The Amazon Kindle is possibly the best known and most widely used electronic book. At Amazon we can find many types of Kindle devices, with prices for all budgets. That and the huge e-book store that the online sales giant has are enough for most users to opt for these devices when purchasing an e-book. However, Kindle devices also have their limitations. And one of the most important is that they do not have the capacity to read ebooks in ePub format , one of the best known of those that are handled by the network.
But don't worry, it is a problem that has a solution. Also, it is a fairly simple solution. Kindle devices are compatible with the AZW format, an Amazon exclusive format, as well as the MOBI format. So if we want to read files in the ePub format on the Kindle, we will have to convert them to one of the two formats compatible with the Amazon device .
Caliber, a free application to convert ePub files into Mobi
To convert the ePub files into Mobi we need a computer and the free Caliber application. It is available for Windows, MAC and Linux, so we can use it no matter what computer we have.
Once downloaded, we will have to install the application. In the installation process, the application asks us for a location for the books. In this directory the books will be copied when we add them to Caliber, so they recommend us to use an empty folder to create our library . Also in the installation process we must tell Caliber which electronic book reader we have.
After installation, you will find an interface like the one you can see in the image above. It is a fairly complete interface, since Caliber has been designed to keep track of our entire e-book library .
So the first thing we will have to do to transform the ebook from one format to another is add it to the Caliber library . To do this, click on "Add books" and select the option "Add books from a single directory" if we only want to add a book or "Add directories and subdirectories" if we want to add all the books in a folder.
Once we have added the book or books that we want, we choose the book we want to convert and click on the "Convert books" option . This will open a new window with numerous options to adjust the data and the format of the new file that we are going to create.
What matters most to us, at the moment, is the output format. We can select it from the drop-down menu that we have located in the upper right corner. We must make sure that in "Output format" we have "MOBI" . It is also interesting to enter the "Page Configuration" option and select the device with which we are going to read the book. Once selected, click on Accept at the bottom of the screen.
The application will start the conversion process. We will see it in the lower right part of the screen. Once finished, we will right-click on the book in question and select the option "Open container folder" . It will be in this folder where we will have the book in MOBI format.
The last step will be to connect the Kindle to our computer and transfer the book in MOBI format to the device , copying it from the computer and pasting it in the folder. Another option is to do it directly from the Caliber application if our Kindle is compatible.
From the Caliber application we can also convert the books to the AZW format . Theoretically, the book covers should be kept in this format, something that doesn't happen with the MOBI format. However, we have tried a couple of titles but have not succeeded in getting the cover to transfer to the Kindle. It may be a failure of our model.