usb power adapter/ micro usb cable test? - Xperia Z1 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

what is the best way to test a usb power adapter or a micro usb cable? cause in the past i have had problems where the usb power adapter would say a phone is charging but it really wasn't and once i changed it it was all good, also vice versa with the cable, i know this is a good example to know which one has the problem but i would like to know instantly and not a couple days later is there any way?

For the power adapter just check the energetic plate. You'll see input and output there. As long as the power adapter is [email protected] or [email protected],5A you're good. I actually use [email protected] for faster charging. You shouldn't go above 2,1a or 2100mah or you'll kill your battery. Slowly it will just get worse and worse battery life. Z1 should limit the current, but I would keep it between 1,5-2,1A anyway.
I had been charging my Z1 with a lots of cables and every one of them was good. Just make sure it's not too long like 5m. (electrical resistance matters)
There's also a module in the stock rom that limits the charging current if your device is running hot. The Z1 can also use more power than it is being charged with. I had this when I was watching a movie with a terrible reception. I dealt with it by turning on the flight mode.

Related

USB Charging So Slow Almost Not Worth It

Is anyone else having this problem?
Any work around to having it actually charge the battery up?
it uses electricity faster than its recharging its crap! ive never known any device do this. When im low on battery and have it connected to my computer i have to switch it to the mains for 30 mins. Its terrible, bad design fault
I have the same problem with my Toshiba G900 (WVGA too). Very slow on USB, but normal fast at standard charging or car charging. USB is very bad for this at all.
it really depends on what you're doing with the phone, its unlikely to charge when busy, its a lot faster at charging than my old advantage, im actually impressed!
have you made sure that you've not ticked turn off charging whilst connected to a computer?
charged in under 3hours whilst on connected to ubuntu yesterday.
don't u guys realized how many amperes that a USB socket and your PC (as well as the power supply) allowed compared to a wall socket?
usb chargin usually is never worth it.
I don't understand your disappointment, usb voltage/ampere are the same for all devices, even for my touch when used as modem doesn't supply enough power for charging seriously
Does it even charge at all via USB when the X1 is on idle? If it does, how long does it take from low to full?
I left my X1 idle on USB for 6 hours, it was nearly flat when I put it on and after 6 hours it was still 1 bar below full. Whereas my LG Viewty fully charged in about 2 hours. My Universal only takes about 3 hours
So in my case, comparing the three phones, you can see where my dissapointment originates from.
vinokirk said:
I left my X1 idle on USB for 6 hours, it was nearly flat when I put it on and after 6 hours it was still 1 bar below full. Whereas my LG Viewty fully charged in about 2 hours. My Universal only takes about 3 hours
So in my case, comparing the three phones, you can see where my dissapointment originates from.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
But remember the size of battery the x1 has maybe the 1500 comes into play.
BuddyLee said:
But remember the size of battery the x1 has maybe the 1500 comes into play.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well, of course. Xperia's battery is bigger. That's like complaining that your glass fills up faster than your pool. (may be exaggerating a bit )
BuddyLee said:
But remember the size of battery the x1 has maybe the 1500 comes into play.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
True tho, point taken.....dissapointment level aleviating.....slightly....
After my phone beeped saying the battery was low, I plugged it into my USB hub (which has a mains supply). An hour later I removed the cable and the phone beeped again.
At least with my P990 I was able to gain some charge, it seems like with the X1 it just stops the battery running down.
Try it after Softreset again. I had this problems with an old ROM on my G900 too. After some time it did not charge. Softreset fixed it.
also yall are forgettin that it's a different kinda battery in the x1 compared to other phones it's ising a li-po compared to a li-ion (which is in most other ppc phones) it charges slower via usb because it's tryin to keep from exploding any extra surge that the usb gets could cause your phone to explain
the li-po is more likely to explain given the way it's built
when you use the wall chargers and car chargers the connection are ment fron rapid rechargin of the device unlike the usb which is for data transfer mainly
