Have I bricked my Forma, perhaps by using KOReader?

[notStanislaw]

Just two days ago, my new Forma arrived. I did the Kobo registration thing and letting it upate itself. After it was properly started I connected it with a usb cable to sync up a few epubs and pdfs with calibre.

Spoiler:

$ uname -a
Linux xxxxxxxxxx 5.10.4-arch2-1 #1 SMP PREEMPT Fri, 01 Jan 2021 05:29:53 +0000 x86_64 GNU/Linux
$ calibre --version 
calibre (calibre 5.9)

So far so good. Next step I took was use NiLuJe's One-Click Install scripts for both KOReader and Plato. Everything worked and I had a great time exploring settings, making myself at home on KOReader and reading books.
Until last night, when I wanted to open the Favorites view and it froze. I may have mistapped on Start USB Storage, but I doubt that would cause a crash.
The power button being the way it is, my fingers now hurt from trying to either shut down, boot or factory reset, but it's all to no avail.
Charging it for an hour even though I doubt it was necessary did not help. Connecting it to the laptop again does not lead to any changes in the dmesg output and it's just stuck on this screen.


I've been looking for solutions but no dice. Can anyone help me troubleshoot this issue and get me back to my readings?

Much love to the FOSS devs making our world a free-er place for everyone.

[notStanislaw]

I also wish to add that I've been scouring KOReader's github issues, these forums and duckduckgo queries for a few hours before I made this post. If there was something I should have found, I did not have the necessary skills and experience to find it.

[NiMa]

Originally Posted by notStanislaw

Just two days ago, my new Forma arrived. I did the Kobo registration thing and letting it upate itself. After it was properly started I connected it with a usb cable to sync up a few epubs and pdfs with calibre.

Spoiler:

$ uname -a
Linux xxxxxxxxxx 5.10.4-arch2-1 #1 SMP PREEMPT Fri, 01 Jan 2021 05:29:53 +0000 x86_64 GNU/Linux
$ calibre --version 
calibre (calibre 5.9)

So far so good. Next step I took was use NiLuJe's One-Click Install scripts for both KOReader and Plato. Everything worked and I had a great time exploring settings, making myself at home on KOReader and reading books.
Until last night, when I wanted to open the Favorites view and it froze. I may have mistapped on Start USB Storage, but I doubt that would cause a crash.
The power button being the way it is, my fingers now hurt from trying to either shut down, boot or factory reset, but it's all to no avail.
Charging it for an hour even though I doubt it was necessary did not help. Connecting it to the laptop again does not lead to any changes in the dmesg output and it's just stuck on this screen.


I've been looking for solutions but no dice. Can anyone help me troubleshoot this issue and get me back to my readings?

Much love to the FOSS devs making our world a free-er place for everyone.

The only thing I could think of would be a short in the Kobo's internal components, since even plugging it in does not output anything to dmesg.
If you can or have one, you could use a meter or something like that to try to see how much power it's drawing off the computer, maybe it could help you.

Does it shows any sign of life or it just seems dead? (e.g. light on power button)

You could ask a replacement, but since the screen was stuck on KOReader's UI, it might be difficult
That's puzzling, I agree

[NiLuJe]

What does actually happen if you try a hard-reset: by which I mean, holding the power button down for *a while* (~20s, possibly more. More certainly won't hurt anything besides your finger ^^)?

If you had the FL on, a good hint that the battery cutoff took is that the frontlight will turn off. You can then release the button, wait a few seconds, and just press the power button normally (which is slightly longer than the usual short suspend/resume press ;p) to power it back on.

(Since you have nightmode enabled, a good bet on what happened is an EPDC hang, Mk. 7 kernels have known issues in corner-cases not really exercised in Nickel, and nightmode is one such aggravating factor. In these instances, a hard-reboot should, well, reboot it just fine, though ).

[notStanislaw]

Originally Posted by NiMa

The only thing I could think of would be a short in the Kobo's internal components, since even plugging it in does not output anything to dmesg.
If you can or have one, you could use a meter or something like that to try to see how much power it's drawing off the computer, maybe it could help you.

Does it shows any sign of life or it just seems dead? (e.g. light on power button)

You could ask a replacement, but since the screen was stuck on KOReader's UI, it might be difficult
That's puzzling, I agree

I have an oldfashioned multimeter but I haven't used it in a long time and the battery's dead, I'll have to go out and get a new one first. I wouldn't know where to stick the pins and what to measure either. Do you mean a more modern one with USB connections?
The light on the power button remains off with or without connection, but because I've also dabbled into the setting for the charging light I'm not entirely positive on whether I've turned that off in Nickle. I think I left that setting on, I'm just not 100% sure.

