# PW2 (2013 model) New update 5.4.5 Now at 5.4.5.1 (as of 8/12/14)



## Tabatha

New software update for PW2 noted at mobilereads. Changes to notes, collections, pdfs, sample buying.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html/ref=hp_left_cn?ie=UTF8&nodeId=201307450

Another update to the PW2, now at 5.4.3.1 No explaination of what this current update does. Again, noted at mobilereads yesterday.


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## stevene9

I downloaded the update, copied it to my Kindle, and then thought to myself, "the last time I did this so fast I got that god-awful horrible update that screwed me so badly". So now I'm waiting before I update for braver people than myself (hi Betsy) to be the testers.

Steve


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## crebel

From the info about the update:  "See all of your collections in a Collections view, and customize where your collections show on your device."

Be still my heart!  Is it possible they have fixed the STOOPIDIST part of the Cloud Collections implementation?  If so, a new Paperwhite may be back on my wish list.


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## Tabatha

I'm hoping the Reboot and battery problems are corrected! Have downloaded, but not yet installed. Watching for others comments here and at mobilereads


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## GBear

I'm also waiting anxiously to hear if they've fixed the problems. Someone who already has the 5.4.2 update will surely take the plunge to see if the new collection features are helpful. It will take longer to figure out if the battery life issue is resolved. Anyway, here's the new information from the Amazon website on managing cloud collections. It's difficult to understand without playing with it, but it looks like a baby step of progress to me, in that you can select which collections to display on each individual device.


View and Manage Your Cloud Collections

Customize the way you view and access collections on your Kindle Paperwhite by filtering items on your Home screen. You can also star your favorite collections to make them even more accessible.
1.  To filter items on your Home screen:  
i. From Home, tap My Items. You will see options to view All Items or view only Books, Periodicals, Docs, Collections, or Active Content.  
ii. Tap Collections to see all of your collections.  

2.  To star a collection:  
i. Press and hold a collection cover, and then tap Show in All Views. A star will appear in the bottom-right corner of the collection cover. The collection will appear on your Home screen when you view All Items or Collections. 
The collection will also appear when you view Books, Docs, or Active Content if it contains books, personal documents, or active content, respectively.



Note: Star settings are device-specific. When you create a new collection, it is automatically starred.



3.  To unstar a collection:  
i. Press and hold a starred collection cover, and then tap Show Only in Collections View. A star will no longer appear on the collection cover, and the collection will only appear on your Home screen when you view Collections.


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## stevene9

Tabatha said:


> I'm hoping the Reboot and battery problems are corrected! Have downloaded, but not yet installed. Watching for others comments here and at mobilereads


I'm glad to see there are other chickens, just like me.

Steve


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## VictoriaP

There's a user on MobileRead who's a bit less chicken than the rest of us, she's posting things as she encounters them. It looks like it does clean up some of the problems with Cloud Collections, though it does not get rid of or give you an opt out for the no-wifi warning messages.


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## stevene9

I read something on mobilereads about some notice when a non amazon book is downloaded. I don't understand what they were refering to. I buy a lot of books from Baen and have them emailed into my Kindle. Now there is no problem. Does this new update do something different?

Steve


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## VictoriaP

They're talking about sideloading via cable, not emailing to Amazon. Nothing to worry about if you're sending files from Baen.


Edited to add: all right, I'm going in. They've apparently brought over the sweet dictionary quick change feature and ability to hide all the reading progress stuff at the bottom, two things I've been coveting from the most recent PW1 update. My experience may vary--I am jailbroken for fonts, screensavers, and the battery percentage hack, so take anything I say from here on out with a grain of salt.   

Post update edits:

OK, the dictionary & hide everything at the bottom features ARE present, and they're sweet!--especially the ability to hot swap the dictionaries from the definition menu. Now if only I could find a French (and Spanish, and Latin, at least to start) to English dictionary that would work with this feature, I'd be in heaven. I'd love to be able to translate without having to be online at the time.

The new mechanism for indicating which collections are on the device is...OK. I'm going to have to study it a little to see how it works exactly, but as a hater of all things visually cluttered, I'm not overfond of now having a row of stars going down the right hand side of all my home pages that are full of collections (for the record, I hate the checkmarks that designate which books are on device too, so if those don't bother you, the stars probably won't either). I'm going to let those with setups that were more annoying under 5.4.2 speak more to this point, as I don't have multiple users on my account, nor do I have an extensive library kept solely in the cloud, etc. I keep everything on device, so I didn't personally encounter some of the issues others have.

The annoying "not connected to wifi" message when moving an item into a collection IS still present, and still does not have a "don't ever tell me this again" selection that I can find. HOWEVER...menus when not connected do feel a bit snappier/more responsive than they did on 5.4.2.

More as I encounter it...


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## GBear

Thank you for your courage, VictoriaP! Unfortunately for me, I don't think I especially value those new features and it seems that the cloud collections, while perhaps marginally less disastrous, are still more annoying than before they were implemented. And I almost always have wifi turned off, preferring to side load content, so those messages would be very tiresome. It appears that I will be sticking with my 5.4.1 firmware for as long as I can hold out. Fortunately, except for keeping my Kindle firewalled, I don't have any complaints about it the way it is, so I will have to be extremely careful not to break it!

I wonder if a market will emerge for pre-5.4.2 Paperwhites?!


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## VictoriaP

Regarding Cloud Collections: If you're *not* on 5.4.2+, I'd definitely suggest waiting until some of our intrepid adventurers who have dealt with the problematic 5.4.2 & 5.4.2.1 do this update and report back. From what I see on MR, this update *may* fix things for some folks by allowing them to select which collections appear on their devices in certain views, so it's probably a step in the right direction. But it's not going to fix ALL of the problems people have encountered.

For me, Cloud Collections have been just a minor nuisance (after a few hours of getting rid of old ghost collections from long-gone devices), which is why I'm not speaking much to that topic. The wifi message irks me; I too generally leave it off to conserve battery life, and I routinely move things in and out of my TBR and genre collections, though my sideloading is relatively minimal. I'd personally like that message to have an opt-out, but I can live with it.

What I'm interested in is stability and battery life, and really, those are best judged in person. This is why I deemed it worth it to me to upgrade, and I'll certainly report back if I have any changes on that score.


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## stevene9

stevene9 said:


> I downloaded the update, copied it to my Kindle, and then thought to myself, "the last time I did this so fast I got that god-awful horrible update that screwed me so badly". So now I'm waiting before I update for braver people than myself (hi Betsy) to be the testers.
> 
> Steve


Even though I loaded the new update on my Kindle, I never told it to update. Much to my surprise, a few hours later I noticed the stars next to my collections. It had updated, even though I never hit the "update the kindle" in the settings menu. I don't undserstand this.

Steve


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## VictoriaP

stevene9 said:


> Even though I loaded the new update on my Kindle, I never told it to update. Much to my surprise, a few hours later I noticed the stars next to my collections. It had updated, even though I never hit the "update the kindle" in the settings menu. I don't undserstand this.
> 
> Steve


Once the update is physically on your Kindle (regardless of how it gets there), it will update itself at some point when the Kindle is in sleep mode. Hitting "update my kindle" isn't absolutely required.


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## Ann in Arlington

I'm on 5.4.2.1 and will likely update my PW13 over the weekend -- not in wifi range long enough during the week for it to do it on its own as I work in a building with no wifi.  I did leave it on last night and it didn't come down but, since I was one peeved with the collections management I'm eager to try it and see what sort of improvements there are.


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## Betsy the Quilter

I was travelling yesterday and so wasn't aware of this.  Interesting!  Will install the update and let you know what the STOOPID rating is.  

Betsy


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## bordercollielady

Tic, toc, tic, toc...  anxiously awaiting to hear if they fixed the Cloud collection mess!!


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## GBear

bordercollielady said:


> Tic, toc, tic, toc... anxiously awaiting to hear if they fixed the Cloud collection mess!!


I, too, await the definitive verdict from Ann and Betsy! Meanwhile, I've been following the thread on mobilereads, which helps but is a little hard to decipher without actually having experienced the 5.4.2 cloud collection "down-date" on my PW.


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## Betsy the Quilter

Sorry--still on CA time, went back to sleep as it was 4AM as far as my body was concerned!

Booting up the PC now so I can download the update and install it.  My PW2 did not update itself.

