How not to install the Windows 10 Anniversary Update

[JoHunt]

I've also installed the Anniversary update and really like the changes. I'm probably the last one on planet earth to know about Cortana, but it's wonderful! It's great fun having her open websites for me and finding info about anything I ask.

[tnforpaul45]

Well as I was reading this thread, I had my Kindle DX sitting next to me, and decided to plug it up to my Win 10 Laptop that has the update. I thought "Well we'll just see if there is a problem!" I recently installed an SSD, clean installed Win 10, and then updated.

The instant I plugged in the USB, the computer blue screen of death'ed and crashed. Captain oblivious here.

Rebooted it with the DX plugged up and it logged in fine, and Calibre can see its contents.

So I guess the moral of the story here is: Results may vary.

[ShellShock]

The update got stuck on "preparing" at 1%, so I had to reboot. Now it seems to be stuck on "restoring previous version of Windows". At this point I don't know whether Windows is completely trashed. I would have been quite happy if it had only adversely affected some USB devices, instead of this.

Edit: after several hours stuck on "restoring previous version of Windows", I did another reset; Windows finally booted, froze a few times, and is now working OK, minus the update. For whatever reason, the update failed, but Windows was able to automatically recover.

Being a glutton for punishment I am giving the update another go...this time from the support page (https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/...update-history) rather than Windows update on my PC. Currently it is at 50% downloaded.

[Sweetpea]

Originally Posted by HarryT

You don't see "Unknown device" in the device manager?

Nope. Naturally, that was the first place I looked.

Originally Posted by HarryT

A workaround is to put your books on the Kobo's SD card. That is recognised by Windows.

If you can actually get the device to show up on Windows...

My workaround is to always have a non-Windows 10 PC somewhere (which isn't difficult as we've not updated our mediacenter PC, due to a lack of, well, mediacenter, in Windows 10)

[shalym]

Originally Posted by Sweetpea

Nope. Naturally, that was the first place I looked.


If you can actually get the device to show up on Windows...

My workaround is to always have a non-Windows 10 PC somewhere (which isn't difficult as we've not updated our mediacenter PC, due to a lack of, well, mediacenter, in Windows 10)

Actually, unless you have a Kobo Glo HD you can take the SD card out and use a regular card reader--it seems that the update doesn't have problems with 99% of all devices, so a generic card reader should work just fine.

Shari

[Sweetpea]

Originally Posted by shalym

Actually, unless you have a Kobo Glo HD you can take the SD card out and use a regular card reader--it seems that the update doesn't have problems with 99% of all devices, so a generic card reader should work just fine.

Shari

I'd have to buy a SD card first But it's not so much the problem of getting books on the device, I want to put them on there with Calibre so the series are filled as well. Now, if there was a Calibre Client like there is for Android, I wouldn't need the physical connection to the PC anymore!

[Rupert DeBear]

Kobo Glo HD was working fine with Windows 10 until I updated to the Anniversary edition. Sigh. Kobo showed up as a bogus drive.

No SD card so no joy there.

No problem transferring books to my Kobo from an Android device (albeit a bit clunky).

I used a Samsung tablet (S2), "Explorer" app, USB OTG adapter (converts USB micro to "USB A", the typical port on computers).

1. Connect USB OTG to S2 with Kobo as external storage.
2. Fire up Explorer and select the main storage where books are kept on the Kobo. The Kobo stores books by author, i.e. a folder named "Last, First", with the epub(s) in the folder.
3. Click the + to add a folder, name it LastName, FirstName
4. Add a new tab for the Android file directory.
5. Find the directory where books are kept on the Android. Find the epub file and select and copy it.
6. Go to the new folder you created on the Kobo and paste the epub there.

Way easier than it looks, but it should work on most tablets and phones.

Back to you Microsoft...

[HarryT]

It's been reported that reformatting the Kobo's drive from Windows Disk Manager fixes the problem. Ie it's something in Kobo's drive format that Windows doesn't like.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by HarryT

It's been reported that reformatting the Kobo's drive from Windows Disk Manager fixes the problem. Ie it's something in Kobo's drive format that Windows doesn't like.

A factory reset does mess this up so it again no longer works with Win 10AU.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

A factory reset does mess this up so it again no longer works with Win 10AU.

As you would expect: a factory reset reformats the drive again. It's probably going to need a Kobo firmware update to fix it properly. How often, though, do you need to do a factory reset? I don't think I've ever done one on any reader, except if I sell it.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by HarryT

As you would expect. A factory reset reformats the drive again. It's probably going to need a Kobo firmware update to fix it properly.

The problem is that the device comes with a version of the firmware installed. That firmware is what's used when a factory reset is done. So when a factory reset is done, it uses the devices initial firmware and not the active firmware. So once a factory reset is done, the only way to fix the now existing problem would be to installed a new firmware that fixes the problem. So you would have to connect to the WiFi, setup the device again, and sync the newest firmware.

Since Win 10AU is the cause of this, Win 10AU should be the fix of this. Why dd MS change things when they were working from XP to Win 10 November update?

[HarryT]

Given that the overwhelming majority of USB devices seem to work fine with AU, I'd hazard a guess that it's some deeply obscure bug in Kobo's drive format that's been triggered by a change in the USB Mass Storage driver in AU. Why did Microsoft change the driver? Could be any number of reasons: a bug fix, a performance improvement, or perhaps some programmer at Microsoft just hates Kobo and wanted to screw them. You'd be best off addressing that question to Microsoft.

[eschwartz]

I am pretty sure Kobo is using bog-standard `mkfs.vfat` to create the drive, I don't see what is so obscure about that.
Perhaps something about the way it is exported?

Regardless, the fact that every operating system for years and years and years has never had a problem, up until this one version of one operating system, implies that it is indeed Microsoft's fault.
And I very much doubt it is necessary for whatever reason they may have had to modify the USBMS driver.

...

Yes, ideally Microsoft will fix this rather stupid bug.
But I guess Kobo cannot rely on that.

I do wonder how Kobo can possibly fix it properly, given that their devices keep a factory restore firmware which will still contain the code which triggers Microsoft's bug.

[crane3]

May not be m$'s "fault" as I've had to install Samsung's usb driver when connecting to a Samsung Tab Pro & an old Samsung Tab GT2(?).

And what is the REAL usb standard hardware? Consider that there are 5-pin & 11-pin connections as well as the slim port type.........
Have read some other companies' phone/tablet had to use the manufacturer's usb driver in spite of a usb "standard".
It's kinda like the situation when m$ took over the implementation of the sata drivers & problems started to occur; & looks like m$ also took over the usb drivers as the win10 shows all the usb drivers are provided by m$.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by HarryT

As you would expect: a factory reset reformats the drive again. It's probably going to need a Kobo firmware update to fix it properly. How often, though, do you need to do a factory reset? I don't think I've ever done one on any reader, except if I sell it.

I can only think of one Kobo firmware update that modified the recovery partition and that was specific to Touch devices (sold in Australia???) that had issues with installing firmware updates

As for factory updates, I've done too many to count. Most were done before I got enthused about error checking all epubs before transferring them to my Kobo. If it doesn't pass FlightCrew and EpubCheck for epub2 or EpubCheck alone for epub3, time to fire up Sigil and fix it.

Recent factory resets were triggered after severe database corruption caused such things as not safely ejecting under Windows, having a Linux VM crash and burn while doing a metadata update, a power outage while vacuuming the database, etc.