E-ink fades over the course of months, right? If it got shorted internally, it would have been at the worst possible moment.
On the other hand, does running KOReader void the warranty? I didn't buy it at kobo itself but at a local amazon-like webshop, they might not understand or care about what's on the screen, or be big enough to not be difficult on small fry like this. It's not stuck on some "do not touch these advanced dev buttons" screen. The worst offender is kfmon.

This luck of mine is part of why I've avoided buying new devices for years...

[NiMa]

Originally Posted by notStanislaw

I have an oldfashioned multimeter but I haven't used it in a long time and the battery's dead, I'll have to go out and get a new one first. I wouldn't know where to stick the pins and what to measure either. Do you mean a more modern one with USB connections?
The light on the power button remains off with or without connection, but because I've also dabbled into the setting for the charging light I'm not entirely positive on whether I've turned that off in Nickle. I think I left that setting on, I'm just not 100% sure.

E-ink fades over the course of months, right? If it got shorted internally, it would have been at the worst possible moment.
On the other hand, does running KOReader void the warranty? I didn't buy it at kobo itself but at a local amazon-like webshop, they might not understand or care about what's on the screen, or be big enough to not be difficult on small fry like this. It's not stuck on some "do not touch these advanced dev buttons" screen. The worst offender is kfmon.

This luck of mine is part of why I've avoided buying new devices for years...

If you didn't directly buy it from Kobo, then you might have a chance. And to be honest, KoReader's UI feels as if could have been the real thing.

For the multimeter thing, you could probably find something more advanced if you googled a little (which I did not), but right now I don't know much about that.

Good luck...

[notStanislaw]

Originally Posted by NiLuJe

What does actually happen if you try a hard-reset: by which I mean, holding the power button down for *a while* (~20s, possibly more. More certainly won't hurt anything besides your finger ^^)?

If you had the FL on, a good hint that the battery cutoff took is that the frontlight will turn off. You can then release the button, wait a few seconds, and just press the power button normally (which is slightly longer than the usual short suspend/resume press ;p) to power it back on.

(Since you have nightmode enabled, a good bet on what happened is an EPDC hang, Mk. 7 kernels have known issues in corner-cases not really exercised in Nickel, and nightmode is one such aggravating factor. In these instances, a hard-reboot should, well, reboot it just fine, though ).

I've tried various intervals, from short presses, to a couple of seconds, to 15, 20, even 40 seconds, including with a stopwatch to make sure my slow counting wasn't too fast. Only my fingers hurt.

The FL was off when it happened, if I recall correctly. Forgive my haziness on the details, but as it happened I was about to read a bit before going to sleep. I then got stressed and spent a few hours trying to fix what I thought would just take five minutes. Hopefully I can catch up on my sleep tonight.

So, suppose I would get a new one, it should just be able to reboot and everything is fine. Do I understand it correctly that nightmode is inherently more stable on Nickel? I did turn it on in Nickel, too, and I find myself wondering whether it was an option I found between the dev settings. I just love having white letters on black backgrounds, which is another reason for me to move away from paper books.

[NiLuJe]

You'll notice that it's not a public feature in Nickel either, which should tell you all you need to know .

(Besides the fact that it looks like utter crap compared to when it's actually optimized for, e.g., on an Oasis 2/3).

[davidfor]

Charge it for a day. Seriously, this is the first time thing to do. Assuming it isn't actually a hardware failure, the chance that it was a runaway process and drained the battery very quickly. And there are a lot of people who have gone through problems like this, left the device on charge because they forgot to unplug it, and found it working the next day. I don't know if it should work, but, it can.

[notStanislaw]

Originally Posted by NiLuJe

You'll notice that it's not a public feature in Nickel either, which should tell you all you need to know .

(Besides the fact that it looks like utter crap compared to when it's actually optimized for, e.g., on an Oasis 2/3).

Hmmm, ouch. I did not think it looked like crap, though, I was very content with it.
Is there anything I can do to prevent such a hang, apart from not using

Originally Posted by davidfor

Charge it for a day. Seriously, this is the first time thing to do. Assuming it isn't actually a hardware failure, the chance that it was a runaway process and drained the battery very quickly. And there are a lot of people who have gone through problems like this, left the device on charge because they forgot to unplug it, and found it working the next day. I don't know if it should work, but, it can.

Seems like a worthwhile thing to try. Freak accidents call for freak solutions. However...

Originally Posted by NiMa

If you didn't directly buy it from Kobo, then you might have a chance. And to be honest, KoReader's UI feels as if could have been the real thing.

