I noticed a few complaints on this forum and others about Goggle Navigation being too much of a drain on the handset even with it plugged into a car charger.
My suspicion is that this is down to badly made car chargers, and on a previous occasion using the Testing menu, I noticed that my own charger was being reported by the phone as USB.
So I set about trying to rectify this, using my awesome rolleyes knowledge of how the phone recognises what it's being charged with and an 'I don't care if I kill the charger, it was free' attitude.
I took it apart and tested continuity between the 2 middle (data) pins on the USB plug, there was none, and the problem was identified. I simply flipped the board over and soldered these 2 pins together and reassembled the charger.
Took it out to the car, plugged it in and lo and behold, the Testing menu now reports that it is plugged into an AC source! As my phone is fully charged and I don't have any trips planned right now I don't know how much real world difference there is, but it's looking promising, at least the phone now knows it can draw 1000mA instead of 500mA, and for 5 minutes 'work' it was worth doing.
I didn't bother with a how-to as I figured chances of someone having the same charger as me were slim, but pics aren't a problem:
Here is my universal USB charger with the cover removed:
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and the reverse side with the 2 pins soldered together:
Probably doesn't tell you a huge amount unfortunately, but to be honest that's because it really is a simple procedure with not much to tell.
where did you get your universal charger? I'm wanting to chop one up and hide the nexus dock on the side of my GTI instead of blocking my 6" double din monitor..
Almost like you can do your radar detector..
-Chalrie
It was an Xmas present, part of a universal kit. It's made by Mountech if it helps though.
thanks I'll look it up, hopefully most universal ones are designed the same usb wise then I could dremel my dash and have a easy access usb port for nav.
Fail!
Despite the mod, it's still not enough to charge/sustain the N1 with Google Navigation running (screen on full brightness). Guess it's just not man enough to produce the required 1A.
I have a USB port installed in my car as per the headunit
at full brightness and while using google navigation AND streaming Slacker via bluetooth... I do not have a -% charge
in fact, the N1 stays fully charged at all times... (however if I have less than 100%, it does take a long time for the % to go up... might take 5 minutes for 1% increase)
sooo I'm not sure what the problem is with the car chargers (as I don't use one)
I have a USB headunit and never thought to try and charge from it! D'oh!
Related
As the title says!
I need a car charger and i don't know what to buy...
i wanted something that can last at least 6 months without having the cable damaged due to stretching
I use the cable of my TomTom One XL. Same voltage...
I like using my ebay-bought USB adapter and retractable mini-usb cable. Cuts down on the mess, and lets me charge other USB devices.
I use Motorola OEM that I got long time ago (4 years back with my first RAZR) - It works no problem
I also use regular USB cable with my wife's iPhone car charger and works fine too... So I guess Blackberry charger will do the same since I use Blackberry as home charger too occasionaly
Note that many of the miniusb chargers will not work consistently. Elsewhere here on the forum there are extensive details, but in short, HTC compliant chargers (meaning will charge 100% of the time) short pins 4-5 on the mini usb port. This is not implemented in normal mini usb chargers. The normal (non-HTC compliant) will usually work but not always.
Read about a small percentage that seemed to have trouble (RLOD related trouble) from cheap or non-HTC chargers, so I got a true HTC OEM at www.tiltdepot.com. Best $25 I've spent.
I have used a tomtom car(borrowed from my mom) charger too, wich is 2.0 Ah, but found out the HTC charger (same 2.0 Ah same voltage) charged a lot better than the tomtom one. After one hour(started with a 3/4 charged battary) the tomtom was pretty much the same(3/4) and the HTC one was fully charged.
Yep... With the TomTom charger I believe the charging current is limited because the HTC phone sees it as potentially a data connection. The HTC charger has short between pins 4 and 5 addresses that. Hard to beat the HTC charger.
