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572 points bookofjoe | 1 comments | | HN request time: 0s | source
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pfooti ◴[] No.41864842[source]
I have a pretty old paperwhite. When it started deleting books i had side-loaded via calibre, I decided to get a kobo. I have a libra color, and I have to say: price notwithstanding, it's a great device. I don't have a lot of experience with more recent devices, but compared to my 2nd gen paperwhite, it is _amazing_.

Color is good enough to read comic books on it, the google drive integration means it's not too hard to get my CBR/CBZ files on directly. The annotation / notetaking featureas are nice (I haven't leaned into them yet, but they work well even on the small screen size), plus all the regular stuff with normal book reading. Also, since it's kobo/rakuten, the libby integration is better (search and select library books right from the device).

The actual reading app is maybe 90% as good as reading on the kindle (or a more specialized reader like perfectviewer on android). There's some annoyingly fiddly features- font size is kind of weirdly variable, when going through CBR files there's no "read next in the folder" gesture nor is there a "this is read/unread" state in the google drive ui, so you always have to remember which book you are finishing when opening the next in the series.

I tried out one of those boox readers with the android apps, which would be even better software-wise, but the boox hardware seems like garbage (for an N=1 at least). My display came with several rows of stuck pixels, and apparently it's a good thing that I ordered from amazon instead of the boox store, because the reviews indicate getting an RMA from boox directly is a pain.

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thih9 ◴[] No.41867629[source]
> When it started deleting books i had side-loaded via calibre

This is news to me. All my kindle library is books side loaded via calibre. Then again, my kindle paperwhite is non stop in airplane mode so maybe this is a factor. In any case this is alarming and thanks for the feedback, I will read more about non-Amazon devices because of that.

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bambax ◴[] No.41867768[source]
All my Kindle library is also books side loaded via Calibre (sent to my kindle email address). I have been doing that for years (more than an decade actually) and have never had any book deleted by the device. Is this real?
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imp0cat ◴[] No.41867823[source]
It's explained elswhere in this thread - only the "DRM'ed" ebooks that "belong" to another Kindle are deleted.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41866327

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bambax ◴[] No.41867979[source]
Ah, ok. I always de-DRM everything automatically (opening books in Calibre does the de-drming). It sometimes happen with the newer systems that newer Kindle books can't be de-drmed, but then I return those immediately.

But I'm surprised a book with DRM can even be added to another device than the one it belongs to, let alone be opened?

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1. dotancohen ◴[] No.41868108{3}[source]

  > I'm surprised a book with DRM can even be added to another device than the one it belongs to, let alone be opened?
It is probably a path that could potentially lead to another sale. The user reads a few pages of the book, gets hooked, and then is told about the restriction.