Betsy


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## MLPMom

I really like the cleaner look of my home page now without all the clutter of the dictionaries, free time and clippings.

I just charged my kindle so I have no idea if this upgrade will affect the battery life yet or not.

Has anyone that downloaded the update noticed anything yet? I am guessing it may take a few days with the upgrade to get a good feel for it and to see if it fixed the battery life issues.


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## backslidr

I updated and everything works. The big stars are quite annoying but I guess they have a use if you have collections from other devices on it. I noticed that they solved the Cloud - On Device issue by greying them out when you're sorting by collections. I thought that was kind of funny. Other than that it doesn't look too bad.


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## kansaskyle

I like the Collections view as it allows me to not see clippings, dictionaries, books not in collections, etc. on my Home screen.

The star feature still doesn't address the problem of showing/hiding Cloud collections on an individual device.  If there is a collection for a different user, I can unstar it, but if you are using Collection view, it still is display (just without the star).  It seems like it would be better to have a "Show/Hide collection on device" option.  

I haven't tried deleting a collection on my device, but I'm guessing that would delete it from the Cloud too?


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## Meemo

It would be better if the "Device" view showed ONLY WHAT'S ON THE FLIPPIN' DEVICE!!   

Okay, I feel better now...    So if I star a Collection on my PW2, what happens on my daughter's PW2 - will it be starred there too?  Or or are the stars, at least, device-specific?


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## VictoriaP

I don't think anyone with two PW2s on one account has reported in yet. Hopefully we'll hear soon on the effects of starred collections and multiple devices.

I will say this thing has gotten ridiculously blazing fast with this update. It's actually somewhat startling, since 5.4.2 had slowed it down so much.


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## Ann in Arlington

VictoriaP said:


> I don't think anyone with two PW2s on one account has reported in yet. Hopefully we'll hear soon on the effects of starred collections and multiple devices.
> 
> I will say this thing has gotten ridiculously blazing fast with this update. It's actually somewhat startling, since 5.4.2 had slowed it down so much.


Good to hear the speed is back -- that was the main thing that made me nix collections altogether on my PW2 -- which means I can't use them on my Fire HDX either since they're linked.



Meemo said:


> It would be better if the "Device" view showed ONLY WHAT'S ON THE FLIPPIN' DEVICE!!
> 
> Okay, I feel better now...


So, they didn't fix this yet?  It's one of the more STOOPID "features". 



> So if I star a Collection on my PW2, what happens on my daughter's PW2 - will it be starred there too? Or or are the stars, at least, device-specific?


I'm eager to know this as well -- but I'm not sure I'm eager enough to do a manual download.  Maybe I will today, though. I'll be home and will have time to play. I may be able to test it between the PW'13 and the HDX. I'd like to, maybe, make some collections on my HDX that don't show up on my PW.


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## Ann in Arlington

I found this via a link on the software download page:
--------------------
*View and Manage Your Cloud Collections*

Customize the way you view and access collections on your Kindle Paperwhite by filtering items on your Home screen. You can also star your favorite collections to make them even more accessible.

_To filter items on your Home screen:_
1. From Home, tap My Items. You will see options to view All Items or view only Books, Periodicals, Docs, Collections, or Active Content.
2. Tap Collections to see all of your collections.

_To star a collection:_
Press and hold a collection cover, and then tap Show in All Views. A star will appear in the bottom-right corner of the collection cover. The collection will appear on your Home screen when you view All Items or Collections.

The collection will also appear when you view Books, Docs, or Active Content if it contains books, personal documents, or active content, respectively.

Note: Star settings are device-specific. When you create a new collection, it is automatically starred.

_To unstar a collection:_
Press and hold a starred collection cover, and then tap Show Only in Collections View. A star will no longer appear on the collection cover, and the collection will only appear on your Home screen when you view Collections.
-------------------------

It certainly sounds like a step in the right direction . . . . .


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## Betsy the Quilter

OK, had a migraine last night, so I really didn't do anything other than install it.  Playing with it now...

So, it looks like I can get back to having only the five or six collections on my PW2.  I have 33 collections that I use on my Fire HDX.  But I don't want that many on my PW2.  I'm going through and unstarring all of the extra ones that I created on my Fire, leaving only the original ones that I wanted on my PW2.

Still playing...

(The collections still show how many items are in them total, not on the device.  So, if you're viewing collections to view ALL collections, you can't tell if it contains any items on your device unless you open it.)

EDIT:  Adding items to collections or removing them works pretty quickly; moving an item by removing it from a collection and adding it to another in the same action (unchecking one collection and checking another), at least on my device, has a big pause--25 seconds for one I timed--when I tap on Done.  The Done button stays black while it's thinking.

Betsy


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## MamaProfCrash

I noticed that I had a message that told me what percentage of a new book was being downloaded. My cook book took forever, as in I walked into the Little Man's nursery because he was crying, changed his diaper, got him some tylenol in another room, sat down in the glider, started rocking him, and it was still downloading. The cook book has 200 recipies but I didn't think it was that big. LM was almost asleep by the time it finished the cook book and the book that I wanted to read (which was downloading after the cook book)

I will have to play with the collections a bit. I might need to work with my MIL when she is visiting next week to set up collections that she is interested in. The problem is she is using my old K3 so I don't know if the starring thing will work for her or if she will have to display my collections and the ones we build for her. Also, my DXG might be going to my husbands Grandmother (technically my Grandmother but that just feels weird because, well, she is not my Grandmother. Ggaining a Grandmother just feels weird. I call her Grandma because it is easier for her but I don't know... OK end weird tangent) so we will need to figure out how to add collections for her. 

Ideally I would like to set up collections for her with the books we think she is interested in and then turn off the 3G. She has a helper at the house and her daughter visits regularly so there is someone there to turn it on and download new material for her but I don't want her re downloading my collections. Grandma does not need an erotica folder. Maybe she does but I am not certain I want to have that conversation with her...


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## Ann in Arlington

The cloud collections don't apply at all to kindles earlier than the 2012 PW. So whatever you do on your device won't change what she has on hers. And, I think, once your PW has imported every collection you've ever had on every device you've ever had or do have registered as of <today's date>, then any changes she makes on her older kindle won't affect your PW.


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## Betsy the Quilter

MamaProfCrash said:


> Grandma does not need an erotica folder. Maybe she does but I am not certain I want to have that conversation with her...


 

What Ann said. Don't import collections from your PW to either your MIL or Grandma's devices--just set them up on the device, and there won't be a problem with cloud collection synching as that's not available on devices older than the PW.

Betsy


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## Eltanin Publishing

VictoriaP said:


> They've apparently brought over the sweet dictionary quick change feature and ability to hide all the reading progress stuff at the bottom, two things I've been coveting from the most recent PW1 update.


Ability to hide progress stuff at bottom while reading?? I'm diving in! Of course, it would be best if you could customize - chose what to show. But I've been asking for this ever since Amazon's PW1 product photos were photoshopped to show this even though it wasn't possible.


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## Betsy the Quilter

OK, more now that I've played with it. There have been a few times when it is really slow, as I mentioned earlier. If I remove a book from one collection and add it to another in one "Add to Collection" view, there's a delay of up to 25 seconds, presumably because it is checking with the cloud. It will update the "items in collection" number as collections are checked in the "Add to Collection" view before tapping on "Done." So, if you had two items in the collection, as soon as you check the collection you want to add the book to, it will say three items are in the collection.

I updated and then registered my second PW2 to my account. Interestingly, there were three collections I had multiples of... This is probably a residue of the "every collection ever created" aspect, (though it had been registered before to my account but at the time of the update I had it registered to another account for testing and I re-registered to my account after updating). I'll check my collections again on both the Fire HDX. The extra collections weren't on my PW2 "Peabody."

I've gone through and now have a totally different set of collections visible on the second PW2 when viewing it by books (and sorted by collections). Here are the two PW2s. Note the stars, if you haven't done the update. The stars indicate that the collection is viewable on that device. (And yes, I read my books by color.  )
















Note that the number of items shown below each collection name is the number of items in the collection, not the number in the collection on the device.

In the next image, you can see that not all collections have the star. These collections are only viewable on the device if you choose collections view in the left drop down menu on the device. (The right drop down menu is the sort, and also has collections as an option.) If you view Books, All Items, or Docs, they won't be visible. The collections without stars will not be visible.









