Why store your ebook collection on your ereader?

[Breid]

I am very possibly representative of a minority viewpoint on this forum, but I am puzzled by other folks' desire to store thousands of ebooks on their ereaders. I am building my collection and add all my purchases to Calibre, which I backup regularly. But I only keep my to be read books on my ereader, and as I currently have 40 titles on that shelf, I reckon that will keep me in reading material for at least a month.

I am wondering if I am a slow reader, or if other folks have a higher 'must store' threshold than mine?

[image by Abhi Sharma / flickr]

[Fluribus]

Adding and removing is a small, but persistent hassle. I would rather have the option to store them on SD.

[jgaiser]

If you've got the onboard memory, why not keep your books instantly available? Don't have every book I've ever purchased from Amazon on my readers, but I do have a great percentage.

[AnemicOak]

If there were more/better ways to organize and browse my library I'd love to keep my whole library on a device. As it stands I do keep a lot of old favorites and complete series for when the mood strikes along with a lot of my TBR, maybe 800-1,000 books total.

[DuskyRose]

Originally Posted by Breid

I am very possibly representative of a minority viewpoint on this forum, but I am puzzeled by other folks desire to store thousands of ebooks on their ereaders. I am building my collection and add all my purchases to Calibre, which I backup regularly. But I only keep my to be read books on my ereader, and as I currently have 40 titles on that shelf, I reckon that will keep me in reading material for at least a month, I am wondering if I am a slow reader, or if other folks have a higher 'must store' threshold than mine?

Firstly, because I feel that unused storage on a device is just wasted space. I paid for it, I want to use it. Which is why I get annoyed when they over promise book storage on a device. If you advertise that it can take a 32G microSD card, then the machine should be able to process the amount of files that can be fit on that space without going brain dead. First thing I do with a new ereader is to fill it up and see if it really works as advertised. So far, I've been more disappointed than not.

Secondly I also like having my total library with me. I quit picking my Next Reads ahead of time, because by the time I finish a book, unless my next one was one in the series I was reading, I've probably changed my mind. Much easier to have my library with me to indulge my whims. That's a large part of my love of reading, is my libraries and having them handy. I've had some long, unhappy dry spells I don't intend to live through again.

Third, I read a lot of fanfic. Usually I don't bother with anything smaller than 10 pages, but most are really not much more than that. The numbers can add up fast if you're collecting in a specific fandom. Depending on story size, I can easily burn through quite a few in a week even if they're large 200 pagers. One really bad night I went through 30 stories. 23 were deleted after a page or so, 5 were fairly good stories I enjoyed, and 2 were keepers I've specifically tagged so I won't delete them. No problems zapping the rest since they're all free. And I didn't have to get out of bed to hustle new ones. Still had more than plenty to chose from at any given time. I think a lot of people read stuff that wouldn't be close to a novel in size so burn through them pretty fast.

In case of emergency, they're backup. I do have a ton of backups at home, in a nice media safe, and one daily off-site backup. But having a backup with me is just part of it. I'd rather have them on my machine than on a flash drive. Sometimes, bad things happen and you're doing good to grab a purse, your kids/hubby/pet and leave your belongings to fate.

And as I said before, I've paid for the space. Leaving it empty just seems wasteful.

[cfrizz]

The reader has plenty of space to be used so I use it. That's the whole point of having that space, so you can put as many books as you want on it to have plenty to read.

[DiapDealer]

I'm in the minority too. I only ever have a handful of ebooks on my devices at any given time. I'd explain why, but I don't think it's really all that relevant to anyone but me.

[Apache]

I rarely know what I am going to read next. I carry my complete library with me for that reason.
Apache

[jersysman]

I am also in the minority. I keep only about 10% of my library on the reader at any one time. The rest are in Calibre on my PC. I do keep my entire library backed up on an external drive, on Copy.com and on an microSD card. I just haven't felt the need to put anymore on the reader.

[GoSharks]

I guess the minority isn't that much of a minority!.... I only keep 10-15 books on my device at a time, Calibre takes care of the rest.

[Ripplinger]

I originally wanted to keep my entire library on my reader, then discovered at around 1100+ books, the reader started to slow down. I keep everything well organized on my PC with Calibre and backed up to other drives and the cloud. I realized how unnecessary it was to carry every book with me and now I keep only around 300 or so on the reader. I usually have my next books to read picked out, but with that many extra, I can always change my mind too, there's still a lot of next-read choices.

[theducks]

I (now) keep my TBR books on the SD card. It has the room , so why not . I keep 2 catalogs in the Main storage. 1)My Paper Library. 2)My e-Library
But since Calibre Companion, I like that catalog view better

I am a moody reader. It is not unusual for me to have a dozen different books in progress. What I read depends on my mood at the moment.

[meeera]

I keep a couple hundred, and that's more than enough to find something that suits my mood. Each to their own, though.

[QuantumIguana]

I used to keep everything on my Kindle. Then I had to set it back to factory settings, and didn't bother to load everything again. Now, I have about 200 books on it. I used to have over 1,000 books on it.

I just don't bother to take the time to delete books, and besides, the more books I have on the device, the more options I have. I'm not always near WiFi, and I never know what I might want to read. The ability to have an entire library in my pocket was one of the selling points of the e-reader.

[speakingtohe]

I agree that if it is advertised it should work and work well. It is not that an ereader has to process all the books you have on the device every time you open a collection and it makes me a bit uneasy wondering just why they do that. A book is a file and even a rudimentary file system should be able to process hundreds of books in a collection o if they have some obscure reason for doing it. The fact that some much older readers do it with 5000 seems evidence enough that it can be done.

The reason I want a lot of books on my reader is that I read a lot. I have also been reading for a long while. Consequently I have at least 800 authors I am wanting to read that I know of. Many of these authors have written more than 50 books.

Rex Stout, for instance has written around 60, and I have read more than 40 of these. I am trying to save some for my deathbed but if I wake up at 3AM and I want to read a Rex Stout book that I possess, I don't want to stagger out of bed and turn on my computer and side load it, deal with the little tiny browser screen and download it from the library or the cloud. A well organised paper book shelf would be easier.
And I might read a typical Nero Wolf novel in an hour so would like to have another handy just in case.

Then I want to expand my horizons by reading books by authors I have not read before or on subjects I am interested in.
I try to read at least one in 5 books by an unfamiliar author. Generally I get them from the library and have a library collection. More incentive to read them if they have to be returned.

I am interested in a fair range of nonfiction. But enjoying fiction a tad more, I would seldom read books on different cultures, cognitive diseases and conditions, retirement planning, health, politics etc. if I had to make an additional effort to put them on the reader. I have them in a collection called other topics.

A lot of other reasons I have lots of books on my reader, many the same as having had lots of books on my physical bookshelves. I have had thousands of books on my bookshelves and in boxes in the basement. Sometimes I read 2-3 books a week and sometimes 2-3 a day. So I got in the habit of stockpiling books Couldn't just wander off to the library or Chapters at 3AM.

I guess it is each to their own. If you know for certain the next 6 books you want to read, why have more. Finish one or two and put on one or two.

If you want to read 10,000 book, even if impossible, and are a mood driven reader like me, you would be up and down all the time second guessing your next mood. On my Sony I have a lot of books because it is easy to browse for something different. On my Kobo's I have a lot less, because browsing is painful, so I only have tried and true authors on them.

Helen