Reviving Good Ol' Kindle 3 Keyboard

CoachDom · 01-11-2025, 01:19 PM

Hi all

I recently dug out my Kindle 3 Keyboard in pristine condition I might say and it had issues holding charge. I tried using it anyways couple of time but eventually it went into a state where it would be stuck in a booting loop and shut down. And it was mostly unresponsive.

I ordered a replacement battery, put it in and now I can get it working - kinda. After holding power for 20s, then Home for 60s it goes into the factory reset mode, I click Del and it boots up. The battery indicator is almost full, but I keep it on the charger anyways, it works for about 30s to 1min and it shuts down to a blank screen. I can retry the factory reset, and redo all the above but it will never stay on.

Any ideas?

Many thanks

EDIT: I tried putting the old (original) battery inside and went through the power - home - reset loop but the script remains the same. My Kindle will stay on for about a minute, after which it will flicker and go into a blank screen. The orange charging light also dies at this point.

Quoth · 01-11-2025, 02:35 PM

Possibly the replacement battery is poor. What date code?

CoachDom · 01-11-2025, 03:09 PM

On the battery it says June 2024

I tried something and it works so far (though it's still on the cable - I will leave it overnight to make sure):
1) 20s power slider
2) 60s home button
3) Typed RESET
4) Plugged it to a charger while in the Recovery mode

So basically I noticed that the only place where the Kindle wouldn't automatically switch off to a blank screen would be the Recovery Mode screen. The orange charging light would only be switched on when on any screen. So I booted to a Recovery Mode and left it to charge. After a while, it automatically left the Recovery Mode and booted into the regular system.

It's been in it for about an hour so I'm going to leave it as is until tomorrow on a charger and will let you know!

EDIT: Just checked on it and it went to the blank screen anyways so I'm back to square one - open to suggestions

DNSB · 01-11-2025, 03:09 PM

Ninja'd!

I would agree with @Quoth. The last person I helped replace a battery in a Sony ereader, the new battery was 9 years old according to it's date code. It was a bit better than the original battery but not by much.

Nice to hear that you appear to have found a solution.

CoachDom · 01-11-2025, 03:43 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by DNSB

Ninja'd!

I would agree with @Quoth. The last person I helped replace a battery in a Sony ereader, the new battery was 9 years old according to it's date code. It was a bit better than the original battery but not by much.

Nice to hear that you appear to have found a solution.

Unfortunately not - check the EDIT

It worked for a while, but went back to freezing.
I tried it with a fresh battery, but still the same result - though it's not lasting as long on the new one. I will do a couple of cycles of this to try charging it a bit.

CoachDom · 01-11-2025, 07:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by CoachDom

Unfortunately not - check the EDIT

It worked for a while, but went back to freezing.
I tried it with a fresh battery, but still the same result - though it's not lasting as long on the new one. I will do a couple of cycles of this to try charging it a bit.

EDIT: So I ran a few of the above cycles, eventually got to a point where the battery was full (orange switched to green) but the Kindle won't stay on. I booted it up, managed to scroll through a few pages of a dictionary, messed around the settings added my WiFi and decided to call it a night, locked the screen with the power slider and a couple of seconds later it went into the blank screen.

It seems like being in a screen saver/standby mode is the issue but I might be wrong.

Any ideas?

mergen3107 · 01-11-2025, 11:31 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by CoachDom

Any ideas?

Trade it to Amazon and get 20% discount for a new Kindle

CoachDom · 01-12-2025, 05:12 AM

I was thinking maybe Jailbreak would help?
Seems to me like some sort of software glitch - if it would be the solder balls, it wouldnt fire up in the first place right?

JSWolf · 01-12-2025, 05:17 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by CoachDom

I was thinking maybe Jailbreak would help?
Seems to me like some sort of software glitch - if it would be the solder balls, it wouldnt fire up in the first place right?

It's not a software glitch. If it was, this issue would have been posted by others on here.

CoachDom · 01-12-2025, 11:57 AM

I'm at my wits end with this - I get the suggestion to simply get a new one with a 20% off but I really like this Kindle and I like giving live to devices that normally would land in a landfill.

Any suggestions? I heard that cracking ball solders on the cpu are a thing with these Kindles - somebody suggested heating it up with a hot air soldering device. I reckon a common hairdryer wont do

LMx7ng10 · 01-14-2025, 12:48 PM

My thought is that the flash memory has gone bad. I have replaced several batteries on the Keyboard but not encountered this problem. But... I had a dead Voyage (left in storage too long). After replacing the battery, all seemed fine until I added books to it. Looked good, but after it went to sleep and woke up, the new books were gone. Tried deleting books. Books appeared deleted from device UNTIL sleep mode > awake. "Deleted" books reappeared.

I finally determined that the flash memory had problems - able to see and access all of the books that were loaded prior to the dead battery, but no longer able to add/delete books.

(I have read MobileRead for a long time, but have just joined.)