If you view by "Books," items like Dictionaries, "My Clippings" and Kindle Free Time and Vocabulary Builder will not be visible. (Note that you can independently turn off Kindle Free Time and Vocabulary Builder if you don't use them.) If you view by "Items," you will see them. I have Items view, page 2 selected below:










*TLR ASSESSMENT: * This is a distinct improvement over the so-called "STOOPID" update. It has fixed one of the major issues with that update--allowing different Kindles to have different collections visible. If you have multiple PWs on your account, and have already been updated to the STOOPID update, you should install this. Plus it has the other goodies discussed.

The collections still show all the books both in the device and in the cloud. If you have a collection with 584 books in it, as I do, this is a problem as I can't easily see just the books in the collection that are on the device, I have to page through the whole collection. Though sorting by "recent," right now, gets most of them at the top of the 74 pages of books in the collection.

If your grandma is on your account and also has a PW, it won't keep her from seeing your erotica collection in the cloud, unless you set up parental controls, but that's a separate issue and, even without collections is a problem if she's browsing the cloud as a whole.

Anyway, those are my thoughts so far....

Betsy


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## crebel

Off topic, but do you need help naming poor "Betsy's 11th Kindle"?    You know, Rainbow Brite or something?


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## GBear

Thank you Betsy! As I understand it, your assessment is that 5.4.3 is a distinct improvement over 5.4.2, but there is still a big issue in that Device View is cluttered by the items in the cloud. Plus, it's still too early to know if battery life remains poor due to the constant syncing of cloud collections.

So, if you were ranking the recent firmware releases for PW2 on the STOOPID Scale, I assume that pre-STOOPID 5.4.1 is still the best release for anyone with a) many titles, b) heavy use of collections, especially on multiple Kindles, and c) multiple users on a single account? What improvements do you see that could tip the scales toward updating for those considering it?


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## Betsy the Quilter

crebel said:


> Off topic, but do you need help naming poor "Betsy's 11th Kindle"?  You know, Rainbow Brite or something?


No. 11 is re-enacting an episode of The Prisoner...  No, that K is going to be a gift eventually, and if I name it, I won't be able to give it away. It's like farmers not naming the calves.



GBear said:


> Thank you Betsy! As I understand it, your assessment is that 5.4.3 is a distinct improvement over 5.4.2, but there is still a big issue in that Device View is cluttered by the items in the cloud. Plus, it's still too early to know if battery life remains poor due to the constant syncing of cloud collections.
> 
> So, if you were ranking the recent firmware releases for PW2 on the STOOPID Scale, I assume that pre-STOOPID 5.4.1 is still the best release for anyone with a) many titles, b) heavy use of collections, especially on multiple Kindles, and c) multiple users on a single account? What improvements do you see that could tip the scales toward updating for those considering it?


I don't think the multiple Kindles is a problem anymore--this update resolved that issue--individual Kindles can have individual collection setups.

I think the main determinant of which update is good for you is the number of books and collections. If you have a LOT of books and a LOT of collections, and can't or don't want to have all your books on the device, (STOOPID) 5.4.2 is an issue. If I look at a collection, and it has a lot of books in it, I have to wade through a lot of books to find the ones on the device. The new update didn't fix this.

*BUT*, if you are willing to have device-specific collections, the problem is kind of resolved, though, as only books on the device will be in that collection. So you could have a collection called, say, Mystery (PW) with only books that are on the device. I may do that yet.

If I'm on the home page, I can't tell how many books in a collection are actually on the device, because it shows the total number in the collection. The new update didn't fix this, though this is relatively minor. It matters less if I have only a few specific collections on the device that I put books I download into, because I know that all of the collections actually have books in them. And if I make PW-only collections, that will be resolved.

So, yeah, I think the major issues with the 5.4.1 are probably resolved. Still think it's a bit klunky, but I can live with this.

Thanks to the early updaters for the info about this update. Looking forward to hearing from Ann and others who are going to be trying it out.

Betsy


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## GBear

Thanks for the additional info, Betsy. I think I could probably make it work. I generally have everything in two collections, where one is status (Currently Reading, Reference, Samples, Unread, and Finished Reading) and the other group is Genres. On the PW2, the collections are preceded by numbers to keep them sorted the way I like, with status collections first.

I could probably coordinate it so that my wife and I have separate status collections (i.e. with a different number prefix) that we don't display on each others' Kindles, and we could figure out, with some work, how to combine genres and put the books in those shared categories.

Since I keep everything that I haven't read yet on my Kindle, all my status categories except "Finished Reading" should be clear of cloud items and fairly easy to monitor. I can live with the genre categories showing cloud and device items, even though it will always irk me that "Device View" isn't restricted to what's on the device.

Still, it all seems like a lot of work to essentially recreate what I've already got. I still think that any possible benefit of cloud collections - keeping collections synchronized across lots of devices, maybe especially in a school or other institutional setting? - is offset by the additional aggravation dealt to probably more people, especially when those people are going to be the most long-term and avid customers.

I'm looking forward to hearing your take on battery life. Meanwhile, I'm still looking for a benefit to upgrading that would make the aggravation of STOOPID worthwhile. Getting rid of the progress bar, even if it annoyed me, doesn't come close.


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## bordercollielady

Meemo said:


> It would be better if the "Device" view showed ONLY WHAT'S ON THE FLIPPIN' DEVICE!!


Booo..... its hard to believe they didn't hear us complain!


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## VictoriaP

Betsy the Quilter said:


> OK, more now that I've played with it. There have been a few times when it is really slow, as I mentioned earlier. *If I remove a book from one collection and add it to another in one "Add to Collection" view, there's a delay of up to 25 seconds, presumably because it is checking with the cloud.* It will update the "items in collection" number as collections are checked in the "Add to Collection" view before tapping on "Done." So, if you had two items in the collection, as soon as you check the collection you want to add the book to, it will say three items are in the collection.


Betsy, this bit has me more dumbfounded than I can express. It's the exact opposite of my experience, and I cannot replicate the amount of time yours is taking to perform simple tasks like this. I've tried on two different wifi networks today, one public and one private--in both cases, I can move/remove a book in or out of multiple collections, and the whole transaction is around five seconds or less from the time I hit Done. My PW2 is so zippy now, I'm afraid it's going to grow legs and run around the house! 

I see you've got some 30-odd collections on that device. How many books? I'm at 40 collections & 700 books (plus jailbroken, which is more likely to slow things down than speed them up), so this has me pretty puzzled. The only thing I can think is that perhaps yours is low on memory? Or it's doing some other processing in the background (stuck indexing, maybe?) Or your maybe wifi is slower than the two I tried?

It just makes little sense that my device would see such improvement with this update while yours bogs down.


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## GBear

VictoriaP said:


> Betsy, this bit has me more dumbfounded than I can express. It's the exact opposite of my experience, and I cannot replicate the amount of time yours is taking to perform simple tasks like this. I've tried on two different wifi networks today, one public and one private--in both cases, I can move/remove a book in or out of multiple collections, and the whole transaction is around five seconds or less from the time I hit Done. My PW2 is so zippy now, I'm afraid it's going to grow legs and run around the house!
> 
> I see you've got some 30-odd collections on that device. How many books? I'm at 40 collections & 700 books (plus jailbroken, which is more likely to slow things down than speed them up), so this has me pretty puzzled. The only thing I can think is that perhaps yours is low on memory? Or it's doing some other processing in the background (stuck indexing, maybe?) Or your maybe wifi is slower than the two I tried?
> 
> It just makes little sense that my device would see such improvement with this update while yours bogs down.


Bear in mind that, since the device is syncing with the cloud, that you may need to look at the number of cloud collections and books, not just what's on the device. I thought someone said that everything may get re-indexed with cloud collections. If that's the problem, then it should just be temporary. 25 seconds to move a book from "Reading" to "Finished" would get my goat.


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## Vicki G.

I just tried it too, just for curiosity sake.  Also, this is the way I always deal with any book when I finish reading it.  It comes out of one collection and goes into another.  My result was the same as yours, Victoria.  Maybe 2 or 3 seconds tops.  291 books, 26 collections.