I ended up calling the retailer and they're shipping me a new one and I've heard they highly value customer satisfaction. Odds are it will be fine.

[notStanislaw]

Originally Posted by davidfor

Charge it for a day. Seriously, this is the first time thing to do. Assuming it isn't actually a hardware failure, the chance that it was a runaway process and drained the battery very quickly. And there are a lot of people who have gone through problems like this, left the device on charge because they forgot to unplug it, and found it working the next day. I don't know if it should work, but, it can.

Okay, so... as there's plenty of time for the return, I decided to give plugging it in another chance. And lo and behold, it boots up Nickel just fine, asking me whether I want to connect it.
So... hooray for potentially generating less e-waste?

Time to hunt for logs, so we can find out what happened and judge whether this device is reliable enough to keep. I'll edit and add them to this post, suggestions remain very welcome of course.

Thanks for all of your patience and help so far!

[notStanislaw]

Sorry for tripleposting, apparently new forum members aren't allowed to edit their posts, probably for good reason.

I found out the nickel/firmware version was not updated, so after making a backup of the entire filesystem I updated it to the recent one, then reran the one-click install.

Spoiler:

Software version: 4.16.13268
Software version: 4.25.1587

I've also turned off nightmode/screen inversion. Everything seems to work.
These are the last lines from crash.log, then those with a grep that seemed relevant.

Spoiler:

01/07/21-16:35:40 INFO  Kobo suspend: going to sleep . . .
01/07/21-16:35:40 INFO  Kobo suspend: asked the kernel to put subsystems to sleep, ret: true
01/07/21-16:35:42 INFO  Kobo suspend: waited for 2s because of reasons...
01/07/21-16:35:42 INFO  Kobo suspend: synced FS
01/07/21-16:35:42 INFO  Kobo suspend: asking for a suspend to RAM . . .
01/07/21-16:35:42 INFO  Kobo suspend: ZzZ ZzZ ZzZ? Write syscall returned:  true
01/08/21-02:59:18 INFO  Kobo suspend: woke up!
01/08/21-02:59:18 INFO  Kobo resume: clean up after wakeup
01/08/21-02:59:18 INFO  Kobo resume: unflagged kernel subsystems for resume, ret: true

Spoiler:

 $  grep --context=2 'error\|warning' 210109crash.log
ffi.load: blitbuffer
ffi.load: SDL2
ffi.load (warning): libSDL2.so: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
ffi.load: libSDL2-2.0.so
ffi.load (warning): libSDL2-2.0.so: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
ffi.load: libSDL2-2.0.so.0
ffi.load (warning): libSDL2-2.0.so.0: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
SDL2 not loaded:	./setupkoenv.lua:27: Not able to load dynamic library: libSDL2-2.0.so.0
01/07/21-02:08:04 INFO  initializing for device Kobo_frost
--
ffi.load: blitbuffer
ffi.load: SDL2
ffi.load (warning): libSDL2.so: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
ffi.load: libSDL2-2.0.so
ffi.load (warning): libSDL2-2.0.so: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
ffi.load: libSDL2-2.0.so.0
ffi.load (warning): libSDL2-2.0.so.0: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
SDL2 not loaded:	./setupkoenv.lua:27: Not able to load dynamic library: libSDL2-2.0.so.0
01/07/21-11:35:40 INFO  initializing for device Kobo_frost
--
ffi.load: blitbuffer
ffi.load: SDL2
ffi.load (warning): libSDL2.so: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
ffi.load: libSDL2-2.0.so
ffi.load (warning): libSDL2-2.0.so: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
ffi.load: libSDL2-2.0.so.0
ffi.load (warning): libSDL2-2.0.so.0: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
SDL2 not loaded:	./setupkoenv.lua:27: Not able to load dynamic library: libSDL2-2.0.so.0
01/07/21-11:40:48 INFO  initializing for device Kobo_frost
--
ffi.load: blitbuffer
ffi.load: SDL2
ffi.load (warning): libSDL2.so: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
ffi.load: libSDL2-2.0.so
ffi.load (warning): libSDL2-2.0.so: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
ffi.load: libSDL2-2.0.so.0
ffi.load (warning): libSDL2-2.0.so.0: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
SDL2 not loaded:	./setupkoenv.lua:27: Not able to load dynamic library: libSDL2-2.0.so.0
01/07/21-12:01:12 INFO  initializing for device Kobo_frost
--
ffi.load: blitbuffer
ffi.load: SDL2
ffi.load (warning): libSDL2.so: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
ffi.load: libSDL2-2.0.so
ffi.load (warning): libSDL2-2.0.so: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
ffi.load: libSDL2-2.0.so.0
ffi.load (warning): libSDL2-2.0.so.0: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
SDL2 not loaded:	./setupkoenv.lua:27: Not able to load dynamic library: libSDL2-2.0.so.0
01/07/21-15:26:21 INFO  initializing for device Kobo_frost
--
ffi.load: libs/liblept.so.5
ffi.load: libs/libk2pdfopt.so.2
error: invalid key in dict
warning: cannot load object (7457 0 R) into cache
error: invalid key in dict
warning: cannot load object (7457 0 R) into cache
error: invalid key in dict
warning: cannot load object (7457 0 R) into cache
error: invalid key in dict
warning: cannot load object (7457 0 R) into cache
error: invalid key in dict
warning: cannot load object (7457 0 R) into cache
error: invalid key in dict
warning: cannot load object (7457 0 R) into cache
error: invalid key in dict
warning: cannot load object (7457 0 R) into cache
error: invalid key in dict
warning: cannot load object (7457 0 R) into cache
error: Unable to read ICC workflow
warning: Attempt to read Output Intent failed
error: invalid key in dict
warning: cannot load object (7457 0 R) into cache
error: invalid key in dict
warning: cannot load object (7457 0 R) into cache
error: invalid key in dict
warning: cannot load object (7457 0 R) into cache
error: invalid key in dict
warning: cannot load object (7457 0 R) into cache
error: invalid key in dict
warning: cannot load object (7457 0 R) into cache
error: invalid key in dict
warning: cannot load object (7457 0 R) into cache
error: invalid key in dict
warning: cannot load object (7457 0 R) into cache
error: invalid key in dict
warning: cannot load object (7457 0 R) into cache
error: Unable to read ICC workflow
warning: Attempt to read Output Intent failed
01/07/21-15:35:09 INFO  opening file /mnt/onboard/Morton, Timothy/Hyperobjects - Morton, Timothy.epub
01/07/21-15:35:10 INFO  RD loaded plugin SSH at plugins/SSH.koplugin