Naztech Premium LCD Display Car Charger:
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http://www.naztech.com/products.php?id_prod=40
The "11 Foot Heavy-Duty Cord" is nice... it's coiled tightly, and long enough to get to wherever you need to in the front of the cab, be it a center console or a seat. The digital display tells you how long it's been charging, and changes color when still charging the device (blue is standby, orange is charging). Nothing beats the Naztech for a USB car charger. I have the silver one, but it looks like the newer ones are black; you can probably get your choice of either if you get one off of Ebay like I did.
They have lots of other cool products for phones, too.
My himalaya's usb/chargeport has been completely ripped off its motherboard. I have to externally charge battery.
however, i got to looking at the thing and i saw a weird jack on the back that looks like its the same pinlayout.
whats the purpose of this port?
I'am looking for that answer like 5 days! I searched a littke over net and i think is called CF backpack jack! Check this link http://www.theunwired.net/?item=rev...backpack-for-himalaya-pocket-pc-phone-edition
And i think that phone can't be charged over that jack. If i am wrong i would be glad to someone confirm that!
If your connector is in one piece (without broken pins, pins 13, 14, 15,16 and 22 are for usb and charge) u can take it to local gsm service to get it solder back for u! If is not, u can use alternate miniUSB jack, there is thread in this forum how to do that! But is ugly to see a small connector that peeking out of phone like a mouse!!!
well if the cfbackpack cna provide power over the power, youd think you could charge from it.
well we can use a any broken one and pull out a connector and solder a cable for it!? But a problem is where to find a broken cfbackback these days!?
i don´t know of any shop who sell this part,dood!
there can found very,very rarely on Ebay my friend !
So, the general advice for all those with broken himalaya connector (depending of what parts are broken) is alternative miniUSB OR, buy an universal charger for charging the battery
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And for PC sync use bluetooth USB dongle (i am not so happy with these solution, cuz my hima don't hold battery much time and when use this dongle it won't hold battery at all, especially when transfer to many data)
And for flashing a new rom, we can use a SD card, but still needs a USB cable for taking a header from bootloader http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=482236)
soldering anything on that motherboard is a real sob, the pins are bloody tiny=
Yes i new that, but that is a job for a service guy. I took the draw and scheme for what pins goes with what (for miniUSB) and took the phone to him and he do the solder job with his super thin Solder Iron and that job costs me a 3 euro. He finished the job in 1h and 15 mins.! It's forbidden to people who don't know anything about these things to take any steps alone. Consult with some gsm service first, instead to do something wrong and destroy the phone board pins and the connector!!! These connector is a general problem! After 1 or 2 years of use, almost every Himalaya will have this problem!!!!
Where to buy Himalaya CF & VGA Backpack
I have and igo with the microusb tip and my DI is headed home soon. I was checking stuff out at the store and I got a long lecture about how power ratings can be different. Clearly verizon sales reps are better than electrical engineers. Anyways so the power ratings on the igo happen to be 4-5w, does anyone know what the ratings on the DI stock charger.
Even better if anyones charged their DI using Igo, how is that working out?
My fuze used to run a little hotter than usual on the igo.
The HTC charger that comes with the phone is just a little stub that plugs into the wall with a female usb connector on it to accept the micro usb cable that ships with the phone.
It outputs 5v at 1 amp.
Here's a photo of the charger:
(the part that's obscured by the flash says 50-60Hz)
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I have an iGo charger as well and was planning to order a tip for this phone. Is it the A97 tip? The iGo site doesn't have the Incredible in their system yet.
very nice picture, thanks for the detail. the igo is rated at 5 watts so its perfect for this. and yes i think a97 is micro usb, however there are many micro usb tips and all of them work. easiest way to make sure is just carry your phone when u go get the tip. unfortunately i have left my tip in the car so i cant say for 100% but the packaging reads A138 which is another microusb. on monday i get my phone so i can hook it to the car and verify.
