eBook Formats and Downloads

Dedicated EBook readers and PC software read a wide variety of eBook formats. The SacredBand.com supports the three most popular formats, and third-party software can readily convert to other popular formats.

Choosing a Format

The EPUB format currently is supported by a wide variety of eBook readers. As the industry standard, books you buy today in EPUB format without DRM are most likely to be supported on the widest variety of readers in the future. EBook readers that cannot read EPUB format usually read the Mobipocket format.

If you own a Kindle, the PDF and Mobipocket are your only choices. PDF will almost certainly be more difficult to read on almost every eBook than one of the other formats. PDF is designed preserve layout and font size across devices. It was neither designed to re-flow text to fit the screen of a variety of different eBook readers nor to scale fonts for easier reading.

PDF format is usually best for printing out paper copies of a book, because the original layout will be best preserved. However, the difference is not likely to be noticeable unless the book has significant graphic content. PDF can also be easy to read on a sufficiently large laptop or computer screen.

Software is available to convert between these formats and others. If your eBook reader does not support one of the above formats, we recommend the free program Calibre. Calibre prefers the Mobipocket or EPUB formats as input and can generate output in a number of other formats. Check with the documentation for your eBook reader to determine which formats it can read.

Calibre can also read and manage eBooks. If you would like to read eBooks on your PC, Mac, or Linux computer, Calibre may be a good solution.

Here are a few more details about the eBook formats offered on SacredBand.com:

EPUB (.epub)

The EPUB format is an industry standard put forward by the International Digital Publishing Forum industry trade group. It is supported by almost every new eBook reader, Kindle being the only notable exception. EPUB is likely to become the format of choice for all eBook readers except those with enough market share they can ignore the others (i.e., Kindle). Some of the eBook readers that support EPUB include recent and future Sony models, the Barnes & Noble Nook, the Apple iPad, and the Stanza software reader (available on iPhone, BlackBerry, Windows Mobile, Plam Treo & Centro, Symbian, etc.).

Adobe has extended the EPUB format to support Digital Rights Management (DRM). DRM essentially locks the book to make it readable on only one or a few devices. Most of the devices support the Adobe DRM format, but the Apple iPad uses its own proprietary DRM on top of EPUB. Documents in EPUB format without DRM should be readable on any device supporting EPUB, but those with DRM must match the manufacturers specification.

MobiPocket (.mobi)

The Mobipocket format was originally developed by a company called Mobipocket to work with their eBook reader software, available on a wide variety of current eBook platforms. It is the most commonly supported format in older devices and will likely continue to be supported for some time, due to the large amount of available content in the Mobipocket format.

Portable Document Format (.pdf)

Adobe designed the portable document format to represent documents in a form conducive to printing. The format specifies where every letter, word, and picture goes on the page, so that the document layout will look as close as possible to the original designer's intent when printed on wide variety of printers.

PDF files are readable with Adobe Reader, and other software, on just about every computing platform. PDF is the most likely format to work, and probably will look the best when printed. However, since the format was designed to preserve layout, it does not adapt well to the wide variety of screen sizes and shapes available in eBook readers, netbooks, and mobile phones. In general, your eBook reader will not be able to reflow lines and move pictures to make a PDF book easier to read on your device. That is, your eBook will probably look better on an eBook reader in either EPUB or Mobipocket format.