If there is anything I can do to help the KOReader project forward, let me know. I'm not sure which logs may be useful at this point.

On a personal note, I could use some advice on what to do with the devices, now. Would it be wise to factory reset the old one and return it, or is it better to cancel the replacement from the retailer? Any opinions?

[NiLuJe]

You won't find anything outside of kernel logs for an EPDC hang. At best iff KOReader was running in verbose debug mode, you might have seen the refresh request being logged, but since it doesn't actually hang in userspace, stuff would still be moving around, making the log not so terribly helpful.

But, FWIW, the device should still be alive and reachable over SSH (either over Wi-Fi or USBNet), and if subsequent refreshes are requested, you should see them all timeout after ~5s in the kernel logs.

See this InkVT thread for an example.

----

All that said, given that it only rebooted fine *after* being plugged for a bit, I'd vote for @davidfor's theory that the battery simply just died. (It's super-tiny on the Forma).

I mean, that's a *little* bit weird with a gauge at 86%, but, the battery gauge is reliably unreliable on Kobo devices, so, who knows ;p.

[NiMa]

Originally Posted by NiLuJe

I mean, that's a *little* bit weird with a gauge at 86%, but, the battery gauge is reliably unreliable on Kobo devices, so, who knows ;p.

~
I agree. No matter the gauge... Yesterday my Glo HD said it was at 100% battery and 2 seconds after it just shut down. And I couldn't bring it up without the MicroUSB cable.

[Pajamaman]

Originally Posted by notStanislaw

On a personal note, I could use some advice on what to do with the devices, now. Would it be wise to factory reset the old one and return it, or is it better to cancel the replacement from the retailer? Any opinions?

I would test it to hell. Put lots of books of different formats on there and open them all and page forward and back lots. Do anything you can think of. Stress test it.

I'm not that familiar with Kobo so I don't know if what you experienced is unusual for Kobo, or Kobo with Koreader. I ran Koreader on a Kindle, and yes, on reflection, it did used to crash a lot if I when into the advanced page layout settings. But a button reset always fixed it.

It seems to me you have two possible issues here--1.a koreader crash, and 2. a battery drain. And then there is night-mode too. The issue is, will it happen again? The only way to be sure is open up lots of different books and formats in koreader with night-mode on. In short, try to replicate the bug. If it happens again, you can probably solve it with a charge and reboot, then send it back.

But like said, Koreader used to crash regular as clockwork when I changed multiple settings in the advanced page format settings. I think I fixed it with a version update. So is it Koreader crashing in a predictable manner, and then for some reason the battery drains (a bad book can cause this). So even if you can replicate the bug, it doesn't necessarily mean the hardware is faulty.