when you think about the charge time just think about how long it actually takes for your phone to run out of battery life from what i heard it's close to like 1.5 to 2.5 days compared to normal ppc phones that last probably a day at the most with out recharge
hope this help
Keland44 said:
also yall are forgettin that it's a different kinda battery in the x1 compared to other phones it's ising a li-po compared to a li-ion (which is in most other ppc phones) it charges slower via usb because it's tryin to keep from exploding any extra surge that the usb gets could cause your phone to explain
the li-po is more likely to explain given the way it's built
when you use the wall chargers and car chargers the connection are ment fron rapid rechargin of the device unlike the usb which is for data transfer mainly
when you think about the charge time just think about how long it actually takes for your phone to run out of battery life from what i heard it's close to like 1.5 to 2.5 days compared to normal ppc phones that last probably a day at the most with out recharge
hope this help
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Err... this is not true for TP. TP lasts about 2 days on average from normal daily usage and it doesn't have problem charging via USB. Given that the port used is USB 2.0 not 1.1 or below. Took about 2~3 hours from nearly flat to full charge if I remember correctly. I have to try again just to make sure. But definitely not taking 6 hours.
I would've thought that X1 shouldn't have any problem with charging since the battery is only like 150mA more than TP. Also, if it's charging faster from the AC adapter, the same result should be expected when charging from USB port. Doesn't matter the type of battery used. Unless if X1 somehow limits the charging current on purpose when PC USB port is detected. Even though USB 2.0 is actually capable of giving out 1.5A maximum. Try to soft reset it after charging for about 2~3 hours. See if the battery gets fully charged. Some TP users are experiencing this issue as well when the battery meter only updates to fully charged after doing soft reset. Experienced users might want to try and measure the current drawn when charging via USB 2.0 port.
Hope this helps.
On my xperia if i put it in sleep mode, it charges no problem using USB.
the advantage used to charge slower from a usb port, that is until someone found out that the standard ac charger had a short across two of the usb pins, and with a quick mod of a usb cable charged quickly from the usb on a computer
however my x1 charges the same from usb or mains, I use the same cable, but can't see what difference that makes.
there are three conditions that affect charging speeds, whether device is on or not, off charges much faster, whether screen is on or not, screen off charges faster, whether theres good radio signal, if like at home, reception is dodgy it can really draw a lot of juice.
Just for comparison sake, I did a test on my TP just to confirm. Charging via USB 2.0 while it was on idle with screen turned on, from 4% to 100% it took about 2.5 hours and its battery feels warm.
Ok lets clear out some things.
A standard PC USB socket can provide maximum 500mA (milli-Amperes) Current at 5 Volt. Ideally that means that a battery rated at 1500mAh (milli-Amperes-hour) can be charged around 3 hours (minimum). Now, subtract the current that the xperia needs while operating and you will get how many milli-Amperes are left for charging.
Of course in order to know how many current the xperia needs to operate you need to connect an ammeter in series, also keep in mind that current needs change depending on usage (wifi, 3g, bluetooth etc).
So in essence if you USB port is not very good and can't give fully 500mA and the xperia needs a great amount of current to be on, then the charging time can be quite long. A simple formula could be:
xperia_Battery_mAh / (USB_Current - xperia_Current)
Now the mains charger is rated at a greater value than the USBs 500mA. Actually I don't own yet an xperia (waiting patiently to arrive), so I don't know how much current the charger can give. Can someone see what is the rating of the charger?
From other devices I own (that can charge through USB) I've seen that their chargers are rated as high as 2 Amperes. Obviously these devices never draw so much current, it is just a failsafe or it was more cheap for them to bundle a charger like that. But they could draw 800mA of current which the USB port is unable to do so.
Keep in mind that while charging with USB might be longer, generally it can be safer for the battery (longer battery life and more charge/discharge cycles), although I am not so sure about this with excessive charging times in a USB port.

[Q] Faster USB Charging?

