Jinke posts new firmware build 3-24-2010

[hidari]

Originally Posted by jusmee

We do NOT want improved bugs !! The old ones were bad enough !!

Seriously though, I wonder if it still flattens batteries ?

Have the update. Seems most things are ok. but Coolreader is not reading my rtf or txt files.... even with the .fb2 attached to the end of it.

[Sunspark]

hidari is unfortunately correct in his observation. Huge fail for this firmware! I flashed back to the earlier March firmware. It was never actually "pulled", you can still download it from the www.theezreader.com under the December 09 label. It actually is the March firmware. See, when they originally posted it they never changed the date on the website because they couldn't edit the flash website, and then I think it was just forgotten that they had replaced the file the link pointed to with a newer one. Save a backup copy while you still can because it looks like we may potentially be losing Coolreader functionality.

[Dave_S]

Originally Posted by Sunspark

The Lbook firmware is slightly more customized but it's been some time since any updates from them--I have no idea why. Go ahead and play, I'll be flashing this tonight.

IMHO, the Lbook firmware is the best V5 firmware around, at least for my reading habits. I am using the 30 March 2010 firmware that Vadim Lopatin (buggins) has made available for testing new features of his CoolReader. His V5 firmware is based on some newer Lbook firmware that Lbook has not made available on their site yet. If you feel adventurous, you can find it here:
http://files.mail.ru/12ENCF
The language of the download site is in Russian, but you can switch to English by clicking the word "English" in the upper right corner of the page. I am currently using both the V3 and V5 versions of that firmware on my readers and it is working fine for me.

[jusmee]

Originally Posted by Dave_S

IMHO, the Lbook firmware is the best V5 firmware around, at least for my reading habits. I am using the 30 March 2010 firmware that Vadim Lopatin (buggins) has made available for testing new features of his CoolReader. His V5 firmware is based on some newer Lbook firmware that Lbook has not made available on their site yet. If you feel adventurous, you can find it here:
http://files.mail.ru/12ENCF
The language of the download site is in Russian, but you can switch to English by clicking the word "English" in the upper right corner of the page. I am currently using both the V3 and V5 versions of that firmware on my readers and it is working fine for me.

Does it support Adobe ADE DRM ?

[Dave_S]

Originally Posted by jusmee

Does it support Adobe ADE DRM ?

I assume so, since ADE is still the default for EPUB unless the CoolReader trick is used. I do not use DRM, so I have not actually tested it.

[jusmee]

Originally Posted by Dave_S

I assume so, since ADE is still the default for EPUB unless the CoolReader trick is used. I do not use DRM, so I have not actually tested it.

Might be worth trying then. I just downloaded it.

[aegeus]

Originally Posted by jusmee

Might be worth trying then. I just downloaded it.

I have downloaded and installed it, so far so good; it seems to be better in design and usability than the original one I will use this until a better one.

An opinion by the way: After seeing all those rich settings in Coolreader one feels pity for the lack of options for epub, pdf and mobi files. If only Coolreader would support these formats.

Regards.

[Dave_S]

Originally Posted by aegeus

After seeing all those rich settings in Coolreader one feels pity for the lack of options for epub, pdf and mobi files. If only Coolreader would support these formats.

CoolReader does not support PDF or MOBI, but it does support EPUB. If you want to try CoolReader for NON-DRM EPUB, just change the filename from filename.epub to filename.epub.fb2 and CoolReader will open the file. You can also specify if CoolReader will use the books own CSS, or your custom CSS in the root crengine folder, or the many menu settings that CoolReader has available in the popup menu.
FWIW, the experimental firmware that I linked to earlier is part of an ongoing effort to speed up CoolReader for very large book files, so this experimental firmware is certainly not yet guaranteed to be as glitch free as a normal public release. For my reading, it is working just fine though.

[rxsz]

With the pulled firmware's battery indicator down a bar, the new firmware, 100324, just would not load. It would get to the 2 beeps, displays very very briefly that a firmware file has been found or something, then it would go to "hit any key to reboot".

Tried it with various SD cards. No go. Finally worked when I went thru the sequence with power plugged in thru the wall adaptor.

So I then noticed that with just that few minutes of charging, the battery indicator went to full, 4 bars. Yeah, no Coolreader for txt files. Bummer.

Okay, back to charging it. Now here's the odd part. After 4 hours, the blinking light goes from red to orange to solid green. And the lightning symbol went to a full 4 bars battery symbol. Hey! Where's the PLUG icon? Without interrupting the charge, it is now at 6 hours of straight charging, and still no plug icon. Just the usual full 4bars indicator.

So, I just powered it off. Goodbye screen (coffee cup upside down), and blank. Then it powered up by itself and the light is blinking orange and the lightning symbol at the bottom comes on. Guess it will be awhile before I know whether I see the plug or 4bars indicator. Odd that it will auto power on while charging.

