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Trouble Charging with Docking station

I purchased one of those docking stations with additional battery charger off ebay. However, for some reason the unit isn't charging the device when it's docked. Instead it loses power. I waited almost 2 months for them to finally ship the item now this. I was thinking it may be the 1.5ma adapter that came with it. My test this evening will be to plug up the regular charger in the mini usb port and see if that will charge the unit. Is anyone else having this problem? I was trying to cut expense by purchasing this unit instead of the more expensive ones sold on expansys for a little over $100 usd. I even went as far as implementing a 3.5 mm plug for audio (stereo) and this took quite a few hrs to do. Please give some feedback.

I have the same docking station you have. It charges my phone if I turn the backlight down, and dont run any data programs (gps, wifi or anything like that) If I run much of anything it will drain down. I attributed it to the charger cable that comes with it. Let us know how your tests go. I can voice for the xtra battery spot, it charges my spare in less than an hour from empty.

touchlasvegas said:
I have the same docking station you have. It charges my phone if I turn the backlight down, and dont run any data programs (gps, wifi or anything like that) If I run much of anything it will drain down. I attributed it to the charger cable that comes with it. Let us know how your tests go. I can voice for the xtra battery spot, it charges my spare in less than an hour from empty.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the reply bud. I said I'll try the OEM charger in the mini port first, and if that works then I'll buy a higher milli amp charger for it (maybe 3 ma). I did a nice little audio mod to it as I discussed and I'll take pictures later when I get in. I really like the unit and the great thing about my audio mod is that it doesn't broadcast my calls over my A/V receiver, it goes directly to my BT headset (conversations stay private), and once I hang up the audio goes back to the A/V receiver, so I can continue listening to my music. The mod only cost me about $3 USD for the necessary parts and some soldering and drilling.

Here are the pics of the mod I did. The Audio works fantastic. I converted the 3.5mm plug to stereo output and well placed too as the device just slide right onto the docking station without any trouble. Now my next task is to find a 3 ma adapter to use as a charger. For some reason even when I use the OEM charger in the mini usb slot the device charges, but does it very slowly as if it was getting the charge from the computer's USB connection, and the 2nd battery slot doesn't charge at all with this method. If anyone would like internal pics (not that they would help much as I've soldered and hot glued all the wires in the device for stability) I will be more than happy to upload some.

charging with cradle
Had the same problem before so I just plug both chargers into the unit. (Athena and cradle adaptor) It now charges abeit slowly with wifi and screen at middle illumination but fast if I turn the screen off( 20% to 100% in 2.5 hrs.). avoid plugging anything else to the usb or any ports while charging. It will grain your battery even if you are not using them.
Can you take a picture of the internal part of the cradle? The part where you installed the audio jack and rca sockets. This is where I am having problems. I find the space too small to install those you installed. Maybe you could give me an idea how to install the same in my cradle.
Another thing, do you think it is possible to put in another USB slot and/or a memory card slot? I'm going to the province(the provincial life here is like 1980's there in the US except for mobile phones and a few computers with limited internet access) and I don't want to carry arround so many gadgets and attachments with me. I have 2 4G usb drives, 16G cf and a 2G mini sd. I keep my file both for business and pleasure outside of my athena for safety. As much as possible, I don't want to attach an external usb hub as it drains my battery. I would rather have an internal hub and changing the led to something smaller to consume less power but integrate them to the cradle.
As much as I want to bring my laptop to the province, the size of my ibm x40 is still to big and heavy for me to carry constantly everywhere.

yetdy said:
Had the same problem before so I just plug both chargers into the unit. (Athena and cradle adaptor) It now charges abeit slowly with wifi and screen at middle illumination but fast if I turn the screen off( 20% to 100% in 2.5 hrs.). avoid plugging anything else to the usb or any ports while charging. It will grain your battery even if you are not using them.
Can you take a picture of the internal part of the cradle? The part where you installed the audio jack and rca sockets. This is where I am having problems. I find the space too small to install those you installed. Maybe you could give me an idea how to install the same in my cradle.
Another thing, do you think it is possible to put in another USB slot and/or a memory card slot? I'm going to the province(the provincial life here is like 1980's there in the US except for mobile phones and a few computers with limited internet access) and I don't want to carry arround so many gadgets and attachments with me. I have 2 4G usb drives, 16G cf and a 2G mini sd. I keep my file both for business and pleasure outside of my athena for safety. As much as possible, I don't want to attach an external usb hub as it drains my battery. I would rather have an internal hub and changing the led to something smaller to consume less power but integrate them to the cradle.
As much as I want to bring my laptop to the province, the size of my ibm x40 is still to big and heavy for me to carry constantly everywhere.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I will upload some pics in a bit. I thought about putting in a 2nd USB slot, however now that you've mentioned the internal USB hub, you gave me a new task for tomorrow. I will go to Rat shack and try to find the smallest hub they have and take it apart and somehow get that bad boy to fit into the cradle. If you've researched any that's pretty small post the link and I'll take a look at it. Give me about 30 mins to upload some pics as I have to take the unit apart and stuff. Oh btw I had to strip the 3.5mm down to the bare metal from a cheap headset I had laying around.

The yellow plastic piece is where the stereo adapter is located. I had to shave down a piece of plastic on the insde that was kinda blocking the space. I also made sure that the unit was able to close properly. As you can see in the pictures there's no other wires for the unit to short out on and everything's secured properly with the hot glue, and some soldering.