Just reading up on USB chargers, and I found somewhere in a thread here about phones defaulting to smaller ma when charging via USB if the connector didn't have the data pins shorted or something.
So, I was wondering a couple of things:
1) If the default charger supplies 700ma, do you think that is the most the Nexus S can draw? Does anyone have one of these shorted USB chargers? Does it charge the NS faster?
2) If it does charge faster, how hard would it be to do something similar to shorting the data connections? I have a generic AC-USB cable which I currently use for my iPod touch.
3) Is there a way to check if it is already shorted out? The USB charging port looks similar to ones on my computer, but I'm not sure what to look for.
Thanks for any help! Maybe if we can sort out this stuff, we can provide a solution for those looking for faster charging!
it does work safely, i'm using a 1000 mAh charger at home, and a 2000 mAh charger in the car both are from aftermarket eBay/DealExtreme charges.
no overheating
and charges faster than stock
AllGamer said:
it does work safely, i'm using a 1000 mAh charger at home, and a 2000 mAh charger in the car both are from aftermarket eBay/DealExtreme charges.
no overheating
and charges faster than stock
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ok thankyou for that AllGamer, I'll think of possible ways I could mod the charger now
The only reason it is slow is because of the USB charging brick instead of just a charger.
Sent from my Nexus S using XDA App
I know it's a wrong thread, but anyone has any pointers as to how to short a regular USB cable to make the phone think it's a power adapter cable?
XBOHDPuKC said:
I know it's a wrong thread, but anyone has any pointers as to how to short a regular USB cable to make the phone think it's a power adapter cable?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Nah it's not the wrong thread that was one of my questions! I'm not sure exactly where you would do it, but maybe if you skinned the wire, then cut the data lines it would work?
Not sure which end you would do it on however, but that may not matter. Any other ideas?
The two center pins in the USB carry the data. If you pull them out, the cable won't be able to connect to the computer.
Sent from my Nexus S
Wow - you don't need to do this and you wouldn't want to in a computer anyway.
The USB specification says that 500ma (@ 5v) of current should be available from a computer's USB port. Of course, the actual wires can carry much more than this, so manufacturers can tell their phones to takes as much current as is offered.
Almost all computers limit their USB power output accordingly - this is why some opld usb-powered external hard drives needed 2 USB plugs to get enough power. The only computers that I am SURE emit significantly more than 500ma on their USB ports are first and second generation MacBook Airs.
Some phones, the N1 and every other HTC specifically, look for a specially shorted cable to "know if they are plugged into the wall adaptor" as opposed to a computer USB port. In reality, this is just a way to make you specifically buy HTC chargers as opposed to third-party off-brands, because plugging one of these phones into an off brand charger will limit the current draw to about 450ma.
If you want to know if your Android phone thinks that it is in "USB" mode or in "AC" mode, just plug the phone in, open the dialer, enter *#*#4636#*#* and then select battery info. If your phone is one that cares (not all do), it will say USB if it thinks it should be in USB charging mode, or AC if it thinks it should be in AC charging mode.
I would not try shorting out the middle pins in a cable and then plugging it into the computer. First, most will probably just disable the USB port completely, shutting off even power you could draw. Second, if it doesn't shut down, you run the risk that a badly-built USB port might not properly limit the current to 500ma - and since they are not designed to furnish more current than that, you might melt something expensive or start a fire. third, if you make a mistake, you risk shorting out either your phone or your computer, which might ruin your day, week or month, depending on your financial means to replace the system that cooks itself.
I would just run out to your local store, pay 15 bucks for a 2A third-party usb charger brick, and go to town. That will work perfectly - this is what I use, and it probably cuts the charge time by 30-40%. Obviously, this indicates that the NS is not capable of drawing a full 2A - I have not put a meter on it, but I would bet that it limits itself to somewhere just under an amp in.
I have recently bought both a 2A wall charger and car charger and my phone does not recognise either of these as anything more than a 500mA source.
Is it really just a case of opening the car charger up and shorting out pins 2 & 3? they are currently not connected to anything in the charger.
If it's indeed a matter of shorting the data lines, then I think you can skin the wire as suggested by others, but then cut the data lines, short the end that leads to the phone, leave the end to the computer open. I think it's the phone that tries to determine whether the data lines are shorted.
Edit: Can someone measure the continuity between the data pins with the stock charger? I wonder if they are shorted. I'm still waiting for my Nexus S to arrive, so can't test it.
Yup, the data lines in the stock Nexus S charger ARE shorted.
I just modified a cheap 1A car charger by popping it open, soldering the 2 data lines together and putting it back.
The report on the Nexus S before I did this (*#*#4636#*#*) said "USB", and afterwards it now says "AC".
I will report back after I make a road trip if this improves the GPS + Pandora + Screen in car situation. I suspect it will.
----------------
Yup, the car charger seemed to actually maintain and increase the battery this time. Seems good.
The NS supports chargers output to a max of 1000mA, as it says on the back of it, where the battery resides.

