Kindle suddenly crashing often

ficbot · 07-11-2011, 01:25 AM

My Kindle 3 seems to be freezing every time I make a highlight, and today it started restarting suddenly every time I plugged it in. Any way to trouble shoot and see where the problem is?

lestatar · 07-11-2011, 02:07 AM

Heya...

- does the problem happen on all books on the Kindle3 or only a specific book?

ficbot · 07-11-2011, 11:49 AM

It was at first on a specific book, which I have now removed. Then I found it had deleted all my collections---the books were still there, but not in collections anymore, which is a huge pain. After it restarted when I unplugged it this morning, it was working much faster and smoother than yesterday, so I started adding them to collections again. And then a second ago, it crashed again.

pidgeon92 · 07-11-2011, 05:34 PM

Could be a corrupt ebook file.

Also, to restore your collections, de-authorize and re-authorize the Kindle.

Bittybye · 07-11-2011, 07:24 PM

I've been having the same problem. It also happens when I do bookmarks. And it isn't the book on my case. I had one book where I made 2 bookmarks with no problem then with the third it just froze. It made the bookmark when it finally came back, and I was able to make a 4th bookmarks in the same book, no problem.

ficbot · 07-11-2011, 07:26 PM

It's just brutal. It's restarted about 7 times today as I have tried to get my collections put back. I am at a total loss. I am going to try just removing the last few books added. I hope I don't have to do a factory reset; it will be a nightmare to have to load back 1000 books! But I am at my wit's end here. It's just made the device completely unusable.

Update: no luck. We are now on restart #14, and I am just going to do a factory reset and start re-loading stuff. All that time spent getting everything arranged just so! Ugh. Maybe I'll just keep less stuff on it from now on. It's too big a hassle when something like this happens.

Snowman · 07-12-2011, 02:57 AM

Are you sure that this is not due to what seems to be a re-indexing occurring as you add or delete a bookmark, or add highlighting?

I was plagued with this. Frequently, but not always, when adding a highlight, my k3 would appear to freeze, but if I waited long enough (90-120 secs, usually), it would return to life. If I got impatient and rebooted, the highlight or bookmark would have been saved. It also seems to be related to the size of your library. Mine is at 1200+ books.

Use debug and turn off indexing - details are in the forums somewhere. I did this in Feb, and have had no problem since then. BTW, this is not persistant. If you reboot your kindle, you will have to reset the no-indexing flag.

Snowman

ficbot · 07-12-2011, 08:21 AM

Thanks for the info, Snowman. The Kindle did have over 1 gb left on it, but it had over 1000 books. I don't know where debug is or how to find it, but I did do a factory reset and the books I loaded back onto it are about a third of what I had before. So far, the Kindle has been much smoother and brisker to operate than it was before. Maybe it was a mistake to feel like I had to have every book on there

For instance, I used to have a collection for every series I had not read yet and now I just made one for 'current series' and loaded in the books for just one series. When I finish those, I will load another. After the night's reboot, it has about 300 books on it. I think I will try to keep at 500 or so and no more.

RainingLemur · 07-12-2011, 10:51 AM

Before I finished reading everything, I was assuming it probably had something to do with the volume of books. And...looks like that may have been the case.

Hope keeping the load light helps out.

chamekke · 07-14-2011, 06:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Snowman

I was plagued with this. Frequently, but not always, when adding a highlight, my k3 would appear to freeze, but if I waited long enough (90-120 secs, usually), it would return to life. If I got impatient and rebooted, the highlight or bookmark would have been saved. It also seems to be related to the size of your library. Mine is at 1200+ books.

Use debug and turn off indexing - details are in the forums somewhere. I did this in Feb, and have had no problem since then. BTW, this is not persistant. If you reboot your kindle, you will have to reset the no-indexing flag.

I've had the same problem with highlighting books... fine for the first few, then after that it begins to freeze up. I'd pretty much given up on highlighting.

Will try waiting longer before giving up and attempting a reboot. Thanks for the advice!

chas0039 · 07-14-2011, 08:01 PM

Keep us up to date on your progress if you could. I found that the nook crashed after 1275 titles and there was a hack for a new library that fixed this. I would LOVE to know the upper limit of the Kindle. Also, at least a few Kindle tech support people have told me that the Kindle does much better and is faster with fewer titles in sub-directories. This is the way Calibre sets things up by default and is counter intuitive to what one would expect.

