The purpose of this thread is to discuss the operation of your Kobo eReader and any issues you may be having with it.

Please note this thread is strictly for owners of the device. If you are not an owner and have questions please use other threads.

Posts by non-owners will be removed.

Okay, I am now the owner of a Black Kobo eReader (actually, my wife will be on Mothers Day but I am trying to get it all working for her). It was the only colour they had and it actually looks better than ebony.

Okay so I seem to have it all set up, have bought a book and have synced it to the device but I still have a few things that puzzle me.

1. How do I get a book off the I'm Reading list? The help suggests you can manage it in the eReader application but the "application" seems to be nothing more than an ecommerce application.

2. The first few times I logged onto the application, it said it was downloading the book I bought, please tell me it doesn't download the book over and over.

Thanks for any assistance.

I bought mine today. It does what it says it does for sure.

The KOBO app supplied in the machine doesn't run under WINE on Linux probably it tries but WINE does not support USB.

The Bluetooth will pair with my PC but of course the Blackberry app does not exists on the PC. It even seems to manage to transfer a file but I don't think it actually does.

I did succeed in getting my stock of 28 eBooks across to the Kobo.
re-downloaded them from Webscriptions.net as epub
Downloaded and installed the Adobe digital reading program on a WIndows XP sp3 machine
Loaded all the books into that program
moved them to the Kobo.

I spent about two hours fiddling with this. ( My WIndows machine is slow)

Worked really well I thought.

I can so no way to remove the built in 100 books from the Kobo. Looking at what software and directories are on the machine I am sure that there will be a hack to do that soon. Removing books from the "I am reading list" is possible but clumsy. You have to fiddle with the Adobe app to do this according to the user manual online.
I haven't yet explored buying and downloading a book directly. I'll try that at the w/e

The "I am Reading" list seems to assume that you will finish reading everything you start! If you open the book and use the Table of Contents to move to the last chapter and then click through the pages until the end of the book, and then do one final click, Kobo will take the book off your "I am Reading" list.

Now that I'm getting comfortable with Calibre and Adobe Digital Editions, I think I'll be using the Adobe app to manage my content on the Kobo. Calibre should soon be updated to link with the Kobo as well.

I downloaded Calibre this morning on both Windows and Linux. Neither version wants to recognize the Kobo yet but as you say Urbanite, I'm sure there will be a driver soon...I hope there is a driver for Linux...probably will be as Ubuntu is a distro supported.


One thing I don't like. The screen displayed when powered off does not seem to be consistent. For instance I am seeing the cover of my current book. I'd rather see a blank screen perhaps with just a battery charge indicator on it.

I plugged in an SD card empty and that immediately showed up in the settings overview. Added a pdf file and an epub file to the card and the "process new content" screen seems to be stuck after 5 minutes.

I'll give it 1/2 hour and then I'll try processing the pdf through the Adobe app first

I called support about the problem of removing 'I am reading' from the desktop and was told that the five books that always show up there cannot be removed until there's a software upgrade. There is something in the user manual that tells you how to do it, but the instructions have no connection to what is on the screen.

I would also prefer to have a blank screen when I'm not reading -- and I noticed that the picture from the cover of the book that stays on screen seems to 'burn' itself into the screen a bit. It does seem to go away later, but it lingers and I'm not thrilled about that.

And am I the only one who thinks the little blue button is going to wear out quickly? It feels like it will be one of those soft buttons that you use a lot that after a while doesn't work on the one contact you need. Like a phone when the 'talk' button seems to lose contact. Since you press the right side (next page) so often, it makes me worry that it will be harder and harder to use after a while.

That being said, I do like it, so far -- but I'm keeping the box and the receipt handy for the year, just in case.

@crisco I agree about the big button. I think that the click right will be the first to go as you say. I checked the "burn in" takes three ofr 4 screen refreshes to go away.

Tried the sd card thing further. Converted some PDFs and ODT ( Open office) to Epub with Calibre and copied them to the card. Worked perfectly.

I downloaded Calibre, loaded up some "news", sent it to the device but afterwards was unable to figure out how to get rid of it. Deleting on Calibre only deletes it on the computer not the device.

Have had the Kobo since launch day. Have experienced many of the "issues" as others so far. The ghosting of the cover image when turning on, although it's not permanent , I do like the cover page displayed when off . Worries about the durability of the d pad , there are already times when it doesn't respond. How has battery life been for everyone? Only lasted about a week for me on it's first charge , not the two claimed. Hoping that improves. I don't get the same sense of progress as you move through an e-book. Would be nice to have a indicator bar. This is my first e-reader and have enjoyed the experience overall.

Hugh, make sure in Calibre you have the reader highlighted, versus the library. Then select the news/book you want to delete. It works that way, I just tried it.

Also make sure you have the latest version of Calibre with the Kobo driver. It was available when I downloaded about 11p last night.

I have to play around with Adobe Digital Editions more. I intend to use the reader with library books and I am pretty sure that is the only way I can transfer them.

Also, do pdf files need to be converted to the epub format or can I just load a pdf onto the reader? I think it will be handy for all those manuals we need to download now. Much easier to walk the reader over to the TV, etc. when we need to troubleshoot as opposed to the laptop or netbook.

Calibre with the Kobo driver works great on Ubuntu 10.04

Tomorrow I'll try again with Calbre on XP.

Thanks guys. Live and learn!

@ava0775 I see that Calibre will only delete books that it loaded itself. Unlike the Adobe software it does not appear to have a mode of loading everything on the Kobo back into Calibre.

OK so if I want to buy a book from the Sony ebook store for the Kobo I have to download the Sony ebook store software first, buy the book, drop the book into the Adobe software that came with the Kobo (I haven't installed that yet) and move it into the Kobo app. Is this correct? Also, sorry for the simpleton questions.

@kumanzc I had the Sony software already on my machine. I imported the downloaded books into Calibre, then loaded it into the Kobo.

@timlocke good to know about the Calibre software.

I am still trying to figure all of this out. This is my first e-reader. So far it seems I can't get around using ADE and Cailbre... and probably even the Kobo software. Since I can't seem to get it straight yet, I passed on giving one to my mother for Mother's Day even though she would love it. It'd be too complicated for her to use.

I also cannot seem to get the book I am reading on my Kobo and my Touch to sync. I suspect this is because the file on my Kobo is epub and on the Touch is web/mobile. Kind of disappointing there but maybe I will figure that out in time.

Actually I am having a lot of fun reading with the Kobo so I haven't spent too much time on the glitches.