Original "Simple" debricking methods for K5-Touch, K4-Mini, & K3-Keyboard

[zkat]

I'm having battery issues as well. I left the kindle charging on a wall charger overnight, but now I just get the low battery screen no matter what.

When I use the mfgtool, it can successfully detect the connected device as an "HID-compliant device", and when I try to go into either diags or fastboot mode, the progress bar completes and my screen blinks, but it comes right back to the low battery screen, and MfgTool says "Please connect device." until I hard-reboot the kindle again.

If I try to switch to fastboot mode and use yifanlu's kindle fastboot tool, it just hangs on < waiting for device >. Any clues? Is the battery dead, or am I misunderstanding the steps?

[geekmaster]

Originally Posted by zkat

I'm having battery issues as well. I left the kindle charging on a wall charger overnight, but now I just get the low battery screen no matter what.

When I use the mfgtool, it can successfully detect the connected device as an "HID-compliant device", and when I try to go into either diags or fastboot mode, the progress bar completes and my screen blinks, but it comes right back to the low battery screen, and MfgTool says "Please connect device." until I hard-reboot the kindle again.

If I try to switch to fastboot mode and use yifanlu's kindle fastboot tool, it just hangs on < waiting for device >. Any clues? Is the battery dead, or am I misunderstanding the steps?

WHAT progress bar? If it is the normal starup progress bar, that is main bootmode. Fastboot mode does not change the screen at all, and diags mode goes directly from the "kindle tree" screen to the diags menu with NO PROGRESS BAR.

I cannot know the status of your kindle or how to proceed without more information...

I need to know WHICH progress bar (main system partition startup, or firmware update) that you see. If it is an UPDATE progress bar, then your USB drive has a ".bin" file on that it is trying to install. If it is a NORMAL progress bar (on the "Kindle Tree" screen) -- that is the main startup screen (not diags or fastboot).

[zkat]

Sorry, I was talking about the progress bar in the *mfgtool*, not the one on the kindle. There's no progress bar on the kindle itself, just the blow battery screen.

[geekmaster]

How do you know you still have a low battery? That warning screen is left over from when a low battery was detected during startup. MfgTool and fastboot mode do not write to the screen.

<waiting for device> in fastboot could be caused if you have USB problems. You could try a different USB cable, or a different USB port, or a different computer.

If your host PC USB ports are working correctly, you should be able to see the kindle (or USB HID device) VID/PID in device manager property details for that device. In linux, you can use "lsusb" to see attached USB devices. The VID is 0x15a2 for freescale (the CPU SoC manufacturer) or 0x1949 (lab126, the kindle manufacturer). The PID (second number) depends on which mode the kindle is in.

If the MfgTool does not complete, it is usually a low battery condition. It would not start if it did not see a kindle in USB Recovery mode, and it would complete if the battery was charged enough.

A worst-case situation if your battery refuses to charge, is that you could connect to the serial port in the kindle and change to fastboot mode to see the battery charging messages fastboot sends to the serial port. Although unlikely, it *is* possible that your battery is damaged and will not charge, because a bricked kindle can severely deplete the battery.

Do not give up. If you just cannot get the battery to charge (do not trust the LED), try the serial port to see if it is charging in fastboot mode.

[zkat]

When I reboot it into HID mode, I can see the HID device with 0x15a2. When I press 'start' on the MfgTool using the Kindle fastboot profile, the progress bar on the tool seems to complete, but the button stays red/"Stop", and the device status changes to 'Please connect device' (again, in the mfgtool).

Unfortunately, I don't really have the means right now to get serial port access.

[geekmaster]

Originally Posted by zkat

When I reboot it into HID mode, I can see the HID device with 0x15a2. When I press 'start' on the MfgTool using the Kindle fastboot profile, the progress bar on the tool seems to complete, but the button stays red/"Stop", and the device status changes to 'Please connect device' (again, in the mfgtool).

Unfortunately, I don't really have the means right now to get serial port access.

That is normal behavior! Until you stop MfgTool, it keeps looking for another kindle to send u-boot to. You should stop it.

The REASON that it cannot see a kindle in USB Downloader mode (0x15a2/0x0052) is BECAUSE the kindle changed to fastboot mode (0x1949/0xd0d0).

You should use the fastboot tool WITHOUT unplugging the kindle from the USB port, which can make it drop out of fastboot mode.

[zkat]

Originally Posted by geekmaster

You should use the fastboot tool WITHOUT unplugging the kindle from the USB port, which can make it dop out of fastobot mode.

