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I've jailbroken mine to have custom covers. Instead of famous dead American authors I've never read, I have famous dead physicists whom I've actually read and w

I've jailbroken mine to have custom covers. Instead of famous dead American authors I've never read, I have famous dead physicists whom I've actually read and whom I admire.

chadgeidel 10y ago
I'd love to do this using "pulp" science fiction book covers. I assumed that there was already a tutorial for this, but my Google-fu is weak. Did you use a guide or just DIY? What size/resolution image does the Kindle expect? Is there a filename format or a directory structure to use?
- semi-extrinsic 10y ago
  Here you go (there is a link on that page for latest Kindle's, this is for v. 1/2/3/4: http://wiki.mobileread.com/wiki/Kindle_Screen_Saver_Hack_for_all_2.x,_3.x_%26_4.x_Kindles http://wiki.mobileread.com/wiki/Kindle_Screen_Saver_Hack_for... Image format is grayscale 800x600 (bigger for Kindle DX) png or jpg. For best quality I recommend fiddling a bit with the color to grayscale work in Gimp or Photoshop, especially if the image has large areas with soft gradients. IIRC, running a selective Gaussian blur after grayscaling, and/or working the curves tool a bit before grayscaling, will improve problematic images quite a bit. Early models had only 4 grayscales, now they have 16. "Posterize" to 4 or 16 colors after grayscale in Gimp will give you a good idea of how the end result looks.
- DanBC 10y ago
  I think you want screensaver hacks. Here's one example, but there are others. http://wiki.mobileread.com/wiki/Kindle_Screen_Saver_Hack_for_all_2.x,_3.x_%26_4.x_Kindles http://wiki.mobileread.com/wiki/Kindle_Screen_Saver_Hack_for... Some people add their contact details to the screensaver images, so if you lose your kindle your contact details are the first thing someone who finds it will see.
  - rsync 10y ago
    Maybe a better hack would be to disable screensavers since they serve no purpose on an e-paper display and actually cost battery to switch from text -> screensaver -> text. The better behavior would be to not flip the screen at all and keep it static, using no battery.
2bitencryption 10y ago
Maybe give those famous dead American authors a try. They're famous for a reason :)
- semi-extrinsic 10y ago
  I was being a bit flippant; they're not all American, and checking the list now I see I've actually read 5 out of 11 of them.
WalterBright 10y ago
I wish the cover would be the cover of the kindle book I'm currently reading.
- boznz 10y ago
  me too, its amazing how often I forget the book title and author when anyone asks..

I've jailbroken mine to have custom covers. Instead of famous dead American authors I've never read, I have famous dead physicists whom I've actually read and whom I admire.

chadgeidel 10y ago

I'd love to do this using "pulp" science fiction book covers. I assumed that there was already a tutorial for this, but my Google-fu is weak. Did you use a guide or just DIY? What size/resolution image does the Kindle expect? Is there a filename format or a directory structure to use?

semi-extrinsic 10y ago
Here you go (there is a link on that page for latest Kindle's, this is for v. 1/2/3/4: http://wiki.mobileread.com/wiki/Kindle_Screen_Saver_Hack_for_all_2.x,_3.x_%26_4.x_Kindles http://wiki.mobileread.com/wiki/Kindle_Screen_Saver_Hack_for... Image format is grayscale 800x600 (bigger for Kindle DX) png or jpg. For best quality I recommend fiddling a bit with the color to grayscale work in Gimp or Photoshop, especially if the image has large areas with soft gradients. IIRC, running a selective Gaussian blur after grayscaling, and/or working the curves tool a bit before grayscaling, will improve problematic images quite a bit. Early models had only 4 grayscales, now they have 16. "Posterize" to 4 or 16 colors after grayscale in Gimp will give you a good idea of how the end result looks.
DanBC 10y ago
I think you want screensaver hacks. Here's one example, but there are others. http://wiki.mobileread.com/wiki/Kindle_Screen_Saver_Hack_for_all_2.x,_3.x_%26_4.x_Kindles http://wiki.mobileread.com/wiki/Kindle_Screen_Saver_Hack_for... Some people add their contact details to the screensaver images, so if you lose your kindle your contact details are the first thing someone who finds it will see.
- rsync 10y ago
  Maybe a better hack would be to disable screensavers since they serve no purpose on an e-paper display and actually cost battery to switch from text -> screensaver -> text. The better behavior would be to not flip the screen at all and keep it static, using no battery.

2bitencryption 10y ago

Maybe give those famous dead American authors a try. They're famous for a reason :)

semi-extrinsic 10y ago
I was being a bit flippant; they're not all American, and checking the list now I see I've actually read 5 out of 11 of them.

WalterBright 10y ago

I wish the cover would be the cover of the kindle book I'm currently reading.

boznz 10y ago
me too, its amazing how often I forget the book title and author when anyone asks..