one.

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Quad
Dec 31, 2007

I've seen pogs you people wouldn't believe

Space Harrier posted:

but I'm thinking that they aren't the best fit for how I like to read.

It seems like your main gripe is the price of e-books.
Which sucks, real talk.
But there are plenty of free legal options out there for lots of books. Gutenberg (but the formatting is usually awful), Amazons got free books (but you have to take a minute to convert from mobi), etc.

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