Has the A138 been working for you? I ended up getting a few A46 tips instead of the micro USB tips because my local Radioshack had them on clearance for about $2.50 a piece. The micro USB tips were $10.
The A46 is a female USB-A connector so it will work for pretty much anything that uses USB, provided you have the proper USB cable to connect it. I got a few 1.5' micro USB cables from monoprice for that part of it.
I haven't used these enough to notice if it's charging significantly faster/slower than the stock charger, but it seems to work fine. I wish iGo would publish the specs for all the tips (amps, volts, etc) instead of just listing compatible devices.
link
I have noticed recently that my HD2 charges when it feels like. I can charge direct from mains, usb or portable solar charger and have noticed that when plugged in and below 100% or any number down to about 10% that it does not always indicate that it is charging and sometimes stops charging before it has got to a 100%.
I have two batteries and both do the same and the phone is set to charge when on USB, so what gives, does anyone recognise this issue and how big an issue is it.. cheers..
Still trying to find an answer to this as the situation has got worse. Now I find that the battery will not charge until it has gone into the red zone and not always then.
Yesterday both batteries were in the last 10% of their life and then just stopped, even though the phone was plugged into the charger.
I have two chargers, three leads, two batteries but just the one phone so I am guessing that either the phone has issues or the rom that I am using has issues..
looking for clues and pointers..
I have had a similar issue, but it occuredmostly when I plugged in my portable charger with me. Above 50% charge, charging was not trustworthy, but below that it was. Up till now I have found the micro-usb cable to be the culprit, although I do not know exactly why.
Wevenhuis said:
I have had a similar issue, but it occuredmostly when I plugged in my portable charger with me. Above 50% charge, charging was not trustworthy, but below that it was. Up till now I have found the micro-usb cable to be the culprit, although I do not know exactly why.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Okay I will check my cable, maybe get one that I have not used before... thanks...
Well it is not the leads. The phone defo has a mind of its own and I can not make any sense of its charging behaviour.
SORTED...
At LAST.. finally got to the bottom of this..
SPB Phone Suite has both "Profiles" and "Rules" and I had not realised that you need to set the rules up and not just leave them at the default as this was telling my phone not to charge in certain profiles..
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Panic over, phone is charging as it should..
My daughter's Nexus 7 wouldn't charge.
After trying ALL the tricks found here and elsewhere I bought a new battery for $40.
Replacing the battery gave me the ability to boot the tablet and I discovered that it was not charging anymore : when powered off, the white on black battery sign wouldn't show up and when booted, the small battery icon wouldn't show the lightning sign when plugged in.
I tried all the chargers and usb cables to no avail.
I then tried to power it using the pogo pins and THAT worked. :laugh: I was finally able to charge it but using the pogo pins.
Conclusion : sometimes the internal charging circuits that links the USB power to the battery is dead but another path exists between the pogo pins to the battery.
The best way to solve my problem was then to buy a dock but :
I couldn't find one below $40
My Daughter's cover wouldn't fit into a dock
So I decided to do a small hardware hack to resurect the Nexus 7 : to internally short-circuit the +5V pogo pin to the +5V USB pin.
It took me about 5 mn to do so and it's been working for a week now with no flaw.
Disclaimer :
I do NOT advise you to do this, Do not do this.
If you do, I'm not responsible of any damage you should encounter.
It really is a last chance option, and it only works if you have that (rare!) problem.
You can tell that you have the same problem if the tablet is charging with a dock and not charging with a USB cable.
If this is the case, you'd better buy a charging dock than doing this.
Hardware fix (see disclaimer)
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In the picture above, I just soldered the +5V pogo pin (bottom right when on the screen) to the USB +5V (right one when on the screen) using thin cable.
To do this I first removed the speakers (3 screws). The standard thin wire was preimpregnated with solder paste on both ends and I only briefly (2sec) heated the wire end on the pogo and usb pin to make them catch.
Problem solved.