PW Is there any hope for my Kindle?

[anon3]

I have a Kindle Paperwhite 1 that isn't turning on, the screen is just blank. I've tried long pressing the power button to force a restart, but nothing so far.

My next step is to leave it plugged into the wall charger for the next 24-48 hours and try again, but I've noticed that when I first plugged the charger into the Kindle the amber light came on for 3-4 seconds and then turned off and it doesn't come back on (no matter how many times I pull out and plug the charger back in).

I have a multimeter lying around, so I decided to open up the Kindle and see if I can get any useful information from the battery itself. It gave a reading of 2.52V on the multimeter (I don't know if this information helps). I plugged the battery back in and connected the charger again and the amber light once again came on for 3-4 seconds before turning off completely, and no more plugging out/in can make it come back on.

I've done some searching and any time the Kindle won't power on it's recommended to leave it on a charge for a few days, which I plan to do, but I was wondering if it sounds like I need a new battery, or if there may be something else more sinister going on possibly with the motherboard itself.

I've also tried plugging it into my computer, but nothing is recognised.

Has anybody came across any issues where the charging indicator would not turn on while connected to a power supply?

[JSWolf]

I know this isn't what you want to hear, but given that it's a PW1, I suggest getting a new Reader.

[dhdurgee]

Sometimes charging problems are due to a temperature sensor calibration issue. This can often be corrected by placing your Kindle in a freezer overnight. Wrap it carefully to ensure no problems with condensation. After allowing it to warm back up try charging it again from a wall adapter.

The fact that your computer fails to see it may indicate other problems, possibly with the mainboard itself. It is also possible that the battery itself has failed in some manner.

If the freezer trick does not work for your case, you will need to open the unit and connect to the serial port to see what is going on. This requires the proper tools and ability to work with tiny, delicate, easy to damage connections on the mainboard. If you can handle this yourself see the serial jailbreak thread for the PW1 for directions on accessing the serial port.

Beyond that you could ask if someone in the forum can help, contact Amazon who will likely simply offer to sell you a replacement at a discount or offer it for sale on eBay or Amazon as a "not working, usable for parts" unit.

Dave

[anon3]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

I know this isn't what you want to hear, but given that it's a PW1, I suggest getting a new Reader.

I have a PW3 and PW4, but was hoping to bring some life back into this old PW1 for a family member. Funny thing is, I upgraded from a PW1 to a PW4 and regretted my decision so much. I hated using the PW4 and was going to sell it and just use my PW1 again, but decided to get a second hand PW3 for the similarity of the PW1 with the 300 dpi screen. I’d like to try and fix it if possible, if not then I’ll keep it around for parts in case I see a broken PW1 that I can Frankenstein together to make one working device.

[anon3]

Originally Posted by dhdurgee

Sometimes charging problems are due to a temperature sensor calibration issue. This can often be corrected by placing your Kindle in a freezer overnight. Wrap it carefully to ensure no problems with condensation. After allowing it to warm back up try charging it again from a wall adapter.

The fact that your computer fails to see it may indicate other problems, possibly with the mainboard itself. It is also possible that the battery itself has failed in some manner.

If the freezer trick does not work for your case, you will need to open the unit and connect to the serial port to see what is going on. This requires the proper tools and ability to work with tiny, delicate, easy to damage connections on the mainboard. If you can handle this yourself see the serial jailbreak thread for the PW1 for directions on accessing the serial port.

Beyond that you could ask if someone in the forum can help, contact Amazon who will likely simply offer to sell you a replacement at a discount or offer it for sale on eBay or Amazon as a "not working, usable for parts" unit.

Dave

I’ve seen that freezer trick mentioned around before! Thanks, I’ll definitely give it a go tonight and hope for the best tomorrow.

I’m not confident that it’s not a motherboard issue. I’ve searched around here a lot and I can’t really remember seeing much about charging issues where the LED fails to even light up once the charging cable is connected. Once I try all the tricks to try breathe some life back into the device I’ll look into connecting up to the serial port if none of them work.

[eddie.t.h]

Your battery is very low. Your Kindle may not want to charge it. Try to charge it on an external charger, it could be a lab power supply set to 4.2v and with the current limited to 500mA.

