New Firmware Released
 

I just checked the Bookeen Blog site, and saw that they released the new firmware this morning. May 7th, 2008.

Their release notes:


What's New
Improvement: new button management (faster and buffered key detection).
Improvement: new event management (previous versions could miss events).
Improvement: reduced power consumption.
Improvement: Table support in Mobipocket files.
Bug fix: large covers in PRC files.
Bug fix: Asian characters are now displayed properly in PRC files.
Bug fix: PDF viewer memory management (to be continued).
Bug fix: TrueType font detection (“Fonts” directory).
Bug fix: various user interface items (to be continued).
Bug fix: detection of MP3 playback frequencies.
New: in the “Library”, a lock symbol is visible when a read-only SD card is inserted.

How to Download

Download the upgrade file by clicking on the "Download" button.
Extract the content of the downloaded zip file.
You should get a file “update_kernel”; this is the firmware upgrade utility.
Copy the file “update_kernel” to the root of an SD card.

How to Install

Make sure your Cybook has enough power to operate.
Switch off your device.
Insert the card into your Cybook.
Switch on your device.
When the boot image is visible (Cybook & Bookeen logotypes), press the “Enter” key and keep it pressed for a few seconds until the screen flashes.
When the screen flashes, you can depress the key; the upgrade process is launched.
Only the needed sections are updated. The upgrade should complete after a couple of minutes.
When the upgrade is completed, the Cybook starts normally.
Delete the file “update_kernel” from the SD card and from your computer. This file will not be useful anymore.
Congratulations! Your Cybook has been upgraded with software version 1.1.

What's Next

New directory view.
Improved Mobipocket, PDF, HTML & TXT support.
New user interface features.
User interface translations.

__________________________________________________ _

Very dissapointing, the main item I was looking for, a new libray views is not included in this release.

Cybook Gen3 Firmware Upgrade
Version 1.1 (Build 685)

The first Cybook Gen3 firmware upgrade is now available.

What's New

• Improvement: new button management (faster and buffered key detection).
• Improvement: new event management (previous versions could miss events).
• Improvement: reduced power consumption.
• Improvement: Table support in Mobipocket files.
• Bug fix: large covers in PRC files.
• Bug fix: Asian characters are now displayed properly in PRC files.
• Bug fix: PDF viewer memory management (to be continued).
• Bug fix: TrueType font detection (“Fonts” directory).
• Bug fix: various user interface items (to be continued).
• Bug fix: detection of MP3 playback frequencies.
• New: in the “Library”, a lock symbol is visible when a read-only SD card is inserted.

everybody else is posting the list of features, i thought i would too. :wink:

....so has anyone been brave enough to try the upgrade?

-Jeff

I guess I am a bit chicken.... I am going to wait a little bit until my gurus.. (delphi96 and HarryT) tell me that it is safe...

Regards


Georges

I take it that page numbers aren't one of the things included... *disappointed* :(

It does make me wonder who they have developing this thing. This is not that awe inspiring a list of features considering that it is six months after the initial release.

I was really hoping for some more tangible improvements in user interface. Although if it fixes the periodic lost place in a book, maybe it will be ok.

Michael

Anyone counting the new threads? I think we'll end up having somewhere between 7 and 15 of them...

OK,

I took the plunge and installed the new firmware. Obviously, I have only used it for a few minutes now, so I can't really say much about it.

However, I can report that I successfully installed it. Also, once it was installed I had no problem returning to the book I was currently reading -- at the correct place in that book.

It's hard to see what is different. The menu's and layout look the same, but I guess I could be overlooking something.

I have seen one positive feature. If you hold down the next page button, it will continue to 'turn' pages. This certainly makes it faster when you need to move forward a couple of pages. It turns fast enough that you really can't skim the pages as it turns. So it works if you know you need to move ahead by a specific number of pages, but its not quite perfect if you aren't sure how many pages you need to turn.

Michael

I'm running the update even as I write this. It's apparently about 40% - no 55% - done. Shouldn't be too long...

Oh darn. I forgot it goes through the progress bar several times... Still waiting...

Okay, it's switched to the small-logo with three dots screen...

Waiting...

And Library is up!

Okay. Contextual Menu (when in Library mode) still shows the choice of 5, 10 and 20 titles per page. It still shows Sort, Filter and Show File Formats. And it's got Advanced.

Under Sort, I get, "Sort By: Title, File Size, File Date, File Name and File Path." No major changes there.

Under "Filter" I still get the choices of: "Hide eBooks, Hide Images, Hide Music and Show All(default)." Again, no surprises there.

When I select "Show File Formats" it toggles between showing the file extension and not. Still no changes.

Under "Advanced" the menu choices are the same. Under "Advanced|Languages..." I get: the choices of "English" and "Francais". Under "Advanced|About", the About dialog box is the same except for the various copyright lines and the Boo Reader version line.


So far, I've not seen any improvements.



When I get into an ebook, I must say that my first desire was to see if any changes had been made in the "Layout" menu. So I went there. Or rather, I tried. It took me three attempts. (I first thought I was being fumble-fingered in my navigation control usage back at the Library, but I'm finding out it's the update.) The first two attempts I accidentally brushed the central button, causing me to accidentally "choose" the wrong option. Damn. This new update is seriously more "sensitive" to accidental touches. After having trained myself to press very firmly under the older firmware, I'm just too heavy-handed right now...

More later.

Derek

Oh yeah. I *did* get into the "Layout" menu. No new features. And as I don't use PDF, or for that matter MP3s, those changes are pretty much useless to me. :( Haven't seen the need for a "Locked SD" symbol for my SD card - but I guess it's something someone would have wanted.

I've installed it. Things still look the same, but it does seem to be zippier.

Well... CRAP!
 

My built-in media card reader just crapped out!!! I mean, it was like, working fine to move the update_kernel to the SD card and when I went to remove the SD card from the Cybook and return it to the card reader, the SD card didn't get recognized. So I pulled my CF card from my dSLR and tried it. That wasn't recognized either - not even a flicker of the green LED when I inserted either of those or of one of my spare SD cards. DOA!

Crap!

:smack::smack::smack:

Oh, f***ing wait! I've been letting Micro-cowpattie do a "security update" in the background while doing all this!!! F**K! F**K! F**K! I loathe Micro-crap!

Derek

Support for tables in MP books is excellent news. That will allow those of us who create books to do some much nicer things.