Enable USB Networking on Kindle DX

-
The first thing is why in hell you may want to do this? Or even what the hell is this usb networking thing?

The thing is that those who are outside of coverage of Whispernet wireless network cannot get some of the Kindle features to work. But even if you enable usb networking you are not getting back 100% of the functionality. Let me tell you some of the things I've learned:

Apparently Amazon will send you a client digital certificate to your Kindle through Whispernet (and only that way), so future orders from you Kindle can be properly authenticated as yours (so you cannot refuse payment I guess, among other things). That means that even if you get your Kindle to access the Internet (ie enabling USB networking) you won't be able to register it to your account (though no error message is presented to the user).

So what USB networking can serve for? Well, enabling USB networking allows you to connect to the Kindle as a network device and to access its Linux system for doing changes, checking what's inside and, if you are not careful enough, to brick it.

If you still are curious about playing this game let me tell you what you need to do:

  1. Get a Kindle.
  2. Get the binary from this thread.
  3. Copy the proper .bin to the root folder of your Kindle.
  4. Do a manual upgrade of Kindle firmware (you do this by pressing Menu/Preferences and the Menu again/Upgrade Firmware).
  5. On the seach box of you Kindle type ;debugOn and `usbNetworking
  6. Connect USB to your computer and you should get a new network interface (defaults to 192.168.2.1 and Kindle would be 192.168.2.2 device).
  7. If you want Kindle to have Internet access you'll need to enable Internet connection sharing on your computing and to populate /etc/resolv.conf on Kindle with a valid DNS nameserver.
  8. You can restore normal USB behavior on Kindle but restarting it (just make sure you delete /mnt/us/usbnet/AUTO file or you'll be running circles).
But at the end of the whole process the most useful thing I could achieve was to set the date on my Kindle DX. Browsing Amazon's Kindle bookshop is possible too but ... as you do not have a digital certificate you cannot download book samples nor you can get access to wikipedia. However, as you are connecting through your computer ... well, you can use your computer to do all these things faster and better than with you USB connected Kindle.

And, regarding my current experience with Kindle DX I would say that size matters and DX is lacking a couple of inches more. If I just could use one of the techniques I get on my mailbox to get a few more inches ...

Comments

Unknown said…
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
1:46 pm
HelpTechLine said…
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
1:24 pm
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

VFD control with Arduino using RS485 link

-
Image
Variable Frequency Drives ( VFD ) allow the control of spindles so speed can accurately be controlled and a detailed acceleration profile for the spindle and reverse rotation can all be handled. In essence a VFD is an three phase inverter for three-phase AC motor. I am using a popular (I mean cheap) Chinese VFD and though the reference manual is not great, I could see there is a built-in RS-485 port. I usually control the start, stop and speed selection using the keyboard on the unit but I thought it will be more useful if I could control everything from the same Arduino is doing our CNC table control. Some cheap RS-485 off eBay and some lines of code later, I can start, stop and change the speed from an Arduino. What a cool thing to have! Some configuration of your VFD are needed before you can use it like that.  You need to set PD163=1 (I am using address 1 in the code). PD=164=1 (for setting serial to 9600bps) and PD165=0 (for using ASCII and 8N1 character format)
Read more

How to get sinusoidal s-curve for a stepper motor

-
Image
After some experimentation, and delving a bit into the math of motion, I realized there can be a significant difference on the motion of a machine by just making small changes. A common and popular approach to smooth one axis of motion is to use a trapezoidal speed pattern, where acceleration and deceleration are uniformly accelerated movements (aka constant acceleration motion) separated by a portion happening at cruising speed. The problem comes with the fact that, while that approach is simple to understand and to code, it does contain sudden changes in the acceleration, that show as spikes on the acceleration derivative, called jerk. These sudden changes in the acceleration translate into undesired vibration in our machines. Most of that can be eliminated by selecting a motion pattern that does not contain sudden changes of acceleration. If we chose a mathematical function for our speed whose second derivative is continuous, then we reduce system vibration quite a lot. One ma
Read more

Importing OpenSCAD designs into Onshape

-
Image
After using Onshape CAD software for a while I am really fond of it. So one natural thing to do, specially once they have released the Instructor's kit is to start using it in the classroom too. But one thing I was not so sure how to do was to use old designs I made using OpenSCAD. It does not mean I am completely quitting using OpenSCAD but suddenly I can see I can do assemblies in Onshape that will look quite nice for showing and documentation purposes if only I could easily import from OpenSCAD. I am glad to report that the route OpenSCAD --> FreeCAD --> Onshape worked brilliantly. Even more when a few tricks were applied. While some people suggest to import CSG files from OpenSCAD to FreeCAD, I have had more success by directly importing SCAD files into FreeCAD. One trick that worked well for me was to get rid of $fn references, so now circles become real circles (or cylinders) in FreeCAD. If a part keeps some $fn references then your cylinders or circles wi
Read more