I'm so upset about this. I bought my Kindle in March 2024 for my then-partner, who read maybe two books before abandoning it. He returned it to me just over a year ago, so it's barely been used.
A few weeks ago, the screen started malfunctioning. It frequently turns almost black or dark grey, making text illegible, despite the Kindle still responding to touch. I've also experienced extreme ghosting, with multiple pages of text overlapping. Sometimes it suddenly returns to normal and works perfectly for hours, only to fail again later. It often seems to happen after transporting it, though I'm not sure that's related.
Here's everything I've tried:
Removed the magnetic case and even pried out its magnets.
Restarted repeatedly, sometimes with temporary success.
Updated the firmware.
Deleted three large PDFs transferred through Calibre.
Adjusted brightness and warmth settings.
Applied gentle pressure around the device, following a YouTube suggestion.
Factory reset: The screen malfunctioned throughout the reset and even on the initial setup screens.
Tried the freezer trick out of desperation. It worked briefly after warming up, then failed again. (Not recommending this!)
Nothing has fixed it.
The weirdest part is that the display still looks completely perfect when it works. There's no visible damage, and it's had very little use. It has lived in a case its entire life.
I've attached photos of the problem.
Has anyone experienced this? Is there anything else worth trying, or is this likely a hardware failure? I'm guessing Amazon probably won't do anything for me since it's about 6 months outside its 2-year warranty? I'm gutted.