So, if you could (much appreciated) let up know what you find as the upper limit. I have close to 1700 titles from ManyBooks and here and it is very tempting to make the move. I just would hate to go through the 48 hours or so it will take only to find I need to undo it.

j.p.s · 07-16-2011, 05:58 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ficbot

Thanks for the info, Snowman. The Kindle did have over 1 gb left on it, but it had over 1000 books. I don't know where debug is or how to find it, but I did do a factory reset and the books I loaded back onto it are about a third of what I had before. So far, the Kindle has been much smoother and brisker to operate than it was before. Maybe it was a mistake to feel like I had to have every book on there

For instance, I used to have a collection for every series I had not read yet and now I just made one for 'current series' and loaded in the books for just one series. When I finish those, I will load another. After the night's reboot, it has about 300 books on it. I think I will try to keep at 500 or so and no more.

I can't find the thread, but it has been claimed that loading a "large" number of books makes the Kindle unstable. Another thread says that that having collections and a large number of books also adds instability.

A third thread says that putting book files in subdirectories in the documents directory makes the Kindle much more stable. The subdirectories do no show up in the Kindle's home page, but the books in them do.

I don't have a lot of books in my Kindle 2 or DX, because of fear of provoking instability, but I plan on making a subdirectory for each collection, move the books into the subdirectories, and see how that goes.

DreamWriter · 07-17-2011, 05:58 PM

I also have problems with Kindle freezing while highlighting and bookmarking. The problem is intermittent. I usually wait a minute or two, and it'll finally come back to life without needing to reboot. The issue's been reported elsewhere, so it's not all that unusual. Some have stated that it has to do with the size of the "My Clippings" file or indexing, but I haven't been able to pinpoint that as the problem in my case. I regularly delete "My Clippings" and check for indexing. I do have a lot of books on my Kindle, however.

As for the frequent rebooting, if you have your Kindle in the unlighted Amazon case (with the hinge), try removing the Kindle from that and see if the problem continues. There have been known problems with that case, and Amazon will take care of you if that's the problem.

chas0039 · 07-17-2011, 09:21 PM

Another freeze problem I found with large numbers of titles is doing a search and then deleting. Deleting works fine otherwise, just not when you find the title by searching. I use the search to find the book, open it, and then go to Home where it is now at the head of the que as "most recently read". Then a delete works as expected.

07-11-2011, 07:26 PM	#6
ficbot Wizard Posts: 2,409 Karma: 4132096 Join Date: Sep 2008 Device: Kindle Paperwhite/iOS Kindle App	It's just brutal. It's restarted about 7 times today as I have tried to get my collections put back. I am at a total loss. I am going to try just removing the last few books added. I hope I don't have to do a factory reset; it will be a nightmare to have to load back 1000 books! But I am at my wit's end here. It's just made the device completely unusable. Update: no luck. We are now on restart #14, and I am just going to do a factory reset and start re-loading stuff. All that time spent getting everything arranged just so! Ugh. Maybe I'll just keep less stuff on it from now on. It's too big a hassle when something like this happens. Last edited by ficbot; 07-11-2011 at 07:46 PM.

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07-11-2011, 01:25 AM	#1
ficbot Wizard Posts: 2,409 Karma: 4132096 Join Date: Sep 2008 Device: Kindle Paperwhite/iOS Kindle App	Kindle suddenly crashing often My Kindle 3 seems to be freezing every time I make a highlight, and today it started restarting suddenly every time I plugged it in. Any way to trouble shoot and see where the problem is?

07-11-2011, 02:07 AM	#2
lestatar LB's lolz Mutt Minion Posts: 2,902 Karma: 5700001 Join Date: Jun 2011 Location: Hong Kong now but NYC forever Device: Kindle3, GalaxyTab, BB Bold9700, BB 8300, Sony Clie, Palm Vx, Palm III	Heya... - does the problem happen on all books on the Kindle3 or only a specific book?

07-11-2011, 11:49 AM	#3
ficbot Wizard Posts: 2,409 Karma: 4132096 Join Date: Sep 2008 Device: Kindle Paperwhite/iOS Kindle App	It was at first on a specific book, which I have now removed. Then I found it had deleted all my collections---the books were still there, but not in collections anymore, which is a huge pain. After it restarted when I unplugged it this morning, it was working much faster and smoother than yesterday, so I started adding them to collections again. And then a second ago, it crashed again.

07-11-2011, 05:34 PM	#4
pidgeon92 Wizard Posts: 3,144 Karma: 8426142 Join Date: Jun 2008 Location: Chicago, IL Device: Kindle PW2, Kindle Voyage, Kindle DXG, Boox M90, Kobo Aura HD	Could be a corrupt ebook file. Also, to restore your collections, de-authorize and re-authorize the Kindle.

