Kubrick: Live CD to debrick Kindle 3, 4, and Touch

[montalex]

Originally Posted by knc1

Had soap or detergent been added to the washing machine before the Kindle was retrieved from its bath?
Some of those products are extremely corrosive.

This whole effort may be a waste of time if something like Tide was in the washing machine.

Fortunately, newer washing machines add soap after water is added to a wash, so, no, there was no soap in the wash yet. I'll find some proper cleaner for the motherboard. Or, I'll just buy a Kindle with a broken screen. They are pretty cheap on eBay. I have purchased used motherboards in the past, for about $25, and they work fine.

[CaelThunderwing]

i just recovered my kindle from a fubar'd rootfs w/ Kubrick, but im not sure everytings right ... it wont charge off my PC. (but enters USB Drive mode properly) but i cant install anyting like Launchpad etc.. always results in U007 unless im mistaken 3G units (US ) use "K3g" marked bins.

[knc1]

Do you have a way to keep it charged?
and

Check that cable, the pc port, and the pc

Any effort spent now without being able to re-charge it will be short-lived.

[DennisH]

ixtab,

I am not sure this is the right place for this and I don't know where is.

I finally bricked my K4NT and used Kubrick (I thought this was a play on two themes - Kindle Un Brick on the one hand and the great film director Stanley Kubrick, director of 2001: A Space Odyssey and creator of the infamous Hal computer on the other hand) to recover it.

It worked flawlessly and I was very relieved I tried to make a $US20 donation to your Laos project. However, my donation was returned with the following note:

"I apologize for that. Recently we had several problems where people stole credit cards, then made a $5 "donation" to us apparently to see if the card was refused, before they used it in a store. Though we are not at fault, we get hit with about a $25 chargeback from PayPal. So we found it best to just quickly refund donations of this amount, especially from countries that where we don't usually get donations, and we didn't recognize the ME extension."

I pass this on just in case you are not aware of this.

[CaelThunderwing]

Originally Posted by knc1

Do you have a way to keep it charged?
and

Check that cable, the pc port, and the pc

Any effort spent now without being able to re-charge it will be short-lived.

w/ the issues i saw much earlier w/ teh indexer causing so much, i charge dit off te USB Service port on mt HDTV (still gave off 5v 1A) i'm just concluding w/ what you and twobob guessed (it being the indexer, it hasnt gone thru anymore "Sluggishness" moments.

curious though why was the image on teh kubrick iso a Stock 3.4 K3 instead of a JB'd 3.4 K3 image?

[Skreelink]

Sorry if this seems... badly worded or hard to understand.. (I'm very tired and not thinking too straight, sure you all know the drill), but I have an issue with a kindle keyboard 3g model. It sat on the headboard for awhile, so I assumed it was a dead battery, let it charge for over a day, nothing.. it doesn't respond to the power button. I thought, alright, maybe sitting has actually killed the battery... I've went through 2 brand new batteries, nothing, charging ~2 days each.

The issue is this; Plug it in, orange light comes on.. (during testing I tried this with the battery out, orange light comes on without a battery too). After it charges for around 8 or so hours, the LED goes out NOT green. Tapping the power slide does nothing, except holding it to 'reset' the device, the orange LED goes out after 15 seconds and I CAN hold Volume down to get my Win7 machine to read the SE Blank RINGO device.

After figuring this out, I thought somehow the firmware got frazzled, so I've tried Kubrick via Virtual Machine and USB disk. I've also tried using ATK (after fighting drivers in a Windows XP VM, it tells me device not supported/reset device)

Another oddity, it seems to reset every say, 2 minutes. Dictated by the sound of unplugging/replugging a USB in Windows 7, and it also disconnects it from the VM. I CANNOT access it via USB to get my books off of it either, if it's not in USB Download mode, nothing reads it.

The screen NEVER changes, although it shouldn't be broken, moisture infected, etc. It was in a case (3rd party case) on the headboard and was working last it was touched. It just sits at the silly man under the tree with the kindle meaning.

For the tl;dr people.. LED never shows green (no matter how many taps/holds/several day charges) just orange for about 5~8 hours after plugging it in, or 'resetting' it with the slider while still plugged in, light turns off after unplug and doesn't come back on unless plugged in.

Attempted Kubrick via USB and VM, and attempted ATK. Kubrick jumps from 0% to Flash Finished instantly when it flashes kernel or rootfs.

I'm used to working with cellphones (Dumb/Android) and PCs.. silly kindle stuff annoys me... Any ideas from anyone?

[twobob]

yup. I have seen about 4 or 5 of these...

Never did get to the bottom of "why" yet. I was going to rip one open and shove a serial cable on at some point.. perhaps you might think about doing the same.

Have no answers. apologies.

[knc1]

Originally Posted by Skreelink

Another oddity, it seems to reset every say, 2 minutes. Dictated by the sound of unplugging/replugging a USB in Windows 7, and it also disconnects it from the VM. I CANNOT access it via USB to get my books off of it either, if it's not in USB Download mode, nothing reads it.

KUBRICK **DOES NOT** work in a VM.

Boot your computer with KUBRICK - it will not disturb your windows install.

[Skreelink]

Originally Posted by knc1

KUBRICK **DOES NOT** work in a VM.

Boot your computer with KUBRICK - it will not disturb your windows install.

The VM was only really for testing, but if you read my post, you'd notice I *did* load it up via a USB drive... I'm no stranger to live discs/USBs, I carry two of them in my pocket at all times. Booting the USB had the same results as the VM, which should *technically* work, if you know how to setup USB passthrough to a VM, but most of my kubrick tests were with the USB boot. Also, it states IN THE OP that it DOES WORK in a Virtual Machine if you clicked the spoiler button.

