Unlike the Kindle DX, the Kindle 2 cannot read native documents like PDF or Word. But this is also a blessing in disguise because you can convert your personal documents to Kindle format and then take plenty of notes on them or create bookmarks to your heart’s content. Native PDF support on the Kindle DX does not support note taking and text zooming, which are missing features that I consider as a major drawback.
If you are on PC, you can use the MobiPocket Creator for converting your PDFs to Kindle format. Mac users can use an application called Stanza.
While the above two tools do a good job, they have one major drawback. They covert the documents with Header and Footer text intact, which means you will find lot of junk thrown all over your document. These headers and footers will appear in random places since the page size on a Kindle will differ from the page size of the PDF document (Typically A4 or Letter). This reduces the readability of the document dramatically.
The solution? Use Amazon’s conversion itself. It costs a little bit of money (at 10 cents per document), but it is really worth it since it does an intelligent conversion by stripping off headers/footers and also the images do appear in correct places unlike the desktop converters. You can also get the same service free by emailing the document to your kindle address with a ‘free’ prefix, in which case, the document is returned to your email address from where you have to copy to your Kindle 2 device manually. This email address is <yourkindleemail>@free.kindle.com.
If anyone knows a desktop converter (Mac or PC) which can strip off headers and footers from office or PDF documents, please leave a comment below. Thanks!
