My kobo just wiped itself. Firmware 3.12
 

My Kobo just wiped itself. It was on 3.12 (I religiously update) and I've been using it for a long time without the slightest problem, but just now in the holiday season, when I'm away of my pc and my collection of epub backups (the real collection resided on the kobo, of course), it decided to go berserk on me. I plugged it in to charge, and when I came back a couple of hours later, it displayed the 'connect me to a computer' screen (no computer handy, of course)...

Any ideas what might have caused this? I know I can never trust the bloody thing again, all my books are gone...

I'm so pissed of!

Have any of you had this problem before, and if you have, what did you do about it (to live with this happening again in the future, for instance)? Keep a 'Calibre' library ready for just in case?

:thanks::help:

Some chargers are wired so Kobo reader thinks it is connected to a computer dislaying "charge or sync?" screen. The one I had with this problem I always selected charge then no problem. You might have lost power long enough to trigger this screen while away. My charger listed for Motorola phone does not cause "charge or sync?" screen to display. The charger that caused the "charge or sync?" screen to display would not charge my old Motorolla flip phone because it wanted to scync with a computer.

As a preventative measure, on our vacations my husband and I each take 2 Kobos, one as backup. The first time I traveled with my Kobo I realized that I had a single point of failure. (I was on a trip where the purpose was rest and relaxation, and reading as many books as I could) It could get lost, stolen, fall in the pool, damaged by sand, etc. Of course my new H2O alleviates some of that concern!

I bought my Sony PRST1 mainly as backup to my Kobo Touch reader. It was easy to load my Epubs without DRM. I wanted to try a Sony ereader because owners were always saying they are the best. Sony eliminating excess stock with 1/2 price sale as PRST2 was available really clinched the purchase. Bought 2 more for my sisters. Having Sony reader, 2 Kobo Wifi readers and 1 Kobo Touch reader at that time prevented worries about bad Kobo updates.

I know I've seen one spurious reset (or at least spurious setup prompt). That happened about two weeks ago on my Glo. From what I can tell though, the database itself was still present; I believe what had happened was the configuration file was corrupted, and this caused the device to reprompt me for setup.

Post setup, all books were back in place. I only use side-loaded ePubs.

When I first got my Glo, it locked up a few times in the first few days for no reason and the only way out was to do a factory reset. Since I read a lot out of the house, my safety net is to have about 500 books on a micro SD card which I have stashed safely in my purse, takes up virtually no room at all. That way I will always have books to read no matter what.

When traveling where I'm away for even a few days, I usually also have my netbook with me which includes my full Calibre library and a USB cable in case I need to transfer books back over to the reader.

Of course since I've started doing this so I can still read (short of losing or breaking the reader), my Glo hasn't locked up and needed a factory reset since then.

I should add that I never use the added storage of the SD card in the reader, I find keeping around 500 books on the reader at any time is more than enough.

I may have made things worse by doing a reset of my own (the pinhole) when I couldn't get wifi setup to work, before checking whether my side loaded books were still on the kobo.
Would my side loaded books (main memory) have been deleted by the pinhole reset? And what if they had been on an SD card?

.... removed

This is too weird. I was sure my Glo had nowhere to insert an SD card? Was there a newer (or older) version which did?

All Kobo ereaders have had the ability for external storage, older models (Original and WiFi) the full size SD card, all others a micro SD card.

Is it in a cover which blocks the SD card - the Gecko Slimfit cover does this for example.

BobC

Page 6 of this user manual for the Glo shows the location of the micro SD slot, at the lower left side of the reader.

A pinhole reset on its own won't wipe either the main or SD memory. What will, though, is accidentally pressing the "light" button when switching on. I did a complete factory reset when this happened to me (sticking "light" button caused by the cover I was using at the time).

BobC

Nothing should wipe the SD card. A factory reset, firmware upgrade, pinhole reset, power off and on should leave it intact. People like to recommend removing it when doing an upgrade or factory reset, but I never remember to until it has already started rebooting and I have never lost anything off the card.

Thanks. Clearly, I was just too happy to read with a frontlight to even look. What a dope I am.