[Rizla]

I've had several e-pubs that freak out my e-reader. I generally use a Sony 650. Basically epubs can very easily crash an e-reader. I've often wondered why, but I haven't bothered to go to the lengths you did to isolate the problem. I find it much easier to convert to mobi and back to epub. That almost always fixes the problem. If that fails I convert to txt then back to epub. I've only ever had one occasion where that didn't fix it, God nows how as a txt should be stripped of almost all formatting.

Epubs are pretty advanced and easily make e-readers hiccup. Lits are even worse, and I presume that is because epubs are based on them.

I appreciate with highly formatted / indented texts like code, that may not work. But then again, it probably would. I suppose the code just uses a lot of tabs / indenting.

I laud your thoroughness, but I think the above approach is a much easier way to deal with the problem.

Incidentally, there is the option in Calibre to remove all formatting information. You might try that too. I do think returning your T2 was a bit drastic, though I concur that the new Sonys can sometimes be a bit flaky.