Kindle Touch owners with Audible: a warning

tomsem · 12-03-2011, 02:13 PM

If you have a linked Audible library, and have a Kindle Touch, be very careful when you are viewing and navigating your Archived Items. A single, inadvertent touch of any item shown immediately initiates download. This in itself is flawed design, since it may have mis-interpreted a swipe as a tap. There should always be confirmation requested.

This is not so much of a problem with normal content: you can simply wait a few seconds or minutes for download to complete, and then remove it. But Audible content can be very large, as much as 2-3GB, and depending on the speed of your internet connection, can take hours to download. Once download starts, The UI offers no way to cancel.

As Murphy's Law would have it, I accidentally touched Thomas Pynchon's "Against the Day", which just happens to be the largest audiobook in my library, weighing in at around 2.5GB (over 60 hours of audio).

Fortunately, I eventually discovered that a hard reset (hold power button in for 20 seconds or so) will cancel the download in progress. However by then I had wasted an hour or more trying unsuccessful methods, like hooking up to computer and deleting the '.partial' file in the Audible directory, and filling up available storage in an attempt to cause download failure, etc.

This is a serious flaw in the UI design of the Kindle-Audible integration. It is also a problem on K3/K4, but potential for trouble is higher on Kindle Touch due to the way the touch UI is wired up.

What should happen is that at least for Audible content, a dialog should pop up that shows available storage and the size of the download, asking for confirmation. And there should be a way offered in the UI to cancel downloads in general.

The other problem is that (unless this has changed recently) wireless Audible downloads to Kindle use the highest quality and therefore largest file sizes (ignoring your Audible account default). Given Kindle's somewhat limited storage capacity, the format should be the '4' instead of 'enhanced'. One could always side load the higher quality format if one wanted that.

I have complained about this several times to kindle-feedback in the past, but obviously this is a low priority issue, or it would have been fixed long ago.

VictoriaP · 12-03-2011, 02:59 PM

Yow. I was annoyed to find my Audible downloads in my Archive in the first place (they don't show on my K2), because the Kindle is the last device on earth I'd ever use for them. But the possibility of accidental download, with no ability to cancel? Ugh, that just makes it worse. FWIW, I'll send feedback today too--I'd strongly like them to add a setting so I can't see them in my Kindle archive, or at least so they can be separated from the ebooks.

Thanks for the head's up on doing a hard reset to escape the download as well!

tombielawski · 12-03-2011, 04:23 PM

Whoa! Good to know. I'm planning on upgrading to the Touch very soon.

12-03-2011, 02:13 PM	#1
tomsem Grand Sorcerer Posts: 6,468 Karma: 25996225 Join Date: Apr 2009 Location: USA Device: iPhone 15PM, Kindle Scribe, iPad mini 6, PocketBook InkPad Color 3	Kindle Touch owners with Audible: a warning If you have a linked Audible library, and have a Kindle Touch, be very careful when you are viewing and navigating your Archived Items. A single, inadvertent touch of any item shown immediately initiates download. This in itself is flawed design, since it may have mis-interpreted a swipe as a tap. There should always be confirmation requested. This is not so much of a problem with normal content: you can simply wait a few seconds or minutes for download to complete, and then remove it. But Audible content can be very large, as much as 2-3GB, and depending on the speed of your internet connection, can take hours to download. Once download starts, The UI offers no way to cancel. As Murphy's Law would have it, I accidentally touched Thomas Pynchon's "Against the Day", which just happens to be the largest audiobook in my library, weighing in at around 2.5GB (over 60 hours of audio). Fortunately, I eventually discovered that a hard reset (hold power button in for 20 seconds or so) will cancel the download in progress. However by then I had wasted an hour or more trying unsuccessful methods, like hooking up to computer and deleting the '.partial' file in the Audible directory, and filling up available storage in an attempt to cause download failure, etc. This is a serious flaw in the UI design of the Kindle-Audible integration. It is also a problem on K3/K4, but potential for trouble is higher on Kindle Touch due to the way the touch UI is wired up. What should happen is that at least for Audible content, a dialog should pop up that shows available storage and the size of the download, asking for confirmation. And there should be a way offered in the UI to cancel downloads in general. The other problem is that (unless this has changed recently) wireless Audible downloads to Kindle use the highest quality and therefore largest file sizes (ignoring your Audible account default). Given Kindle's somewhat limited storage capacity, the format should be the '4' instead of 'enhanced'. One could always side load the higher quality format if one wanted that. I have complained about this several times to kindle-feedback in the past, but obviously this is a low priority issue, or it would have been fixed long ago. Last edited by tomsem; 12-03-2011 at 02:49 PM.

Similar Threads
Thread	Thread Starter	Forum	Replies	Last Post
Touch Just a word of warning to Touch owners	distorteddisco	Kobo Reader	28	08-26-2011 12:18 PM
Touch Owners of the new Nook Simple Touch	jbcohen	Barnes & Noble NOOK	34	06-24-2011 01:16 PM
Kindle 3, Nook Simple Touch, Kobo Touch and Libra Pro Touch	jbcohen	Which one should I buy?	4	06-18-2011 07:58 PM
PRS-600 Non-responsive touch in stores, problem for owners?	del	Sony Reader	8	01-08-2010 12:44 AM
iPod Touch upgrade to 3.0 (Rant Warning)	smithno	Apple Devices	20	08-09-2009 10:34 PM

12-03-2011, 02:59 PM	#2
VictoriaP Addict Posts: 298 Karma: 491576 Join Date: Mar 2009 Device: Kindle PW2; Kindle Touch; Kindle 2; iPad Mini; iPad1	Yow. I was annoyed to find my Audible downloads in my Archive in the first place (they don't show on my K2), because the Kindle is the last device on earth I'd ever use for them. But the possibility of accidental download, with no ability to cancel? Ugh, that just makes it worse. FWIW, I'll send feedback today too--I'd strongly like them to add a setting so I can't see them in my Kindle archive, or at least so they can be separated from the ebooks. Thanks for the head's up on doing a hard reset to escape the download as well!

12-03-2011, 04:23 PM	#3
tombielawski Member Posts: 10 Karma: 20000 Join Date: Nov 2011 Device: Kindle	Whoa! Good to know. I'm planning on upgrading to the Touch very soon.

Advert