# Fire HD 8.9" screen going black when laid down flat on particular desk



## avenger1212 (Nov 26, 2012)

You folks are probably getting sick of me.    I seem to attract all the weird issues.

My wife had her Kindle at work today. It's in a pink Amazon tablet case that turns the device on and off when you open and close it. I think those work by magnets. Anyway, my wife says she set the device down flat on her work desk, and the screen would go black. She could pick it up and it would turn back on where she was at when she set it down (i.e. in a book or in the browser). She did not have to unlock the device as if it had turned off. She could reproduce the issue by setting the device down on the desk again. If she tried her lap, it would work fine. And I have it laying flat on my desk as I type now, and it's fine. 

It appears to only do this on that particular desk, so far. She tried setting it with the cover in a tent like shape, where the device was angled off the desk, and it worked then. It only did it when she'd lay it down flat. The desk is one of those old sheet metal desks you see in offices a lot, with a laminate top. Anyone heard of this happening before? I wonder if the cover or device is somehow reacting to the metal desk top, and turning off the screen. The odd part is that she doesn't have to unlock the Kindle when she picks it up, thus making it seem like it's not really turning off.


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## Dragle (Dec 10, 2011)

Yep, sounds like it's the metal surface combined with the magnetic case.  Someone reported in another thread that it turned off when they sat it on the stove top.


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## avenger1212 (Nov 26, 2012)

Never mind! She said it *was* needing to be unlocked when she'd pick it up. So, it was not just coming back on, but was coming back on from sleep mode as you'd expect.

I ran a test, putting the Kindle flat against the side of our fridge, and it would magnetize to the fridge and put the device in sleep mode. It would wake as soon as I would take it off the fridge. So, those covers do in fact work by magnet, and setting a Kindle down on a metal surface, or a metal surface with thin laminate as in this case, can trigger the device to go to sleep.

Dragle, thanks for the reply. It seems you are correct in what's going on. The case is reacting with the metal surface and turning off the device. She'll just have to put a pad of paper under the Kindle when laying it on her desk to read from now on.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

Right, we had another thread about this.  It's the cover/metal desk combination.

If she lays the Kindle down with the cover open instead of behind the Fire, it won't turn off.

Betsy


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