Amazon and DRM changes

[DuckieTigger]

Originally Posted by Joykins

I did a little experiment. Charged up my PW2 only to discover it's using KFX which means its firmware is too new to use to deDRM. Was able to deDRM some older books not using KFX directly from this PW2.

Charged up my Kindle NT4 only to discover that it doesn't work anymore. My husband is going to try changing the battery himself, to see if that will make it work again. He did this with his NT4 and the right side buttons now work but not the left side, so right now I am waiting, seeing as half a brick here might be better than a total brick.

If you still have your husbands NT4, that might work. All you need to do is turn it on and have the wifi working. The rest you can do from computer.

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by Joykins

I did a little experiment. Charged up my PW2 only to discover it's using KFX which means its firmware is too new to use to deDRM. Was able to deDRM some older books not using KFX directly from this PW2.

Charged up my Kindle NT4 only to discover that it doesn't work anymore. My husband is going to try changing the battery himself, to see if that will make it work again. He did this with his NT4 and the right side buttons now work but not the left side, so right now I am waiting, seeing as half a brick here might be better than a total brick.

For bought books (not KU):
Turn off WiFi and use Download from "Manage my content and devices" and pick the PW2.
Open the the downloaded file with Calibre in your File manager/Explorer.
You won't get KFX files.

The Kindle only needs to be registered. It doesn't need to even work.

[Joykins]

Originally Posted by Quoth

For bought books (not KU):
Turn off WiFi and use Download from "Manage my content and devices" and pick the PW2.
Open the the downloaded file with Calibre in your File manager/Explorer.
You won't get KFX files.

The Kindle only needs to be registered. It doesn't need to even work.

That is what I normally do. I was trying to see if I can still get **KU** books deDRMed through this loophole. For Science.

[Joykins]

Originally Posted by DuckieTigger

If you still have your husbands NT4, that might work. All you need to do is turn it on and have the wifi working. The rest you can do from computer.

It's registered to his account and he doesn't have KU. Otherwise, yes, this may work if I took his device, assuming he'd let me, but he might have problems reregistering it seeing as his NT4 is only partially functional. I don't feel comfortable doing that just for an experiment.

[Unseen Entities]

Originally Posted by jhowell

Amazon creates different format variants of each book for delivery to different Kindle reading platforms. I took a look at the Feral book on some different model Kindles to see how they compare.

Download & Transfer: 2.17MB AZW3 file with color JPEG images

3rd gen Kindle Keyboard: same as Download & Transfer

5th gen Paperwhite 1: 678KB AZW3 + 958KB AZW6 with B/W JPEG-XR images

9th gen Oasis 2: 1.5MB KFX with B/W JPEG-XR images

Kindle for PC 1.39: 33.1MB KFX with high resolution color images

So in the end the quality of the book you receive varies greatly according to the device for which it is downloaded.

Originally Posted by DuckieTigger

Success, the Kindle Touch does work just like the Kindle Keyboard 3. It is the newest device that will get you same as Download and Transfer via USB file that can be moved into Calibre directly

Huh, good to know.

Its a shame you cant use K4PC anymore to download (new) books with higher quality images than Download and Transfer.

Dont think Android work for that anymore either. I should probably look at non-Amazon retailers for anything image heavy I suppose.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by jhowell

Images being split off into a separate AZW6 file when delivered to Kindle devices is not a new thing. It was first seen almost ten years ago in late 2013. In retrospect it was a precursor to KFX format which uses B/W JPEG-XR images split into a separate container when delivered to Kindle devices.

Because it is only used for a relatively small number of image-heavy books, handling AZW6 has not been a major priority. A method for combining the AZW6 and AZW3 files into a single AZW3 has been requested over the years for KindleUnpack and calibre, but those requests were rejected. A pull request to add that capability to the DeDRM plugin was rejected because it is not a DRM-related issue.

An AZW6 Image Merge plugin was created for calibre in 2021. However it only handles combining file downloaded using the Kindle for PC app, not an e-ink Kindle. The author of that plugin is still active on MobileRead. Perhaps they could be convinced to add handling for Kindle devices.

------------

Amazon creates different format variants of each book for delivery to different Kindle reading platforms. I took a look at the Feral book on some different model Kindles to see how they compare.

Download & Transfer: 2.17MB AZW3 file with color JPEG images

3rd gen Kindle Keyboard: same as Download & Transfer

5th gen Paperwhite 1: 678KB AZW3 + 958KB AZW6 with B/W JPEG-XR images

9th gen Oasis 2: 1.5MB KFX with B/W JPEG-XR images

Kindle for PC 1.39: 33.1MB KFX with high resolution color images

So in the end the quality of the book you receive varies greatly according to the device for which it is downloaded.

Is there any way to pull out the images from the KFX version download with KindleforPC 1.39?

[jhowell]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Is there any way to pull out the images from the KFX version download with KindleforPC 1.39?

Amazon does not encrypt images in reflowable books so it is theoretically possible. There is no existing software to do that however.

[rantanplan]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Is there any way to pull out the images from the KFX version download with KindleforPC 1.39?

Isn't there a plugin for Calibre to download them? Hi-Res Kindle Images or something like that?

[ownedbycats]

Originally Posted by rantanplan

Isn't there a plugin for Calibre to download them? Hi-Res Kindle Images or something like that?

That's only for covers, I think.

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by jhowell

Amazon does not encrypt images in reflowable books so it is theoretically possible. There is no existing software to do that however.

Obviously could be manually done, but I'd not bother even reading on 8″ 300 dpi eink.

[Rhooo]

Originally Posted by j.p.s

Unseen Entities and jhowell have covered most of it, but until it gets automated, there is a manual workaround. calibre + plugin handle the azw3 just fine. You just need to copy the azw6 file to the book's sdr directory. If you care about X-ray and/or page numbers, the direct download by the kindle ias a bonus. Just also copy the XRAY.*.asc and the BookName.apnx files to the book's sdr directory. The other files are not needed and some even cause annoying actions during reading (StartActions.*.asc and EndActions.*.asc)

This doesn't work on my end. Just managed to get a PW1 I ordered off Amazon. I can now pull my KU books off the device and remove the DRM in Calibre, but the images still don't show even if I make a sdr directory with a name identical to the book and copy the AZW6 file there. I also can't see any way of just opening the AZW6 to get the images and manually insert them via Sigil or another ebook editor.

God, I'm going to have to buy yet another even older bloody Kindle just to be able to read these books in non-stunted form on my Kobo, aren't I?

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by Rhooo

God, I'm going to have to buy yet another even older bloody Kindle just to be able to read these books in non-stunted form on my Kobo, aren't I?

Well, do you need to read specifically those books? I mean, there are plenty of other books you can buy from another store.

[Rhooo]

Originally Posted by Sirtel

Well, do you need to read specifically those books? I mean, there are plenty of other books you can buy from another store.

I've got about a dozen series I've been reading on KU and I don't really want to be left hanging. Also, if you want affordable, frequent-release fantasy romance (as I do) KU is pretty much the only game in town.

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by Rhooo

I've got about a dozen series I've been reading on KU and I don't really want to be left hanging. Also, if you want affordable, frequent-release fantasy romance (as I do) KU is pretty much the only game in town.

You can always buy them. Then you can use the Download & Transfer option for your PW1 and avoid these problems with images.

[lkmiller]

Or just read them on one of those Kindles.