MobileRead Forums - View Single Post - Help! DRMed books crashing the UK PRS-505 on a Mac

iCowboy · 09-14-2008, 04:04 PM

Damn! I was hoping it was nothing more than a software/hardware bug inside the Reader itself.

I’ve tried putting one of my DRMed books into an unauthorised Reader and the book is there (no crashing!), but it is listed as having just one page and can’t be opened.

The first thing to check is if your Waterstone’s book is readable inside Adobe Digital Editions on your computer. Double-click the book in the Library, it should open and give you a contents page and show the first page of the book. In my case the book opens and I can read it on the computer. The corruption is something to do with the Reader and its connection to the computer.

I don’t know if you’ll have any luck calling Sony and explaining your problem. I haven’t used Sony’s UK support, so I can’t tell you if they are at all useful in these matters. If you do get anywhere, let me know.

My other suggestion is to see if it anything to do with your AdobeID and Adobe Digital Editions. If it something about our AdobeIDs then another AdobeID shouldn't do the same thing and you could open DRMed books assigned to that ID.

If you know someone else who owns a working Reader you could always temporarily assign your Reader to their ID (see instructions below) and see if their books can be opened on your Reader. You’ll need to perform a hard reset on your Reader which erases all the data on the machine and resets any DRM on the Reader itself. The next time it is plugged into a PC running ADE, the PC will detect the Reader and authenticate it to that user’s AdobeID. Obviously, save any data you want to keep before resetting your Reader.

HUGE WARNING APPROACHING
For reasons best known to themselves Adobe have limited the number of times you can activate your Reader to six. If you try a seventh time your Reader cannot be authenticated and you’ll need to plead with Adobe Technical Support to undo the previous activations. They’re on:

http://www.adobe.com/support/digitaleditions/

But they don’t respond quickly, I’ve been waiting four days for my account to be unlocked.

RESETTING A READER
(Remember this is going to wipe your machine’s memory). If the Reader is on, slide the "Power" so that it turns off. Look for a small pinhole on the back panel and press the reset button on the back using a bent paper clip (do not use anything sharp like a pin).

Slide the "Power" button to turn it on. While the screen displays "Starting up ...", you will see the light above the "Power" button flash in yellow. Hold down the "MARK" and "VOL +" buttons.

Keep these 2 buttons pressed until the screen will show a "Reset All" message, and ask to delete all content. Press button '5' to clean up content, this could take several minutes if you have many files on the Reader. When the deletion completes, the Reader will turn off.

If the Reader can read someone else’s files then you can be fairly sure that the problem lies with the AdobeID you’ve been using to get books. If you don’t know anyone with a working Reader then the only way I can think of doing it is really quite involved. It starts by getting a new AdobeID from the Adobe site at:

https://www.adobe.com/cfusion/member...nl=1&loc=en_us

You’ll need a second email address to do this. You’ll then need to:

1) uninstall Adobe Digital Editions from your PC (or create a new user account on the PC);
2) reinstall with your new AdobeID;
3) hard reset your Reader and authenticate it using the new AdobeID;
4) create a new account at Waterstones using your alternative email address;
5) buy a book from Waterstones using your new account;
6) download it on to your Reader.
7) unplug the reader and not have it crash!

The problem here is of course that any books assigned to your old AdobeID won’t be readable on your new machine because they are assigned to different email addresses.

Hopefully, Waterstones will understand when you explain your problem and allow you to transfer books to your new account.

I’m waiting to do this just as soon as Adobe unlock my ID, but goodness knows how long this will take.

I really wish someone would tell us what is wrong with this. The problem is that we have three organisations – Sony, Adobe and Waterstones; all of whom will point the finger at someone else. Only one thing is clear – the DRM on this product is killing it as far as I’m concerned; I’ve paid a lot of money, followed all the rules and the product simply doesn’t work as advertised. Sony and Adobe have screwed up.

I’ve posted a request for help on the Adobe Digital Editions support forums, so hopefully someone there knows what to do. I’ll pass on any info I have here.

In the meantime, good luck!

