Washed out lockscreen

[tintin42]

Edit: Fixed links and image sizes. Added a second example of wash out without text bleed.

Dear everyone, new here and new to e-ink in general. Bought a Kobo Aura and it is wonderful to read on, but I am wondering if what I see regarding a washed out screen is normal. I suppose it has to do with how the device refreshes the screen.

Quite frequently, maybe 25% of the times I put the Aura to sleep the screen is woefully washed out like this. Sometimes there are shadow text lines like in the first image, but other times there are none.

As a comparison, the third image is what it looks like at a successful sleep. This can always be done after first entering the home screen and then setting the device to sleep:

When I turn it back on and start reading the text is also faint (much fainter then when I stopped reading before the sleep) but improves after a couple of page turns. I normally have the device set to refresh every chapter but if I have the refresh set to every page it does not help this problem. The screen is still washed out quite frequently when sleeping, and the text is faint for a couple of pages. It is not a really big issue for me, I am more wondering if this is normal or if the screen on my Aura is worse than average. Using firmware 3.3.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by tintin42

When I turn it back on and start reading the text is also faint (much fainter then when I stopped reading before the sleep) but improves after a couple of page turns. I normally have the device set to refresh every chapter but if I have the refresh set to every page it does not help this problem. The screen is still washed out quite frequently when sleeping, and the text is faint for a couple of pages. It is not a really big issue for me, I am more wondering if this is normal or if the screen on my Aura is worse than average. Using firmware 3.3.

Looking at your first image, the lines in the background look like the ghosts of lines of text. I suspect that your Aura is not setting all pixels white/black/white (flashing the screen) before entering sleep. I know that various versions of Kobo's firmware handle entering sleep/power off differently -- one version was downright annoying as the screen blinked for about 5 seconds. I don't have an Aura but you might want to try updating to 3.8.0 to see if you notice any improvement.

Regards,
David

[AbPho]

I am sorry but I can't help. I am interested in hearing what others have to say though. Subscribing to the thread. Good luck. I hope you get an answer soon.

[robko]

Until you mentioned you had the same problem even if you had refresh set to every page, I would have said this was the issue. It makes sense that going back to the home screen first solves it because that will force the refresh. As DNSB said, there has been variation in this with different firmwares but I don't remember 3.3 being particularly bad, but it could be that slight differences between the models mean the Aura shows it more than the others (especially since it has a different refresh). Writing bleeding through on the cover has shown up in beta's a number of times but usually gets fixed.
So the short answer is: I'm sure it related to a lack of refresh before the cover, but I'm not sure why yours isn't refreshing properly before going to the cover.

[tintin42]

Thank you for the answers, yes, something is slightly wonky with the refreshing. I'll try with and side load a FW update to 3.8 and see what happens.

[filmo]

Can't see your pictures. Moderator block them because images included in posts must be no more than 600x600 pixels.

[Dr. Drib]

Originally Posted by filmo

Can't see your pictures. Moderator block them because images included in posts must be no more than 600x600 pixels.

Information only:

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Don
(Moderator)

[anesthezea]

I have a similar problem with my Aura. Everything bleeds through, sometimes up to three layers of text and book covers can be seen through the top layer (home screen, an open book, menus, everything). I put in for a replacement on Aug. 4th and was told on Aug. 29th that it was never sent. I've asked for a refund due to a month of repeated bad customer service, but I'm not sure if I will get it. I'm waiting (again) for CS to contact me.

[tintin42]

Fixed the links in the first post. Sorry about the large images.

I have since updated the firmware to 3.8. Now it seems like the washed out screen is gone if I put the screen to refresh every page. The sleeping screen/book front still have the same problems of being washed out if I have the refresh set to every chapter. I suppose this could easily be fixed in the firmware by always forcing a refresh before setting the device to sleep regardless of the page turn refresh setting. The book cover look is purely visual, it is more irritating that the first page is much lighter after returning from sleep with a faded cover. Sometimes on the verge of being hard to read.

In a way I like the chapter refresh since directly after a refresh the letters are more of a gray shade but after a few pages the characters get a deeper black from bleed through of the previous lines. The individual characters loose a bit of the crispiness but the deeper black makes up for it. I cannot replicate the deeper blacks by just changing the weight of the font.

[Jellby]

Originally Posted by tintin42

Fixed the links in the first post. Sorry about the large images.

Note that it's usually much better to attach the images (look for the "Manage Attachments" button, below the message box in advanced mode), that way you can include larger images, as they will be only displayed as thumbnails, and you don't need to upload them elsewhere.

