Aura HD Warning: Android OS kills your HD. Mine is dead

[jshzh]

I thought I could give it a try since if the android didn't work, I could still use the power button alone and get into the nickle. Unfortunately, I was wrong.

I followed step by step the instructions on Angor's blog. Not to blame him for sure! I decided to take the risk without necessary knowledge and experience. Just a warning for others who are tempted.

At first the Kobo nickle still worked after the treatment. Then I tried pressing the light button and then the power button, nothing happened or the nickle started. I thought I might not press them the right way so tried a few times. The device is useless since then. It does not power up, the light does not turn on - not when I use the power button alone, not when I use the combination of both light and power buttons, not when I connect it to the computer with USB.

I am expecting the worst scenario. Any advices are welcome. I did back up the internal system on the sd card but not sure it will help at all. The SD card partition looks exactly as it should be. With a 32G card, I rearranged the sizes, the order of the partitions are the same as that is the image. Only the KOBO 32FAT is larger.

And a lesson for others: don't try it. It could be because I did something wrong - guess I don't know how to press buttons! Or the new kobo firmware does not work with the modification? I have no idea.

Update: since the device was "dead", I started to abuse the two buttons and magically turned it on. However, no luck with android, which never starts. I watched 3:09-3:17 of this video many times but still can't get it work. Following another blog: I press the light button and hold it, then move the power slide, when the write light is on, I release the power button. According to the tutorial, the light should turn red - I should release the light button - then the light turn green and android will be started. The light on my device never turns red.

[Ken Maltby]

I don't know if there is one, but there should have been an "uninstall" KoboRoot.tgz that would remove the startup changes that check the external uSD card.

You could just try doing a sideload of whatever firmware you want, probably whatever the current one is. It will likely rewrite the startup code. (If you are using KSM be sure when you "Handle update" that you do the full update, not the partial update. You will have to reinstall KSM.)

Luck;
Ken

PS; I could be wrong but I don't think the AuraHD LED is a tricolor LED, I have only seen a white light from it.

[PeterT]

One thing I think people need to be careful of is knowing WHAT version of Kobo f/w a given modification was developed for. Items like scripts DO change as Kobo evolves and willy-nilly replacement of scripts can be risky (especially if the modification includes an uninstall option).

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by jshzh

I am expecting the worst scenario. Any advices are welcome. I did back up the internal system on the sd card but not sure it will help at all. The SD card partition looks exactly as it should be. With a 32G card, I rearranged the sizes, the order of the partitions are the same as that is the image. Only the KOBO 32FAT is larger.

There is more in the card than just the three partitions. The uBoot and uImage files are written to other parts of the card and this is what is used to start the boot. Was you backup of the card an image of the card or something else? If it was an image, have you tried restoring it to the card? If it isn't an image, an image can be supplied. Either way should get the device working again. At least to use the Kobo firmware.

[jshzh]

Thank you, Ken, Peter, and David. I decided to give the SD card another chance before a factory reset. The android finally got booted. I am guessing the possible reasons for the previous failure may be:

1) I used the card reader/slot on PC for making the image instead of using a USB card reader.
2) I might have resized the partitions incorrectly. This time I didn't resize the card and put it into kobo right after the image was created.

I read Angor's guide a few times but I am not sure if I got it right. It reads like this:

"You can use micro SD card up to 32GB, you only need to move the last two partitions to the end of the card and extend the first partition. "

After the image was written into the card, there are 5 parts there: 30M unallocated/kobo fat32/android data/Android system/unallocated space. After moving the android data and system to the end of the card. There are 3 parts before them. 30M unallocated/Kobo fat32/unallocated. Should I turn these 3 into one or should I combine the second and third only? It may seem obvious to people who know programming. But I couldn't get a clue from what I have read. In another article on android on glo the author said the first unallocated space 15M (in the glo image) should always be there for android to start. Some other comment on Angor's blog seemed to imply that all the first 3 should merge. I will wait for your insight on this issue. So, 1) should there be 3 or 4 parts on the 32G sd card after resizing? 2) if there has to be unallocated space before the 3 main partitions, does its size matter? 30M (as in the image) or more, or exactly 30M?

@Ken, I got the 3 color idea from the author on android on glo. Probably the Glo LED turns read and then green when the light button is pushed. The LED on HD is only white.

As to the actual experience of android on the HD, it works fine. Some Russian language does help while setting up - otherwise one could be scared away by the keyboard. I only tried Greader to read news articles from a few websites. The E-ink display is not optimized for reading because it is a rendering of colored webpages so letters show different shades of grey, instead of black. Night reading mode looks better. The front light couldn't be set under around 15%. Below that, the light will just turn off. The system also consumes more battery.

Thanks

[jshzh]

BTW, to avoid complication, I installed only coolreader and koreader under KOBO OS, not the KSM.
I was forced to use USB card reader after my PC card reader suddenly stopped working, then the hard drive in an old new netbook (probably used less than 200 hours) mysteriously started to make loud noise and failed. That card reader turned useless too.
Not sure how long I will keep the android system. It may be more useful for people who read comic books with some apps. Greader does allow you to download whole articles in different modes while sync with websites so there is no need to keep the wifi on all the time. It would be very pleasant reading experience if there is an app to turn all words into the same dark black instead of grey.

[jshzh]

Since the android started to work properly, I tried to resize the partitions. Unfortunately, when I inserted the card in a usb adapter, the disk showed up in My Computer but Windows 7 asked me to format the disk before using it. I ignored the message and opened the Partition Wizard. The entire disk showed as unallocated and 0% used. There seems no way for me to resize the partitions. What can I do? Thank you.

[PeterT]

See https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=209122 for info on resizing partitions. While it's from a thread on how to upgrade the SD card on a Glo, the same techniques will work for any of the SD card based Kobo devices.