Mike.

09-14-2008, 04:04 PM	#12
iCowboy Enthusiast Posts: 29 Karma: 14642 Join Date: Sep 2008 Device: Sony PRS 505	Damn! I was hoping it was nothing more than a software/hardware bug inside the Reader itself. I’ve tried putting one of my DRMed books into an unauthorised Reader and the book is there (no crashing!), but it is listed as having just one page and can’t be opened. The first thing to check is if your Waterstone’s book is readable inside Adobe Digital Editions on your computer. Double-click the book in the Library, it should open and give you a contents page and show the first page of the book. In my case the book opens and I can read it on the computer. The corruption is something to do with the Reader and its connection to the computer. I don’t know if you’ll have any luck calling Sony and explaining your problem. I haven’t used Sony’s UK support, so I can’t tell you if they are at all useful in these matters. If you do get anywhere, let me know. My other suggestion is to see if it anything to do with your AdobeID and Adobe Digital Editions. If it something about our AdobeIDs then another AdobeID shouldn't do the same thing and you could open DRMed books assigned to that ID. If you know someone else who owns a working Reader you could always temporarily assign your Reader to their ID (see instructions below) and see if their books can be opened on your Reader. You’ll need to perform a hard reset on your Reader which erases all the data on the machine and resets any DRM on the Reader itself. The next time it is plugged into a PC running ADE, the PC will detect the Reader and authenticate it to that user’s AdobeID. Obviously, save any data you want to keep before resetting your Reader. HUGE WARNING APPROACHING For reasons best known to themselves Adobe have limited the number of times you can activate your Reader to six. If you try a seventh time your Reader cannot be authenticated and you’ll need to plead with Adobe Technical Support to undo the previous activations. They’re on: http://www.adobe.com/support/digitaleditions/ But they don’t respond quickly, I’ve been waiting four days for my account to be unlocked. RESETTING A READER (Remember this is going to wipe your machine’s memory). If the Reader is on, slide the "Power" so that it turns off. Look for a small pinhole on the back panel and press the reset button on the back using a bent paper clip (do not use anything sharp like a pin). Slide the "Power" button to turn it on. While the screen displays "Starting up ...", you will see the light above the "Power" button flash in yellow. Hold down the "MARK" and "VOL +" buttons. Keep these 2 buttons pressed until the screen will show a "Reset All" message, and ask to delete all content. Press button '5' to clean up content, this could take several minutes if you have many files on the Reader. When the deletion completes, the Reader will turn off. If the Reader can read someone else’s files then you can be fairly sure that the problem lies with the AdobeID you’ve been using to get books. If you don’t know anyone with a working Reader then the only way I can think of doing it is really quite involved. It starts by getting a new AdobeID from the Adobe site at: https://www.adobe.com/cfusion/member...nl=1&loc=en_us You’ll need a second email address to do this. You’ll then need to: 1) uninstall Adobe Digital Editions from your PC (or create a new user account on the PC); 2) reinstall with your new AdobeID; 3) hard reset your Reader and authenticate it using the new AdobeID; 4) create a new account at Waterstones using your alternative email address; 5) buy a book from Waterstones using your new account; 6) download it on to your Reader. 7) unplug the reader and not have it crash! The problem here is of course that any books assigned to your old AdobeID won’t be readable on your new machine because they are assigned to different email addresses. Hopefully, Waterstones will understand when you explain your problem and allow you to transfer books to your new account. I’m waiting to do this just as soon as Adobe unlock my ID, but goodness knows how long this will take. I really wish someone would tell us what is wrong with this. The problem is that we have three organisations – Sony, Adobe and Waterstones; all of whom will point the finger at someone else. Only one thing is clear – the DRM on this product is killing it as far as I’m concerned; I’ve paid a lot of money, followed all the rules and the product simply doesn’t work as advertised. Sony and Adobe have screwed up. I’ve posted a request for help on the Adobe Digital Editions support forums, so hopefully someone there knows what to do. I’ll pass on any info I have here. In the meantime, good luck! Mike.