Is the audio not availble via the usb plug? I was led to belive the usb to 3.5mm headphone adaptors work with the ameo? If this is correct and all the pins have connectors then the audio should be availble without adding a 3rd plug.
The genuine htc cradle does have audio out but looks like it only has 2 plugs so it must be possible?
I have just got a 2nd dock station from ebay to try and make my own 4 in 1 plug for charging, tv out, and hdd connection for the car. Does any one have the mini usb headphone adaptor and the ability to test for continuity between the headphone socket and the usb plug?
regards

delboydell said:
Is the audio not availble via the usb plug? I was led to belive the usb to 3.5mm headphone adaptors work with the ameo? If this is correct and all the pins have connectors then the audio should be availble without adding a 3rd plug.
The genuine htc cradle does have audio out but looks like it only has 2 plugs so it must be possible?
I have just got a 2nd dock station from ebay to try and make my own 4 in 1 plug for charging, tv out, and hdd connection for the car. Does any one have the mini usb headphone adaptor and the ability to test for continuity between the headphone socket and the usb plug?
regards
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Those 3 in 1 adapters do work, however I did the mod to eleminate the need to carry around any extra hardware. I used the 3 in 1 adapter in the usb slot from T-mobile wing phone and it worked just fine. It has the 3.5mm slot, and 2 mini usb slots. But again I did it this way to eleminate the need for that. I'm currently in the process of finding a small USB hub that I can strip down from it's housing and fit it inside the docking station. I already located a 3ma adapter with variable voltage settings. This should be good enough to run all the components and charge the batteries at the same time. Let me know how your mod goes or if you need some ideas.

I was considering this: http://www.upgradenation.com/Tripp_Lite_The_ultra_small_4-port/U222-004-R/partinfo-id-551698.html USB hub to implement into the docking station. Let me know what you guys think, I will check the size when I get home to see if it will fit. I drew it to scale on a piece of paper just to make sure before I order it. Now keep in mind that I will be taking it out it's housing to get it to fit inside the unit, hence eleminating the extra load. Oh btw problem solved with the charging. Feedbacks please.

tootallk2000 said:
I was considering this: http://www.upgradenation.com/Tripp_Lite_The_ultra_small_4-port/U222-004-R/partinfo-id-551698.html USB hub to implement into the docking station. Let me know what you guys think, I will check the size when I get home to see if it will fit. I drew it to scale on a piece of paper just to make sure before I order it. Now keep in mind that I will be taking it out it's housing to get it to fit inside the unit, hence eleminating the extra load. Oh btw problem solved with the charging. Feedbacks please.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Got a USB hub that may work. It's a hybrid. I also attached pics of how I modified my cradle.

yetdy said:
Got a USB hub that may work. It's a hybrid. I also attached pics of how I modified my cradle.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I got in late yesterday, and wasn't able to check the size against the cradle. I see you have slots for a flash card reader on yours, the question now is, have you found a spot to fit all that in there? The size of the one I saw looks like it would work, but it doesn't have the card readers in it. I think that would be very ideal to have in there too. Let me see pics of the final product, if you can get it to fit, if you can't no biggy i'll just do without the card reader in it.

tootallk2000 said:
I was considering this: http://www.upgradenation.com/Tripp_Lite_The_ultra_small_4-port/U222-004-R/partinfo-id-551698.html USB hub to implement into the docking station. Let me know what you guys think, I will check the size when I get home to see if it will fit. I drew it to scale on a piece of paper just to make sure before I order it. Now keep in mind that I will be taking it out it's housing to get it to fit inside the unit, hence eleminating the extra load. Oh btw problem solved with the charging. Feedbacks please.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What was the solution for charging? Have you talked with the folks at gpsforless or HTC to see if they could fix there design, by using the designs that you have developed so far? Or are you interested in making a couple extra docking stations for a fee? Sometimes we have more time than money and other times we are starved for time... Lately, I have been starved of time...
Thanks for taking the time to develop a solution that I have been dreaming about, while on the road traveling, ect...
Part of the work around that I was using was BT audio recievers, they have been a great work around, but also have some limitations as well...
I look forward to hearing and seeing good things from you in the future
v/r
Bob

yetdy said:
Got a USB hub that may work. It's a hybrid. I also attached pics of how I modified my cradle.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Have you gotten any of the hubs to allow for you to power and recharge the device or spare battery via USB?

the usb hub works but it literally drains my battery so much that i prefer not to use it anymore.

DealExtreme - charging cable - mini review

So, I bought one of those $4 charging cables from Deal Extreme. Not bad, actually. A couple of initial thoughts:
#1) Shipping: 3 weeks from order to delivery. This is not some next day, in-house job. This is coming from Hong-Kong or some area in China and it will take the full 3 weeks from the time you order to it arrives at your door.
#2) It works. Charges just fine, plugs into the existing wall adapter. No worries.
#3) It crashed my PC. I don't know if it was the pulling of it out or the putting of it in, but my PC crashed, and my PC never crashes.
#4) It does not have the top labeled like the stock one does. No little white arrow / triangle.
#5) Fits just like stock. Once you get the orientation correct (little black tabs guide you), it fits in solidly with no worries.
For four dollars, I am extremely pleased. I'll use it with the wall socket, and I'll use my stock one for delicate operations like PC-to-Phone transfers.

Thank's for the review... I was wondering when mine would get here, it had been about a week and a half already.

[[ UPDATE ]]
My charging cable has stopped working. I think.
I let the battery completely drain, and then I tried using the Deal Extreme cable plugged into the wall. The phone threw up an icon for bad connection to cable. I unplugged and replugged several times. Eventually I left it all night. It did NOT charge.
I don't know if it just can't do it when it was completely dead battery, or if the cable itself just is broken or if it is just poor quality. I will keep experimenting.

i have had the same problems with 6ft cables from yourcharger on ebay, none work with my pc to sync and when charging one killed my battery like it was wired wrong and the phone started freaking out and the home screen froze and i had to remove the battery, and the other it doesnt even show i have a cable connected to the phone

I've experienced bad battery/charger error with $4 dealextreme cable.
The cause is extremely thin conductors inside the cable.
The solution is simple. You have to make it shoter. Just cut 55cm off, and connect the rest.
As a result - 20cm cable, which can be made longer with any quality usb extender.