CoachDom · 01-19-2025, 08:01 AM

I think it's more random than what you describe. It had been working for me for a couple of days, until yesterday when it went to a blank screen again.
I ordered a Kindle with a broken screen but otherwise working so I just swap the motherboards but still if possible I would like to get this one working (as a spare maybe)

01-11-2025, 01:19 PM	#1
CoachDom Junior Member Posts: 8 Karma: 10 Join Date: Jan 2025 Device: Kindle 3 Keyboard	Reviving Good Ol' Kindle 3 Keyboard Hi all I recently dug out my Kindle 3 Keyboard in pristine condition I might say and it had issues holding charge. I tried using it anyways couple of time but eventually it went into a state where it would be stuck in a booting loop and shut down. And it was mostly unresponsive. I ordered a replacement battery, put it in and now I can get it working - kinda. After holding power for 20s, then Home for 60s it goes into the factory reset mode, I click Del and it boots up. The battery indicator is almost full, but I keep it on the charger anyways, it works for about 30s to 1min and it shuts down to a blank screen. I can retry the factory reset, and redo all the above but it will never stay on. Any ideas? Many thanks EDIT: I tried putting the old (original) battery inside and went through the power - home - reset loop but the script remains the same. My Kindle will stay on for about a minute, after which it will flicker and go into a blank screen. The orange charging light also dies at this point.

01-11-2025, 03:09 PM	#3
CoachDom Junior Member Posts: 8 Karma: 10 Join Date: Jan 2025 Device: Kindle 3 Keyboard	On the battery it says June 2024 I tried something and it works so far (though it's still on the cable - I will leave it overnight to make sure): 1) 20s power slider 2) 60s home button 3) Typed RESET 4) Plugged it to a charger while in the Recovery mode So basically I noticed that the only place where the Kindle wouldn't automatically switch off to a blank screen would be the Recovery Mode screen. The orange charging light would only be switched on when on any screen. So I booted to a Recovery Mode and left it to charge. After a while, it automatically left the Recovery Mode and booted into the regular system. It's been in it for about an hour so I'm going to leave it as is until tomorrow on a charger and will let you know! EDIT: Just checked on it and it went to the blank screen anyways so I'm back to square one - open to suggestions Last edited by CoachDom; 01-11-2025 at 03:12 PM.

01-11-2025, 03:09 PM	#4
DNSB Bibliophagist Posts: 44,451 Karma: 167726581 Join Date: Jul 2010 Location: Vancouver Device: Kobo Sage, Libra Colour, Lenovo M8 FHD, Paperwhite 4, Tolino epos	Ninja'd! I would agree with @Quoth. The last person I helped replace a battery in a Sony ereader, the new battery was 9 years old according to it's date code. It was a bit better than the original battery but not by much. Nice to hear that you appear to have found a solution. Last edited by DNSB; 01-11-2025 at 03:11 PM. Reason: OP posted their response while I was writing mine.

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01-11-2025, 02:35 PM	#2
Quoth Still reading Posts: 13,629 Karma: 103503445 Join Date: Jun 2017 Location: Ireland Device: All 4 Kinds: epub eink, Kindle, android eink, NxtPaper	Possibly the replacement battery is poor. What date code?

01-12-2025, 05:12 AM	#8
CoachDom Junior Member Posts: 8 Karma: 10 Join Date: Jan 2025 Device: Kindle 3 Keyboard	I was thinking maybe Jailbreak would help? Seems to me like some sort of software glitch - if it would be the solder balls, it wouldnt fire up in the first place right?

01-12-2025, 11:57 AM	#10
CoachDom Junior Member Posts: 8 Karma: 10 Join Date: Jan 2025 Device: Kindle 3 Keyboard	I'm at my wits end with this - I get the suggestion to simply get a new one with a 20% off but I really like this Kindle and I like giving live to devices that normally would land in a landfill. Any suggestions? I heard that cracking ball solders on the cpu are a thing with these Kindles - somebody suggested heating it up with a hot air soldering device. I reckon a common hairdryer wont do

01-14-2025, 12:48 PM	#11
LMx7ng10 Junior Member Posts: 3 Karma: 10 Join Date: Jan 2025 Location: US Device: Multiple	My thought is that the flash memory has gone bad. I have replaced several batteries on the Keyboard but not encountered this problem. But... I had a dead Voyage (left in storage too long). After replacing the battery, all seemed fine until I added books to it. Looked good, but after it went to sleep and woke up, the new books were gone. Tried deleting books. Books appeared deleted from device UNTIL sleep mode > awake. "Deleted" books reappeared. I finally determined that the flash memory had problems - able to see and access all of the books that were loaded prior to the dead battery, but no longer able to add/delete books. (I have read MobileRead for a long time, but have just joined.)

01-19-2025, 08:01 AM	#12
CoachDom Junior Member Posts: 8 Karma: 10 Join Date: Jan 2025 Device: Kindle 3 Keyboard	I think it's more random than what you describe. It had been working for me for a couple of days, until yesterday when it went to a blank screen again. I ordered a Kindle with a broken screen but otherwise working so I just swap the motherboards but still if possible I would like to get this one working (as a spare maybe)