Getting an eReader

[c_redman]

How would I go about converting a .txt file from simplified to traditional' date=' anyway? And would it be accurate? It seems auto-conversion ends up giving typos.[/quote']

My experience is more traditional -> simplified, but Google Translate seems to work well. When comparing parallel mainland/Taiwan texts vs. the results from Google translate (into simplified), it's error-free as far as I tested. It beats Wenlin's conversion, which can't guess whether 著 should convert to 着 or 著, which means a lot of post-conversion hand-editing for every instance of it.

[gato]

I can confirm that sending a Word / RTF file with traditional Chinese text to your kindle account for conversion does work correctly under the zh-CN setting.

[Glenn]

Alright. I guess that means I'm going to have to buy Office, then. :/

[gato]

You don't need office. Word Pad is enough. RTF format works.

[Glenn]

Thanks for that tip! Well, it didn't work over USB for some reason (it just never showed up), but it seems to have made it fine when I e-mailed it (even though the 黑 in the title ended up as a square). Thanks for all the help, roddy and gato!

[realmayo]

Does anyone with a Kindle regret getting it? Might have preferred an iPad or whatever instead? Or even just stuck to hardcopy books? I'm keen, for reading Chinese but mainly English books, but not sure whether to take the plunge.

[roddy]

Not preferred as such, but my Ipod nano recently broke*, so I've been looking at getting a new one, but then I see that for not much more I could get an Ipod touch, and that makes me look at how much extra an Iphone would be. If I get anything else portable with a readable screen, the Kindle may well go - not because I don't like it, but because I'm trying to reduce gadget numbers.

*and then I completely ruined it in the fixing process. Even if you do have pliers, it's worth seeing if you can borrow the right screwdriver from somewhere.

[gato]

My eyes get blinded after reading for an extended period on the iPhone because of the brightness, even if I use nightmode. Reading on the Kindle is much easier on the eyes.

[abcdefg]

Does anyone with a Kindle regret getting it? Might have preferred an iPad or whatever instead? Or even just stuck to hardcopy books? I'm keen, for reading Chinese but mainly English books, but not sure whether to take the plunge.

I'm very pleased with my Kindle; it's a pleasure to use and easy on the eyes. I didn't want "multifunctionality." I just wanted an easy way to bring a hundred books along to china in my carry-on bag for recreational use.

[gato]

The MOBI (Kindle) edition of many Chinese magazines can be downloaded for free at kindle.dooland.com. Both current and back issues are available. I would particularly recommend 《南方人物》,《中国新闻周刊》,《文史参考》,《看历史》, and 《书屋》.

http://kindle.dooland.com

[roddy]

In case anyone else hasn't noticed yet (ie whizzed down looking for download links and missed the instructions), you want to visit that address via your Kindle browser and you'll get a Kindle-friendly site you can download directly from. Pretty nifty, can download the magazines direct to the device. I got 文史参考 - have to admit, I didn't expect to read about Mao's trousers falling down.

I've now also got a Ipod Touch. The original plan was to see which one I prefer for reading, but the new plan is to spend the rest of my life beating the final level of Chopper 2, and never read anything substantial again.

[orangutan]

I want to get an ebook reader because I like reading Chinese novels and newspapers. I want an e-ink device that allows me to click on a character that I don't know (ideally touch screen) and it will give me an instant translation along with the pronounciation and tone. Can I achieve this easily with a Kindle? There seems to be a lot of technical stuff on this thread but from what I understand this is not currently possible.

Also, can anyone with experience of other ebook readers tell me if they can be used in this way?

Thanks in advance!

[gato]

Kindle doesn't have a touch screen. In fact, e-ink technology currently doesn't work well with touch screen, and almost no e-ink device has a touch screen.

There is also no Chinese-to-English dictionary available for the Kindle. There is only dictionary in other direction, English to Chinese. If having a built-in Chinese-to-English dictionary is critical to you, you might want to consider getting a e-ink reader by the Chinese company Hanwang: http://www.360buy.com/product/262884.html

That having said, if you want to read both English and Chinese books and want to able to have access to English e-books, then the Kindle is the best e-ink reader on the market right now.

[hbuchtel]

Thanks for linking to the dooland.com site!

I just wanted to post that while all of the magazines are free using Kindle (as far as I could tell), the same magazine editions have to be paid for when downloaded through the iPhone/iPad Touch app.

Reading on the two devices is a completely different experience. The iPad looks just like a magazine page. It only offers one level of zoom, which is good enough to see even the smallest text clearly, but means that a block of text will sometimes spill off either side of the screen (whether in vertical or horizontal mode), requiring constant side-to-side scrolling. Maybe this isn't a program issue...this was reading 南方人物周刊 (11年第4期), and maybe (?) other magazines did a better job prepping the files for use with this program. What it really needs is a zoom function like the internet browser uses, where a double-tap automatically fills the screen with a block of text.

