# seriously annoyed by kindle



## kavade (Sep 15, 2011)

I have an iPad, and I bought my first ebook through Amazon and downloaded it to my MacBook Air. I assumed I could transfer it to my iPad.
The book cost $85. Let me repeat that - EIGHTY FIVE DOLLARS. Turns out I cannot transfer the book to my iPad. So, while traveling on crowded trains in Tokyo I am trying to keep up with my grad work  by reading this $85 text on a laptop. In a crowded train. Doesn't work out  very well. I spend 3 hours a day on Tokyo trains and I need that time to read my grad text. This is ridiculous. Amazon says I can't read it on my iPad. I say - well, never mind. 

So then I thought, well, I'll print out chapters as they are assigned. But noooo...can't do that either. No print option. So, my question to the Kindle community is this: can I somehow get this EIGHTY FIVE DOLLAR (in case you missed that part) text onto my iPad? Or print it out, or anything other than trying to juggle a laptop on trains? Surely there is a way to make this text easily readable? 

To any who can contribute a solution, my heartfelt thanks.


----------



## geko29 (Dec 23, 2008)

You can't transfer content (in a useful fashion) in or out of any Kindle reader, be it a hardware device, ios/android app or pc/mac app, as each download is keyed to the particular device, and won't work on any other.  What you can do (and is much easier that what it seems you're trying to do) is open the Kindle app, go into your archive, and re-download the book.


----------



## kavade (Sep 15, 2011)

But it won't download to the iPad, though I have the Kindle app on the iPad. "Not available for iPad," it says.

So I'm SOL? 

What is EPUD? WOuld that be relevant to this situation?


----------



## MrPLD (Sep 23, 2010)

Load the book into "Calibre", convert to a format that the iPad can read.

btw, I don't see what this has to do with the Kindle, sure, your situation is annoying but it's not Kindle, Amazon or iPad's fault as such.


----------



## kavade (Sep 15, 2011)

Why the book is available only for PC strikes me as absurd. And if such things occur regularly then no more e-readers for me. 

As to your very helpful sounding suggestion for Calibre, could you please elaborate? I just went to my Amazon Kindle account and it lists my iPad but will not download it to the iPad. Sooo...I get Calibre for my MacBook Air? And then somehow transfer the book on my Air into Calibre, and then from that to my iPad? Will these steps be obvious and clear?

Many thanks for your help.


----------



## Mike D. aka jmiked (Oct 28, 2008)

kavade said:


> Amazon says I can't read it on my iPad. I say - well, never mind.


Amazon customer service, Amazon's web page, or what?

I've never heard of an ebook being restricted like that. Is this actually a Kindle ebook, or a PDF?

If you don't mind, what is the book? We could possible help more if we knew that.

Mike


----------



## _Sheila_ (Jan 4, 2011)

I don't understand...

I have a Mac, and iPad an iPhone and a Kindle.

I read all of my books on all of them.

They all sync so that the last page read is available on all of them.

I would be in contact with customer support - a supervisor in necessary - to see what the problem is.

I'm also an author - and I can't think of any way that I can decide which device my books will be read on.

Sheila


----------



## kavade (Sep 15, 2011)

Amazon customer service actually telephoned me - and after checking into the problem said "Wow. I've never seen such a problem before, but it just isn't available in a format for iPad. Sorry. Want a refund?" Well, no, I don't, I HAVE to have this book, I just want to be able to read it without balancing a laptop precariously in a moving train.  The title is "The Origins and Development of the English Language" by Algeo, 2009 I think. 

Do you think your Calibre solution would work?

Ta very much.


----------



## MrPLD (Sep 23, 2010)

If you use Calibre to convert it to ePub it should work.  If it's a DRM protected file you'll have to work out how to strip that before converting (which technically is "illegal").


----------



## history_lover (Aug 9, 2010)

kavade said:


> Amazon customer service actually telephoned me - and after checking into the problem said "Wow. I've never seen such a problem before, but it just isn't available in a format for iPad. Sorry. Want a refund?" Well, no, I don't, I HAVE to have this book, I just want to be able to read it without balancing a laptop precariously in a moving train. The title is "The Origins and Development of the English Language" by Algeo, 2009 I think.
> 
> Do you think your Calibre solution would work?
> 
> Ta very much.


That's very strange and it sounds like Amazon are not responsible for it - the publisher might have put those restrictions on the Kindle book. But to be fair it does say on the book's page: "Read it exclusively on Kindle for PC or Kindle for Mac". Unless that's only been recently added in light of your situation, you can't hold Amazon responsible for not warning you before you purchased it.


----------



## Mike D. aka jmiked (Oct 28, 2008)

Ah, it's a textbook, not a regular ebook. I see that the product page specifies that it is for Kindle PC or Mac, but they confuse things a bit by saying "No Kindle required." It works on the Kindle app for Mac or PC only.

This is almost certainly a publisher limitation not an Amazon one, and Calibre isn’t going to help unless you break the DM, and possibly not then. I've had no experience with textbooks in Kindle format.

I think you're stuck.

Mike


----------



## kavade (Sep 15, 2011)

Well, I must say that you folks are good souls for looking into the matter for me. 

I'll investigate further with Calibre. Even just printing it out would help but I guess I can't do that either.

But many thanks for the attempt to help.


----------



## _Sheila_ (Jan 4, 2011)

I would send an email to the publisher and ask them for a solution.

They probably won't do anything - but it never hurts to ask.

Sheila


----------



## kindlegrl81 (Jan 19, 2010)

In regards to printing the pages you need that day...it is a tad bit time consuming (as you have to do it for each page) but you can do screen shots of the book and then paste them into a word processor and print from there.  I don't know how to do this on a Mac but I do know how to do it on a PC (press and hold "ctrl" and "Print Scrn" at the same time).


----------



## sebat (Nov 16, 2008)

Calibre is free, you can download it here... http://calibre-ebook.com/download

Not sure if it will help but it doesn't hurt to try.


----------



## kindlemama (Jan 5, 2010)

This won't help to get it on your iPad, but since you're at the point now of being willing to read it in paper format, what about returning the electronic version and buying the paperback version instead?  I know it'd be cumbersome, but still better than the laptop.


----------



## luvshihtzu (Dec 19, 2008)

I looked up up your book title and it says:  
"This Kindle book looks just like the printed book
Read it exclusively on Kindle for PC or Kindle for Mac"

So, the DRM is set up in such a way that it can be only read on your Kindle for Mac.  You have to find a way to remove the DRM first before trying to transfer the book to your iPad.  Do you have any friends who are computer savvy?  I would use Drop Box for transferring the large book file to an iPad, but you still have to have a book copy without this very limiting DRM.
If it were me, I would see if Amazon would refund your money and let you buy the paperback copy.
Too bad that Amazon is limiting you to only reading on two devices for this particular book.  Wonder if the new tablet coming out made by Amazon will be of any use to you for books like these in the future?


----------



## jason10mm (Apr 7, 2009)

Wow, that sucks. This is why naming the hardware and the software the same thing is leading to confusion. They should have called the hardware the Kindle and the software something else (Flame?...ooh, too cheesy  But I suppose the marketing guys they paid all that money to who came up with the kindle name didn't give them a twofer.


----------



## Rasputina (May 6, 2009)

I have not tried this but I remember reading on Amazons website recently that they are setting it up so you can read their books in any browser window. So I'm wondering if you could read it that way on iPad? Sorry I haven't ventured into the realm of etextbooks yet so I have no direct experience with it.


----------

