February 24, 2026
Kindle vs Fire: Bus Stop Brawl
Hacking an old Kindle to display bus arrival times
Fans turn dusty e-readers into bus boards as Team Fire crashes in and battery jokes fly
TLDR: A crafty user turned an old Kindle into a live bus-time wall display. Comments erupted into a screen showdown (e‑ink vs cheap Kindle Fire), battery complaints, and a Shanghai flex about citywide e‑ink signs—proof that DIY transit boards are cool, useful, and edging into the mainstream.
An old Kindle got transformed into a wall-mounted bus board that refreshes every minute — and the comments went full transit nerd. Team e‑ink cheered the chill, power-sipping vibe, while Team Fire tablet barged in: “I prefer LCD… grab a Kindle Fire HD10 for ~$40 and flip on developer mode,” bragged one, turning this into a screen war. Bargain hunters piled on with “old Kindles are €15–20 on eBay” flexes, crowning it the anti-TRMNL option without the $140 splurge. Retro romantics dropped a SystemSix callback, because dashboards should look like they time-traveled. Some even shared their own builds, like this blog, fueling the DIY hype.
Then came the reality check: batteries. “Most of mine won’t hold a charge,” sighed one commenter, spawning jokes about mounting the thing near an outlet forever. And just when the thread felt cozy, a global mic drop: “Bus stops in Shanghai have e‑ink screens that already do this,” a reminder that public displays are catching up fast. The original post’s confession about forum headaches and “Kindles are slow lol” became a meme, but that’s the charm: a scrappy jailbreak, a simple server, a custom app, and boom—live bus times. It’s geeky, thrifty, and just chaotic enough to spark a comment war. The community mood? Delighted, divided, and very online.
Key Points
- •An old Kindle Touch (4th Gen/K5/KT) is converted into a live bus arrival display that refreshes every minute and can exit via the menu button.
- •The process involves five steps: jailbreak, install KUAL & MRPI, set up SSH, run a server to serve the Kindle image, and create a KUAL app.
- •Jailbreaking relies on identifying the Kindle model/firmware and following the MobileRead forum guide to apply the correct package.
- •KUAL and MRPI are installed per Kindle Modding Wiki instructions, with a required Hotfix step and optional disabling of OTA updates.
- •SSH is enabled using the KUAL USBNetwork extension (installed via MRPI), with successful connection indicated by a new network interface on the host computer.