Aura Is my screen dead?

[firehawk12]

Hi all,

I have a Kobo Aura that I haven't used in a while. I thought I'd pull it out again to see if it worked, and I noticed two things.

One was that the font colour was really "light". Instead of black text, everything looked like a faded gray.

The other was that there are lines running horizontally in the middle of the screen:
http://i.imgur.com/0NSrJBR.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/PWeFLEH.jpg
(I hope they show up in those pictures).

Did my device just die from inactivity? I have an old Paperwhite with similar inactivity from the same time and it's still working fine, so I was just wondering.

(The Aura is a good manga reader, so I'd be sad if the screen is basically dead).

Thanks for your help.

[Ken Maltby]

One thing that would make me concerned is that you are seeing the same lines when both an image and a text page are displayed. They look to me like a ghosting effect appears on a page, but it is not likely that you had a page with dark lines up before each page. You could try displaying a solid dark image a few times.

Luck;
Ken

[frostschutz]

You're not the first with this type of damage (although I can't find the other thread right now). Not sure as to what causes this, but to my knowledge no one found a way to repair...

On my Story HD I occasionally got a error that looked like a printer running out of ink and it turned out to be caused by a dying battery (too low voltage maybe? or whatever) but I don't think your issue is the same...

[firehawk12]

Yeah, the device says my battery is charged anyway.

I don't remember the details of loading images onto the Aura, but can I just find a black jpeg online somewhere and then just copy it to the device to view it?

[Barbara1955]

Re-Boot might help. IF the battery is charged as you said.. Charging was my 1st idea.

[firehawk12]

I actually had to reboot it by holding the power button to the side for 10 seconds for it to power up. I'd rather not try factory resetting it though, as I've since forgotten how to load up the custom firmware and all that stuff on the device...

[frostschutz]

Found old thread which had the same issue: https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=262586

[Ken Maltby]

Originally Posted by firehawk12

Yeah, the device says my battery is charged anyway.

I don't remember the details of loading images onto the Aura, but can I just find a black jpeg online somewhere and then just copy it to the device to view it?

It is probably easiest to just make a .png or .jpg file in any image program, even Windows Paint, Size it to what your device displays and fill with black.

Luck;
Ken

[firehawk12]

Originally Posted by Ken Maltby

It is probably easiest to just make a .png or .jpg file in any image program, even Windows Paint, Size it to what your device displays and fill with black.

Luck;
Ken

Would you happen to know what resolution the Aura screen is?
And the Kobo software can natively read picture files then?

[JSWolf]

1024x758 is the screen resolution.

[Ken Maltby]

As I remember it the stock software can display .png files.

[firehawk12]

I tried leaving it on black for a bit and the horizontal lines seem to be there, so I imagine that's just a screen defect. At least it looks like the text is a bit darker now.

[JSWolf]

Make a backup of your Aura and try a factory reset.

[the.Mtn.Man]

Originally Posted by firehawk12

Did my device just die from inactivity?

Looks more like stress damage to me, possibly from something sitting on it or being dropped. I doubt it's from inactivity.

[JSWolf]

I still say it looks like a screen controller problem. I would contact Kobo about it.