I wrote a longggggggg post yesterday about the update but unfortunately the site was having some problems and it never did load.  And I neglected to copy it so that I could later paste it some place.  To make a long story short, I love this new update.  I like the fact that a collection can be removed but still seen.  Right before the update that gave everyone a headache, I had made a collection titled Read.  I wanted to move books that had been read to that collection, maybe another collection as well, but definitely that one.  Then I removed the books from my Kindle.  It's great!  By going to Cloud, I can see the books that have been added to that Collection but I don't have to have it showing on my regular Home Page.  

I didn't know so many people hate having the Reading Speed at the bottom of the page.  Different strokes!  Personally it is one of my favorite features about the PW.  In fact, it and X-Ray are the 2 items that keep me from trashing the PW in favor of the basic K4.


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## VictoriaP

GBear said:


> Bear in mind that, since the device is syncing with the cloud, that you may need to look at the number of cloud collections and books, not just what's on the device. I thought someone said that everything may get re-indexed with cloud collections. If that's the problem, then it should just be temporary. 25 seconds to move a book from "Reading" to "Finished" would get my goat.


Betsy mentioned she had 33 collections total. As seen in her third image, in Collections view, some do not have stars and are likely to be Cloud-only. (All books in-cloud, not on device, and the collection unstarred so it doesn't typically show on the home screen.) At least so far in my usage, there's no performance difference between Cloud-only collections and collections which are both in the cloud/on device.

Additionally, that reindexing occurrs only the first time a device downloads an update that includes Cloud Collections. Betsy & I both went from a 5.4.2.x firmware to 5.4.3. My device did not reindex; neither should hers have done so--though stuck indexing may very well be part of the problem if she's downloaded anything recently.

As you said, 25 seconds is abysmal. Something's not right here.


----------



## Betsy the Quilter

Victoria & Vicki,

I have 33 collections, and 56 books right now on my PW2.

Most of the time mine is very zippy. If I add a book to a collection and then tap "Done, " very fast. If I open "Add to Collection" and deselect a collection by tapping on it and then tap "Done," very fast.

Where I have the slowdown is if I try to do the two operations within a single "Add to Collection" view. Let me step through what I'm doing, with pictures.  (Note that I was doing this previously in a collection with 31 items. I'm doing it in a different collection that I need to pare down, but the steps are the same.

I have one catch-all collection, Fiction, for books I can't remember what they are when I'm organizing or if they are classics or literary or something. It currently has 583 items. I want to make it smaller. So I open the collection:










I see that Bad Luck and Trouble can be moved (not sure why it ever got into Fiction, LOL) out of Fiction and into the new combined Mystery and Thrillers collection I created for the PW (while leaving it in Mystery):









So, I deselect "Fiction" and tap on "Mystery and Thrillers," so that "Mystery" and "Mystery and Thrillers" are both selected:









When I tap on "Done," it flashes to black, then flashes to black again. Here's a video showing it with another book:






I'm going to restart the device and see if it changes anything.


----------



## VictoriaP

OK, that video is wild.    It's actually a lot like I experienced prior to this update. 5.4.3 actually reversed this for me.

*pondering*

(Edited to add: I do that same routine literally all the time, after I download a new book and when I've finished reading one. Takes five seconds or less right now on mine...)


----------



## Vicki G.

Ditto everything Victoria said.


----------



## Betsy the Quilter

I restarted the device.  It's still doing it and consistently, when I do the kind of move depicted in the video.  The rest of the things I do with collections go pretty quickly.

It actually doesn't bother me, I won't be doing moves that often, but I mentioned it for completeness..

Betsy


----------



## Tabatha

Tabatha said:


> I'm hoping the Reboot and battery problems are corrected! Have downloaded, but not yet installed. Watching for others comments here and at mobilereads


So far, battery life seems to have been much improved since updating, and also haven't yet had a problem with it rebooting ramdonly.


----------



## Lursa (aka 9MMare)

A bit off topic but what is the "g" in the menu bar across the top of the Home page for?  I still have a PW1.


----------



## Atunah

Lursa (aka 9MMare) said:


> A bit off topic but what is the "g" in the menu bar across the top of the Home page for? I still have a PW1.


That is the goodreads integration. You can connect your goodreads account to your kindle. I have a PW1, I tried it and wont use it again. It rebooted my kindle twice while fiddling with it. Its also pretty slow. It just gives an overview of your goodreads account, your friends, your books. You can add books to read, currently reading and to-read from the kindle. Those are the only shelves that show up that I could see.


----------



## Atunah

Betsy the Quilter said:


> I restarted the device. It's still doing it and consistently, when I do the kind of move depicted in the video. The rest of the things I do with collections go pretty quickly.
> 
> It actually doesn't bother me, I won't be doing moves that often, but I mentioned it for completeness..
> 
> Betsy


I was going to say after watching your clip that my PW1 does the same thing. It stays on the black bar, then a refresh with still at the bar and then finally back to where I started. Same with mine that it does it when I select and deselect, just as you showed. But again, mine is a PW1.


----------



## Betsy the Quilter

Atunah said:


> I was going to say after watching your clip that my PW1 does the same thing. It stays on the black bar, then a refresh with still at the bar and then finally back to where I started. Same with mine that it does it when I select and deselect, just as you showed. But again, mine is a PW1.


It does actually move the book on mine--it just does it rather slowly.  Does the move work on yours, Atunah?

Betsy


----------



## Atunah

Betsy the Quilter said:


> It does actually move the book on mine--it just does it rather slowly.  Does the move work on yours, Atunah?
> 
> Betsy


Yes, it does move it, but like you said its slow. Its not that slow when I do the other way around, the collection thing I mean. Just when I do what you showed in the clip.


----------



## Lursa (aka 9MMare)

Atunah said:


> That is the goodreads integration. You can connect your goodreads account to your kindle. I have a PW1, I tried it and wont use it again. It rebooted my kindle twice while fiddling with it. Its also pretty slow. It just gives an overview of your goodreads account, your friends, your books. You can add books to read, currently reading and to-read from the kindle. Those are the only shelves that show up that I could see.


Ah, thank you.


----------



## luvmy4brats

I'm updating now. Considering I have had oodles of Kindles on my account over the years, this whole collections thing should be fun <not>


----------



## Betsy the Quilter

I'll be interested in hearing how it goes for you, Heather!

Betsy


----------



## luvmy4brats

Betsy the Quilter said:


> I'll be interested in hearing how it goes for you, Heather!
> 
> Betsy


I had over 220 collections... Many were the same name with a different symbol before it (/samples 'samples *samples) it was quite annoying. I wound up deleting all but about 15 of them.


----------



## Atunah

Luvmy5brats said:


> I had over 220 collections... Many were the same name with a different symbol before it (/samples 'samples *samples) it was quite annoying. I wound up deleting all but about 15 of them.


Ah yes, you also had those symbol collections. Actually now come to think of it, it might have been you I got that idea from way back. One of you. I know we had to use some inventive sorting systems and they changed as devices and software changed. 
I had a lot of collections too. Many duplicates like you.

I think I am on the right track now with my PW. Because of the way the starred collections work, I now have a collection called unread in addition to one called read that are starred. That makes it so that it is a catch all and when I look at all my non starred 40 collections in the cloud sorted by my items, it won't list all items on the bottom, even though they are in some collection. Just that those collections aren't starred. This system makes it so every single book is in at least one collection that is starred. This will make it easy in the future to sort new acquired books into collections and nothing gets overlooked. 
I am now currently in the process to slowly put everything unread into the unread collection. It will take a while as I will also use that to make sure they are in any of the other non starred 40 collections they need to be in like sub genres, tropes, purchase year etc. I have to do it one book by book. I have to often look the book up to make sure about the genre. Like I separate european historicals from american historials, etc.

That way once I am done, everything is in proper collections for the future and hopefully no matter the future device, they will show up there being in those collections from now on.

I don't have to explain that I am a bit OCD when it comes to putting stuff into order. I have to do it, its an urge. If only I could get that all done in real, not just in virtual spaces.