I recently purchased the car charger that came with a usb/charger for $6.50 the build quality for the car lighter charger is pretty outstanding it even has all the safety and mfg. Stamps on it. The usb charger on the other hand is quite shabby and it took me a few tries to get the pin to go in correctly. Also didn't have an arrow to differentiate which side was which so I had to take a bright marker n mark it. All in all for the price and the usual long delivery time it was well worth the 7$ now I don't have to log around my stock usb cord everywhere
Sent from my Dell Streak using Tapatalk

Car Dock with integrated Micro USB Charging plug

Hi all,
I got fed up with waiting for something like this to be released, so I've decided to make my own, and thought I might as well share the process.
My requirements are:
- One handed operation
- Windscreen mount dock
- Works with my case
- Dock is always 'plugged in' and is left mounted in my car
- Car mode on the phone is triggered when using with the dock (I use Tasker to trigger a load of actions when my car dock is used, such as turning on Bluetooth, saving the current location when I remove the phone from the dock as a basic 'car finder' etc)
I started off with this dock, which I got ages ago as I just wanted something (even though it wasn't what I thought I would end up with). I got this phone almost the day it was launched, and so there wasn't a lot of choice at the time.
Samsung ECS-K200BE - http://www.amazon.co.uk/Samsung-Gal...4CPO/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1360155480&sr=8-1
I then had to look for a short micro USB extension cable with a right-angled plug, which turned out to be extremely difficult to find for some reason! eBay delivered in the end (although it took over a month to arrive): http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Micro-USB..._USB_Cables_Hubs_Adapters&hash=item41642d957a
You can also get one that goes to a USB socket instead of a micro USB one, but you'll then lose the ability to trigger car mode later on, as USB has 4 pins only, and phone manufacturers tend to use the 5th pin in micro USB for this purpose.
I'm afraid I didn't take photos of the first couple of steps, but they are fairly simple.
The Micro USB plug has a couple of raised parts on the longer side of the D shape, which provide the 'click' as you plug the cables in, and ensure that cables don't just fall out easily by providing some resistance. You can see them on this image for example: http://www.cablewholesale.com/hires/10u2-03xxx.jpg I filed these off on my micro USB extension, as I want the phone to slide in and out the dock really easily, and the dock itself will hold the phone in position on the plug, so it's not a problem. I filed them down until the plug slid in and out the phone really easily with no resistance at all. Careful where the filings go, you don't want them shorting anything out!
I then put tape across the bottom of my phone (masking tape would do, but I used PVC electrical insulation tape since it's what I had to hand), cut a slot for the micro USB plug, put the whole thing in the dock, position it all to be as central as you can, and plug the micro USB plug into the phone through the cut in the tape.
I also removed the rubber protective piece from the bottom of the dock (it's a separate piece to the back) during this step to prevent glue getting all over it, but remember to leave a small gap for it if you do the same! I also used a penknife to cut some grooves into the sides of the gap that the plug pokes through, to help the glue have something to grip on to.
It's then just a case of using some 5 minute epoxy to hold everything in place - it will stop being runny after 5 minutes, but it will be a bit jelly like for a while after that. I did this bit in 2 stages - an initial glue to get the position fairly fixed, then while the glue was still a bit flexible I put a larger amount on around the sides and also between the outgoing cable and the dock to fix everything. I left the phone in for a few hours (I took it out after the first stage and put it back in again though to make sure I wasn't gluing the phone to the dock!), and had some pressure pushing the plug into the phone/dock assembly (with the phone held in tightly by the dock). You'll have to experiment with the best way to do this but I used tape initially, then when the glue had gone hard but flexible still, i rested the whole lot upright and balancing on the plug to push it in (keep glue away from the phone and only on the dock).
After a couple of hours (or maybe a few more) the glue should harden and go solid, holding everything in place.
And that's pretty much where I'm up to at the moment. The phone slides in and out very easily (I'm pretty happy with it, it's better than I expected), and connecting a charging cable to the extension proves that it works - the phone starts charging when I slide it into the dock, so not broken anything so far!
I'll attach a picture in the next post, as I can do that from my phone a lot easier than transferring it to this PC.

Re: Car Dock with integrated Micro USB Charging plug (ongoing project)
(Apologies for the side-view being blurry)
Sent from my Samsung Galaxy Note II using Tapatalk 2

Next steps: I plan to put araldite epoxy over the whole plug to secure it and really make sure it isn't going anywhere. This takes a lot longer to set than the glue I've used so far, but the advantage of using the 5 minute epoxy first is that my phone doesn't have to be in the dock for this stage. Then I'll sand it smooth and spray it black, and work on the car mode triggering bit, which I'm going to make as a separate unit. The advantage of using the extension lead is that you can attach whatever accessory you want into the micro USB, audio splitter, charging, car mode or whatever. Or I'm sure you can find similar MHL extensions if you wanted to do that as well.

This is an interesting project. Thanks for sharing the idea. But do you really want to recharge your phone every time you use the dock? Would unnecessary recharging shorten the life of the battery?

Spare batteries are cheap. I'd rather have a phone that is charged more than one with a battery that will last longer. If I have to get a new battery for £10 or whatever I'm not too bothered! I already have 3 batteries for this phone. In addition, as part of a previous project, I have a switch in my car that controls the power output of the micro USB cable coming out of my dashboard so I could turn it off if necessary, and the dock would still trigger car mode when plugged in.

