eReader software at v.3, Vista & OQO support

I've tried just about every eBook reading software out there and I just keep coming back to eReader's platform. The DRM is tied to the credit card you used to purchase your content, not to a device, which is a huge plus to me. I was nosing around the eReader site last night and saw an upgrade to the software; not sure when it was added, but it's now at version 3.0.2 for Windows based devices. The new version includes more common tasks in the toolbar, such as 'go to chapter' and 'find'.

The new version includes support for Vista and even more interesting is a version specifically for the OQO (shown), which should make for an awesome mobile book reader. I don't have an OQO on hand, so I'm not sure if there's something specific here for a smaller screen device, but I may try to install this version on my Samsung Q1P's Vista partition to have a look-see.

Comments

[Bob Russell]

Thanks Kevin. It's great to see the upgrade. I'd like to see more development done for Palm and Win Mobile versions, but it is my favorite platform also. At least for DRM'd e-books not on dedicted e-book devices like the Sony Reader.

As you said, the DRM is tied to a credit card (only a hash value is actually stored, in case anyone has any worries about privacy), so I can read the e-books I've bought as long as eReader software continues to be available on devices I use. Plus UMPCs are bringing a whole new set of devices into the mix.

It will be interesting to see if there is a new version of eReader coming for the future Linux MIDs or Linux-based Palm devices.

[borax99 (Alain C.)]

eReader is definitely the way to go. I've been using version 3.x for a while now, there are some issues but no showstoppers. (1) the cataloguing function does not work very well, for some reason even some ebooks purchased directly from the ereader website don't populate properly in the database - blank author, etc. (2) I haven't found a way to *just* launch the reader pane. Since the catalog doesn't work very well, I wish there was a way to emulate the previous version and just launch the reader portion.

These are minor quibbles, their idea of DRM is, as John Dvorak once said, both brilliant and simple. What's the one piece of personal information a pirate is NEVER going to divulge? Their credit card number. Beyond that, I find that you don't get nagged to provide the key very often. Very smooth experience dealing with the website and reader, and copious quantities of free ebooks in .pdm format on the web as well.

Thanks for highlighting this for your many readers !

[Francois Camoin]

I agree--it's a wonderful program. Only thing is it now refuses to work on Q1P under vista. Worked for a couple of days, then next time I opened it, I got the dreaded "eReader program has stopped working." I've since then uninstalled and reinstalled it six or seven times, with no luck. It installs, but won't run. Anyone out there have any ideas? I bought the machine largely to run this one program.
thanks
francois camoin

[Dave Beauvais]

Thanks for the note on this as it prompted me to go check for an update for the Windows Mobile version, which was updated on April 13, 2007 to version 2.6.5. The new version adds Windows Mobile 5 softkey support and has a few bug fixes which they don't elaborate on in the release notes. The change to softkey menus has the unfortunate side effect of making the eReader menus even more poorly organized than they were before and one of them is wasted on a "Quit" function which could have been assigned to something much more useful. But I'm just glad to see that they're still updating it!

[erinq]

I have the same problems Francois - I installed ereader pro on my U810. eReader opens fine but when I select a book the program freezes and I get this error message: ereader has stopped working.

I have uninstall/reinstalled numerous times to no avail. Have no idea where to go from here. I tried installing the OQO version but I can a message saying it isn't compatible. Ideas?????
thanks

[alan edwards]

i just had the same ereader has stopped working message and tried uninstalling reinstalling etc to no avail. i then deleted the actual folder and searched for "ereader" files and deleted the user data and prefetch files and its now working fine. hope this helps anyone else in the same boat