----------



## luvmy4brats

Atunah said:


> Ah yes, you also had those symbol collections. Actually now come to think of it, it might have been you I got that idea from way back. One of you. I know we had to use some inventive sorting systems and they changed as devices and software changed.
> I had a lot of collections too. Many duplicates like you.
> 
> I think I am on the right track now with my PW. Because of the way the starred collections work, I now have a collection called unread in addition to one called read that are starred. That makes it so that it is a catch all and when I look at all my non starred 40 collections in the cloud sorted by my items, it won't list all items on the bottom, even though they are in some collection. Just that those collections aren't starred. This system makes it so every single book is in at least one collection that is starred. This will make it easy in the future to sort new acquired books into collections and nothing gets overlooked.
> I am now currently in the process to slowly put everything unread into the unread collection. It will take a while as I will also use that to make sure they are in any of the other non starred 40 collections they need to be in like sub genres, tropes, purchase year etc. I have to do it one book by book. I have to often look the book up to make sure about the genre. Like I separate european historicals from american historials, etc.
> 
> That way once I am done, everything is in proper collections for the future and hopefully no matter the future device, they will show up there being in those collections from now on.
> 
> I don't have to explain that I am a bit OCD when it comes to putting stuff into order. I have to do it, its an urge. If only I could get that all done in real, not just in virtual spaces.


Yes, I'm the same way. I will eventually reorganize everything. Just not this week.


----------



## GBear

Luvmy5brats said:


> Yes, I'm the same way. I will eventually reorganize everything. Just not this week.


Like Atunah, I think I also got my original collection sorting scheme from you, and I thank you! The OCD side of me does have everything in both a "status" collection and at least one "genre" collection, so I should be in fairly good shape on my book organization if and when I do decide to upgrade, except for having to get rid of all those iterations of different collections created with different symbols for various Kindles.

However, I'll still face some significant challenges:

1) I will need to negotiate with my spouse for a shared collection scheme. I think it will be best if we can have common "genre" collections - we don't have to have them all visible on each others' Kindles but probably best to not have competing genre collections. And we can have different "status" collections (i.e. "His Currently Reading" and "Her Currently Reading" to keep track of what's where. Maybe we'll have to each add a "Not interested" collection if we want to make sure that all the items have a personal status, although she's not as OCD as I am so maybe that will just be something I do! Anyway, this seems necessary to keep us from messing up each others' collections schemes. She has a PW1, so this wasn't as big an issue until the cloud collections update was also made available for her Kindle.

2) I'll need to get used to seeing cloud items cluttering up my Device-only view, which will continue to make me mad until/unless Amazon fixes this. However, I think I can minimize the impact within my "Status" collections, because most of the time I'll be accessing those (e.g. to select the next book in my "Unread" folder, where those are almost always loaded on the device) instead of the large, messy genre collections.

3) I'll have to get used to the "not-connected" messages. I do a lot of library reading, which keeps me offline and sideloading content for various reasons. It sounds like the new firmware will persist in reminding me that I'm offline and trying to get me to assimilate into The Cloud.

Right now I don't have to deal with any of the above issues. With version 5.4.1, things are just as I like them. So I think I'll stick my head in the sand for the foreseeable future!


----------



## Atunah

GBear said:


> 3) I'll have to get used to the "not-connected" messages. I do a lot of library reading, which keeps me offline and sideloading content for various reasons. It sounds like the new firmware will persist in reminding me that I'm offline and trying to get me to assimilate into The Cloud.


That not connected message is driving me bonkers. I still have a lot of sorting to do and I do it here and there when I feel like it, maybe 20 books at a time. And wifi really eats the battery on my kindle fast if I do all that sorting. And like you I read library books and sometimes I need wifi off til I am done.

Thankfully I don't have to share collections with anyone. My husband only reads here and there and its older stuff he keeps on his ipad. I told him to put that on his own amazon account as we don't share reading preferences anyway. He whined when he had it on mine and saw all my books. Men 

I don't even want to contemplate how I would figure out this mess if sharing with others. Yikes.

I was also going to add that I tried importing the collections from my now updated PW1 to Kindle 4PC and what a mess that was. It still pulled in older collections that have been deleted for 2 days now and almost none of the new ones I made and most of the books sorted into are not showing up there either. What server did K4PC pull that info off I wonder.


----------



## Betsy the Quilter

As not all of my books were in collections before the update, and I'm trying to get them all in, I made a collection starting with the number 1 (1 collected) that I'm putting everything in as I put things in my real genre collections.  This way it shows up first when I go into "add to collection" for a specific book, and I know if I've already dealt with that book.  Hmmmmm.  Maybe I'll make a "1 unread" collection, too.  Once I know I have all of my books in collections, I can delete the "1 collected" collection.  And I can always change the name of "1 unread" to "Unread."  (I do a fair bit of moving books into collections on my Fire HDX, and one can't sort the "Add to collections" view as one can on the PW2, but it works on the PW2, too.

A tip--on your updated PW1 or 2, if you have a bunch of collections, but only a few starred collections, and some "uncollected" books that have been delivered to your device.  Go in and out of each of the starred collections on your device, and sort collections by "recent" within the "Add to collection" view.  Then all the collections on your PW that you're adding books to will be on the first page.  I have five pages of collections, but only six collections on my PW2.

Another tip--if your list of collections in "Add to collections" view is several pages (mine is five pages), tapping on the 1/5 in the bottom right corner will pop up the go-to menu.  You can put in a page number or tap in the box opposite "Titles starting with:" to go to collections starting with the letter you designate, or the letters closest to it if you type a letter none of your collections start with (you'll be put in "Title" view if you use a letter).

Betsy


----------



## Rie142

Betsy the Quilter said:


> As not all of my books were in collections before the update, and I'm trying to get them all in, I made a collection starting with the number 1 (1 collected) that I'm putting everything in as I put things in my real genre collections. This way it shows up first when I go into "add to collection" for a specific book, and I know if I've already dealt with that book. Hmmmmm. Maybe I'll make a "1 unread" collection, too. Once I know I have all of my books in collections, I can delete the "1 collected" collection. And I can always change the name of "1 unread" to "Unread." (I do a fair bit of moving books into collections on my Fire HDX, and one can't sort the "Add to collections" view as one can on the PW2, but it works on the PW2, too.
> 
> A tip--on your updated PW1 or 2, if you have a bunch of collections, but only a few starred collections, and some "uncollected" books that have been delivered to your device. Go in and out of each of the starred collections on your device, and sort collections by "recent" within the "Add to collection" view. Then all the collections on your PW that you're adding books to will be on the first page. I have five pages of collections, but only six collections on my PW2.
> 
> Another tip--if your list of collections in "Add to collections" view is several pages (mine is five pages), tapping on the 1/5 in the bottom right corner will pop up the go-to menu. You can put in a page number or tap in the box opposite "Titles starting with:" to go to collections starting with the letter you designate, or the letters closest to it if you type a letter none of your collections start with (you'll be put in "Title" view if you use a letter).
> 
> Betsy


Thanks for the tips Betsy. I am off to try to figure all this out. YIKES. I also share my account with my mother and my son. So I have to keep them in mind also.


----------



## Ann in Arlington

I wonder if I'll have time before April 15 to figure out this out.   I haven't even bothered to do the manual download and haven't gotten an automatic update yet. . . . . . . BUT, I basically have no collections any more because I bailed on them with 5.4.2 because it was severely impacting battery life.  But I would like to add a few back . . . . . . 

When I get it I'll still send negative feedback that ON DEVICE should NOT SHOW anything that is NOT On The Device!     Why isn't that logical to whomever programmed the thing? 

Has anyone checked to see if they've put back the direct sharing to FB -- rather than having to go through GR.  And even then it doesn't work; it just goes to GR.


----------



## Tabatha

Ann in Arlington said:


> . . . . BUT, I basically have no collections any more because I bailed on them with 5.4.2 because it was severely impacting battery life. But I would like to add a few back . . . . . .


Battery life is vastly improved with this last update.


----------



## Toby

Thanks for the tips!


----------



## Ann in Arlington

Mine updated overnight.  At least, I assume that's when it did.  I noticed it when I opened it this evening after work but, as I work in an area with no WiFi (not even cell coverage) it surely didn't come in during the day.   I've kept the notification on the home page so I can easily find the feedback address when I've played some.  I'm pretty sure I'll give kudos for improvements but still object to 'collections' and 'device' showing the same thing and lament the lack of ability to post directly to FB.


----------



## Tabatha

Another update to PW2 noted at mobilereads. Now at 5.4.3.1 No mention of what this update does, maybe just a minor bug fix.

Edited post to show new version number.


