Talk about panic. I went to get my Kindle DX out last night to settle in an enjoy a few chapters of my latest read and instead I got a screen that said:

Critical Battery

Your battery is empty.

To continue using your Kindle , connect it to a power source.

It may take a few minutes of charging before your Kindle starts.

Fear in my heart! How would I survive without my Kindle ! Now before I get started here let me just say that my Kindle has probably been my most favourite gift ever. No wait – nothing probably about it – it IS my most favourite! Well – that and my Complete Calvin and Hobbes Collection . I got the Kindle as a Christmas present from my parents this past Christmas and it and I have been inseparable since. I have an entire library of books in it – all the stuff that I have been wanting to read forever and ever.

OK, so back to my evening of horror. I took out my Kindle charger and plugged it into the electrical receptacle and then attached the USB cord from that to my Kindle … Nothing. Screen still frozen with those chilling words. Critical… Battery… uuhhhhhhh. So I jump on Google and start to search for solutions.

The first one I came across that had and sort of solution said the following:

Use this exact sequence:

1. Slide the power button and hold it for 30 sec.

2. Release and wait for 20 sec until the screen begins to flash.

3. As soon as it does, plug in the power and keep it connected for 2 hours.

So I tried it. Nothing – frozen screen still with those horrible words.

I searched some more – all of the sites were telling me the same thing. Finally I stumbled across these words:

Tried to charge using Kindle’s usb cable and plugged into my computer. Yellow light was on and nothing else. After 30 min or so the light switched off and this happened every time I replugged the cable, the Kindle screen was the same with the same words. I tried a Hard ReBoot. Hard rebooting didn’t work – just nothing. Then I read the method about rebooting while charging. Nothing new, but after a couple of minutes the sign that something was connected to my PC appeared and I saw the Kindle item inside “my computer”. I realised that this was something new in the process, after about ten minutes the Kindle tried to reboot itself but without any success, still it was a great progress! After it tried to reboot the connection with PC was lost so I repeated the procedure described above. The next time when the Kindle tried to reboot (still with no progress) the connection survived and after the third attempt of rebooting it was successful and the device appeared to work as usual!

So I decided to try combining the two methods. I plugged my Kindle USB cord into my computer – the orange light lit up. I tried the reboot process of holding the switch for 30 sec and then letting go. Nothing – Still frozen – still those words… So I tried again. This time the orange light stayed on after I held the switch for 30 seconds and let go of it. About a minute or two later the screen flashed several times and the start up screen appeared – to great war whoops of joy by myself (like I actually did anything). About 10 minutes after that the autoplay function kicked in and said my computer recognized that something had been plugged into the USB port. My Kindle has been plugged into my computer for about an hour now – charge light is still orange, but I am hoping for green soon!

UPDATE: SUCCESS!! It took about 8 hrs, but I finally got the green light and a full charge! My Kindle booted and runs perfectly!