[anon3]

So I put it in the freezer for about 10 hours and plugged the charger into it, again the orange LED indicator came on for a few seconds before going off again. I have had it plugged in for 6 hours now but I’m not sure if there is any point if the LED is not even lighting up.

Originally Posted by eddie.t.h

Your battery is very low. Your Kindle may not want to charge it. Try to charge it on an external charger, it could be a lab power supply set to 4.2v and with the current limited to 500mA.

I don’t have any other way to charge to battery other than through the kindle. I don’t mind buying a new battery for it, if I can be sure that is where the issue is.

[eddie.t.h]

As a last resort, do something like this https://youtu.be/_41R5M4lwpY
The battery must be above 3v to start charging.

[anon3]

Originally Posted by eddie.t.h

As a last resort, do something like this https://youtu.be/_41R5M4lwpY
The battery must be above 3v to start charging.

Interesting, so the fact that the charging indicator only appears briefly may be due to the fact that when first plugged in, the Kindles charging circuit realises that the battery is too far gone to be safely charged, so cuts the power going to the battery, which would possibly explain why the LED then turns off.

I think I’ll try a replacement battery and hope for the best. I’ll update this post with the results.

[eddie.t.h]

Before you buy a new battery, you can ask a local GSM service if they would charge yours. It is a pity to invest in a new one if it turns out that there is other damage. Also, your old battery may be fine after being charged.

[anon3]

Originally Posted by eddie.t.h

Before you buy a new battery, you can ask a local GSM service if they would charge yours. It is a pity to invest in a new one if it turns out that there is other damage. Also, your old battery may be fine after being charged.

Okay, so I had actually ordered a battery before I seen your post. It arrived today and I ran the multimeter over it and got a reading of 3.82V. I installed it and noticed a green flash on the charging indicator, which I wasn’t getting before. The kindle is still in a weird state though, because I am now able to plug it into the laptop and see it appear as a device. It also turns on but nothing appears on-screen. The the front light LEDs all turn on but the screen remains blank. I don’t see any visible cracks or damage to the screen, but it is behaving like it is powered on (the LEDs turn off when connected to the laptop and turn on again when unplugged and the power button turns them off and on). Not sure what to do now. I might disconnect the screen cables and make sure they’re reconnected again properly, then leave it on the charge for a while but I’m thinking there could be a motherboard issue.

[eddie.t.h]

It's a good idea to check your connections. It is detected by the computer as what? External drive or something else? Try rebooting with long holding the power button (30s).

[anon3]

Originally Posted by eddie.t.h

It's a good idea to check your connections. It is detected by the computer as what? External drive or something else? Try rebooting with long holding the power button (30s).

I did reply to this a few days ago but it looks like it never made it through. So the Kindle showed up on the laptop as 'Kindle' and I could view the root of the device and see the documents folder, so that told me that there was some sort of life in the device.

After some messing around with the device last week I was sure that the issue lay with either the screen or the motherboard and at that realisation I decided that I probably didn't have the knowledge to go any further, so I kind of gave up on it.

Then I spotted a PW1 on eBay for parts because the screen was damaged and it wouldn't turn on, so I grabbed it for about £8 in the hopes that the motherboard would be good and I could swap it out for mine.

The device arrived and it looked dead, but I held the power button in for 40 seconds and it booted up and other than the scratched up screen it worked fine. So I opened it up, took it all apart and discovered that it was a 3G model (mine is Wi-Fi only) and I was hoping that this wouldn't cause issues when I tried to swap them out. I moved across the motherboard, but decided to not attach the 3G module and when I turned it around the screen was showing the tree loading screen, success! Confirmation that the screen was working and the board was the issue.

It did boot up, but I was stuck in a boot loop and my new fear was that a 3G board was not compatible with my Kindle for some reason. Turns out the small piece of metal that is screwed in near where the 3G module is found was causing an issue that left the device in a boot loop. I removed this and reset the device and everything seems fine! The only issue was that I couldn't seem to register it (no error message, just does nothing after details are entered) but I'm not bothered, the books can still be added via calibre.

I'm more than happy that I was able to bring this back from the dead, even if it has been frankensteined a little bit.