Troubleshooting Extremely frequent crashes on brand new PW2

[Animec]

So I'm at my wits' end here.

I bought a PW2 a few days ago and, right, out of the box, it had a tendency to crash and reboot. Usually without warning, but often after locking up or showing some graphical glitches.

I can find no real pattern to this problem. It began before I had synced many books. It is independent of the book being read or stored on the device or in the cloud. It is independent of wifi status or activity. It is independent of search. No relation to the "frontlight". It has nothing to do with the browser. The battery is fully charged.

I have upgraded and downgraded the firmware to no benefit. I have jailbroken it with no major differences. I installed KUAL and some kindlets, which made crashes a little more frequent, perhaps.

Near as I can tell, this seems to have something to do with a memory issue and/or trying to use a process that either doesn't exist or is borked. I'm no computer expert, so I can't make much sense of the log-file. However, the most frequent error-type messages seem to be associated with the words ACX, mesquite, and various com.lab126.*-files that are not provided by any .service-files. There are several segfaults after tinyrot tries to rotate /var/log/metrics_high_priority and finds nothing to rotate. lab126.pmond frequently warns about process_too_large.

I love the reader but am beginning to feel like it's unusable do any of you know how I may even begin to solve this problem?

Thanks in advance.

[pidgeon92]

It sounds like a bad book file. I'd go with a factory reset, just add back one or two books, read one, and see if the problem persists. If it does, I'd ask Amazon for a replacement.

[Animec]

Sorry, I should have clarified that I have attempted a reset and also that it seems to have nothing to do with any specific book-files. The kindle crashes even without any books loaded. The only pattern I've been able to find is that using the search-box may make it more likely to seize-up and reboot.

Unfortunately, returning to Amazon is not an option atm but I'll see if I can return it to the reseller and buy a Kobo or Nook in London. This is just very frustrating, I am very pleased with the hardware and it has such promise, but I dunno.

[pidgeon92]

If it's a reputable reseller, they should just exchange the faulty unit for a new one.

[NiLuJe]

I'd go with hardware fault, even with heavy poking, I only ever managed to truly crash a Kindle *once* in over 4 years. That's a pretty damn good track record.

[sirmaru]

This is what you said,"I have upgraded and downgraded the firmware to no benefit. I have jailbroken it with no major differences. I installed KUAL and some kindlets, which made crashes a little more frequent, perhaps."

That is what caused the problem. No one may take it back.

[NiLuJe]

Must not feed the troll, must not feed the troll, must not ... Oh, hell!

Yes, because a single public key sitting on your device is so terribly evil...

----

In the future, please refrain from talking crap about stuff you have no insights about, thank you very much.

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by sirmaru

This is what you said,"I have upgraded and downgraded the firmware to no benefit. I have jailbroken it with no major differences. I installed KUAL and some kindlets, which made crashes a little more frequent, perhaps."

That is what caused the problem. No one may take it back.

... Despite endless evidence to the contrary, of course... Everyone who has had a hacked device replaced by Amazon please raise your hand.
<raises-hand>I'll start.</raises-hand>

And not one reported case that I am aware of in which either Amazon or a retailer refused to take one back because it was hacked.
(It is entirely possible one can do something stupid enough that Amazon has no choice but to notice. Like maybe leaving blatant hacked screensavers all over the screen. But I don't think anyone has ever done that.)

Also, it is utterly impossible for the presence of that one file to cause the problems stated.

In the fine tradition of, well, lets just say a particular person who is well-known for posting endless amounts of utter garbage, this claim is delusional to an extent I cannot even begin to describe.

Please refrain from providing tech "support" when you don't have a clue what you are talking about.

[Barty]

@animec: are you using a cover by any chance?

[sirmaru]

Amazon terms of use of their software is described here:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/custom...B08637AAB6F586

"You may not, and you will not encourage, assist or authorize any other person to copy, modify, reverse engineer, decompile or disassemble, or otherwise tamper with, the Amazon Software, whether in whole or in part, or create any derivative works from or of the Amazon Software."

Of course, Amazon reps may not even be aware of this and may not check any returns for firmware modifications.

However, if jail breaking causes problems, one has still lost time going down this path.

If one knows what they are doing, then fine. If one is in doubt, the best way is to just use the Amazon firmware as is and not do any modifications.

I've owned five Kindles and never did any jail breaking. So far as I am concerned, they work just fine in plain vanilla.

Finally, firmware may be UPDATED in the background and may cause real problems if old versions were jail broken.

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by sirmaru

Amazon terms of use of their software is described here:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/custom...B08637AAB6F586

"You may not, and you will not encourage, assist or authorize any other person to copy, modify, reverse engineer, decompile or disassemble, or otherwise tamper with, the Amazon Software, whether in whole or in part, or create any derivative works from or of the Amazon Software."

Irrelevant.

Of course, Amazon reps may not even be aware of this and may not check any returns for firmware modifications.

How utterly true. As the knowledgeable dev team here and anyone who has dealt with the issue knows very well.

However, if jail breaking causes problems, one has still lost time going down this path.

You are assuming for no reason whatsoever in the slightest (and that has already been explained to you) that the problem has anything to do with jailbreaking.

Le me clarify.

The problem has nothing to do with jailbreaking!!!

If one knows what they are doing, then fine. If one is in doubt, the best way is to just use the Amazon firmware as is and not do any modifications.

I've owned five Kindles and never did any jail breaking. So far as I am concerned, they work just fine in plain vanilla.

Then you are more than welcome to guide people IN YOUR AREA OF EXPERTISE, the vanilla Kindle.

Finally, firmware may be UPDATED in the background and may cause real problems if old versions were jail broken.

Firmware will and does get updated in the background all the time, and does indeed cause problems. It removes the hacks and modifications by flashing a pristine, fully-working vanilla firmware to the device, which is a damn big problem in my mind -- and has nothing to do with the OP's problem.