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Larry Dignan, Andrew Nusca and Rachel King
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My Amazon Kindle is cured but naked

By | December 21, 2010, 3:18pm PST

Summary: Amazon has a Kindle cover problem on its hands and is offering refunds as well as $25 to be applied to another one—or anything else on the e-commerce site.

Amazon has a Kindle cover problem on its hands and is offering refunds as well as $25 to be applied to another one—or anything else on the e-commerce site.

In a nutshell, the Kindle would keep rebooting mid-paragraph of a reading session. It was enough to drive someone insane. The problem: Amazon’s $34.99 Kindle covers—non-lighted—would damage the Kindle. Something about metal clips and static electricity.

On Amazon’s customer support forum, you can see a situation spinning out of control. First Amazon was a touch dismissive. Then the groundswell of complaints heated up. Last week, Amazon went to the policy of refunds for covers and the promotional credit.

If you happen to one of these folks with a rebooting Kindle call Amazon directly for a refund. Word of the fix started to bubble up last week, but I’d guess a lot of Kindle users missed it.

Overall, the fix seems fair.

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Topics

Amazon.com Inc., Refund, Amazon Kindle, E-books & E-Readers, Personal Technology, Larry Dignan

Larry Dignan is Editor in Chief of ZDNet and SmartPlanet as well as Editorial Director of ZDNet's sister site TechRepublic.

Disclosure

Larry Dignan

Larry Dignan has nothing to disclose. He doesn’t hold investments in the technology companies he covers.

Biography

Larry Dignan

Larry Dignan is Editor in Chief of ZDNet and SmartPlanet as well as Editorial Director of ZDNet's sister site TechRepublic. He was most recently Executive Editor of News and Blogs at ZDNet. Prior to that he was executive news editor at eWeek and news editor at Baseline. He also served as the East Coast news editor and finance editor at CNET News.com. Larry has covered the technology and financial services industry since 1995, publishing articles in WallStreetWeek.com, Inter@ctive Week, The New York Times, and Financial Planning magazine. He's a graduate of the Columbia School of Journalism and the University of Delaware.

For daily updates, follow Larry on Twitter.

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RE: My Amazon Kindle is cured but naked
MichelSimon 12th Oct
@james347
The post is written in a very good manner and it entails many useful information for me.
ville porto cervo
View in thread
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RE: My Amazon Kindle is cured but naked
james347 21st Dec 2010
Get an iPad....oh wait...
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RE: My Amazon Kindle is cured but naked
MichelSimon 12th Oct
@james347
The post is written in a very good manner and it entails many useful information for me.
ville porto cervo
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RE: My Amazon Kindle is cured but naked
Mike (not Cox) 21st Dec 2010
I've had my DX with the black leather cover for nearly three weeks - so far, so good. Looks like it's really tied to that particular cover for the regular Kindle.
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RE: My Amazon Kindle is cured but naked
yooperjo Updated - 21st Dec 2010
I've had my DX since August. I have a neoprene cover by M-Edge and have never had a problem. I love my Kindle!
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RE: My Amazon Kindle is cured but naked
neilpost 22nd Dec 2010
$34.99 for a cover

ROFLMAO !
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Metal clips and static electricity???
i8thecat Updated - 22nd Dec 2010
Sounds like horrible engineering to me... You shouldn't be able to ESD it with a protective case... That's insane.
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RE: My Amazon Kindle is cured but naked
jimoro 22nd Dec 2010
@i8thecat :: Check it out. The Kindle is actually connected to the case by the same electrical contacts on its left edge that are used to power the lamp in the lighted version of the same case. I was wondering about that design choice when I first browsed through the accessories on Amazon. Major oops!
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RE: My Amazon Kindle is cured but naked
ray.case@... 22nd Dec 2010
seems like time to invest in some humidification...
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RE: My Amazon Kindle is cured but naked
online@... Updated - 22nd Dec 2010
I wish my Kindle 3 was having this problem! I've had it for a couple of months now, with that same cover, and not a single problem. I'd love to have the lighted cover...

And that non-lighted cover, while a tad overpriced, is very nice...holds the Kindle securely, is surprisingly protective, and make it easy to hold like a book, even bending completely backwards. I had the official cover for the original Kindle which was good, but a joke compared to this one (I think it was included in the price, though...)
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RE: My Amazon Kindle is cured but naked
leopards 22nd Dec 2010
Yet again, I am glad my choice was the Sony Reader PRS-505. Getting a bit long in the tooth now, but it came with a cover (leather) and I can buy my ebooks just about anywhere but Amazon!
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RE: My Amazon Kindle is cured but naked
ryork272 27th Dec 2010
@leopards
Oh, and you find the Sony to be perfect? Think again!

Here, from a Sony PRS-505 owner:
"So..., I am bricked. I have no idea why it is trying a firmware update, I certainly never started one. So is it automatic? I see nothing about an update being issued. I am dead in the water at this point. Is there a hard reset somehow that will reset it back to factory state? I have all my books I have bought on my computer still (by the way, I only had about 15 on the device)."

Oh no! The Sony is "bricked"! Its only a matter of time Leopards. It will happen to you, just read the forums you poor loser.

The fact that you cannot buy Amazon books makes the Sony useless rubbish.

I have the Kindle 3 with Amazon's cover that has a built in light. No batteries required. Its awesome. The Kindle 3 rocks!
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RE: My Amazon Kindle is cured but naked
ryork272 27th Dec 2010
@leopards

Here's another happy Sony PRS-505 customer:

"Well, I did call Sony support, and after an hour and a half holding (ouch) and trying different things, was told I have to send it in. It took 45 minutes to get to level 2 support, where I had to start all over again. They were trying to help, but 45 minutes to get to level 2 and then having to go over it all again really stunk. I have had it like 31 days, so no return.. grrrrrr. They did authorize the shipping, but say it is going to take 5-10 business days to repair."

I think I will stick with my Kindle 3, thank you.
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RE: My Amazon Kindle is cured but naked
dxg19 2nd Jan 2011
I haven't had any problems with my Kindle 3G. However, the Kindle may not be for everyone due to the lack of color and other issues: For a fast and simple review of the eReaders on the market, go to theebookreport.net
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RE: My Amazon Kindle is cured but naked
heybales 17th Jan 2011
I had this problem, and received a refund from Amazon. They didn't want the cover back, so I decided to hack the cover and remove the offending prongs. The result was a pretty clean modification. Documentation is on flickr here.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/heybales/sets/72157625780363786/with/5338068312/
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RE: My Amazon Kindle is cured but naked
birumut Updated - 17th Jun
Well done! Thank you very much for professional templates and community edition
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