Been a while since I updated this - sorry!
Right, so at the end of the last post, I had basically filed the USB plug down so it didn't 'click' into place, and glued it in place using some fast epoxy. Next, I cut back quite a lot of the fast epoxy (it's not as good as the araldite that I'm going to put all over it, and it's only there to hold the plug in position while the araldite dries). I also cut some gouges into the surfaces around where I'm gluing to help the araldite adhere to the surfaces - it's worth sanding them with some fairly coarse paper too, though probably not that necessary, it'll be plenty strong enough.
After that I masked off the bottom of the cradle, but leaving the usb plug sticking through
Once this was done, I mixed up some Araldite epoxy resin. It has a resin and a hardener that you mix in a 2:1 ratio. I also added quite a lot of finely ground up wood fibres to the mix - if you have access to some, it improves the strength of the material, and also helps you mould it into a shape when you apply it, rather than have the glue run everywhere. You can always hold it in place with tape if not.
After it has dried (first photo), it sands quite well to the desired shape. I didn't want anything too fancy so just made some flats on it and left it at that (2nd and 3rd photos).
Finally I masked it off again, sprayed it matt black and re-fitted the rubber piece that goes at the bottom either side. Voila!
It's possible to spend a lot longer making this neat than I did, but my solution works perfectly for me. If I ever decide I want to make it neater I can easily sand the paint off, sand more glue (or add more on top), and repaint.

Some action photos:
None with the phone in yet as I was using the phone to take the pics - will have to remember my actual camera at some point if anyone is interested!
I used a 'rapstrap' to hold the cable to the stem of the cradle, keeping it hidden and out the way, and plugged in the cable from my car (emerges from a hole in the A pillar where it meets the dashboard - that's a separate mod to the car!). For the cable to switch things into smart dock / car mode / whatever mode I want, I'm going to making the cable described in this thread:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1321491
I have all the parts necessary, will have to see how up-to-scratch my precision soldering skills are! This way, I can swap out the cable for a different one that triggers a different mode if I want, or re-use the cable on another car dock in the future (either one I modified or not!)
Apologies for the rotation of the photos, it's the right way up on the originals... strange.

I should say as well - I've been using this for a couple of weeks now, and I'm glad I spent the effort. It works so much better than I expected! It's effortless to get the phone in and out. I thought there would be a lot more 'misses' when I tried to get the phone in, but it's gone in straight away almost every time - obviously there has been the odd 'miss'! The sides of the cradle do a good job guiding the phone in, as the phone is almost as wide as them, so it gets roughly centred anyway, then you just squeeze the sides of the dock in and the phone is gripped tightly - no chance of falling out. To release, it's just a button at the back of the dock then lift straight out with the same hand - pretty convenient.
I'd love to see other people's pics if they make one, or improve mine (probably not too hard to do!), or any other mods that do the same thing!

Car Dock with integrated Micro USB Charging plug (ongoing project)
Nice work mate
:good:

Re: Car Dock with integrated Micro USB Charging plug (ongoing project)
I think it looks great. Obviously a labor of love and I'm down with that. This holder could suffice for your next couple Sammy phones as long as the USB depth doesn't change much with different cases/devices. Overall I dig it

This looks like what I did for my S3 in August of last year, except I molded Sugru to keep everything together and for the base, I used a holster w/ the "wings" bent apart so I could just slide in from the top and pull it up and out when undocking. It works w/ a thin case (i usually just have a bumper around my phone).
I actually trimmed it a bit more after this picture was taken to make it cleaner and even cut the top half of the holster off to make it easier to grip the phone when pulling it out. Best thing is, it's so fast to pop it in or pull it off to undock it - I actually had the phone in the holster with the cable plugged in while the Sugru was setting so it lined up the cable perfectly.

Re: Car Dock with integrated Micro USB Charging plug (ongoing project)
Very nice! I cant seem to find one anywhere that fits the note 2 with microusb. Keep us updated
Sent from my SGH-I317 using xda premium

Thanks all for you kind comments! I'm just happy I have a good setup now. Once the cable disappears behind the dock, it disappears from the drivers point of view - it goes behind the dashboard where it's connected to a USB charging unit and a 3 way switch (can choose between charging on, off and on with ignition), all wired directly into the fuse box. Last step is the cable to put it into car mode or smart dock mode (not decided which to use yet), also with audio out - though I would likely not use that, since I use Bluetooth to the car anyway. Thought I might as well make the whole cable with that option since I was making one anyway! I may have a stab at that this weekend

how about using NFC for changing profile? You could attache NFC tag to your holder

Yep, that's also an option and would be very easy to do - but I have Tasker installed and use the car mode to trigger a load of actions, so probably won't be needing NFC for that.

Final fix for Nexus 4 red light of death

Hello i'll try to explain how i fixed the red notification light when my friend's phone died.
The situation was that he charged the phone from the car built in USB and after he unplugged the charger the phone never powered on.
I tried all the solutions that google search can provide and nothing helped.
The problem was that when you plug the charger the red light stays on without any blinks and nothing helped.
Tools you need:
*Torque screw T5 screwdriver
*Small Philips screwdriver (thanks scream4cheese for remind)
*Plastic handle or something else (to open the back cover without damage it)
*Thin wires
*old/new phone charger
So lets start - hope it will help some one that stuck in this situation
1. First of all you need to remove the back cover to get access to the battery.
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2. Unscrew the 2 screws that holds the battery flex cable.
3. Disconnect the flex cable from the phone.
4. Now you need two thin wires that you can connect to the battery flex cable.
5. Find some old phone charger ( i used old nokia charger ) that can provide about 5.0v-5.8v.
6. If you have volt meter find where is the positive and negative (+) and (-).
7. Connect the battery positive (+) to charger positive (+) and negative to negative.
8. Plug the charger to power and wait about 15-13 minutes, do not leave in that charging position too much time because the battery may EXPLODE.
9. Disconnect all the wires and reconnect the battery to the phone (if not working wait few minutes and start over from step 7) maybe the connections is not good or mot enough charged.
10. power on the phone and you have solved that issue.