----------



## Ann in Arlington

Thanks, Tabatha. I took the liberty of putting a date in the first post to make it clear how new this info is.


----------



## Tabatha

Thanks Ann! I thought of that, but was too lazy to go back and edit it again. I actually downloaded the update on Monday when I noted it at mobilreads.


----------



## Betsy the Quilter

New update to PW2:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html/ref=hp_left_v4_sib?ie=UTF8&nodeId=201307450

What it does:

Access Notes from the Reading Menu While reading, you can view all of your notes by tapping the Menu icon and then selecting Notes. You can also continue to access the Notes tab from the Go To menu in the reading toolbar. To learn more, go to Add, View, Edit or Remove Notes Manage Cloud Collections

See all of your collections in a Collections view, and *customize where your collections show on your device.* To learn more, go to View and Manage Your Cloud Collections.

PDF Improvements Pan and zoom within PDF documents more quickly and easily, and adjust the margins for an optimized reading experience.

Cancel Full Book Purchase from within a Sample While reading a book sample, you can view the price of the full book and purchase with one tap. You can also cancel the purchase before the download is complete by tapping cancel purchase.

Noticed I missed 5.4.3.1....going to check this out! (bolding mine.)


----------



## Betsy the Quilter

OK, finishing update now.  I don't remember seeing this before, but when it finished updating there was a cute little checkmark saying the update is over.

I haven't been able to see much difference so far....which makes sense since it's a .1 upgrade. 

It does seem much zippier than the last time I really tested things.

Betsy


----------



## Atunah

I thought it was a tad bit zippier adding books to collections. 30 or so compared to like 2 minutes it took before. So still slow, but a bit better. I'll let it do its back round stuff for a while and test again. Seems to me that it does things after an update. 

Otherwise, its the same to me. Unless I am missing something. But like you said Betsy, its just a .1 update. That is usually just some bug fixing thingy right?


----------



## Betsy the Quilter

Atunah said:


> I thought it was a tad bit zippier adding books to collections. 30 or so compared to like 2 minutes it took before. So still slow, but a bit better. I'll let it do its back round stuff for a while and test again. Seems to me that it does things after an update.
> 
> Otherwise, its the same to me. Unless I am missing something. But like you said Betsy, its just a .1 update. That is usually just some bug fixing thingy right?


Right. I think the page is misleading... I think it lists all that stuff because you don't need to have the earlier updates first--you can probably go right from 5.4.2 to 5.4.3.2; I didn't need to have 5.4.3.1 installed.

Betsy


----------



## Atunah

Arg, never mind me. I am in the wrong thread. They look so much alike. I have the PW1. That is what happens when I haven't had my tea yet.


----------



## Toby

This update sounds really good. I will like the new features. Will be checking to see if I get the update, otherwise, I'll maunually update it.


----------



## Vmurph

Sooo...Anyone try it yet?


----------



## lindnet

Wow, my PW2 is so far behind.  It's still at 5.4.0.


----------



## Betsy the Quilter

Vmurph said:


> Sooo...Anyone try it yet?


I tried it earlier today (see below)--if you have 5.4.3 or 5.4.3.1, I don't think you'll see a difference, it seems to be mostly performance issues.



Betsy the Quilter said:


> OK, finishing update now. I don't remember seeing this before, but when it finished updating there was a cute little checkmark saying the update is over.
> 
> I haven't been able to see much difference so far....which makes sense since it's a .1 upgrade.
> 
> It does seem much zippier than the last time I really tested things.


Betsy


----------



## Vmurph

Betsy the Quilter said:


> I tried it earlier today (see below)--if you have 5.4.3 or 5.4.3.1, I don't think you'll see a difference, it seems to be mostly performance issues.


I thought someone mentioned an added ability to customize our collections more?

PS: I downloaded it already. I just haven't had a chance to plug my Kindle in yet. Too busy reading, lol.


----------



## Betsy the Quilter

Vmurph said:


> I thought someone mentioned an added ability to customize our collections more?
> 
> PS: I downloaded it already. I just haven't had a chance to plug my Kindle in yet. Too busy reading, lol.


Right, I quoted that from the download page in my post yesterday morning that announced the upgrade. But the collections stuff doesn't seem any different to me than from after the 5.4.3 upgrade. I've got two PW2s on hand, one that has the upgrade and one doesn't and didn't see any difference that I could note.



Betsy the Quilter said:


> Right. I think the page is misleading... I think it lists all that stuff because you don't need to have the earlier updates first--you can probably go right from 5.4.2 to 5.4.3.2; I didn't need to have 5.4.3.1 installed.


So if you have 5.4.3 or 5.4.3.1, I don't think you'll see much difference (though it did make mine faster, as far as I can tell). If you still have 5.4, as lindnet said, you'll see the difference.

If anyone finds any significant difference (and I wouldn't expect one, as it's an upgrade from 5.4.3.1 to 5.4.3.2) please post it.



Betsy


----------



## Jamie25UGA

Alright you paperwhite experts, does anyone know if I delete a collection on my paperwhite that is a collection on my keyboard will it delete off the keyboard? I see the paperwhite is using the cloud more so than the keyboard so I'm thinking not but I'm about to gift my keyboard and had planned to keep it on my account for a family member to have my books...I'd hate to be rearranging my paperwhite and take off all of her collections/books on the keyboard. I seem to have a ton of duplicate collections, one set from my keyboard, and another from where I was trying to set up collections on my PC.


----------



## Betsy the Quilter

No, deleting a collection off your Paperwhite will not change the Keyboard's collections (and vice versa).  The Keyboards does not have the "live" connection to the cloud collections that the Paperwhite does.

She'll be fine!

Betsy


----------



## Ann in Arlington

I'm at 5.4.3 . . . . if there was a 5.4.3.1, I never got it.  Am mostly off wifi this weekend so I doubt I'll see 5.4.3.2 before next week, if then.  May end up doing it manually . . . . .


----------



## Meemo

The one thing I've noticed (and I'm not sure which update this came with - I'm on 5.4.3.1) is that I can now, finally, get things sorted to where I can see only the Collections that are on *my* PW2. There's only one view where I can do that, but at least there's that one. I'm still annoyed that if I want to put a book into a collection, I have to page through every flippin' Collection on my account. (And with 4 people on my account, that's still just not acceptable.)


----------



## Betsy the Quilter

Tabatha said:


> Another update to PW2 noted at mobilereads. Now at 5.4.3.1 No mention of what this update does, maybe just a minor bug fix.
> 
> Edited post to show new version number.


Per Tabatha on April 16th, there was a 5.4.3.1...



Meemo said:


> The one thing I've noticed (and I'm not sure which update this came with - I'm on 5.4.3.1) is that I can now, finally, get things sorted to where I can see only the Collections that are on *my* PW2. There's only one view where I can do that, but at least there's that one. I'm still annoyed that if I want to put a book into a collection, I have to page through every flippin' Collection on my account. (And with 4 people on my account, that's still just not acceptable.)


I'd have to go back through the thread, but I _think_ that the collections view and having starred collections came with 5.4.3. *makes note to start a list of firmware changes*

Meemo, I agree. What I do is, before adding the book to any collections, I open the collection that I want to move the book into, or all of the collections actually on the device if I'm doing a lot of books, one by one (I have six or seven), before adding any books to collections. Then, within the "Add to Collection" window, I sort the collection view by recent. This way, the collection or collections I just viewed will be at the top of the list/on the first page. It's a workaround that I shouldn't have to do, but there it is.

So, for example, I have 18 books I have gotten recently and not added to collections. I just opened and closed the six collections I have on my device (Fantasy & Sci Fi, Fiction on PW (a catchall), Horror, Mystery and Thrillers, Nonfiction, Romance). Now, when I hold on the first book, a mystery, and tap on "Add to Collection," those six collections are on the first page.

Betsy


----------



## MLPMom

Has anyone's kindle automatically updated on it own? I am still at the 5.4.3 version and my wifi has been on for over 24 hours.


----------



## Toby

No, not yet.


----------



## Tabatha

It has always been months before I've received an automatic update, so I have always downloaded it and installed it myself.

Have noticed a significant change in the battery lasting longer with this latest update. Have always had to charge almost nightly before this last update. Also had a freeze again, which needed restart to correct, hope that is not back permanently, or I'll definitly have to send back for exchange. It was a constant problem when first received it as a new kindle but 5.4.3.1 seemed to fix it.