"Yes, I do know that it also works in a Virtual Machine, provided that you make sure the device (which enters 3 different modes) is actually seen by the VM in all of these modes. For the average end user, the VM simply constitutes another layer of potential trouble - which is why I don't suggest to run Kubrick in a VM."

[knc1]

Originally Posted by Skreelink

The VM was only really for testing, but if you read my post, you'd notice I *did* load it up via a USB drive... I'm no stranger to live discs/USBs, I carry two of them in my pocket at all times. Booting the USB had the same results as the VM, which should *technically* work, if you know how to setup USB passthrough to a VM, but most of my kubrick tests were with the USB boot. Also, it states IN THE OP that it DOES WORK in a Virtual Machine if you clicked the spoiler button.

"Yes, I do know that it also works in a Virtual Machine, provided that you make sure the device (which enters 3 different modes) is actually seen by the VM in all of these modes. For the average end user, the VM simply constitutes another layer of potential trouble - which is why I don't suggest to run Kubrick in a VM."

There is more than one "VM".
You did not mention "which" "VM".

What tells you that the device **is not** in USB downloader mode?
That you did not mention.

The other tools that you tried, where you running those from the KUBRICK command line?
The tool builds that are on the KUBRICK disk or other builds?

What is the output of lsusb -vv when you think it is not in USB downloader mode?
If you past the entire output, please wrap it in spoilers.

[Skreelink]

Originally Posted by knc1

There is more than one "VM".
You did not mention "which" "VM".

What tells you that the device **is not** in USB downloader mode?
That you did not mention.

The other tools that you tried, where you running those from the KUBRICK command line?
The tool builds that are on the KUBRICK disk or other builds?

What is the output of lsusb -vv when you think it is not in USB downloader mode?
If you past the entire output, please wrap it in spoilers.

The other tools, such as ATK, was a windows application. I've done nothing with the KUBRICK command line, but in another linux environment I do not remember having ANYTHING show up in lsusb. When the device is not in USB download mode, nothing responds. No device shows attached to the PC (windows or Linux), nothing under lsusb, etc. Just the orrange LED comes on. In USB download mode, it's freelance something in lsusb and SE Blank RINGO in windows, can't remember offhand, I don't have the kindle on me as I'm not home right now. Tomorrow I plan to retry everything as I'm sure messing with it today has drained any power in the battery (although it's been on charge for over 48 hours). Likely might be something I'll need a serial cord to get any real information, I just don't happen to have one.

[knc1]

Ensure that the USB cable and port are good.

Also be sure you are not using a "power only" USB cable.

Boot into the KUBRICK live usb stick you made - escape to the command line, then use the tools you find there.
We **KNOW** how those builds work and respond.

That will eliminate a whole bunch of possible problems.

The general troubleshooting path will be:

Confirm that the device will not enter USBdownloader mode.
Then find the reason -
There are only a very few things that it might be - since this mode is manufactured into the SoC core when the chip is masked.

But my current bet is that it **is** in USBdownloader mode -
That the problem is after that point in the process.

[Skreelink]

Originally Posted by knc1

Ensure that the USB cable and port are good.

Also be sure you are not using a "power only" USB cable.

Boot into the KUBRICK live usb stick you made - escape to the command line, then use the tools you find there.
We **KNOW** how those builds work and respond.

That will eliminate a whole bunch of possible problems.

The general troubleshooting path will be:

Confirm that the device will not enter USBdownloader mode.
Then find the reason -
There are only a very few things that it might be - since this mode is manufactured into the SoC core when the chip is masked.

But my current bet is that it **is** in USBdownloader mode -
That the problem is after that point in the process.

Could you give a list of commands I should try tomorrow? KUBRICK *does* read the kindle as usb downloader mode, as it prompts to continue after the reboot with slider + volume down. Should I do these commands in USB Download mode, or try a normal reboot without? The cords I am using (I have 3), are the OEM Kindle cord, OEM Samsung phone cord (I primarily use this one for programming phones), and an OEM Motorola cord, I have no generic cords (for the sake of my phone flashing and programming, I can't have charge only cords).

[twobob]

like I said before. Seen a few toasted kindles do what you describe.

Fairly certain that no amount of shuffling around software is going to help.

Need to rip it open and have a delve into the serial output IMHO. see what is truly wrong. I suspect you will see something like ERROR: eink_controller.ko cannot be started (paraphrasing) or ERROR: /mnt/base-us cannot be mounted

indicating a broken part. That would be my guess. Sorry

[knc1]

Originally Posted by twobob

like I said before. Seen a few toasted kindles do what you describe.

Fairly certain that no amount of shuffling around software is going to help.

Need to rip it open and have a delve into the serial output IMHO. see what is truly wrong. I suspect you will see something like ERROR: eink_controller.ko cannot be started (paraphrasing) or ERROR: /mnt/base-us cannot be mounted

indicating a broken part. That would be my guess. Sorry

Yup -
I thought it was going into USBdownloader mode -
sort of hard to break that without melting down the SoC chip itself.
(Although a broken power switch or volume - switch could prevent the user from triggering it.)

My next bet:
You will find the second error twobob mentioned in the output of the serial port - -
Usual cause:
System power failed while trying to write to the flash chip, corrupting it beyond recovery.

The cost of replacing the flash chip makes it impractical to do - the K3 just isn't worth that much.

So most likely you are now the owner of a set of used, K3 parts - less the motherboard -
e-bay it and start over with another device -
or
buy a "broken screen" K3 and swap motherboards.
keeping in mind that there where at least three different display screens shipped with the K3 during its production run.