That would explain it. I was having issues with virtualbox and usb, so I was rebooting from my windows partition to my linux one, and that was probably knocking it out. I just fixed the usb issues and have ssh access. Everything looks in order, just gonna dd mmcblk0p1.img and hopefully I'm set.

Thank you for your patience, and all the help when it first bricked. Awesome work!

[geekmaster]

Originally Posted by zkat

That would explain it. I was having issues with virtualbox and usb, so I was rebooting from my windows partition to my linux one, and that was probably knocking it out. I just fixed the usb issues and have ssh access. Everything looks in order, just gonna dd mmcblk0p1.img and hopefully I'm set.

Thank you for your patience, and all the help when it first bricked. Awesome work!

I run winxp inside virtualbox, which is installed on my linux host PC.

In virtualbox, you can view the VID/PID without attaching to it, by hovering over it in the virtualbox menu: Devices / USB Devices / (whatever the kindle IDs as). You get a popup box after a second or so with the VID/PID and other info in it.

I like to make MfgTool stop scanning for devices (red stop button) as soon as it completes downloading to the kindle. I have had it hang my VM. To recover, I need to close VirtualBox (saving the VM state), then restart VirtualBox and the VM, then MfgTool is "unhung" when the USB port "disappears". I try to prevent that by closing MfgTool as soon as I am done with it.

[zkat]

For the sake of closure, I can also report that you've successfully unbricked my Kindle Touch. I don't really know what killed it. I tried undoing some miscellaneous things I remembered I'd done, but it still wouldn't boot -- so I just replaced mmcblk0p1 and everything turned out alright.

Thanks again!

[geekmaster]

Originally Posted by zkat

For the sake of closure, I can also report that you've successfully unbricked my Kindle Touch. I don't really know what killed it. I tried undoing some miscellaneous things I remembered I'd done, but it still wouldn't boot -- so I just replaced mmcblk0p1 and everything turned out alright.

Thanks again!

You are welcome! I added your success report to the first post in this thread. That first post is not as short as it used to be.

[murz_07]

I still can not charge Kindle. After about 30 minutes it stops charging and battery is still empty. So I can't boot in fastboot mode. How can I charge my Kindle?

Actually I can charge it but only while "Critical Battery" is displayed. This is not enough, when I boot it in fastboot it appears in "USB Devices" in VM for couple of seconds and dissapears. When I try to boot it in diags after that it says "Critical Battery" again.

May be I should replace battery with fully charged one?

EDIT:
It turned out the problem is not ONLY with the battery. VM now says:

Failed to attach the USB device Unknown device 1949:D0D0 [0001] to the virtual machine 42.

Failed to create a proxy device for the USB device. (Error: VERR_FILE_NOT_FOUND).

Result Code: E_FAIL (0x80004005)
Component: Console
Interface: IConsole {1968b7d3-e3bf-4ceb-99e0-cb7c913317bb}

BTW: what about fastboot for windows?

[murz_07]

Woohoo!
I somehow finally got green LED, which means my Kindle is fully charged!
So now all I need is fastboot for windows or some help with attaching Kindle to VM.

[geekmaster]

Originally Posted by murz_07

Woohoo!
I somehow finally got green LED, which means my Kindle is fully charged!
So now all I need is fastboot for windows or some help with attaching Kindle to VM.

You cannot trust the LED on a bricked kindle. Good luck debricking it.

[murz_07]

Originally Posted by geekmaster

You cannot trust the LED on a bricked kindle. Good luck debricking it.

I'm pretty sure I can trust it in my case.

But I can't attach Kindle to VM. I added it to filters and it appears in "USB devices" for a couple of seconds and then there is "No device connected" in this menu.

[geekmaster]

Originally Posted by murz_07

I'm pretty sure I can trust it in my case.

But I can't attach Kindle to VM. I added it to filters and it appears in "USB devices" for a couple of seconds and then there is "No device connected" in this menu.

The only time that I and others have seen that behavior is with a low battery. I saw one case where somebody jumpered a fully-charged 3.7v cellphone battery to their kindle in place of the kindle battery, to perform their recovery. Then the kindle battery charged fine in the kindle AFTER debricking...

Try switching to fastboot mode and just leaving the kindle attached in fastboot mode for a few hours. Do not switch it in or out of a VM. Just let it charge in fastboot mode. Interrupting the USB connection makes the kindle drop OUT of fastboot mode.