E-bestsellers and other goodies from your local library via OverDrive: Read them for free on the Sony Reader PRS-505
By Jeff Scott, Director of the City of Casa Grande Public Library in Arizona
Own a Sony PRS-505? Want to borrow best-sellers and other e-goodies offered by local libraries—for free?
Here’s how to check out titles from OverDrive, a provider of e-books to public libraries in the U.S. and seven other countries, including Canada, Mexico, the U.K. and Australia. Search here for a library using OverDrive’s service. In some cases, for a fee or otherwise, you may be able to enjoy OverDrive books even if you aren’t a resident. The New York Public Library charges $100 for a card (here’s the application). But the actual checkouts will be free.
Procedures at different libraries may vary, but this guide and my accompanying video should give you a general idea. Significantly, DRMed Adobe PDF is the most common e-book format at many libraries. And through a just-released upgrade, your PRS-505 can now read it. What’s more, starting next month, you’ll be able to buy 505s with the Digital Editions upgrade already built in, so that you can skip the first two steps.
Step #1: Upgrade your PRS-505
Download the latest Sony Reader firmware.
Step #2: Get Adobe Digital Editions
Step #3: Go to your library’s site
Visit your local library’s site. If you live in the States, there’s a good chance it will subscribe to OverDrive’s service directly or through a consortium. Here’s a downloading area for Phoenix-area library users.
Have you library card number and Personal Identification Number (PIN) ready.
Step #4: Find the book you want to read.
Yes, some of the most popular books might be already checked out, but you can do an electronic hold and be notified via e-mail. Even if you can’t locate a best-seller, you might find another recent title of interest.
Just as an example, I downloaded What Happened, the best-seller by former White House press secretary Scott McClellan.
Step #5: Put the book in your electronic book bag
Add the book to your electronic book bag and check out the book with your library card number, PIN, and the selection of your library, if it’s in a consortium.
Step #6: Confirm the check-out and download the title
Next, confirm the checkout and download the title.
Step #6: Open the book on your desktop
Open the title on your desktop and your Adobe Digital Editions will open the file.
Step #7: Connect
Connect your Sony PRS-505 to your laptop or desktop computer via the USB cable.
Step #8: Drag and drop the file
Open your Digital Editions Library, drag and drop the e-book file into your Sony Reader (either the main part or the memory card if you have one). The book should show up within the "Borrowed" category of "Bookshelves." You may need to click first on the book icon at the left of the screen, just under the Digital Editions logo.
That’s it!
Imagine the benefits here. If you are a voracious reader, you can now always have a book available with your Sony Reader, a laptop, and an Internet connection. Think about it. Everybody is talking about that latest book and you badly want to read it. Perhaps your flight has been delayed and you could really use something to read. Now, you can download books for free to your Sony Reader.
Moderator’s note: We’ll also be interested in guides to popular library e-offerings from services besides OverDrive. Same for instructions for other hardware besides the Sony. - D.R.
July 25th, 2008 at 2:14 am
It’s funny because I recently wrote an article about not forgetting your public library as a great place to find digital media
Besides Overdrive there are two other services that my library(Seattle Public Library) offers and I am sure they are available through other libraries as well. They are:
netLibrary - An online library of eBooks and music. They offer both Cliffs Notes and The Complete Idiot’s Guide series among others.
Safari Books Online -“Access digital books on computing, databases, programming, Web design and more. The collection includes over 1,000 titles for the three most current years from publishers such as O’Reilly, Addison Wesley, Que and Sam’s Publishing. These digital books can be read while you are online.”
I would say the best thing to do is just go check out your own libraries website to see what they are offering.
For some other services that may be offered by your library, I have found a couple.
EBook Library - They seem to focus on academic and research eBooks.
ebrary - I couldn’t find any information on what kind of books they offer but they have an extensive list of publishers that they offer material from.
The only problem is that these websites seem to always hide their catalog of books so it is hard to see what they offer through their websites.
July 25th, 2008 at 9:12 am
Great article about Overdrive. I had no idea what it was!
Unfortunately, my local library doesn’t belong and the fees for other libraries that I checked ($100/$150) don’t make economic sense. I can buy a lot of ebooks for that.
July 25th, 2008 at 2:32 pm
Paul,
I am sorry your local library doesn’t provide this service. I am sure with the proliferation of ebooks, more libraries will provide this service.
(If you get a library card with Phoenix, it is only $20 for one year.) Since you don’t have one locally, you can shop around
July 25th, 2008 at 3:09 pm
OK, I have to admit my mouth is watering. I have the magic FREE FREE FREE NYPL card (NYCer here). But I haven’t even used e-borrowing with my desktop ADE!
July 25th, 2008 at 7:11 pm
Jeff, thanks for the tip. If/when I’m ever in Phoenix again, I’ll follow up. An out-of-stater can get the card for $20, indeed, but must apply in person. Teletransportation, anybody?
More seriously, I’d welcome suggestions from you and others as to choices besides NYC.
For now, kudos to Phoenix. I need to check, but it’s even possible that the OverDrive collection of PDFs is even bigger than in NYC.
David
July 26th, 2008 at 5:40 pm
David,
M library is part of the consortium, but my library’s rules are different. Plus, since I am the director, I can make exceptions. If you want a card, let me know
September 1st, 2008 at 10:43 pm
I live in Napa, California and our local library doesn’t subscribe to Overdrive. Would it be possible to get a 20.00 out of state library card without having to personally apply for one?
Thanks,
Clayton Brown
September 3rd, 2008 at 11:25 am
This is an old topic but I hope the writer will be back here. I looked at the Brooklyn Public Library site last night and it has ebooks interlaced — all mixed in — with audiobooks. The screensnap above also looks similar to BPL. Are libraries using the same software or what? I hate having to go through audiobook listings because I have zero interest in them and there are so few ebooks, searching by author invariably produces result = 0.
September 3rd, 2008 at 1:39 pm
Hi, Mike. Use BPL’s advanced search page and you can choose the format you want. The PBL, like Jeff’s library consortium in Arizona, is serviced by OverDrive. That’s why you see a similar view. Yes, I’ve got major probs with the selection. It’s an issue of resources and size of the market. TeleRead, anyone?
Thanks,
David
September 3rd, 2008 at 5:25 pm
Thanks for that tip, David, but we both know the selection of ebooks will be so *small*, that straight browsing through titles is the better way to go in order to discover what’s there. Having the non-eBooks mixed in prevents that. And if I’m finding that frustrating as a “techie,” imagine the disgust of the general public!
September 4th, 2008 at 3:58 pm
At the BPL site, you can browse eBooks only from a link on the left hand navigation bar. You do have to scroll down somewhat, but under the Collection category, there is a link that says “View all eBooks”. There were almost 1800 titles available. You should write in with what kind of eBook titles you would like to see and with suggestions on how to make the page better. Remember, there is a reason the word public is in the name Brooklyn Public Library.
September 5th, 2008 at 2:30 pm
@BklynGuy: Aha! Just went there and tried it. Thanks!