Tag: Amazon | IT Nota

This is a step-by-step tutorial on how to setup a VPN connection on Amazon’s Kindle Fire HDX without using any open VPN client from Amazon app store download or Google Chrome store. That way, the setup is much easier compared to previous Kindle generations since everything can be done from its onboard VPN client and it only takes a few steps to set it up.

Although this tutorial uses specific instructions from Private Internet Access, it can be used as a how to setup vpn connection tutorial for almost any other VPN client on an Android device. Just check with your own VPN service or network administrator for the VPN configuration information and make the necessary adjustment.

On your Kindle Fire, swipe down from the top of the screen and you can either tap Wireless (faster) or Settings. For this purpose Settings only adds an (unnecessary) extra step.
Tap VPN and Add a VPN Profile.
Type in the VPN profile information below, using explanation from Private Internet Access (PIA)*
- VPN Name: Private Internet Access
- Type (The security protocol for the VPN): L2TP/IPSec PSK
- Server address: us-texas.privateinternetaccess.com (you can pick other available servers)
- L2TP secret: Do not enable (Just leave this blank)
- IPSec identifier: Leave empty
- IPSec pre-shared key: my safety
- Tap Save to create your VPN profile
Your VPN profile is saved and appears on the VPN screen.
From the VPN screen, tap the VPN Profile (Private Internet Access).
Enter the username and password for your VPN, and then tap Connect.
You might also want to check Save account information to save your credentials. You don’t typically want to keep re-typing your username and password every time you want to connect to a VPN server.

Once your VPN is activated you should see a key icon and your VPN profile should say that you’re connected (under the VPN name).

Kindle Fire HDX connected to a VPN (key icon)

That’s all there is to it.

With the latest generation of Kindle Fire HDX, it’s very easy to setup a native VPN connection so there’s no excuse of not using it and compromising your information security when accessing the Internet via a public Wi-Fi.

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You might want to setup a few profiles for different connection servers. As a rule of thumb the closer a server is to your location, the faster the connection is. However, you still want to have the options to connect to other available servers.

Amazon Cloud Drive can do an amazing job in organizing your MP3 uploads according to the album and artists, sometimes though when you upload your existing MP3 collections, its MP3 uploader may fail to recognize songs with different artists from the same album. Just an example here, I uploaded a collection of songs from an old CD Lifescapes: Relaxing Classical I converted a few years ago using Sony Sound Forge (I just ripped the CD and saved each song as an mp3). And each song was categorized by the artist and uploaded to several albums with the same name. What’s worse two albums were slapped with some random thumbnails.

Incorrectly uploaded to multiple albums

Here’s a simple tip that will only take about 5-10 minutes to fix the problem. The problem usually lies with incomplete ID-tags. What we see right away is there’s no track number information. And there are other missing information that we cannot see unless we check the Properties of the files.

Windows explorer showing MP3 songs collection with various artists

MP3 collection with incomplete ID-tags

So the first step we want to do is to highlight all the mp3 files you want to upload (left-click on the first song on the top and press shift and left-click on the last song at the very bottom of the list), then right-click your mouse on any of the song and go to Properties.

Find an ID-tag Property called Album artist and type in “Various Artists” without the quotes. You may also want to edit other metadata that are supposed to be the same for all mp3 files. Here you want to make sure you only edit all metadata for the group but not for the individual file. For example, in my case here, I already have the same Album name “Relaxing Classical” so I don’t need to update it, but you may see (multiple values) on your compilation for Album. If that’s the case, you want to update it using the same name. Click OK after you’re done.

Edit group metadata

Next, we need to do a rather tedious work, that is to pick each mp3 and assign a track number. If you don’t have that information, you can do search from Amazon or other search engines. I usually find most metadata and album artwork from Amazon.

Edit individual metadata (assign track number)

When you’ve finished assigning track numbers, your mp3 collections should look similar to this. And you’re pretty much done.

MP3 files with assigned track numbers

Before you re-upload your mp3 to your Amazon Cloud Drive, you might want to delete all the botched uploads first just to clean your cloud space.

Now you’re album should show correctly.

Corrected MP3 album on Amazon Cloud Drive

Corrected MP3 album upload

* The artwork was added separately using dBpoweramp ID tag editor to all mp3 files before they were uploaded.

Hope it helps.

How to Use VPN On Kindle Fire HDX

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How to Upload an Album with Different Artists to Amazon Cloud Drive

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