----------



## Ann in Arlington

I'm still at 5.4.3 -- I can't decide how much it matters to me and whether I want to do the updates manually.   I'm not having any problems . . . . .


----------



## MLPMom

I broke down and just manually did it. I haven't noticed any changes so far but I wasn't really expecting to based on what others have already said about it.


----------



## DD

MLPMom said:


> Has anyone's kindle automatically updated on it own? I am still at the 5.4.3 version and my wifi has been on for over 24 hours.


I just took my PW2 off of airplane mode for the first time in a while and it updated automatically.


----------



## Toby

I just got my update. Actually, I didn't see it happening, but I noticed it was a bit faster, so I checked.


----------



## loonlover

Mine updated sometime in the last couple of days.  Haven't really noticed any differences.


----------



## Marie Long

My PW just updated yesterday. Is this the same update that the OP was talking about?? If so, why is it we're just receiving a 2 month-old update? So far, I've always kept my PW wi-fi on since I got it last month, and this is the first time I'm receiving an update for it.


----------



## Betsy the Quilter

Marie Long said:


> My PW just updated yesterday. Is this the same update that the OP was talking about?? If so, why is it we're just receiving a 2 month-old update? So far, I've always kept my PW wi-fi on since I got it last month, and this is the first time I'm receiving an update for it.


No, Marie, note the subject of the thread--there was an update to 5.4.3.2 on 5/8/14 (and an earlier one to 5.4.3.1 since the thread was started).

Here's part of my post earlier in the thread, on May 8, announcing the new minor update:



Betsy the Quilter said:


> New update to PW2:
> 
> https://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html/ref=hp_left_v4_sib?ie=UTF8&nodeId=201307450


Amazon, as always, has rolled out updates to the firmware over the course of several weeks.

Betsy


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## Ann in Arlington

Just checked and I'm at 5.4.3.2  I think I completely skipped 5.4.3.1 because I was on 5.4.3 last time I checked -- somewhere earlier in the thread, not too long ago -- yes -- I posted on the 14th. 

My guess is they released 5.4.3.1 and then found there were still some little things to fix, so they stopped sending it out, did some more tweaks, and then started sending again as 5.4.3.2.


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## Betsy the Quilter

5.4.3.2 apparently incorporated 5.4.3.1 because I manually updated from 5.4.3 to 5.4.3.2.

I'm thinking that they found something else they wanted to fix soon after releasing 5.4.3.1 and stopped the roll out until 5.4.3.2 could be released.

Betsy


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## MrKnucklehead

is that new update just for the Paperwhite

it automatically downloaded on my Paperwhite...still trying to figure out if I like it...I'm not not involved with Goodreads and as of now I'm not crazy how they changed the Bookmarks...

is still update for Kindle Fire also


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## Ann in Arlington

I think I may have just discovered another feature added with one of these incremental updates.  Or, if it was always there, I never noticed it before.  But I don't think it was.

It seems to me, when the PW was first released, the progress tracking options in the lower left corner were time to end, time to chapter (if there were appropriate codes in the file), page number, and location number. 

In answering a question in another thread -- and to verify the above -- I noticed there is now a 5th option . . . .nothing at all.  And if you have nothing at all, the percentage also does not show on the right side.


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## musclehead

I noticed that, too. But it was a while back. Not sure when that feature arrived.


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## GBear

I don't have a "display nothing" option with firmware 5.4.0, so it must have been introduced after that. 

It is hard to imagine a feature Amazon could introduce that could entice me to upgrade and take on the cloud collections nightmare. This certainly isn't it!


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## Meemo

It's actually much better now that I can get it sorted so that I only see the Collections on my PW2. I still think they should take the whole "On Device" thing literally, like most users do, but it's far less frustrating for me now than it was after the initial infamous Cloud Collections update.


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## Ann in Arlington

Meemo said:


> It's actually much better now that I can get it sorted so that I only see the Collections on my PW2. I still think they should take the whole "On Device" thing literally, like most users do, but it's far less frustrating for me now than it was after the initial infamous Cloud Collections update.


Yeah. I'm more or less satisfied with the way it works now. But it really is sort of wrong that, for folks with lots of collections, the update essentially _broke_ it. You pretty much had to get rid of all your collections and start from scratch . . . .which is not good customer service.

I think, though, that the people with lots of collections were only a small minority of kindle owners. And I guess when they tested it they didn't have folks with tons of collections/multiple devices on their accounts. Heck, the non kboards people I know with kindles, basically don't have collections at all. Or if they do, it's just one or two.  Those folks never saw a problem, so even though many of us sent feedback, it was a drop in the bucket. And, maybe too late to do anything anyway as the update had gone out.

I agree 110% about a correct usage of the distinction between 'cloud' and 'on device'. That's just stoopid in my mind. And I can't understand why they don't see that?


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## Tabatha

New software update today for PW2  Version 5.4.5. Original link will still bring you there.


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## Ann in Arlington

Thanks Tabatha -- any word on what might be different?

(I'm guessing it's probably to do with Kindle Unlimited access.)


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## Tabatha

If you click on link to page it states the changes. Now will sync last page with all devices which some have been waiting for. 

Ann, this is for the PW2, the PW1 that you have is now at 5.4.4.2


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## Ann in Arlington

Tabatha said:


> If you click on link to page it states the changes. Now will sync last page with all devices which some have been waiting for.
> 
> Ann, this is for the PW2, the PW1 that you have is now at 5.4.4.2


Yeah -- I have the 2013 PW.


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## Tabatha

Ann in Arlington said:


> Yeah -- I have the 2013 PW.


Sorry, forgot you traded it when I did which made it almost free!.


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## Betsy the Quilter

Tabatha said:


> If you click on link to page it states the changes. Now will sync last page with all devices which some have been waiting for.
> 
> Ann, this is for the PW2, the PW1 that you have is now at 5.4.4.2


Mine does this already? I thought? (PW2)

EDIT: What it does now is sync to "most recent page read" which may or may not be last page read...bolding mine... Quote from the page:
Link to Update page



> Sync to the Most Recent Page Read
> Any books you are reading on your Kindle Paperwhite will now *sync to the most recent page read* across all Kindle devices and/or reading apps registered to your Amazon account. You can still *manually sync your Kindle Paperwhite to go to the furthest page read.* To learn more, go to Sync on Your Kindle Paperwhite.
> 
> Preview a PDF in Pan-and-Zoom Mode
> When viewing a PDF in pan-and-zoom mode, you will now see a small preview window in the margin of the screen.
> 
> Read a Sample While Your Physical Book Ships
> While you are waiting for select physical books to arrive at your doorstep, you can start reading the book right away by adding a sample of the book to your Kindle library. With this release, these samples will be now available for download in the Cloud tab of your Kindle Paperwhite in addition to your other supported Kindle devices and apps. Any previous samples you have claimed through a physical book purchase will also be available in the Cloud to download. To learn more, go to Read While Your Book Ships.


Betsy


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## Betsy the Quilter

The "read the sample" thing is cool....I mean, one could manually do that.


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## Ann in Arlington

Most recent vs furthest page is a definite improvement. That way, if my brother reads a book to the end, when I start it a month later, _I'll_ be able to sync without first resetting the furthest page.

The sample thing is cool -- I guess it's only for books where there's a linked kindle and paper edition. My first thought was maybe it's to get people to buy kindles? So folks who mostly read paper will see how fun reading ebooks is. But then I realized, we're talking about the PW, which, if you have one, you already know. So, cool, but, I'm not sure I understand the point? 

I wonder if they'll put the feature on their android/iThing apps?


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## Betsy the Quilter

Ann in Arlington said:


> Most recent vs furthest page is a definite improvement. That way, if my brother reads a book to the end, when I start it a month later, _I'll_ be able to sync without first resetting the furthest page.


Yes, it's cool. That Amazon Ann, always thinking....

Betsy


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## Ann in Arlington

Betsy the Quilter said:


> Yes, it's cool. That Amazon, always thinking....
> 
> Betsy


I think I'll claim credit because I'm pretty sure I mentioned this several years ago.


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## Betsy the Quilter

Ann in Arlington said:


> I think I'll claim credit because I'm pretty sure I mentioned this several years ago.


Works for me! 