[tintin42]

Originally Posted by anesthezea

I have a similar problem with my Aura. Everything bleeds through, sometimes up to three layers of text and book covers can be seen through the top layer (home screen, an open book, menus, everything).(

The refresh problems have not been helped by the FW upgrade. I have now used a refresh of 1 page only and the washed out text persists. Sometimes a proper refresh can be forced via looking up a word in the dictionary, but not always. The screen is neither properly refreshed when entering the start page or anything else (see attached image). Or is the book too large (4700 pages)?

Since the text starts washed out after flipping a few pages some parts of letters are proper black (like the "d" in under) while others stay washed out until a letter on some later page have overlapped it.

Do I have a dud on my hands? Should I try a factory reset?

[robko]

Originally Posted by tintin42

Do I have a dud on my hands? Should I try a factory reset?

I was going to suggest trying a factory reset. Something doesn't seem right and a reset may get you back to where you should be. Otherwise I would have to think a dud of some sort.

[imkh]

Originally Posted by tintin42

The refresh problems have not been helped by the FW upgrade. I have now used a refresh of 1 page only and the washed out text persists. Sometimes a proper refresh can be forced via looking up a word in the dictionary, but not always. The screen is neither properly refreshed when entering the start page or anything else (see attached image). Or is the book too large (4700 pages)?

Since the text starts washed out after flipping a few pages some parts of letters are proper black (like the "d" in under) while others stay washed out until a letter on some later page have overlapped it.

Do I have a dud on my hands? Should I try a factory reset?

tintin, I just had all this happen to me, and it was the book.

I had been happily reading with Aura HD on 3.8.0 with no trouble, then started a new book. I usually edit mine in Calibre so the layout suits my aging eyesight, but hadn't prepared ahead so started to read this one as is. All OK and I used the sleepcover at about page 30 before going to sleep. Next morning it had all your symptoms!

When I had a look at the book (a side-loaded epub) in Calibre editing the formatting was crazy. Though the individual file sizes were under the 260kb recommended, most of what looked like paragraphs were in fact just breaks, and the actual paragraphs were often 10 pages long!

Took quite a while to edit, but the newly paragraphed book is now on the Kobo and all the problems have gone. (Only other thing done was I charged the battery but it was at 50% to start with, so probably not the culprit.) So I suggest you look at the book, especially since it is very long. Usually the problems accumulate as you go through the book so they're not obvious at the start, usually the main problem with epubs is that the individual file sizes are too large, but it could also be a formatting problem as I just had.

Also I'm a bit of a newbie about long books, they may have their own problems as well - maybe someone could make other suggestions?

Hope this helps

[tintin42]

Originally Posted by imkh

tintin, I just had all this happen to me, and it was the book.

I had been happily reading with Aura HD on 3.8.0 with no trouble, then started a new book. I usually edit mine in Calibre so the layout suits my aging eyesight, but hadn't prepared ahead so started to read this one as is. All OK and I used the sleepcover at about page 30 before going to sleep. Next morning it had all your symptoms!

Seems like it was the book here as well. I switched to a single book version of the multi-volume book and now everything seems to works as it should.

Originally Posted by imkh

When I had a look at the book (a side-loaded epub) in Calibre editing the formatting was crazy. Though the individual file sizes were under the 260kb recommended, most of what looked like paragraphs were in fact just breaks, and the actual paragraphs were often 10 pages long!

I dug into the book with calibres editing tools, but there were no obvious formatting errors in the book. But since I wanted to be able to use kobos formatting tools i stripped out fonts, margins, line-height and text-align, so now the single book epub is not original any longer. I did not test the unaltered version extensively, so I could not say for sure if the smaller book fixed the problems altogether or if the reformatting was the ultimate cure.

Originally Posted by imkh

Usually the problems accumulate as you go through the book so they're not obvious at the start, usually the main problem with epubs is that the individual file sizes are too large, but it could also be a formatting problem as I just had.

I had the same impression with the original long book, that the problems accumulated over time.

[TechniSol]

I'm glad that a forum member had a fix, but the other question is why the situation, while admittedly not quite kosher, still causes such bad behavior... I understand that the basic problem is probably that the input data is not correctly formatted according to standards, but whatever happened to proper exception handling? I posted a machine for sale on Craigslist tonight and got a deleted listing with no explanation whatsoever! It's like the lunatics are running the Asylum today!

Eeep, I think I just channeled my father!