This is really helpful. It should be a sticky. :thumbup::thumbup:
Also I would like you to add the type of screw drivers is needed to open the phone's cover and the pins.
Torque screw T5 screwdriver
Small Philips screwdriver
Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk 2

Good to know in case it happens so thanks but I was just wondering whether just disconnecting battery terminals wasn't enough as quite a few mentioned that that's how they fixed it so not sure how this method works.
Anyway thanks
Sent from my Nexus 4 using xda app-developers app

It looks to me that there are circumstances where battery drain is such that the battery voltage drops too far too fast for the phone's charging circuits to cope. (Hence it happening mostly to people running battery-sapping benchmarks.)

gie62001 said:
Good to know in case it happens so thanks but I was just wondering whether just disconnecting battery terminals wasn't enough as quite a few mentioned that that's how they fixed it so not sure how this method works.
Anyway thanks
Sent from my Nexus 4 using xda app-developers app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
As i mentioned the battery discharged fully under the 0.2 Volt (after charging the phone with incompatible charger which output is about 3.5V) *in this case the battery is much powerful than charger and it forwarding the power back to charger and not the charger to phone*
so the phone doesn't know that the battery is OK and thinks that it is bad battery, in this case you should use my method or replace to new one if you have an choice to receive it fast or find in local shop.
I'm not guarantee that my method will save your battery you may need to replace it.

According to the service manual, the wireless charger is also separate from the other phone circuitry.
The red light indicated trickle charging, which is slow. And maybe the phone uses more charging than even trickle charging can provide.
A Qi charger should charge the battery normally even if it is empty, as the phone does not need to power up to achieve high charge currrent.
That sounds a lot easier than opening it up and charging the battery manually!

jutezak said:
According to the service manual, the wireless charger is also separate from the other phone circuitry.
The red light indicated trickle charging, which is slow. And maybe the phone uses more charging than even trickle charging can provide.
A Qi charger should charge the battery normally even if it is empty, as the phone does not need to power up to achieve high charge currrent.
That sounds a lot easier than opening it up and charging the battery manually!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
In this case the Qi or Original nexus charger not helping, because it connect to the same circuit as usb charger, the mother board controls the battery charging so in this case you cannot charge in any way if the phone thinks that the battery is bad.
Any way in most cases like that you will change to new battery because the old one is totally dead :/

Neat. So you basically used a defibrillator on the battery . Sad to see the battery management being so poor on this device that it lets the battery drop that low.
Sent from my Nexus 4 using xda premium

Ummmmm. I think people are just being impatient. I had my N4 powered off while overseas for 2 months. When I returned and turned my N4 on, I received the "Red Light of Death".
I read through all of the forums and found the same fixes everywhere.
Open the phone up and reset the battery terminal bar, etc etc...
Now, I have no problem doing that, but I just couldn't accept such a major flaw from this phone, not to mention the problem appeared to be widespread.
Anyways, back to my original point, people are just crazy impatient and freak out over each and every little thing. The first thing they do is rip their phone open and start tinkering.
I ASSURE YOU. JUST LEAVE IT PLUGGED IN USING THE WALL CHARGER FOR AN HOUR OR SO, and it WILL turn back on.
Now, maybe there are situations out there where my method doesn't work, in that case, shame on LG and Google.
Though, I would be willing to bet, if this happens to anyone else, just leave it the hell alone and let it sit on the wall charger for a couple of hours, turning it on and off a few times in between (or at least attempting to), it will come back to life.

It took a month to get my phone...When i got it finally..it had no charge at all..tried to switch it on but all i got was a red flashing led.it scared me a lot but i plugged in the charger and it stayed there for an hour until it turned on..
Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk 2

There is a lot of cases for the red button, in my case nothing helped only that solution, I'm not telling people to use my advice when you see red light first of all should try easier way to solve it, like charge with original charger for few hours etc
Sent from my Nexus 4 using xda premium

Hi
This is defeating a safety mechanism. When lithium batteries are over discharged they can become permanently damaged and then are not safe to recharge. Recharging could result in gassing and or an explosion and fire, this may not happen right away or at all, however the chances of this happening is significantly increased after a deep discharge or some other fault causing over-heating etc. Why did LG build in this protection mechanism in the first place? Do people just think it was to annoy owners and have returns for no reason? Lithium batteries can be lethal which is why there have been world wide recalls in some cases, and they are only safe now because of safety devices built into the battery and phone.
I wouldn't want a phone exploding in my pocket or against my face or in my hand or setting fire to my home. Lithium batteries are generally pretty safe only because of these safety mechanisms, defeat them and lithium batteries become pretty dangerous.
Read up on safety issues here: http://batteryuniversity.com/learn/article/lithium_ion_safety_concerns especially under the "What every battery user should know" section and please realise you are literally playing with fire by defecting or shorting out the safety mechanism which this direct charging method is likely doing.
Regards
Phil

Very good thank you

Must say this has saved me from the trouble that would be sending my phone to RMA! Thanks a lot!

This worked for my girlfriends Nexus 4 that she allowed to go completely dead. 3 buttons, etc...would not get a response from the unit.
yev.gavrikov said:
Hello i'll try to explain how i fixed the red notification light when my friend's phone died.
The situation was that he charged the phone from the car built in USB and after he unplugged the charger the phone never powered on.
I tried all the solutions that google search can provide and nothing helped.
The problem was that when you plug the charger the red light stays on without any blinks and nothing helped.
Tools you need:
*Torque screw T5 screwdriver
*Small Philips screwdriver (thanks scream4cheese for remind)
*Plastic handle or something else (to open the back cover without damage it)
*Thin wires
*old/new phone charger
So lets start - hope it will help some one that stuck in this situation
1. First of all you need to remove the back cover to get access to the battery.
2. Unscrew the 2 screws that holds the battery flex cable.
3. Disconnect the flex cable from the phone.
4. Now you need two thin wires that you can connect to the battery flex cable.
5. Find some old phone charger ( i used old nokia charger ) that can provide about 5.0v-5.8v.
6. If you have volt meter find where is the positive and negative (+) and (-).
7. Connect the battery positive (+) to charger positive (+) and negative to negative.
8. Plug the charger to power and wait about 15-13 minutes, do not leave in that charging position too much time because the battery may EXPLODE.
9. Disconnect all the wires and reconnect the battery to the phone (if not working wait few minutes and start over from step 7) maybe the connections is not good or mot enough charged.
10. power on the phone and you have solved that issue.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

