u/charles_arrowby

Received my X3 about 3 weeks ago and love the device. Immediately flashed CrossInk and the experience has been super smooth. But since the first time I charged it, from 8% all the way up to 100%, it has been giving me issues. In the first hour of reading after the charge, the battery went all the way down to 67%. Then it went down rapidly while I was reading, into 50s. Then somehow it stabilized, and for a number of hours it went slowly from 63 to 61%. I finished the book I was reading and opened a new one, and the battery indicator went to... 3%. And then down to 0%. And it died. After being at 62% for ages and ages. It's kind of frustrating for what is a device that has only been charged once. Has anyone else had issues like this? Going to charge it overnight all the way and see if that helps.

I struggle to follow what I'm reading even when there is subtle background noise, so I've been trying to build a library of music that lets me tune everything else out. It's been a real challenge to find stuff that is the right balance of stimulating and flow-enabling. I started with 'classic' ambient stuff: Tim Hecker, Tokyo B.G.M. Corp, Kenichiro Isoda, Coldcut, Takumi Yoneyama. But lately I've also been listening to a lot of ambient Americana: The Dead Texan and Hank & Slim. Some ambient jazz hits but a lot of it is unfortunately too distracting. I've also been experimenting to mixed results with looping the same ambient track over and over to induce a trance like state. Anyone else in the same boat as me and perhaps further down the stream?

I've been seeing this device around for a while but felt satisfied with the Kobo Libra 2 that I've had for 5 years now. The problem is that I just wasn't reading all that much, I had hundreds of books on the e-reader and thousands more sitting in a calibre library that were collecting the digital equivalent of dust. So I decided to take the leap and see if an X4 might help me streamline, declutter, actually read the epubs that I've been hoarding... but it did seem a bit too small. So for months I toyed with the idea before dropping it. It was only after seeing an umpteenth testimonial on here that I decided not only to take the leap but also to fully commit to portability with the X3. It'll arrive in a couple of days and I feel a bit overwhelmed by all of the setup options, really there is too much freedom almost... In a bid to avoid the analysis paralysis that I fell into with the Kobo, I thought I'd see if the community here has simple suggestions for how I can get the X3 up and running. These trackers seem like they'd be really helpful for me, but suggestions for firmware, tips from experienced users, anything to help me get going would be much appreciated.

In 1984, Imran Khan was struggling with a stress fracture in his shin and hadn't bowled for almost 2 years. We were forced to rely on medium pace workhorses like Azeem Hafeez and Tahir Naqqash who rarely went past 125 - 130 km/h. The same year, an unknown club cricketer, someone who didn't even make the team at Islamia College, showed up to open trials at Gaddafi Stadium. Javed Miandad spotted his raw pace and natural swing and selected him for a tour match against New Zealand. That player, Wasim Akram, went on to take 9 wickets and was immediately selected for the senior side with just one first class game under his belt. Five years later, Saleem Jaffer, still trying to recover from from a thrashing by Australia at the 1987 World Cup, injured himself in a Super Wills Cup match. Imran Khan, home sick at the time, turned on his television to see a teenager with only six first class matches running in to bowl with a vicious round-arm action. The next day, he met with that bowler, Waqar Younis, to let him know that he would be going with the national squad. Imran and Miandad knew that line and length could be taught, but not pace. In fact, they believed that the flat and sluggish pitches of Pakistan's domestic circuit ruined young fast bowlers by forcing them to slow down in order to bowl long spells. There has been a lot of discussion lately about Ali Raza, and how he needs to play FC cricket before getting a chance in the national team. This is exactly the kind of thinking that has left us with an entire generation of Azeem Hafeez' and Tahir Naqqash'. Fast bowling is what made Pakistan the best team in the world for most of the 90s, and fast bowling is what is sending us spiraling towards minnow status now.

Test cricket is a bowler's format and the best account of a team's quality. This is what the last 40 years look like for Pakistani pacers:

Era	Key Pacers	Pace Avg.	Pace S.R.
1986 - 1991	Imran, Wasim, Aaqib	~26.5	~56.0
1991 - 1996	Wasim, Waqar, Aaqib	~23.5	~48.0
1996 - 2001	Wasim, Waqar, Akhtar	~26.5	~54.0
2001 - 2006	Akhtar, Sami, Shabbir	~33.5	~60.0
2006 - 2011	Asif, Amir, Gul, Akhtar	~30.5	~55.0
2011 - 2016	Junaid, Wahab, Rahat	~33.2	~62.0
2016 - 2021	Abbas, Shaheen, Naseem	~29.8	~58.0
2021 - 2026	Shaheen, Khurram, Mir Hamza	~38.78	~68

Our best period since 2001 came with the emergence of a 17 year old Shaheen Afridi and a 16 year old Naseem Shah. Both bowlers were fast-tracked into the team: Naseem after 7 FC matches and Shaheen after just 3. Of course, this turned out to be a false dawn. Before his injury in Galle, Shaheen had 99 test wickets at 24.86. His next 27 wickets have come at over 40 apiece. You might as well be looking at two different bowlers. But those injury problems had more to do with overbowling and poor management than they did with early debuts. We have also moved, just like in 1984, towards first class workhorses like Khurram Shahzad and Mir Hamza who have no pace. Abbas had a very successful run in the team but he has also lost a fair bit of pace and never developed a good enough bouncer to crack the upper echelon of test bowlers.

Last month, Nahid Rana took 11 wickets against us while bowling consistently in the high 140s. Bangladesh have developed an entire generation of quality fast bowlers by changing their system from the grassroots. Obviously, that's never going to happen in Pakistan. But that is okay, because we've never needed fancy solutions like that. In Ali Raza we are lucky to have one of the most exciting prospects in world cricket. His U-19 record is 38 wickets at 18.21 and his performances at that level against India have echoes of Waqar. He also has a great action, bowls it fast, and is already older than Naseem (16), Aamir (17), and Shaheen (17) were when they received their first caps. He is the same age as Wasim (18) and Waqar (18) and only one year younger than Umar Gul (19).

Ali Raza might not be the answer, in fact I don't think anyone could claim this with confidence, but in Pakistan we have always gambled on fast bowlers. It's who we are. So I have no idea why we're not looking to do it now. There have been failures too: Mohammad Zahid, Mohammad Sami, Hasan Raza... but our fast bowling is currently the worst it has been for 40 years. We need to try something.

Outside of a few songs, jazz has never really never clicked for me. This changed recently when I discovered Jim Hall's version of Concierto de Aranjuez. It is so lush, dreamy, and beautiful -- Ron Hanna's piano solo might be the best piece of instrumentation that I have heard in music full stop. The track reminded me of another that I love, Fujiyama by the Dave Brubeck Quartet. I scoured the subreddit for similar music, but found that a lot of cool jazz recommendations weren't quite scratching the itch. One example is the Ahmad Jamal Trio's Live at the Pershing, evidently a terrific record but driven more by space, swing, and interplay than the overwhelming and seductive mood of Aranjuez. While I would welcome recommendations, what I am really looking for is a language to understand the differences within the subgenre of cool jazz. So far I think the following records might fit this category:

• Freddie Hubbard - First Light
• Grant Green - Idle Moments
• Mal Waldron - Left Alone
• Gil Evans - Out of the Cool
• Paul Desmond - Desmond Blue

Weird as it may be, I don't think that records like Take Five or Bill Evans / Jim Hall's Undercurrents (which was terrific) quite fit this category. I'm also open to the possibility that I have no clue what I am talking about. Maybe I just like music with orchestral strings...