Be careful when ordering ebooks....

[James S]

Hi All,

I just purchased a copy of The Path by Esmeralda Arana...twice!

The reason for purchasing two copies is I made the big mistake of getting the first in Adobe ebook Reader format.

If you can avoid it, do not use the Adobe software especially if you are planning on purchasing ebooks. It locks you into using the ebook on only one PC - the one it was downloaded to. It then certifies it using a hardware identifier that is unique to your setup at that point in time. You cannot back it up, you cannot transfer it to anither PC. If you upgrade your PC's processor, motherboard or hard drive, the ebook can no longer be opened. Its the way the copyright encryption on the ebook works, and according to the help files in the Adobe Reader, if anything at all happens to you PC, tough luck!

Adobe claim they can help you reinstall it if this happens, by what they call a Voucher Update, however the link that is supposed to do this in the reader software is a dead link, and there is no option on Adobe's web site to update any vouchers.

So, a better way to go if you do want to use ebooks is, believe it or not, use Microsoft's reader. It's no where near as polished or intuitive as Adobe's reader, but its more flexible. It uses the MS Passport activation to certify the reader, so if you have a few different PCs, as long as the MS reader software on them has been activated using your passport, the ebooks you purchased can be transferred between them. There is also a small piece of software readily available called Convert Lit (.lit being the extension of ms reader format ebooks). This program can remove levels of protection to make it readily portable to other devices, and Microsoft have not yet moved to block it.

As much as I dislike Microsofts strangle-hold of the PC market they're definitely the lesser of two evils when it comes to ebooks.

James.