works like a charm, just fixed mine by following the steps.
I dropped my phone in the pond and it was totally submerged under water for about 3-4 minutes, can't power up after, dry for couple of days still doesn't work, all I got was a red led light while charging (not flashing).
I thought the phone was beyond repair so just leave it in a bag of rice to see if there's any miracle. Take the phone out after 3 days, connect to the charger and I get a red flashing light, I think it is a good sign, so I did a google search and redirected to this post, connect the battery flex to an old nokia charger for about 14 minutes and it was fixed, how amazing is that.
My sincere thanks to yev.gavrikov!
-----------------------------------------------------------
update:
the phone turns off automatically after 20 minutes, the red flashing light comes back, will try again tmr, too late to go through that again.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
before I connected the wire with the battery flex I took a read with a volt meter the voltage is 0.36, after a 14-minutes charge the voltage increased to 1.30, still way below the 3.8v standard voltage. But the phone is ok to power up with the stock charger and the battery status bar shows 99% after charge for about half hour. I thought it was fixed, though the the charging rate seems little bit too high, from 1.3v to 99% just within half hour !
Will try again tonight, but I figure might be something wrong with the power management module of the main board.

Don2k9 said:
works like a charm, just fixed mine by following the steps.
I dropped my phone in the pond and it was totally submerged under water for about 3-4 minutes, can't power up after, dry for couple of days still doesn't work, all I got was a red led light while charging (not flashing).
I thought the phone was beyond repair so just leave it in a bag of rice to see if there's any miracle. Take the phone out after 3 days, connect to the charger and I get a red flashing light, I think it is a good sign, so I did a google search and redirected to this post, connect the battery flex to an old nokia charger for about 14 minutes and it was fixed, how amazing is that.
My sincere thanks to yev.gavrikov!
-----------------------------------------------------------
update:
the phone turns off automatically after 20 minutes, the red flashing light comes back, will try again tmr, to. o late to go through that again.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
before I connected the wire with the battery flex I took a read with a volt meter the voltage is 0.36, after a 14-minutes charge the voltage increased to 1.30, still way below the 3.8v standard voltage. But the phone is ok to power up with the stock charger and the battery status bar shows 99% after charge for about half hour. I thought it was fixed, though the the charging rate seems little bit too high, from 1.3v to 99% just within half hour !
Will try again tonight, but I figure might be something wrong with the power management module of the main board.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I went in the pool with my Nexus 4 in a plastic bag to keep the sand out. Realized it after several minutes that I still had it in my pocket and got it out. Didn't have any rice so I wrapped it in a diaper for a day. Then I got some rice and left it in the rice for about 2 days. I pulled it out and it looked dry enough. Plugged it in and got the battery charging white icons. They went away, I waited a few minutes and tired to turn it on. Nothing. So I waited a while longer and tried it again. The red light started blinking and I couldn't get it to do anything. I tried different cords but no help. When I tried to plug it into another charger base I noticed some condensation in the front camera and in the back flash. So I stopped the whole deal and put it back in rice and laid it up in a window sill. I'm not sure what my next move is. I think the flashing red light might have saved me from turning it on and screwing it up further. I've rooted my previous phones and I feel fairly comfortable with that stuff but I'm a little nervous taking the back off this phone though. I would finally like to try a wireless charger first before I go ripping into the back of this thing. Plus I don't have a volt meter to check the charger. Any suggestions on how I could try a charger without buying one? Or what my next step is?

QI chargrer
Hey there I actually was looking for a soluiton to this, since i HAD the same problem. I didnt wanted to open up my phone, so i decided to charge it back somehow else. With the normal factory charger wasnt really successfull try, so i bought a QI charger, with USB pluggable slot at the end, and plugged to the factory 1.2a converter. After 1-2 hours my phone started to charge, and displayed the charging white battery instead of blinking light!
So im actually really thankfull on all the ideas here, hope my suggestion will help on more ppl.

A little over a week ago I was driving to a client in a very rural area. Had my Nexus 4 running Navigation and playing music over my car's AUX port. Also had my USB plugged into the car's cigarette lighter port to keep it charged.
All of a sudden, the music stopped playing. Looked at the phone and it was off. Pushed the power button to turn it back on and the red LED started blinking. At this point I panicked because it was a 4 hour drive in the middle of nowhere, had no idea where I was going, and now no Nav or phone calls.
Over the next 10 minutes I kept pushing power and holding it for a variable length of time, from just an instant to 30 seconds or more. No dice. Then after what must have been the 20th try or so, the phone booted up. Relief! When it was fully booted, I noticed the battery was around 90%. No problems since then.
FWIW, YMMV.

Nexus 4 Red light of death FIXED
@yev.gavrikov
Thanks a TON Friend :highfive:
Finally My Bros. Nexus4 Worked we just did till Step 3 and again installed it Back
Amazingly phone booted back to basic
The Story:
Device Info Nexus 4
Kernel : Franco nightly R156
ROM: PA 3.6
 @Stock Speed Stock CPU Governor
was running AnTuTu Benchmarking the battery was @50% suddenly in between the test phone screen was off, when we checked phone was not booting up :crying:
So i saw this Thread and watch 2-3 videos How to dismantle the Nexus 4
Skills : Moderate (Needs Precision and patience)
I just removed and reinstalled the battery terminal.
And amazingly the phone Started ....WOW Awesome :good: @yev.gavrikov
Thanks

Dash Charge protocol analysis

On the Oneplus forum there is a thread where they analysed the dash-charging cable ( https://forums.oneplus.net/threads/...-cable-doing-internally-lets-probe-it.456017/ ).
The topic was finished by somebody posting a teardown of the cable revealing that it's dash-charging capabilities are encoded on a BQ2022 from ti.
The next logical step is to dig into the communication between the phone and the charger.
The same guy that tore down the cable also took a look at the chargers (google translate will be helpfull):
http://www.chongdiantou.com/wp/archives/1228.html Mains
http://www.chongdiantou.com/wp/archives/1339.html Car
Maybe we can continue the investigation here....

