adobe reader won't open my ebook

T

Twisted Pixie

New member
So I paid $45 for the ebook version of this textbook. I jump through all of the inane Adobe DRM Activation hoops. I wait a friggin hour for the ebook to be converted to palm format, then another hour for it to transfer to my Palm (Tungsten T2). It wouldn't fit on the palm itself, so I had to figure out how to put it on my memory card, which I admit I have had for years and never used.

So... now that the above is all done, I open Adobe Reader on my palm and lo and behold, there is the title of my $45 textbook. I naively assume that I will be able to tap on the title and the book will appear on my screen. Instead, I tap on the title, and I get the adobe logo for a couple seconds, then back to the menu that list my book title. ARGH! What am I doing wrong??

I read the Adobe Reader Users Guide (because I do try to figure things out before admitting defeat and asking help from anonymous internet people) and it says

If your Palm OS device has a secondary storage card and you wish to access PDF documents from the card, make sure that your PDF documents reside in the default directory meant for .pdb files (on the Palm OS device). For example, the default directory for .pdb files on a Palm m500 or Palm m505 is /Palm/Launcher, or on a Sony Clie PEG S300 it?s /Palm/Programs/MSFiles. The Adobe Reader software looks in this directory and all itssubdirectories for PDF documents.

So I check, and the file is indeed in /Palm/Launcher.

So WTF am I supposed to do to be able to read this $45 book I paid for??

Edited to add: I went to the adobe support site, and in there forum archives is a year-old post asking the exact same question, with no responses, other than a couple "I have that problem too" replies. Then I check what I have to do to contact an actual Adobe person, and the answer to that one is: give them $39. I will never buy another ebook again.
 
Thanks for the suggestion. Unfortunately, it did not work.

OK, so I paid $30 to upgrade to a version of Documents to Go that will open PDF files. Installed it and waited another hour to upload it... and Documents to Go won't open my ebook because of Adobe's stupid DRM encryption. The only thing that will open it is Adobe Reader, which, as outlined above, does not work. And even if I were able to figure out how to circumvent the DRM, doing so is illegal under the DMCA, and as past events have shown, Adobe has no qualms about throwing people who break their ebook DRM in jail.

So... now I am out $75 and I still can't read my damn ebook. My only option at this point is to pay Adobe $39 for the privilege of speaking to their tech support about their nonfuctioning product. But I am loathe do to that, because WTF have they done to deserve my $$.
 
I'm not trying to be a snotty boob, is there some reason why you cannot use the free ereader software? I've used the free version for a couple of years now, both on my Garmin iQue 3600 and brand new Palm TX. Works well. Best of all, its free. Select Palm OS, then clik on the free version. I would be interested in knowing why you chose to do a conversion to pdf. There is also a version of ereader that works on your pc.
http://www.ereader.com/product/browse/software

Edited: Does the textbook has illustrations that don't appear in the ereader software....
 
I didn't convert the book to a pdf - I bought it that way. (And yes, it has lots of tables that are images) I bought it in Adobe ebook format, which is apparently a pdf that is protected by their DRM and cannot be opened in anything other than Adobe software. When I said I "converted" it - this is part of the process of transferring an Adobe ebook to a PDA. It reformats it to look better on the PDA screen and checks to make sure that you have registered your PDA as an authorized device.

This is the first time I have ever bought an ebook. I was given the choice of Adobe or Mobipocket format. Because I own and have been a longtime user of lots of Adobe software, such as Acrobat Professional, Photoshop, Illustrator, etc, I mistakenly assumed that the Adobe Reader for the Palm would be of similar quality. Instead I found a byzantine DRM system and minimal support. I have contacted the publisher and asked to be able to download the ebook in the alternate format. Hopefully Mobipocket reader will work better for me.

Thanks for the suggestions.
 
I'd be pretty darn frustrated and pissed off too. :mad:
Adobe's stuff is usually pretty bullet proof, so I would probably have gone down the same road you did. Here's hoping the new year brings you some practical help from the publishers. ;)
 
I'm not sure if it will deal with the DRM, but you may want to give PalmPDF a try. It will read native .pdf files from a card (any directory) and it's free. You can get it here: www.freewarepalm.com/docs/palmpdf.shtml

You also might want to consider investing in a SD card reader so that you can simply drag and drop files to a card rather than having to move files by Hotsync. It's MUCH quicker.
 
There is one idea I have, although I don't know how secure your file is.

Have you checked to see if it's possible to print the file? If you have, you could use a third party program that lets you print documents to an Acrobat file. You would select the Acrobat printer and then give your a file a new name when you are printing. Usually, files created this way are less secure. Good luck!
 
They let me download it in Mobipocket format, and now it works :) And FWIW, they said "If there is strange formatting tags or a number of pictures or a certain size the Adobe Reader wont convert it correctly leading to the problem you mentioned." hmph. They should test them before selling them then. But they were nice and let me keep the pdf sinceMobipocket doesn't have a desktop reader for the Mac.

Mobipocket is so much easier than the Adobe format. First of all, the Adobe version was > 10MB. The Mobipocket version is 544K. The content appears to be the same. And the DRM process is minimal. All you have to do is look up an ID number from the "about" menu and type it in when you download the ebook file.

Thanks for the advice. I will definitely look into an SD card reader. And dwinget, yeah, I tried to print the file to pdf (all of the Mac print menus have this option) but I got an error saying it wasn't allowed. Oh well, I like the mobipocket version better anyway.
 
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