Betsy
(Editing prior post.)


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## Ann in Arlington




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## Tabatha

Another software update for the PW2 2nd generation, now at 5.4.5.1. Link on first post still gets you there to download.


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## Betsy the Quilter

Thanks, Tabatha!

Betsy


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## Betsy the Quilter

I left mine charging overnight and it updated by itself...

Here's the link (also in the first post, as Tabatha said) and the description of what the current update adds.

Latest update



> *Sync to the Most Recent Page Read*
> Any books you are reading on your Kindle Paperwhite will now sync to the most recent page read across all Kindle devices and/or reading apps registered to your Amazon account. You can still manually sync your Kindle Paperwhite to go to the furthest page read. To learn more, go to Sync on Your Kindle Paperwhite.
> 
> *Preview a PDF in Pan-and-Zoom Mode*
> When viewing a PDF in pan-and-zoom mode, you will now see a small preview window in the margin of the screen.
> 
> *Read a Sample While Your Physical Book Ships *
> While you are waiting for select physical books to arrive at your doorstep, you can start reading the book right away by adding a sample of the book to your Kindle library. With this release, these samples will be now available for download in the Cloud tab of your Kindle Paperwhite in addition to your other supported Kindle devices and apps. Any previous samples you have claimed through a physical book purchase will also be available in the Cloud to download. To learn more, go to Read While Your Book Ships.
> 
> Betsy


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## Meemo

Wasn't all that in a previous update?  Or was that the PW1?


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## Ann in Arlington

What Betsy listed was in 5.4.5.

5.4.5.1 is basically bug fixes and other stuff most people won't really notice.


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## CAR

I have not played around with the 5.4.5.1 a lot.  But after our PW2's have been updated,  I noticed a couple things..
1.  I could only find my collections on my PW2.  And on my wife's PW2 I could only find her collections.  
2:  The device vs cloud was working much more as expected.  

To be honest I was surprised about this, and spent a few minutes trying to find my collections on my wife's PW2.

P.S.  We are both on the same Amazon account for Kindle Books.

P.S.S  I just want to update my previous post.  It is still possible to see the other persons collections still with 5.4.5.1    But you have to work at seeing them now.


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## GBear

CAR said:


> I have not played around with the 5.4.5.1 a lot. But after our PW2's have been updated, I noticed a couple things..
> 1. I could only find my collections on my PW2. And on my wife's PW2 I could only find her collections.
> 2: The device vs cloud was working much more as expected.
> 
> To be honest I was surprised about this, and spent a few minutes trying to find my collections on my wife's PW2.
> 
> P.S. We are both on the same Amazon account for Kindle Books.


If they really addressed some of these huge issues with shared accounts and cloud collections, I might be tempted to get back to installing the upgrades. (I have thus far avoided cloud collections.) Can this be confirmed?


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## Ann in Arlington

This .1 update is just general improvements, bug fixes, things like that.  But the 5.4.5 did change the collections (or was that the previous update?). ANYWAY, you can now 'star' them and you only will see the ones for that device ON that device if that's what you want. Which most of us did!  You won't see the ones that are, for example, collections on another device, or purely in the cloud.

Unfortunately, within the collection on your device, you will still see books from that collection that are only in the cloud, even when sorting by 'device'. But it's a definite improvement over the initial implementation.

Still, if you have a LOT of collections, you'll probably end up having to more or less start over, because the first thing that will happen is every collection you have ever had will 'count' as a live collection -- even those from devices you've gotten rid of.  Which practically means you'll have lots of duplicates.  If, before you update, you name your device collections uniquely so you'll know they're the right ones, it won't be as difficult to then delete all the others -- or leave them and star your current ones so the old ones don't show.


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## Wisteria Clematis

Ann (or anyone), will every single book show within the collection even if it is in the cloud and not on the device? I haven't installed updates because I don't want to scroll through pages of grayed out titles that aren't actually on my kindle currently. If this has also been fixed I'd really like to take advantage of the updates.

Thanks,
Wisteria


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## gustavray

Both my father and I have Kindle Paperwhite 2. His was updated to 5.4.5 and he lost access to footnotes. Whenever you click on it, nothing happens. I called Amazon a lot of times and they couldn't do anything. I read somewhere that they received a lot of complaints on that and were going to fix that on the next update. I updated his Kindle again to see if they sorted this out on 5.4.5.1 but they haven't...  This is really annoying... Makes me wonder if I should have chosen Kobo instead...


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## Ann in Arlington

Wisteria Clematis said:


> Ann (or anyone), will every single book show within the collection even if it is in the cloud and not on the device? I haven't installed updates because I don't want to scroll through pages of grayed out titles that aren't actually on my kindle currently. If this has also been fixed I'd really like to take advantage of the updates.
> 
> Thanks,
> Wisteria


In short, yes. I don't keep most of my books in collections, but I do have 3 for specific non-fiction things that I need to be able to find quickly -- connected to work or hobbies.  So, if the document or book is in the collection on the device, it shows in a darker print. When I've removed it from the device, it still shows in the collection even when in 'device' sort. So, for example, the one collection has only 3 items in it actually on the device, but it shows there are something like 20 in it. So that part of STOOPID is still there.

BUT, at least if I have collections on some other device, I don't have to have it showing on my main device with the ability to 'star' the collections.

For books NOT in a collection, when you delete it from the device, you no longer see it on your home page.



gustavray said:


> Both my father and I have Kindle Paperwhite 2. His was updated to 5.4.5 and he lost access to footnotes. Whenever you click on it, nothing happens. I called Amazon a lot of times and they couldn't do anything. I read somewhere that they received a lot of complaints on that and were going to fix that on the next update. I updated his Kindle again to see if they sorted this out on 5.4.5.1 but they haven't... This is really annoying... Makes me wonder if I should have chosen Kobo instead...


I'm going to say this is a coincidental glitch and not caused by the update as I have not had any such issue. And I have read books with footnotes and have had no problem accessing them.

A couple of thoughts: maybe it's a problem with the BOOK not having been properly linked/formatted. Try downloading a fresh copy.

_Samples_ may have footnotes but they won't work because it's a sample and the part of the file with the notes isn't part of the sample.

I expect some people might not see it as a huge deal -- if you mostly read fiction, for example, there usually are not many footnotes -- but, footnotes ARE supposed to work. So I'd say you're within your rights to contact 'em again, if it's still happening regularly, and ask to have the device replaced.


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## metal134

Ann in Arlington said:


> Most recent vs furthest page is a definite improvement. That way, if my brother reads a book to the end, when I start it a month later, _I'll_ be able to sync without first resetting the furthest page.
> 
> The sample thing is cool -- I guess it's only for books where there's a linked kindle and paper edition. My first thought was maybe it's to get people to buy kindles? So folks who mostly read paper will see how fun reading ebooks is. But then I realized, we're talking about the PW, which, if you have one, you already know. So, cool, but, I'm not sure I understand the point?
> 
> I wonder if they'll put the feature on their android/iThing apps?


This. I have wanted this since the beginning. The biggest issue for me has been either books with footnotes (jumping to the end to read footnotes would forever-more be my furthest page read), or collections which, if I didn't read everything in order, could be frustrating.


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## Betsy the Quilter

Meemo said:


> Wasn't all that in a previous update? Or was that the PW1?


Oops, yes, it was. I wish they wouldn't list it that way on the Latest update page....

Betsy


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## Meemo

So something I've noticed with one of these recent updates - I tend to put my series books into Calibre and change the metadata for titles of books that are part of a series, to show where they fall in the series (so I'd have, for example, Sookie 1 - Dead Until Dark; Sookie 2 - Living Dead in Dallas, etc). I also add the series name and number to those corresponding fields in the metadata. All of a sudden I'm seeing the metadata series info AND the changed title on the home page of my PW2. So now I'd see Sookie [1] - Sookie 1 - Dead Until Dark. Not sure when that happened, it was prior to this newest one because mine updated last night and I just noticed the change last week. Must not've been reading many series books until recently...

Anyone else use Calibre and notice that?? I haven't seen anything about it here or on Mobileread.


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## Ann in Arlington

I don't use Calibre, but there's been discussion in the WC that Amazon has begun including information in the kindle file about which book of a series each title is.  In cases where authors had already included it manually, it's showing up twice in the title when converted through the Kindle Publishing process.


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