e-reader suggestions

[rfglass]

My mother is looking into an e-reader,any suggestions?Books,music,wifi,expandable memory. someone suggested Kobo's opinions? It needs to be backlit for reading in the dark

[3.0charlie]

Wife been using the Sony PRST1 for over a year now, and I've bought the PRST2 for my daughter. Long-lasting battery, book management is easy too. Version 2 seems better (not 100% sure, since it's for Xmas and haven't played with it yet).

[PerryC]

I have a Kobo and love it. Mine is an original model from just after release so it doesn't have wi-fi or any of the other newer features. The only real issue I have with the Kobo is I find the website and the desktop application are very clunky. I have yet to find a way to purchase more than one book at a time...have to buy each book individually. You can set up a wishlist of books on the desktop app, but that doesn't appear on the website, in fact there is no wishlist on the website. A few other minor gripes, but those are my two biggest annoyances.

You might want to reconsider the backlight, and maybe get a clip on light. The backlights are horrible for the eyes. Oh and get a memory card right away if you can...most ereaders only hold about a thousand books before you need more memory. Yes that means mine is full

[Shadowmeph]

How do ereaders work, I mean when you buy one do you have to download books from a certain company or could you uploadd a PDF file to it I am not sure how they actually work.

[PerryC]

Most of them will read epub, pdf, and rtf documents so you can grab the books from anywhere. Kindle also has its own format Mobi, Apple has their own as well but can't remember what it is since I don't own any Apple products.

Generally, when you purchase an ebook you have the choice of what format you want to download it. With my Kobo I buy from both Kobo (Chapters website) and Smashwords. There is a large choice of free books on both sites. Smashwords has a large number of relatively unknown or newer writers so the quality may vary. I have also bought from Amazon. Depending on your choice of book genres Gutenberg Press also has a wide variety of free books.

[Shadowmeph]

ok so I guess that I couldn't take a pdf file from my PC and upload it to the e reader? or can I do that.
I ask this because I have a huge amount of PDF files like manuals and the like on my PC and it would be great to be able to upload them to an ereader type thing and carry that around instead of having to print out pages all the time when I am working on some one vehicle or what ever.

[NyteOwl]

Most e-readers will read PDF as well. I like my Aluratek Libre despite it lacking what many consider necessary features. It has a regalr LCD display, no fancy "e-ink", no backlight, no touch. What it does have is the ability to read an amazing range of document formats. It is also fairly inexpensive and has decent battery life. It will play MP3's though I've not tried out that function.

I use it mostly for holding reference material (most of that in PDF form) though it's handy in waiting rooms too :).

[PerryC]

Easiest way to use a pdf file on an ereader is use a memory card, most use a SD card. I read alot so I actually have a couple of SD cards for my Kobo, both smaller 2GB ones and both pretty much full.