So, I did some digging around the Car-Unit with my Logic Analyzer.
Description of setup here: http://imgur.com/a/G7pPN
The charger waits for a current draw (i didn't bother testing it's thresholds) and then reads/checks-for the E²PROM embedded in the plug of the cable (presumably containing an authentication for dash).
At a similar time the phone sends a kind of "preamble" consisting of high-low transitions of varying lengths (but this doesn't seem to important to the charger, it tries to "dash" even without it).
Afterwards the phone and charger start exchanging 9 bits of data in bursts. One USB-Data-Line is clock, the other one is data. The chargers supplies the clock and the first 9 bits and after a short pause the phone gets to reply with another 9 bits as the charger supplies another "clock-burst".
At the beginning (before dash-charging is in effect), the charger sends 150h and the phone replys with 158h.
Once the phone is ready to begin dash-charging it replys with 178h instead.
The charger then configures it's Step-Down Converter for ~4.5V of output voltage and then sends 148h to the phone.
It either replies with 170h if the voltage is too high or 178h if the voltage is correct (I didn't see a reply for "too low", but it might exist).
If the phone replies 170h the charger lowers the voltage by about 100mV-200mV and "asks" again.
Once the phone replies with 178h the charger stops lowering the voltage and sends 14Ch to which the phone replies with 141h.
During the dash-charging process the charger periodically sends 144h to which the phone replies with a number which seems to roughly coincide with the state of charge (i have seen values from 16Eh to 178h).
The charger seems to nudge-up the voltage every once in a while (presumably when the current dropped below a threshold).
If the battery is relatively full (i tested at 90% charge) the "dash-charging-cycle" doesn't even start and the communication stays at an exchange of 150h/158h data "words".
I did some minor probing on the wall-wart with a stripped USB 3.0 extension and found that it uses the same commands but with the lowest bit set (i.e. it adds 1 to the command codes). Unfortunately the USB 3.0 cable had some internal resistance ruining most of the analog measurements.
todo:
- I didn't manage to capture is the transition from dash charging back to "normal" 5V mode at the end of the charge cycle.
- The values communicated at the transition from the voltage-setting process to the dash charging operation are unclear to me (but they appear to be always the same).

Do you think it's safe to use OnePlus 3 brick or car Dash charger with let's say micro USB cable and charge other phones? Or OnePlus power bank?

nitramcek said:
Do you think it's safe to use OnePlus 3 brick or car Dash charger with let's say micro USB cable and charge other phones? Or OnePlus power bank?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
it's safe as with other phone or cable it will act as a normal charger blocking at 1.5A.
Dash charge will only activate if, the dash cable is used with a dash charging phone or oppo vooc phone.

Le_Zouave said:
it's safe as with other phone or cable it will act as a normal charger blocking at 1.5A.
Dash charge will only activate if, the dash cable is used with a dash charging phone or oppo vooc phone.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Great, so It's safe to use my car Dash charger for charging other phones to.

atheist93 said:
So, I did some digging around the Car-Unit with my Logic Analyzer.
Description of setup here: http://imgur.com/a/G7pPN
The charger waits for a current draw (i didn't bother testing it's thresholds) and then reads/checks-for the E²PROM embedded in the plug of the cable (presumably containing an authentication for dash).
At a similar time the phone sends a kind of "preamble" consisting of high-low transitions of varying lengths (but this doesn't seem to important to the charger, it tries to "dash" even without it).
Afterwards the phone and charger start exchanging 9 bits of data in bursts. One USB-Data-Line is clock, the other one is data. The chargers supplies the clock and the first 9 bits and after a short pause the phone gets to reply with another 9 bits as the charger supplies another "clock-burst".
At the beginning (before dash-charging is in effect), the charger sends 150h and the phone replys with 158h.
Once the phone is ready to begin dash-charging it replys with 178h instead.
The charger then configures it's Step-Down Converter for ~4.5V of output voltage and then sends 148h to the phone.
It either replies with 170h if the voltage is too high or 178h if the voltage is correct (I didn't see a reply for "too low", but it might exist).
If the phone replies 170h the charger lowers the voltage by about 100mV-200mV and "asks" again.
Once the phone replies with 178h the charger stops lowering the voltage and sends 14Ch to which the phone replies with 141h.
During the dash-charging process the charger periodically sends 144h to which the phone replies with a number which seems to roughly coincide with the state of charge (i have seen values from 16Eh to 178h).
The charger seems to nudge-up the voltage every once in a while (presumably when the current dropped below a threshold).
If the battery is relatively full (i tested at 90% charge) the "dash-charging-cycle" doesn't even start and the communication stays at an exchange of 150h/158h data "words".
I did some minor probing on the wall-wart with a stripped USB 3.0 extension and found that it uses the same commands but with the lowest bit set (i.e. it adds 1 to the command codes). Unfortunately the USB 3.0 cable had some internal resistance ruining most of the analog measurements.
todo:
- I didn't manage to capture is the transition from dash charging back to "normal" 5V mode at the end of the charge cycle.
- The values communicated at the transition from the voltage-setting process to the dash charging operation are unclear to me (but they appear to be always the same).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Really interesting analysis. What's your goal? Enabling dash charging without dash accessories?
(USB-C for example)

My primary motivation is curiosity.
If the protocol turns out to be sufficiently simple to replicate (which is looking good at the moment) I might try and build a dash powerbank to quickly top of my battery. I wouldn't want 3+ Amps going through a flimsy micro-to-c adapter from a vooc bank...

