Kobo Discontinues Support for Older Kobos

[Tarana]

I just received this notice on Feb 28. I'm annoyed, not that they are discontinuing support but that they didn't bother to give any warning so that I could download stuff to this older ereader before being cut off.


We have important news for you regarding your Kobo Wireless eReader.

Part of our commitment to providing the best possible reading experience means keeping up with the latest advances in eReader technology and internet security protocols. With this in mind, we will need to discontinue support for some of our earliest products manufactured before 2014.

As of February 28, the Kobo Wireless eReader will no longer be supported by Rakuten Kobo*. This means it will no longer receive software updates, and will not be able to connect to the Kobo eBookstore. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.

Rest assured that no items in your Kobo library will be affected; you will continue to have access to all reading material you have purchased or downloaded from Rakuten Kobo.

[Ripplinger]

Another reason why I always download all purchased books immediately to my PC and treat them to Apprentice Alf. I never trust any store, not even Amazon, to always remain in business and keep my books available.

But even now you should be able to download anything you purchased in the past to the Kobo Desktop app, then just remove DRM and sideload all the content to your older reader.

[Barbara1955]

I had Several e-Book stores go out of Business. Sony.. for 1. And lots of Discontinued e-readers. sigh

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by Tarana

I just received this notice on Feb 28. I'm annoyed, not that they are discontinuing support but that they didn't bother to give any warning so that I could download stuff to this older ereader before being cut off.


We have important news for you regarding your Kobo Wireless eReader.

Part of our commitment to providing the best possible reading experience means keeping up with the latest advances in eReader technology and internet security protocols. With this in mind, we will need to discontinue support for some of our earliest products manufactured before 2014.

As of February 28, the Kobo Wireless eReader will no longer be supported by Rakuten Kobo*. This means it will no longer receive software updates, and will not be able to connect to the Kobo eBookstore. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.

Rest assured that no items in your Kobo library will be affected; you will continue to have access to all reading material you have purchased or downloaded from Rakuten Kobo.

Rather odd. I received a notice at the end of January (28th or 29th) and then second notices on Feb. 28th for both my Mini and my Kobo Wireless.

There was quite a bit of discussion at the end of January Basically, the Kobo Wireless is not capable of being updated to handle TLS 1.1/TLS 1.2 while the Mini's factory firmware is not capable of TLS 1.1/1.2 but later firmwares are. Life is tough and SSL 3.0 and TLS 1.0 are decades old and no longer considered secure.

[jackie_w]

Originally Posted by Tarana

I just received this notice on Feb 28. I'm annoyed, not that they are discontinuing support but that they didn't bother to give any warning so that I could download stuff to this older ereader before being cut off.

It was discussed quite a lot in this forum about a month ago. Did you miss all these threads?

https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sh...d.php?t=314744
https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sh...d.php?t=314748
https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sh...d.php?t=314812

[issybird]

Originally Posted by DNSB

Rather odd. I received a notice at the end of January (28th or 29th) and then second notices on Feb. 28th for both my Mini and my Kobo Wireless.

I didn't get any emails at all about my Mini. No harm done, but I understand being irritated if you got only one on the last day.

[Tarana]

I'm not worried about the ebooks themselves. I download them when I buy them and slide them right into Calibre without DRM. I have had a Kobo account long before a Kobo ereader.

Yes, I took a gander at those posts when they first appeared, but Kobo Wifi and Kobo Wireless - didn't know they were the same thing and having not received the original notice, I wouldn't have had reason to pursue more info. They could have had a notice on the website as well, just like Amazon did. Just sayin'. In any case, the battery on this thing isn't long for this world, so likely it will be recycled before 2020 anyway. Just some mild inconvenience. Should have just bought a newer Kobo at the time.

[rcentros]

Originally Posted by DNSB

There was quite a bit of discussion at the end of January Basically, the Kobo Wireless is not capable of being updated to handle TLS 1.1/TLS 1.2 while the Mini's factory firmware is not capable of TLS 1.1/1.2 but later firmwares are. Life is tough and SSL 3.0 and TLS 1.0 are decades old and no longer considered secure.

"Not capable" of upgrading to TLS 1.2, or just not worth it for Kobo?