07-11-2011, 07:24 PM	#5
Bittybye Addict Posts: 262 Karma: 505124 Join Date: Dec 2009 Device: PRS-T2	I've been having the same problem. It also happens when I do bookmarks. And it isn't the book on my case. I had one book where I made 2 bookmarks with no problem then with the third it just froze. It made the bookmark when it finally came back, and I was able to make a 4th bookmarks in the same book, no problem.

07-12-2011, 02:57 AM	#7
Snowman Zealot Posts: 106 Karma: 3566 Join Date: Aug 2008 Location: London UK Device: iPhone 5, Kindle K3, Kindle Voyage	Are you sure that this is not due to what seems to be a re-indexing occurring as you add or delete a bookmark, or add highlighting? I was plagued with this. Frequently, but not always, when adding a highlight, my k3 would appear to freeze, but if I waited long enough (90-120 secs, usually), it would return to life. If I got impatient and rebooted, the highlight or bookmark would have been saved. It also seems to be related to the size of your library. Mine is at 1200+ books. Use debug and turn off indexing - details are in the forums somewhere. I did this in Feb, and have had no problem since then. BTW, this is not persistant. If you reboot your kindle, you will have to reset the no-indexing flag. Snowman

07-12-2011, 08:21 AM	#8
ficbot Wizard Posts: 2,409 Karma: 4132096 Join Date: Sep 2008 Device: Kindle Paperwhite/iOS Kindle App	Thanks for the info, Snowman. The Kindle did have over 1 gb left on it, but it had over 1000 books. I don't know where debug is or how to find it, but I did do a factory reset and the books I loaded back onto it are about a third of what I had before. So far, the Kindle has been much smoother and brisker to operate than it was before. Maybe it was a mistake to feel like I had to have every book on there For instance, I used to have a collection for every series I had not read yet and now I just made one for 'current series' and loaded in the books for just one series. When I finish those, I will load another. After the night's reboot, it has about 300 books on it. I think I will try to keep at 500 or so and no more.

07-12-2011, 10:51 AM	#9
RainingLemur Spork Connoisseur Posts: 2,355 Karma: 16780603 Join Date: Mar 2011 Device: Nook Color	Before I finished reading everything, I was assuming it probably had something to do with the volume of books. And...looks like that may have been the case. Hope keeping the load light helps out.

07-14-2011, 08:01 PM	#11
chas0039 Sceptic Posts: 573 Karma: 73436 Join Date: Jul 2010 Location: The Lake Device: rooted Nooks, retired. JetBook Lite, Kindle 3, 4, Kobo Nia, Libra H2O.	Keep us up to date on your progress if you could. I found that the nook crashed after 1275 titles and there was a hack for a new library that fixed this. I would LOVE to know the upper limit of the Kindle. Also, at least a few Kindle tech support people have told me that the Kindle does much better and is faster with fewer titles in sub-directories. This is the way Calibre sets things up by default and is counter intuitive to what one would expect. So, if you could (much appreciated) let up know what you find as the upper limit. I have close to 1700 titles from ManyBooks and here and it is very tempting to make the move. I just would hate to go through the 48 hours or so it will take only to find I need to undo it.

07-17-2011, 05:58 PM	#13
DreamWriter Books are brain food. Posts: 2,950 Karma: 4836916 Join Date: Nov 2010 Location: U.S. Device: Paperwhite · Fire HD6/HD8/HD10 · Galaxy Tab A7	I also have problems with Kindle freezing while highlighting and bookmarking. The problem is intermittent. I usually wait a minute or two, and it'll finally come back to life without needing to reboot. The issue's been reported elsewhere, so it's not all that unusual. Some have stated that it has to do with the size of the "My Clippings" file or indexing, but I haven't been able to pinpoint that as the problem in my case. I regularly delete "My Clippings" and check for indexing. I do have a lot of books on my Kindle, however. As for the frequent rebooting, if you have your Kindle in the unlighted Amazon case (with the hinge), try removing the Kindle from that and see if the problem continues. There have been known problems with that case, and Amazon will take care of you if that's the problem.

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07-17-2011, 09:21 PM	#14
chas0039 Sceptic Posts: 573 Karma: 73436 Join Date: Jul 2010 Location: The Lake Device: rooted Nooks, retired. JetBook Lite, Kindle 3, 4, Kobo Nia, Libra H2O.	Another freeze problem I found with large numbers of titles is doing a search and then deleting. Deleting works fine otherwise, just not when you find the title by searching. I use the search to find the book, open it, and then go to Home where it is now at the head of the que as "most recently read". Then a delete works as expected.