Kindle Troubleshooting 101: If You Can't Open Any of Your Kindle Books....

Here's the kind of situation that I tend too easily to ignore (once I have solved it) because it seems like it must be a fluke that isn't going to occur often enough to bother bringing it up here at Kindle Nation. But after I experienced it twice in my first two weeks with my new Kindle DX, two things occurred to me:

1. This is a problem that Amazon should fix so that it does not keep happening.
2. It's definitely worth passing on the "fix" in Kindle Nation so that my fellow Kindlers can avoid the feelings of panic and despair that have come over me twice now as a result of a sudden and inexplicable inability to open any of the Kindle editions aboard my Kindle DX.

Here's the problem: suddenly none of the Kindle books, periodicals or blogs that are displayed on my Kindle DX Home screen will load. When I click on any of them with the Kindle DX 5-way, a message appears on the screen telling me that the Kindle is unable to open this document and referring me to my Manage Your Kindle page at Amazon.com, via my computer, so that I can fix the problem (I wish I had made a screenshot, but alas my panic was too intense to think of such things!). I go to my Manage Your Kindle page at Amazon.com, but it tells me nothing, and everything appears to be fine with my Amazon.com account, credit cards on file, etc. I notice, meanwhile, that my Kindle does open my Personal Docs and my Audible.com audiobooks, so it seems clear that there is not a hardware problem.

I called Kindle Support at 1-866-216-1072 and it quickly became clear that

1. The problem had nothing to do with anything that I could address through my Manage My Kindle page; and
2. It is such a common problem that the the support guy to whom I was speaking was able to cut me off 10 seconds into my description of the problem to start focusing on the fix.

He said that the problem was a "file index corruption" problem that has been occurring "in a few cases," and the solution is a simple hard boot or restart of the Kindle.

So here's the simple solution, should you face the same lack of access to your Kindle library:

1. From your Kindle's Home screen, press the Menu button on the side of the Kindle.
2. From the Menu listing, use the 5-way to select "Settings."
3. From the "settings" display, press the Menu button again.
4. From the Menu listing, use the 5-way to select "Restart."
   

(You can also initiate a restart by holding the power switch to the right continuously for about 20 seconds, letting it go, then sliding it to the right again, but this takes longer and puts more wear and tear on the Kindle's few moving parts).

Your Kindle will then take about two minutes to complete a hard reboot, during most of which you will see the Amazon Kindle silhouette graphic of the figure sitting under a tree reading. A progress bar will appear on the screen about halfway through, and toward the end of the reboot you will briefly (and cruelly!) be shown a nearly empty Home screen with the words "Showing all 0 items" at the top and "Archived Items (0)" just below it.

How Many Copies Can You Download When You Buy a Kindle Book? We'll Let You Know....

“We face new situations every day and quite frankly we’ve never run into this problem before, but now that you’ve raised the issue please know that it will be addressed directly.”

Maybe.

Dan Cohen at the Geardiary.com blog goes into great detail sharing a blow-by-blow description of his difficulties getting a straight story from Amazon on several kinds of limitations that Kindle customers may face in downloading a Kindle book more than once.

From the Kindle Nation Mailbag: Another way to do higher math using the Kindle

Thanks to faithful Kindle Nation subscriber Bob for this helpful follow-up to this week's Kindle Nation post, Kindle DX Secrets: It's a Calculator!

Hi Stephen,

In your most recent Kindle Nation, you mentioned how to do basic Math on the DX. There is another way that I use on my Kindle 2 by going online.

Most folks do not know that if you go to Google and type in ANY complicated Math expression into the search bar, Google will automatically give you the answer at the top of the search list. (Google folks are heavily into Math.) You can do the same on the Kindle.

Go to Experimental, Basic Web, Bookmarks, Google. Type in 5*log(32) by using the SYM button to put in the parenthesis and the * symbols where * means multiply, and then click on search. You'll see the first result listed is 5 * log(32) = 7.52574989

If you type in 5^32 (on a calculator, the carat symbol means to perform an exponent, so this is 5 to the 32nd power),

you'll get back the answer 2.32830644 x 10 to the 22nd power.

I'm not sure how many people would use this, but it's may come in handy some day for someone.

Love the newsletter!
Sincerely,

Bob

Her Wiccan, Wiccan Freebie in the Kindle Store

Traci Hall's Wiccan yarn from Samhain Publishing, Ltd. is now free in the Kindle Store.

What can you buy for a dime in the Kindle Store?

Now selling for one thin dime in the Kindle Store, The Caliphate:

And here it is listed with 37,079 other titles that you can get for under a buck to read on your Kindle 1, Kindle 2, or Kindle DX.

Throw Out the Kindle Baby, But Keep the Bathwater

Technology blogger Mike Elgan posted a very smart piece - Elgan: Why the iPhone doesn't matter - in which he argues a strong point, much more elegantly, that I have been making since the Kindle first appeared: that the device is almost always secondary to what it connects us with. While he focuses primarily on the iPhone, he carries the point over to this smart observation about the Kindle and its baby-faced assassins:

A similar phenomenon is happening with other devices. For example, the Amazon Kindle is by far the best selling e-book reader. But the Kindle hardware device is nothing to write home about, especially the first one, which was a piece of junk. What's great about the Kindle, and the thing that makes it "better" than the Sony Reader and even better than all the color "Kindle Killers" that have been demonstrated in the past year, is the Amazon Kindle Store. Hardware doesn't matter. Network is everything.

Kindle DX Drop Tests, Intentional and Otherwise

Although I said in my Kindle DX review last week that I lacked the courage to put my new Kindle DX through any intentional drop tests, it turns out that it did not take long for such a test to occur on its own. On Saturday morning I was getting back into my car at Starbucks in Cushing Square and the DX slipped out of the makeshift holder I had improvised for it. My naked and wholly unprotected 19-ounce Kindle DX experienced a straight vertical fall of about two feet, directly onto an asphalt parking lot surface. Fortunately it landed, just as I would, on its backside. I sheepishly picked up the Kindle DX, checked for dents, cracks, or scratches, determined that it remained pristine, and placed it on the empty front passenger seat beside me.

Although I did not have time to arrange for candid video of my personal Kindle DX drop test, it may come as no surprise to you that Amazon has posted its own video: of its own Kindle DX drop test, not mine. You may view it here.