I'm getting a Nook Tablet, OMG

May 14, 2012 1:38 AM

I'm getting Nook Tablet! Woohoo Mother's Day!

I want free stuff. I didn't get an iPad because it costs. How do I maximize free stuff on my new toy?

I want to just hang out in the living room instead of living in the "dining room" with my PC. Email and text documents are a plus.

I have some FaceBook games that I like.

posted by lilywing13 to technology (15 answers total)

There's the Baen Free Library for sci-fi and fantasy; also, thefifthimperium.com has downloadables of a TON of SF/Fantasy books, with the publisher's blessings.

You can probably also find a ton of free books on Barnes and Noble's website, likely similar to the Kindle Store on Amazon.
posted by Heretical at 2:03 AM on May 14, 2012

If your ethics are a bit more flexible, the options expand quite dramatically. Honestly if you just google Title + PDF or Author + PDF you'll get a link to download something nine times out of ten. Sometimes you have to hunt a bit, but most of the time you will luck out in the first few links.
posted by Chekhovian at 3:57 AM on May 14, 2012

Project Gutenberg has thousands of free ebooks available for download.
posted by Telpethoron at 5:54 AM on May 14, 2012

Just remember that the internal memory only has 1GB for anything not "bought" through the Nook store. I got a 16GB card because of that and my comic books I want to read on there. But really, 1GB will get you a ton of stuff on there. I had somewhere around 60-80 comics and Reddit's 100 Favorite Book selection plus a bunch of other things before I got the card. So you'll be fine without one.

As for recommendations, ManyBooks has a good amount of stuff too.
posted by theichibun at 5:57 AM on May 14, 2012

You can take your tablet into a B&N and get the memory repartitioned to hold more sideloaded material. I wouldn't do that, because apps are the one thing you cannot sideload, but if you don't want to shell out for a memory card, it's an option.
posted by BibiRose at 6:27 AM on May 14, 2012

B&N's Nook Blog gives out a single free book every Friday. They really try to appeal to every possible taste over the year, so the selection is wide-ranging.
posted by Runes at 6:42 AM on May 14, 2012

Looking at your question again-- email is fine on the nook as long as you don't mind typing on a touch screen. It is really easy to use websites. I have a black and white nook for reading, and never expected to get much use from the color nook I sort of inherited, but I wind up grabbing the color nook all the time for websites. Using the nook for text documents is not my cup of tea-- I really need a keyboard-- but a friend of mine uses one of the office-y apps and loves it.

I also get a lot of use out of the public library ebooks. This has become so popular that when you request a book you'll be like 50th on the list, but most people ignore the email telling them the book is theirs, so it really only takes a few weeks. I wouldn't do it with anything time-sensitive but if you just want a steady stream of, say, mysteries, you can make a wish list and then request another every so often.
posted by BibiRose at 6:54 AM on May 14, 2012

Your local library system more likely than not offers e-pubs loans. You can't count on them having everything in the e-pub version and if it's like my library system more times than not, if the book is the least bit popular and relatively new, you'll have to get on a waiting list, but it's a legal option for newer titles. If your local library doesn't have ebooks, you can buy a library card from some big systems for a yearly fee. For example get an out of state library card from the Philadelphia Free Public Library for $35.00 (it used to only be $15.00). One caveat with the borrowing e-pubs from your library. Typically you can't renew. Not a big deal for me in general because I'm a quick reader, but I'm currently trying to race through Haruki Murakami's IQ84 (900 pages) before the due date when it will disappear from my kindle.
posted by kaybdc at 6:58 AM on May 14, 2012

lilywing13: "How do I maximize free stuff on my new toy?"

If you want to maximize the utility of the device, you really need to root it. (important note here

Rooting the tablet gets you access to the Android marketplace, while retaining all the B&N specific stuff. It's a no-brainer if you're seeking to maximize utility.
posted by namewithoutwords at 7:02 AM on May 14, 2012

My Nook Color has been my pet project for a little more than a year now, and I think you'll be pleased. Even if you do nothing but play with the tablet, browse the web and read books, it's a great device.

