Kindle Indexing Question.

[Quis]

I just got my Kindle today and I did a dump of 550+ books in the .txt format, will it index these all at once??? And is there anyway for me to check up on the indexing progress?? Or should I wipe the kindle and maybe add 10 at a time?? Im finding im getting frozen screens, slow navigating etc and books not showing up on the list that I put up there.  Should i do a wipe and add maybe 10 at a time?? Or should I just give it some time to index, it seems like it does indexes when I go to the list and click each book at a time and wait 15 seconds or so, but that seems very tedious.  Anyway to have the kindle concentrating on indexing everything at once??

Thanks.

[911jason]

I don't think there is any way to speed it up... but I would suggest you plug in the power cord immediately so that it doesn't drain completely while it's trying, because that can lead to other problems. You can check on the progress of the index by using the keyboard and searching through your books for a bunch of letters that would never actually appear in any of the books. Try XBGGGYT or something like that. The results page should tell you that XXX books have not been indexed yet.

[Quis]

But it wont mess up the indexing progress by putting that many books on it at once right?? right now its at 323 not yet indexed, im gonna curl up with it for another hour or 2 then plug it in to charge.  Will it be fine plugged into the usb of my PC?? Or should I just be safe and plug it into the outlet??

EDIT: Refreshed the no yet indexed page after 30 seconds and its down to 320 not indexed, so it is definately doing it, but yea seems to be sucking down the battery like mad.  It also seems to be indexing faster while the wireless is on...strange.

[911jason]

I don't think it hurts it to put on more books, just makes it less friendly to use while it's working that hard... I'm pretty sure that you can plug it in to the computer and still read, but not sure about the details on that since I never do it.

[Masonity]

You can. You just have to eject (my computer, right click on it, eject. Don't use safely remove or it keeps the plugged in screen up!) the kindle first, so it just takes power and doesn't maintain an open data connection.

[911jason]

Thanks for clarifying that Masonity... I've wondered about that when I've connected my K2 in the past to transfer screensavers or books, but never cared enough to look for the answer. Good to know! =)

[TechBotBoy]

I'm only guessing at this - sorry - but perhaps a tool like Calibre that can do a bit of organizing and converting the .txt files to e-book format might be of some assistance - I too have a bunch of public domain books that came with my Kindle and at one point I tried to load up the entire section of Childrens books - it took a bit of time, but in the end seemed to manage the job well - there might have been a couple of hundred titles.  If I get a chance to do a bit more testing , I'll post the results.


                       - Tbb

[Quis]

Yea the kindle was clean when i got it but it was also a bunch of .txt files and it seemed to index em without a hitch.

[VictoriaP]

It absolutely is going to bog the Kindle down to deal with 550 files of any sort.  Your best bet is to plug it in and leave it alone until it's done.  The processor on these things just isn't capable of handling multiple files at once, and you're only slowing it down further by trying to read on it while it's fighting its way through the pile.

Leave wireless on when you plug it in.  One of the things I've noticed is it appears to do is send the indexing results back to Amazon both for backup and for use on the http://kindle.amazon.com site; I added notes to 90 or so books one day while trying to set up some tags, and the Kindle stayed bogged down until I turned wireless on AND left it alone.  About two hours later, it was complete and no further issues.

Congrats on your new toy!

[loca]

Yea the kindle was clean when i got it but it was also a bunch of .txt files and it seemed to index em without a hitch.

That;'s usually a very quick process, true.

[pidgeon92]

That;'s usually a very quick process, true.

For 550 titles? It could take days depending on the file size.

[sherylb]

I have a K1 and one day recently got the bright idea to move a bunch of books from my K1 to my SD card and it was enough to trigger a full index...over 800 books. It took about 3 1/2 days to complete. I just kept it plugged in and it chugged away and I read in the morning and the evening with no problems. I did not turn on whispernet though, thinking that it was working hard enough already without trying to talk to the mothership too.
Just adding a book here or there isn't enough to trigger a full index and it usually indexes the individual books so fast that by the time I do a search to check on it, it's already finished.