atheist93 said:
My primary motivation is curiosity.
If the protocol turns out to be sufficiently simple to replicate (which is looking good at the moment) I might try and build a dash powerbank to quickly top of my battery. I wouldn't want 3+ Amps going through a flimsy micro-to-c adapter from a vooc bank...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
hmm, so you're trying to replicate it on the hardware side, that's a cool application and it'd be great to have other options for power banks and car chargers.
i honestly don't know much about the topic, but do you think i'd be possible to replicate it on the software side? ie, mimic the protocol to enable faster charging when plugged into a USB-C fast charging output? (but also limit it to 3A since that's a safe max similar to the Nexus 5X/6P)

I am pretty sure that it is not possible to do it in software only.
The whole point of Dash is to let the charger do the regulating and make the phone just "pass-through" the raw connection to the battery.
You might be able to trick the phone into switching it's "pass-through" feature on without getting the right initialization, but this would frankly be stupid as the result would be 5V from the USB-Port pushing directly into the lithium cell which is supposed to stay below 4,2V. Initially the internal resistance of the USB-Cable might limit the current sufficiently to prevent an immediate catastrophic failure, but I can't imagine it working out well in the long run...
The only possible solution i see for this to work is to have a device that plugs into your existing USB and steps down the voltage appropriately, but that is hardware again.

atheist93 said:
I am pretty sure that it is not possible to do it in software only.
The whole point of Dash is to let the charger do the regulating and make the phone just "pass-through" the raw connection to the battery.
You might be able to trick the phone into switching it's "pass-through" feature on without getting the right initialization, but this would frankly be stupid as the result would be 5V from the USB-Port pushing directly into the lithium cell which is supposed to stay below 4,2V. Initially the internal resistance of the USB-Cable might limit the current sufficiently to prevent an immediate catastrophic failure, but I can't imagine it working out well in the long run...
The only possible solution i see for this to work is to have a device that plugs into your existing USB and steps down the voltage appropriately, but that is hardware again.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
a physical device which enables dash charging, particularly up to 3A via USB-C and 2.4A via USB-A to USB-C, would be of great use too

atheist93 said:
My primary motivation is curiosity.
If the protocol turns out to be sufficiently simple to replicate (which is looking good at the moment) I might try and build a dash powerbank to quickly top of my battery. I wouldn't want 3+ Amps going through a flimsy micro-to-c adapter from a vooc bank...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I bought the Dash car charger to be used as a car charger as well as backup power for camping etc. The dash charger seems to work with a wide range of input voltage. I would guess 8V-28V works fine.
I tested the dash car charger with eight AA Eneloop batteries but it didn't work well. The input voltage dropped from 11V to 6,6V. I think the stress was too much for eight batteries and dash charging didn't work. Ampere (app) displayed a reading of 1120mA for charging current.
Ten AA Eneloops were enough to dash charge the phone twice from 40% -> 90%. I also tested the dash car charger with a 19V PSU and it workerd fine as well.
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The next step is to buy lifepo 4 / lipo battery and build a case.

Thanks for the work done.
The problems with the enelope is the wiring... I guess there will be a massive voltage drop over the holder/wires and clips.
These things are not made for higher currents. I have seen experiments failing because of battery holders and crocodile clips very often. The problem is that these cables often have massive resistance which is no problem as long there is no current flowing... Greetings from Ohms law

Squabl said:
I bought the Dash car charger to be used as a car charger as well as backup power for camping etc. The dash charger seems to work with a wide range of input voltage. I would guess 8V-28V works fine.
I tested the dash car charger with eight AA Eneloop batteries but it didn't work well. The input voltage dropped from 11V to 6,6V. I think the stress was too much for eight batteries and dash charging didn't work. Ampere (app) displayed a reading of 1120mA for charging current.
Ten AA Eneloops were enough to dash charge the phone twice from 40% -> 90%. I also tested the dash car charger with a 19V PSU and it workerd fine as well.
The next step is to buy lifepo 4 / lipo battery and build a case.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
How did your project go? And why Lipo batteries? Why not 18650 batts?

MonoTovarisj said:
How did your project go? And why Lipo batteries? Why not 18650 batts?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You can get custom Li-Po batteries to fit any size and are generally square. 18650s are cylindrical and there would be wasted space between the batteries so with a Li-Po you would be able to get higher capacity. Just a wild guess

MonoTovarisj said:
How did your project go? And why Lipo batteries? Why not 18650 batts?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I ended up using battery from my 18V cordless drill. The battery is quite small and light weight for it capacity. It was the easiest and cheapest option as I need battery backup very seldom.

I did a case for 4 x 18650 and the car charger, but got a little stuck in the project. Mostly because I don't have any electronic skills.

This looks cool.
What questions do you have? I can help out with the electronics. But it seems to be quite straight forward. But to be safe use protected 18650 cells. I can recommend the Panasonic NCR18650b, they are the best ones currently available. See: https://www.gearbest.com/batteries/pp_187046.html. You might need to adjust your design the protection makes them a bit longer than standart 18650 cells.

The design is already for the panasonic protected 18650 cells. However I would have liked a pcb in the buttom with full charging circuit and a usb-c for charging. With my current design I have to take the cells out for charging. :-/

MonoTovarisj said:
The design is already for the panasonic protected 18650 cells. However I would have liked a pcb in the buttom with full charging circuit and a usb-c for charging. With my current design I have to take the cells out for charging. :-/
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You want to connect the 4 cells in series right?
I haven't found any good 4s charging modules yet.
Building you own charger circuit based on an charger IC is hardcore electronics. I have tried and i took months.
So charging the externally should be fine really.

affmalg said:
You want to connect the 4 cells in series right?
I haven't found any good 4s charging modules yet.
Building your own charger circuit based on a charger IC is hardcore electronics. I have tried and I took months.
So charging the externally should be fine really.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah series, as I need the voltage for the car charger, and 3.7 times 4 gives a nice 14,8V for the charger.
Regarding charging that was my conclusion as well, however if I wanted to commercialise it, I would need a built-in charging circuit.
I would be able to get wires to the top poles as well if that would help the design, then you would be able to charge them individually and switch to a serial connection when in use.