The new Amazon Kindle 3 firmware has just been released as a preview edition with a ton of great new fixes. It adds a fair amount of new enhanced features to the world’s most popular e-reader, and you can thank the Kindle community for their feedback. What’s new in the Kindle 3.1 firmware? You can now share your notes with the public, real page numbers, book ratings and more!
Some of the new features that accompany the latest firmware edition to the latest generation of Kindle e-reader is a manual update right now, while the pushed version will be available in a few weeks.
First of all, one of the most important updates is the public notes system. This new notes system allows users to share their book notes and highlights for the general public to see. It allows any existing Kindle e-reader user, such as authors, their fans, book reviewers and readers worldwide can share their thoughts on specific book passages. This should be great for authors themselves sharing insights on your favorite characters, or trusted reviewers to give you broader character biographies.
Another great feature in the brand new 3.1 firmware update for the Amazon Kindle is real page numbers. Most of the time due to page size and screen size the ebook page numbers might be different from the printed version of the book. This makes book clubs and reviewing particular passages and events a little bit confusing. Amazon has fixed this system so if the ebook has a printed cousin that is in bookstores, the virtual and tangible book will have the same information on each page.
One of the great features about browsing Amazon’s vast library of ebooks is seeing how other people thought of the book. Sometimes you might want to take a chance on a new author, only to find out 100 people said this novel was a crime against humanity! Now when you finish a novel, there is a new rating system that you can rate the book. So whether it was a literary masterpiece or the worst book in history you can share this information with other people to give them the heads up.
Now there is some things you need to know if you want to install this new firmware on your Kindle. First of all, if you are running any hacks on your device, most of your hacks will not work. We have reports that the company has altered the way it checks for a valid update now and it specifically only uses the two Amazon key files instead of any installed key file. Also, if you have a fair number of books on your Kindle it may take up to an hour for the page fix to work properly. It has to sync for new data in order for the new page information to work. Make sure you have [Home] -> [Menu] -> [Sync & Check for new items] turned on.
If you want to manually load in the new update for the Amazon Kindle WIFI or the Kindle 3G you can download the update HERE.
Michael Kozlowski is the editor-in-chief at Good e-Reader and has written about audiobooks and e-readers for the past fifteen years. Newspapers and websites such as the CBC, CNET, Engadget, Huffington Post and the New York Times have picked up his articles. He Lives in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
