Also, Amazon has announced plans for "later this year" to support EPUB books, so that the Kindle will be compatible with the most popular format for library lending. (I'm presuming that this will be pushed out to current Kindles in a firmware update.)Tinderbox (UK) said:
Hmm...good question. The original press release makes no mention of the ePub format, just that Amazon is working with Overdrive to provide e-book lending. Now I'm wondering where I heard anything specific about ePub, or if I or someone else that I read has jumped to a conclusion.jmiked said:
You can use Word or Open Office (free) to convert them to .doc and then e-mail them as attachments to your kindle address. Then for about fifteen cents a pop they'll appear on your kindle with almost no effort.Birdman28 said:
Ok, I do have the calibre software someone mentioned so i guess i could convert them to mobi files. But you mention sending the .doc files as e-mail attachments. This I read somewhere that people are charged everytime you do this, so if I have the files in .doc or .txt or convert them into .mobi, can't I just transfer them onto the kindle just using the usb cable? I would rather just do that instead of paying all the time to use the e-mail system.A.D. Bloom said:
You are charged if it is sent over the 3G network to your Kindle; but you can get it for free by sending it to the "free" email address, in which case you can manually download it via a web link and then onto your Kindle via USB, or if you have a WiFi capable Kindle (all the "3" models) and an available WiFi connection, it can download it directly, still for free. In other words, it only costs you if you use the 3G cell phone network for the download, not if you use the Internet.Birdman28 said:
Ok thanks for explaining that. So if I understood correctly, emailing them using the free email works. And if I already have some books on my computer, I just transfer them directly to the Kindle using the usb cable? (as long as I put them in the right folder on the kindle)NogDog said:
If they are in .txt format, I recall that you can just copy them over to the Kindle via USB.Birdman28 said:
Various people have suggested various ways of doing the conversion: they are all right, and you could use any of those methods.Birdman28 said:
R summary: use calibre! 
Well. . . .no.Franklin Eddy said:
I've never used it. It is certainly very helpful for some things -- format conversion, even library organization, metadata adjustment. But it's not essential; you can use your Kindle quite happily without ever having heard of it. I know people like that. And some who have looked at it find it way more complicated than they need and just not worth the trouble. So, NOT essential for everyone -- though, again, many people do find it indispensable. 
Or, assuming there's no DRM, you can probably have Amazon do the conversion for you. In all cases, the better the quality of the original -- the better the resulting converted document.
