Is my Fire tablet dead?

goodValue

I've tried combinations of power/volume buttons pressed for 20 seconds, 40 seconds, but the screen stays blank.

I had switched it off. Then on again, and did a slow charge to about 75%.
When I tried to use it a couple of hours later, I couldn't get anything on the screen.

It's about 7 years old.

Are there any other fixes I could try?

flaneurs_lobster

You say you charged it to 75%, does that mean you were getting a charge indication on the screen?

goodValue

Yes, this was a value taken from the screen

flaneurs_lobster

From a scan of the Google search results (which no doubt you've done yourself) I think you've tried the usual recovery methods. 

Time for a new / refurbed tablet?

goodValue

You may be right.
But for the last year I've only used it to read books through my local library.
So I might rethink if I actually need one.
I think I may have the HD7 ( the 7 refers to the screen diagonal? ).
A web search showed the price of a new one as $60, which, I think, is cheap for a tablet.
When I looked at the price of eReaders a year or two ago, they were much more than this.
As tablets are more versatile, I would have thought they would be more expensive.

flaneurs_lobster

Can't argue about pricing of ebook readers, they are expensive. But if you are able to try one you might see how the reading experience is much better on a dedicated device rather than a general purpose one - the e-ink screen technology just works better.

(Amazon) Kindle ereaders are probably the best value but getting ebooks from anywhere other than Amazon is a faff. Don't have one myself (I use Kobo) but I believe you can email library or other .epub books to recent devices which will convert them. 

goodValue

Yes, during my recent searches I did see that criticism of the Kindles.

With no experience of the different file formats, whenever I've tried to work at the file level, I didn't get very far.
That's why I was happy using the BorrowBox app, which was reasonably easy to set up, and easy to download books.

I originally bought the Fire to store data for use when travelling. But I haven't done that much travelling since buying it.
So maybe I'll postpone the decision on a new purchase, to a time when it looks like I will do more travelling.

cerebus

goodValue said:

You may be right.
But for the last year I've only used it to read books through my local library.
So I might rethink if I actually need one.
I think I may have the HD7 ( the 7 refers to the screen diagonal? ).
A web search showed the price of a new one as $60, which, I think, is cheap for a tablet.
When I looked at the price of eReaders a year or two ago, they were much more than this.
As tablets are more versatile, I would have thought they would be more expensive.

Are you on the American version of amazon? If you are be warned that tech is cheaper over the pond and will be more than $60 over here

You need to use amazon.co.uk not amazon.com