Nook Touch 1.1 Rooting News For February 23, 2012

Note that these posts have moved on to Nook Touch with the 1.1 update. If your Nook Touch has a version prior to 1.1, see older posts in this series. It would be best to update to 1.1, however, if your Nook Touch has not yet been rooted.

Also see past posts in this series because I do not follow up on all threads mentioned in past posts. There are likely updates to many subjects.

There’s a lot of information after the break, but it’s really not as intimidating as it seems. Many people, by carefully following instructions, are happily using a Nook Touch turned into an Android tablet with an eInk screen.

Before starting with Nook Touch rooting, the device will need to be switched on and if you go through the set up, it will ask for your MAC address. Getting that can drive you crazy. Here is a shortcut for how to do that: [N2E] How to Find MAC Address on initial setup

If you do not want to register with Barnes & Noble for an account (if, like me, you don’t have a credit card or you are outside the United States), do this: [Q] Skip the initial setup.

Now on to rooting …

These methods work only on the Nook Touch. Do not try them on the NookColor, Nook Tablet, or any other device.

Before using any of the information below, read the complete thread of forum posts at each link. They are the latest word on how to solve problems that might crop up. They are the experts.

Don’t be in a hurry to root your Nook Touch. Taking the time to do it correctly will save hours of frustration later — and not brick the device and waste its purchase price.

Before you do anything, back up your Nook Touch:

Backup/Restore N2E

[IMG] n2T-Recovery – Nook Simple Touch – Factory Restore / Recovery [v:0.2 17.11.11]

[NST]Touch-Formatter

As some people where having trouble returning to stock after rooting, this is a semi automatic method, easy to follow, that will leave your nook stock

[NST][CWR][RC2] Clockworkmod based Recovery – fixed backup issue

Making a backup with CWM only includes the following partitions: boot, system, data, cache. It doesn’t include the /rom partition which contains data thats unique for every device.

Triggering Factory Restore:

The built in “Factory Restore” doesn’t wipe everything, it just restores important parts of your system.

Just press the power button until you see the screen flicker, then immediately press and hold both left and right bottom buttons (it will trigger Factory Reset (not restore))

Do not proceed with any rooting method until your Nook has been backed-up. Each Nook Touch contains an identifier unique to it that cannot be restored without very technical skills. With a safe backup first, rooting becomes less stressful should something bad occur.

Below are the available rooting methods (note that “N2E” means “Nook Second Edition,” what B&N calls the “Nook Simple Touch Reader”).

Based on the activity at XDA at the time of this post, this first method seems to be the most popular:

[N2E][1.1] TouchNooter 2.1.31

This Nooter is designed with the sole purpose of opening up the possibilities of the device by giving users Root, Google Apps, and other Apps which make the device more usable as an android device than just an e-reader.

In no particular order are the other rooting methods:

[NST]MinimalTouch 1.1beta5 (+Index to manual rooting)

[N2E][1.1] SalsichaNooter 0.4 18/11 – With Market, Gapps, Themed ADW, NookTouchTools

And for those who like to do things step-by-step manually:

[NST]Manual Rooting, ADB, Gapps (1.1), etc

XDA coders have now banded together into The Nooter Project.

How do I transfer apps from my pc to my rooted nook touch? — ADB (Android Desktop Bridge) via WiFi. Beyond that, there are tons of threads about it.

Best Launcher for Nook STR?

Note that there are technical things — such as resizing the internal Nook Touch partitions — that I won’t link to in this post. For most people, rooting the Nook Touch and installing apps is sufficient. Should the day come when you require more, visit the XDA Developers Nook Touch Forums for advanced technical modifications.

The Nook Touch apparently has a bug that can ruin the reading experience for those who use bookmarks, highlighting, and notes. This apparently affects all side-loaded books:

bug: open sideloaded epub on some page, goto Home. Press Reading Now – the book starts from very beginning, no notes or bookmarks.

BUT selecting the very same book from My Library restores it all.

It is now like 2 different books, each with its own highlights and reading position.

And, recently: Page numbers and bookmarks lost for sideloaded books

Here’s a discussion of how to fix that:

[Solved] On the problem of broken bookmarks

And the solution, barring B&N sending out a Nook Touch Update to fix it, requires technical skills, as the above forum illustrates.

Now onto other basic mods and apps:

eBookLauncher (new homescreen)

I have started porting my Sony homescreen replacement to work on the nook

Sample screensnaps, more at the above link (click to enlarge):

[NST][Home replacement] EpubBrowser [02/19/2012]

Screensnaps (click to enlarge):

NookReader – Associate ePub files with the stock reader

Basically, this is an app that registers as an ePub receiver and forwards along the ePub activity to the B&N stock app.

[APP][09/29/11] Book button menu. {NEW:LandscapeSwitch,Propagation}

Screensnap:

I covered this one in a prior post: [Q] [POLL] Do we need NST specific launcher? (Preview version here)

Its development is currently on hiatus but I was able to pull two screensnaps (that I had to convert to grayscale because the originals were “broken”):

PDFs on the Nook Touch: Nook PDF Reader, Native Android PDF Viewer based on MuPDF library, and other suggestions.

This thread excites me: [Q] Installing swype? and here are two videos illustrating Swype installed:

What excites me is that it makes me think that installing Graffiti on the Nook Touch is possible. It was originally thought that since the Nook Touch is English-only and has no keyboard switching dialog (for other languages, for example), people would be stuck with the embedded keyboard. Rooting allows the keyboard to be entirely replaced. It’s not switching, but it’s better to have what you want. For other keyboards, see: [Q] What is the best alternative keyboard for nook touch?

This is still sad: [Q] Multi-Touch support on Nook Simple Touch?. Although the Sony Reader PRS-T1 can do multitouch, that feature is still lacking the Nook Touch and why remains a mystery.

Yesterday I posted an epic video someone did of the Nook Touch eInk screen nearly acting like an LCD. Here is some more information about hacking that: Tweaking the screen refresh. And this is the code that you want to do that: NoRefresh enabler. I wonder how many apps that wouldn’t work due to eInk flashing before might now work with that enabled?

[Q] Anyone using the Android Kindle app on the Touch? — it works, but there is no Find within a book, buying from the Store does not work, and since the Nook Touch runs Android 2.1 it cannot use the latest version of the app. Other than that, it can still be used to read Kindle Books.

The Nook Touch does not have an inactive Bluetooth chip hidden inside like the NookColor, so this is the only method to connect a keyboard:
[WIP] USB Host support (working)

Even that is rather tricky at post time:

For me, the keyboard recognition is 100% reliable, as long as I follow this exact sequence:
-connect OTG-cable without the keyboard
-enable host mode
-connect keyboard to the otg-cable

And there might be a powered USB hub in that loop too. Surprisingly, there is still only one video on YouTube demonstrating this:

Although for a better view of what it’s like to type, this video shows actual typing with a keyboard on the eInk screen but it’s been piped through a remote-controlled desktop:

If you’re thinking of getting a Nook Touch and rooting it so it can be connected to a physical keyboard, I’d wait. They are still working on perfecting that. Right now, it’s more of a neat trick — and even when perfected it will rapidly drain the battery.

Lastly, who doesn’t like screensavers? Share your screensaver images! Here’s one I pulled from that thread:

I have other posts about screensavers:

Use Calibre To Make eBook Cover Screensavers
Add Your Own Picture to the Kindle Screensaver
HowTo: Sony Reader Screensavers
Screensavers For eInk eBook Devices
More eInk Screensavers
eInk Screensaver Experiments

And that wraps up this latest Nook Touch rooting post.

For others, see: B&N Nook Touch Rooting