Kindle Firmware 5.17.1 imminent

[mergen3107]

According to this post, 5.17.1 is imminent.

It is unclear whether Kindle Scribe is in the list though.

[mergen3107]

Probably related to “new” Kindles releasing soon

[BionicGecko]

As usual the info appeared on the French Amazon page first. Really wonder why it’s so often the case?

[Animage]

Originally Posted by BionicGecko

As usual the info appeared on the French Amazon page first. Really wonder why it’s so often the case?

Just a guess, but maybe something with consumer laws in the EU?

[binaryhermit]

Just looked at the release notes linked in the link from the first post, passed them through a machine translator, and was disappointed at how useless they are.

EDIT: 2024
Updated 9 October 2024

Amazon regularly changes the internal software of its devices to improve your experience. The operating system of your Kindle e-reader and other pre-installed software automatically receive updates via the Internet. We would like to inform you that a new update will be available for your Kindle e-reader. It will improve its security and performance, add patches and offer new features. In this update, the software version of the Kindle 5.16.21 e-reader is updated to 5.17.1 or later.

This update weighs 370 MB.

This notification will also be available at www.amazon.fr/help/sw/kindle.

By thanking you for your interest in Amazon devices and services,

The Amazon Appliances team

[mergen3107]

Yeah, same old generic “bug fixes and improvements” as many apps do too

[tomsem]

Originally Posted by mergen3107

Yeah, same old generic “bug fixes and improvements” as many apps do too

My theory about such updates is that they allow the vendor to get metrics on how many are in the active install base, and secondarily deliver bug fixes when there are any.

In case of Kindle I think there are hidden features which can be turned on for a select group of testers and may or may not roll out generally. 'additional highlight styles' (underline, outline) is one that's referenced in the current update and which I hope sees the light of day.

[dandelioncottage]

Some people on Reddit are speculating that this software update might remove Download and Transfer from all Kindles.

[gustophersmob]

Originally Posted by dandelioncottage

Some people on Reddit are speculating that this software update might remove Download and Transfer from all Kindles.

Is the D&T via usb tied to the device firmware? I would think that’s related to Amazon’s back end, but who knows.

[cvkemp]

Is now available on Amazon website, became available this morning, but not for scrip

[j.p.s]

Originally Posted by dandelioncottage

Some people on Reddit are speculating that this software update might remove Download and Transfer from all Kindles.

Originally Posted by gustophersmob

Is the D&T via usb tied to the device firmware? I would think that’s related to Amazon’s back end, but who knows.

Yes, the download part of D&T via usb doesn't involve the kindle or its firmware version and amazon doesn't even know what version is installed on kindles that are kept in airplane mode and manually updated.

But I guess that amazon could use some version as an excuse to remove the web page D&T option for devices it knows are running that version.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by cvkemp

Is now available on Amazon website, became available this morning, but not for scrip

I take it scrip was a typo for Scribe?

[mergen3107]

https://blog.the-ebook-reader.com/20...17-1-released/

5.17.1 is out, but not for Scribe yet.

Nothing to note, really

[BionicGecko]

Originally Posted by mergen3107

https://blog.the-ebook-reader.com/20...17-1-released/

5.17.1 is out, but not for Scribe yet.

Nothing to note, really

Thanks for sharing the link. I do find this change slightly thought-provoking:

General Improvement: The “Whispersync for Books” setting within Device Options is now simply called “Sync”. There is no change to the underlying synchronization functionality.

I somehow find this revealing of the mindset at Amazon; the cloud services are no longer something special, just a “sync” you would expect from any modern device. This feels in line with the apparent decision to remove the Download and Transfer Via USB functionality from the new models.


This is perhaps interesting as well:

There’s actually two different 11th gen Kindles now, a 2022 version and a 2024 version, so that’s going to make things confusing moving forward. Will they have different links for firmware downloads? Mine arrived with software version 5.16.20.0.2, which was never available for the 2022 model.

It seems at least some of the new basic Kindles did ship with an unpublished, non-dot-zero version; I wonder what’s behind that, and more generally, the sharp jump from version 5.16.10.0.1 to 5.16.21 in officially released firmwares.

[kript96]

My base arrived with 5.16.20.0.1