[Tarana]

Originally Posted by rcentros

"Not capable" of upgrading to TLS 1.2, or just not worth it for Kobo?

Could be either. They weren't supporting anything older than 2014 according to the notice. So 5 years is going to be Kobo's limit for support. Amazon continues to support the Kindle 3 which I believe came out in 2009. 10 years. Heck, there was support for the Sony up until last year and that came out when? 2005? It's true that a lot of people don't see what the problem is - 5 years for an ereader, but clearly many last much longer than that. Forced planned obsolescence or just a bad choice of early software?

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by rcentros

"Not capable" of upgrading to TLS 1.2, or just not worth it for Kobo?

I don't have a real answer to that question. It may be a financial decision in that the time and effort to compile, debug and deliver a newer Linux kernel to work in the limited CPU and RAM of the Kobo Wifi for the number of them still in use does not make fiscal sense. I remember booting off a SD card at Chapters to do an update but not sure if that was a Kobo Original or a Kobo Wifi and delivering an update in that form would add greatly to the expense.

I own an Android tablet that has lost much of it limited usefulness with many websites no longer let it connect so I get to see unsupported protocol error messages. Oddly, it is only a year older than my Nexus 2013 but the manufacturer decided not to support any upgrades after a point upgrade (4.2-4.3??).

[the.Mtn.Man]

Originally Posted by Tarana

Could be either. They weren't supporting anything older than 2014 according to the notice. So 5 years is going to be Kobo's limit for support. Amazon continues to support the Kindle 3 which I believe came out in 2009. 10 years. Heck, there was support for the Sony up until last year and that came out when? 2005? It's true that a lot of people don't see what the problem is - 5 years for an ereader, but clearly many last much longer than that. Forced planned obsolescence or just a bad choice of early software?

To be fair, Amazon and Sony are much larger companies than Kobo with big revenue flows.

[AnemicOak]

Originally Posted by Tarana

Could be either. They weren't supporting anything older than 2014 according to the notice. So 5 years is going to be Kobo's limit for support. Amazon continues to support the Kindle 3 which I believe came out in 2009. 10 years. Heck, there was support for the Sony up until last year and that came out when? 2005? It's true that a lot of people don't see what the problem is - 5 years for an ereader, but clearly many last much longer than that. Forced planned obsolescence or just a bad choice of early software?

The only Kobo eInk device they officially ending support for is the Kobo WiFi from 2010. I don't know if there is a technical reason or if it's simply that they know a very small percentage of those devices are still in use so chose not to do it for a financial/resources reason. Thankfully that device will still work in conjunction with the Kobo Desktop software. As far as the Sony devices I don't know if they could update those devices even if they wanted to or if they'd have to get Sony to be involved in that (not sure if Sony turned over firmware code, etc. to Kobo or not).

The Mini is from 2012 and as long as the user has it updated to 3.19.5760 will still be able to connect to the Kobo store and sync with Kobo (they aren't updating the firmware anymore, but others aren't updating a lot of their older devices, like the Kindle 3, either). The Kobo Touch is from 2011 and isn't on Kobo's list. The Glo is from 2012 and isn't kn Kobo's list. The Aura HD is from 2013 and isn't on Kobo's list.

Originally Posted by the.Mtn.Man

To be fair, Amazon and Sony are much larger companies than Kobo with big revenue flows.

Well, Rakuten isn't exactly small potatoes.

[DuckieTigger]

Originally Posted by AnemicOak

Well, Rakuten isn't exactly small potatoes.

Rakuten is quite large (warning understatement), but Kobo isn't. Just like Amazon is big, but Lab126 isn't. And didn't Rakuten overpay for Kobo when they bought them, because Kobo wasn't in real great shape?

[the.Mtn.Man]

Originally Posted by AnemicOak

Well, Rakuten isn't exactly small potatoes.

I'm not familiar with the business arrangement. Does Kobo necessarily have access to all of Rakuten's resources?

[AnemicOak]

Originally Posted by the.Mtn.Man

I'm not familiar with the business arrangement. Does Kobo necessarily have access to all of Rakuten's resources?

No more than Kindle/Lab126 (responsible for Kindle, Echo, Fire...) have access to all of Amazon's resources.