That being said, I'm a big proponent of 'dual booting' your nook. Basically, you can install an OS to an SD card, put in the card, reboot the device. When it comes back up, it will boot from the OS on the card instead of the internal memory. The two biggest options are CM7 and CM9 (CyanogenMod Gingerbread and Ice Cream Sandwich respectively).

Why?

Well, because you're probably going to want to go back to stock at some point and/or start over. You probably don't want to void your warranty. You might be worried about bricking your new tool.

If anything doesn't work, you just remove the SD card, reboot, and you're back to factory stock. I've tried rooted stock, installing to the internal memory (EMMC) and booting from SD card and I like the flexibility of running from a card.

Couple of quick notes from many wasted hours reading forum threads and testing. Buy a Sandisk class 2 or 4 8GB card (16 if you must but you probably won't need the space) and a little USB adapter so you can read/write it. For random non-sequential read/write, it's the best out there. (class 8 or 10 is great if you've got a camera writing large sequential blocks, but optimized all wrong for running an OS in your pocket!)

Second, don't panic. Do some reading, memail me, or make some posts on the Q&A section over at XDA.

For a peek at what you'd be getting yourself into, check out this thread. If that seems overwhelming, then don't sweat it, just enjoy your Nook!

http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1528625
posted by envygreen at 10:34 AM on May 14, 2012 [1 favorite]

Oh, forgot to mention one cool thing about running CM7 or 9! On my nook, I run the B&N Nook reader app, as well as the Amazon app so I have access to more than one market when shopping for books.
posted by envygreen at 10:36 AM on May 14, 2012

My nook and I have a bit of a storied history. I've rooted and rom'd about 5 android devices (including the nook) and the nook is by FAR the most difficult to conquer, but it's also the hardest to kill. I do not recommend you try it if you're not at least pretty computer savvy.

That said, if you want even 50% of the functionality of what the device is capable of, you're going to want to root it (and probably rom it) so you can get the android market.

I actually made a wall mount for mine and it's my uber-nerdy-room utility tool. Over night, it's slid into its mount and it automatically loads the Kaloer Clock app at about 8:30pm, in night mode. (Kaloer is one of a million alarm clock apps. I adore it because I can dim it super low and even though the digits are 3 inches tall it doesn't keep me up or cast any light into the room.) Then at 6:30 it wakes us up. Then at 6:35 it closes Kaloer and opens the Weather Channel App (not the prettiest, but I can make it remember to show me the hourly forcast for the day.) Then at 6:45 it closes that and takes me back to the home screen and shows me my agenda for the day. (I can make it do any of this manually, this is just the automatic schedule.) Then, because there is a bug in CM7 regarding how to force the screen to turn off, at 7 it says, out loud, "Please Turn Me Off", and I press a button on the screen that shuts off the display.

Sometimes at night I slide it out and watch some TV or play some silly game or something. I don't read on it because I have a kindle, and the e-ink seriously trumps the color screen in every possible way for reading.
posted by TomMelee at 11:12 AM on May 14, 2012

Thanks for the responses! I work in IT, so I'm not too scared of "dual booting" it. I definitely appreciate the safety of being able to just pull the card and have it return to factory.

Some of my work colleagues have iPads and Kindles, so we're all interested to check out the similarities and differences.

Thanks again! I'm like a kid waiting for Xmas right now.
posted by lilywing13 at 8:45 PM on May 14, 2012

Oh, great then. I personally recommend repartitioning it if you get a "blue dot" nook, feel free to bug me if you run into issues. (I ran into issues, and I *never* run into issues.)
posted by TomMelee at 5:53 AM on May 15, 2012

Posting this from my nook. I finally got it in my hands 2 days ago. The first one that arrived was an 8GB delivered by mistake. Funny story, but too long for this keyboard.

Been learning the touchpad, as I've never really used one, playing around, and learning about this little Star Trek gadget.

Thanks again!
posted by lilywing13 at 2:03 AM on May 26, 2012