How to turn your netbook into an ebook reader
Posted by Scout on February 19, 2009
Amazon has just released the Kindle 2 - a sleeker, better version of their original ebook reader. At $359 (PhP18K), however, it still feels impractical for a dedicated reading device. For the same amount of money, one can buy a decent netbook which can act as a fully-functional PC, and is sufficiently light to carry around as an ebook reader. All you need to do is follow some very simple steps:
1. Get free ebooks online.
There are tons of sites on the web where you can legally download free ebook copies. These are either old works that have defaulted to the public domain, or new works by contemporary authors who have made their books free accessible. Examples are classics by Homer, Mark Twain, Charles Dickens, Jane Austen, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, to modern suspense thrillers, self-help books on computer programming, Internet marketing, and just about every subject under the sun. Some of the more popular sites are Project Gutenberg, Free-ebooks.net, e-Book.com Australia, PlanetPDF, and the eBook Directory.
2. Download an e-reader software.
Ebooks come in a variety of formats, but the most common are .txt, .html, .pdf, and .cbr. Different ebook readers have been optimized to make reading onscreen a little easier for each of these. FBReader is good for text and webpages, while Adobe Reader is obviously for PDFs, and ComicBookReader is the prime choice for comic page scans. All of these are available for free, as are many other altenatives.
3. Install EEErotate.
Reorienting displays is not new, but the problem is that it’s incredibly frustrating to navigate when your trackpad inputs clash with the screen orientation. EEERotate enables you to flip the trackpad readings along with the screen, making it much, much easier to navigate in Portrait Mode. This program was originally developed for Asus EEE PCs, but they should work fine for other netbooks and notebooks. Check if your video driver supports display rotation, though.
4. Press the magic keys, voila!
Launch your reader application, load your favorite ebook, and press the following simultaneously:
ALT-CTRL-RIGHT: Rotates display 90 degrees clockwise.
ALT-CTRL-UP: Rotates display back upright.
Here’s what my EEE PC 1000H looks like, when I’m reading Japanese manga. Sugoi!
» Filed Under Netbooks
Looking for something else? Try Search:
Related Posts
Comments
One Response to “How to turn your netbook into an ebook reader”
Leave a Reply
Loading ...
hey thanks for the tip, I was looking for something like EeeRotate.