The Kindle pages are much more readable. The text fills the screen, and images take up their own page. Comparing it to the iPad version, it appears that some images and text-boxes were left out. It is less flashy but overall is a much better reading experience. (this is with the 15cm Kindle)

EDIT: Took some better quality photos -

[gato]

For reading on the iPhone/iPad, you would better off with apps from the magazine publishers if they are available. For instance, the following all have iPhone/iPad apps: 南方人物周刊、南方周末、财新（新世纪周刊）、时代周报、新京报、凤凰周刊.

[bande]

The Dooland site is great. It's amazing how much easier it is to read magazines out of China now than even a couple of years ago. Also, has anyone found a pinyin ime solution for the kindle browser?

[gato]

I think the 多看 add-on system might have a Chinese IME, but I am not sure. I never bothered to tried. 多看 was developed as a Chinese solution for the Kindle when It didn't support Chinese natively. Now that Kindle 3 supports Chinese, there is not much of a need to use 多看. You can goggle for it to find out more.

[orangutan]

I'd seen a few primitive Hangwang ereaders around but I checked out what seems to be their best one, the F31 in Zhongguancun today. It is e-ink style, with a touch-screen which works pretty well and it has a Chinese-English dictionary for instant translation. Touch the word on the page and it pops up straight away.

However, the dictionary itself is not good at all - it doesn't have enough words, also you can click on a single character and it will give you a double-character combination which you don't want or vice-versa, most words don't have pinyin, although it can read the word aloud its pronounciation is often next-to unintelligible, and the dictionary entries are just too brief.

In sum, if you want an ereader with a built-in Chinese-English dictionary, as I do, this is not it.

So basically this kind of product doesn't exist at the moment.

The Sony Reader Touch has e-ink and a touch screen but does not have a Chinese-English dictionary. Also, according to the staff at Zhongguancun, this device is not for sale in China at the moment.

So bascially there is a gap in the market waiting to be filled. I find it difficult to believe some one will not fill it soon. Why do Sony produce an ereader which doesn't even have a Japanese-English dictionary? Perhaps when they sort that out they'll sort it out for Chinese as well and release the Touch in China.

Otherwise we have to wait on Amazon to produce it for the Kindle and hopefully add touch-screen at some stage.

Pleco on one of their forums say there are big technical issues to getting their software onto a Kindle and it's not something they're working on at present.

[singlung]

in case you do not own a kindle and want to read magazines from dooland on your pc for free, all you need to do is the following:

1. install the kindle pc app (calibre also works, but slower)

2. install the user agent switcher addon (you need to run firefox)

3. create a new user agent with

Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; Linux 2.6.22) NetFront/3.4 Kindle/2.0 (screen 600x800)

in the field 'user agent', leaving the rest blank

4. here you can check your user agent, i had to restart firefox to make it work

5. when you switch to the newly-created kindle user agent and go to http://kindle.dooland.com/ you stay on that site (as if you were on a kindle) and won't get redirected to dooland.com/kindle telling you about how to get to the kindle store

6. enjoy the magazines

[knickherboots]

This thread has been focused on one dedicated ereader--the Kindle--and mentions some other devices, such as the iPod. Does anybody have some insight on how the nook and Sony Reader work in China?

I have two specific questions. First, is it possible to download books in China via the 3G capability of the nook with 3G (and wifi) capability (list price in the United States: $199) and Sony Reader Daily edition, which also has 3G (and wifi) capability (US$299)?

Second, how do the nook and the Sony Reader work with simplified Chinese texts?

A friend here in Beijing who has a Kindle uses its 3G capability to download texts at no additional cost. (She used a U.S. address to "register" her Kindle. I use VPN and have a U.S. credit card, so I have access to the bookstores run by the device companies/bookstores.) This is apparently making use of a loophole of some sort, and she thinks that this 3G access could be disrupted at any time. (I think that she mostly reads stuff from Chinese sources, not the Kindle store.) I don't know if this same type of 3G access is available for the nook or Sony.

The thread above indicates that the Kindle does a reasonable job of handling Chinese texts, though it seems to require some tweaking, and there is no Chinese>English dictionary capability. Has anybody used Chinese texts with the nook or Sony? I'm mostly interested in learning more about the nook, because I've seen someone using a Sony to read a Chinese book. Along these lines, has anybody installed a monolingual Chinese dictionary on any of these devices?

I know that there are all sorts of options and issues out there when comparing ereaders and when putting them up against cell phones and Apple products, but I think I've got my remaining concerns nailed down to these two above. In short, though, we want to use an ereader (rather than an LCD device) that can display texts in English, Chinese, and German.

For reference, here's a useful link to a comparison of ereader specs posted by gato in another thread:

My link