[sein]

Originally Posted by Dave_S

IMHO, the Lbook firmware is the best V5 firmware around, at least for my reading habits. I am using the 30 March 2010 firmware that Vadim Lopatin (buggins) has made available for testing new features of his CoolReader. His V5 firmware is based on some newer Lbook firmware that Lbook has not made available on their site yet. If you feel adventurous, you can find it here:
http://files.mail.ru/12ENCF
The language of the download site is in Russian, but you can switch to English by clicking the word "English" in the upper right corner of the page. I am currently using both the V3 and V5 versions of that firmware on my readers and it is working fine for me.

Thanks, Dave_S, for the recommendation. I downloaded and installed this firmware without any problem. And I love it! I've tried and it works perfectly with txts, rtfs, htmls, fb2s, and epubs (with fb2 modified extension).

There are so many more options now with CoolReader. More fonts and more font-sizes are always welcome. Normal or Bold font-weight makes some fonts really readable. And an amazing feature is the Display update mode. When the Always use fast updates option is chosen, the turn-page speed is really faster and more pleasant. I even have the feeling that the overall contrast has been improved. Texts are a little bit blacker now... Or maybe it's only me... And the Dictionary is working! But only with English-Russian translation...

Great update! Of course there are some drawbacks. It takes more time to open a book. And even though I find the general visual interface nicer, I miss the different book-format icons that are gone. But overall, an even better upgrade than the original Astak March firmware. Thanks, Dave_S, for the good advice.

[Dave_S]

Originally Posted by sein

There are so many more options now with CoolReader. More fonts and more font-sizes are always welcome. Normal or Bold font-weight makes some fonts really readable. And an amazing feature is the Display update mode. When the Always use fast updates option is chosen, the turn-page speed is really faster and more pleasant. I even have the feeling that the overall contrast has been improved. Texts are a little bit blacker now... Or maybe it's only me...

You can also create a "fonts" folder in the root of the file system, and put any Truetype fonts that you want in there, and CoolReader will display them in the fonts menu the next time that it is started. Some fonts look much blacker than others, so some experimentation may be necessary to find one that suits you.

Originally Posted by sein

Great update! Of course there are some drawbacks. It takes more time to open a book.

As I may have mentioned, this firmware is part of a series of work being done by the author, Vadim Lopatin, to improve the performance of CoolReader on very large documents, so this initial opening slowdown may just be an artifact of the work currently underway. I assume that when this work is completed the official Lbook firmware will be updated again?

[aegeus]

Originally Posted by sein

Thanks, Dave_S, for the recommendation. I downloaded and installed this firmware without any problem. And I love it! I've tried and it works perfectly with txts, rtfs, htmls, fb2s, and epubs (with fb2 modified extension).

There are so many more options now with CoolReader. More fonts and more font-sizes are always welcome. Normal or Bold font-weight makes some fonts really readable. And an amazing feature is the Display update mode. When the Always use fast updates option is chosen, the turn-page speed is really faster and more pleasant. I even have the feeling that the overall contrast has been improved. Texts are a little bit blacker now... Or maybe it's only me... And the Dictionary is working! But only with English-Russian translation...

Great update! Of course there are some drawbacks. It takes more time to open a book. And even though I find the general visual interface nicer, I miss the different book-format icons that are gone. But overall, an even better upgrade than the original Astak March firmware. Thanks, Dave_S, for the good advice.

May be Astak should support Coolreader financially instead of wrestling with the factory engineers; no need to discover America again; it is obvious that someone did a great job better than them and this version is much better than the original one. Moreover by this way it would be so much easier to improve the firmware since there will be a paid crew for this. Of course at the end this is a financial decision rather than strategic I think.

Regards.

[booknut]

Does it still offer the option of moving or deleting files?

I just downloaded the firmware by Vadim Lopatin and can answer my own question, yes it does. To those who wonder why I like the option to copy files, I keep a whole bunch on an SD card and when I find what I like to read, I copy it over from the SD card to the main memory, this keeps my "currently reading" list more organized.

I have to say, this firmware upgrade is great, if you have additional fonts installed and you go into Settings and change the font, the change is applied immediately and you can see what the menus will look like at once. My book titles and authors are now much easier to read.
Love this firmware!

Update: File copy and delete only work on the SD card, at least for me. File open works on SD card and internal memory.

[Dave_S]

Originally Posted by booknut

Does it still offer the option of moving or deleting files?

Yes.

EDIT: The Lbook firmware does, but if you are referring to the Jinke firmware I do not know.

[ThomasMcKean]

Originally Posted by Dave_S

Yes.

EDIT: The Lbook firmware does, but if you are referring to the Jinke firmware I do not know.

I just tried it. It worked well.

The INVERSE works well, too, and it did not with the ASTAK.

There are several advantages to this update. I am going to keep it instead of the ASTAK one.

However, on the down side, GOD HELP YEW if yew try to load a LIT file! ACK!