Without a doubt, the very envisioning
of E-Books is now completed with the rise of tablets. We tell you the best ways
to enjoy this wonderful relationship
Our story is a simple one. It is a love story, which started with the coming of two
technological advances that nobody knew was made for each other. Electronic
Books were a growing trend that met with the surging popularity of tablets, and
romance blossomed. It was only natural - put E-Books into tablets, and not only
will you increase the feasibility of a tablet, but even create a market of its
own. The rest, as they say, is wonderful history.
Of course, to fully enjoy E-Books on your
tablets requires a little extra effort, especially in understanding how the
E-Book market works in Malaysia. It's not complicated, just... cumbersome. And
after that, in true CHIP fashion, we'll be telling you the best E-Book readers
to get, and what you should be looking for
The important note: E-Books and Tablets
vs. Malaysia
E-Books unfortunately suffer the same
problems as with most digital contents available online: regional restrictions.
Like movies and music, E-Books are also bound by licensing issues, essentially
locking out a lot of our access to well-known E-Book libraries and their
content.
Two of the largest and most popular E-Book
providers to tablets are Amazon (through Kindle) and Barnes and Noble (through
Nook), both which, sadly, doesn't distribute to Malaysian account holders. You
won't even be able to download the respective apps to utilise. There are
methods of bypass, of course, which include getting gift cards or faking U.S
accounts (with name generators), but we'll leave that out for now.
E-Book readers: What you should be
looking for
Content is, of course, king. You should
note what they have for sale, and then, subsequently, make sure that they have
a lot of free content for you to peruse. Most E-Book readers provide access to
public domain books, which include most classics. Some provide free E-Books to
browse, preview or, with luck, obtain for free.
Accessibility would be next, and this
mostly has to do with presentation. How well does pages display itself? Are the
fonts adjustable in size? How's the backlighting? Can you lock rotation so that
you can read lying down sideways? What about being able to read in the dark?
One thing to look out for is its supported format. Does it also allow you to
read PDF or EPUB files from the computer?
Features would be another. These are mostly
irrelevant if you're solely looking for a good reading experience, but
additional features liked dictionary access, bookmarking or a nice in-app
library may make all the difference between one app and the other.
What about hardware? We don't need to talk
about the iPad, but on Android's front, the bevy of device sizes should be
something to factor in. If reading is what you're getting a tablet for,
something inexpensive but good like the Google Nexus 7 or the Samsung Tab 7.7
would make a great paperback substitute.
The Apps
We will be avoiding apps that are
regionally inaccessible for, well, obvious reasons. Instead, these are the apps
that not only provide you with content that you can access locally, but are
also reputable and excellent E-Book readers in their own right.
iBooks
Surprisingly, but perhaps not quite so, the
iOS' own iBooks is one of the better E-Book apps out there. As part of a recent
change in usage terms, this is the only iOS reader that allows in-app
purchases, though you won't be able to buy any books using a Malaysian account.
Thankfully, iBooks support the syncing of DRM-free PDF or EPUB E-Books through
iTunes, which is an excellent feature. As a reader, iBooks doesn't offer too
much in terms of features and accessibility; the interface may look good, but
it doesn't distant itself much with innovative or interesting things. Still, if
you're not intending to go far to look for an E-Book reader, iBooks may very
well serve as a competent default reader.
Surprisingly,
but perhaps not quite so, the iOS' own iBooks is one of the better E-Book apps
out there.
Aldiko
No Android device could do without Aldiko.
Aside from being able to provide E-Book purchases from your favourite
publishers (we'll get back to this), Aldiko also supports PDF and EPUB books
uploaded directly from the computer. It's a clean and feature-ful reading app,
complete with scalable fonts and adjustable backgrounds; you can even set the
margin of the lines. It also has a neat dictionary feature by letting you hold
and touch a particular word to let it call a search over Google or Wikipedia.
We would have to note that Aldiko supports E-Book purchases from MPH, which we
trust may be pretty useful for you.
No
Android device could do without Aldiko.
Kobo Reader
Kobo reader is fantastic for three primary reasons.
One, it's one of the rare apps that support purchases of E-Books without region
limitations, so you can go crazy with the credit card without worrying that
it's Malaysian. Two, it actually works on multiple platforms, which stretches
from the iOS to Android and even on the PC, so you can access your library
regardless of the platform you have at hand. Three, it actually has some of the
best non- classical free novels in its library which you can check out. They're
not A-listers, but it does expand Kobo's library considerably. The reader
itself works great, offering various font sizes and "white- on-black"
night reading mode.
Kobo
reader is fantastic for three primary reasons.
Bluefire Reader
Bluefire is great for the fact that it
supports the Adobe Digital Editions DRM platform, which is a format used by
other services that include Sony and Barnes and Noble's Nook. It's a
particularly nifty feature if you have other Adobe DRM books that you would like
to have on your iPad. As a reader, Bluefire sports a few interesting features
as well, including text sizes of 30 different increments, multiple text colours
and varied margin layouts. Oh, and Bluefire is the iOS platform that MPH
supports as well, so if you're going local with the E-Book purchases, this is
the iOS app to get.
Bluefire
is great for the fact that it supports the Adobe Digital Editions DRM platform,
which is a format used by other services that include Sony and Barnes and
Noble's Nook.