[Q] On charge - but battery still depleting?

Hi guys,
I wanted to use my NexusS in the car. I have a 3rd party cigarette lighter to USB which I put a mini to micro adapter on.
The phone does two strange things...
Firstly the screen will not go off - it won't time out and if I switch it off it switches itself right back on again.
Secondly, even though it says it is charging the battery life depleted - and fast too. I watched it loose 10% of its charge in around 10 minutes.
Any ideas - is it just a rubbish USB adapter (worked fine with my other phones, most were HTC).
Anyone else seen this - and fixed it?
/R
try a different charger. If issue stops, you've got your answer
Try a name brand (not cheap or generic) cigarette lighter plug that has a USB female on the other end. You could use the supplied usb data cable that came with the phone for charging (that's just about all it's good for). It's a straight cable so it won't be pulling on the phone when it's charging and if you're using it (if the cable is long enough) I hate coiled cables with a passion! Yeah it might be six feet long if you stretch it out but it will always be pulling the phone if you use it while charging.
Some cables aren't wired inside like a standard usb cable is. Lg is notorious for that. Some of their older phones refused to charge if you tried to use a standard usb cable. For a good data cable, that isn't cheap quality, I suggest the sprint usb data cable that the corporate stores sell. It's built good and has a solid connection. A less expensive one is an ultra brand usb to micro usb cable that you can find at compusa. The six foot one is perfect. Yes you can find others online cheaper of course, but as a local solution, you should be able to find these stores. I don't know the quality of any that might be sold at best buy or your cell phone company. Generally from what i've seen, the cell phone stores that have lots of generic accessories, have dummy phones or all their phones in a glass display case are the places that will probably have low quality cables. Some people don't care about stuff like that and some run into problems with flashing or being detected correctly by the computer or the plugs wiggling in the sockets and possibly causing intermittent connections. See where I'm going with this? Imagine you are flashing and halfway through it or at a critical point of data transfer. The plug connections aren't good or solid because they wiggle. The contacts momentarily lose connection and the data stops... Stuff like this is a bricked phone waiting to happen imo. Both Samsung and HTC cables that were supplied with the phones with my past phones seemed like they weren't very good data cables. Some may have never had a problem with these but I have. Times when phones refused to flash or be detected by the host computer, then the problem went away when I used "better" quality cables.
Sorry for my usual rambling when I reply. I like to explain things in a way that a non tech person could begin to understand.
As for your original question, I have experienced this too. Almost always a reboot fixes that problem. A good tool to use for charge and discharge info is a widget called battery monitor widget. I turn the sampling rate faster to like five seconds and the battery capacity to what the battery is actually rated at. The widget always seems to guess the wrong capacity of the battery. You can watch and learn what your phone normally idles at and when something is really sucking a lot of power. On the flip side, it will show you when the battery is trickle or charging it hard. Mine idles at less than ten milliamps and I've seen it charge as much as upper nine hundred milliamps (970's+).
sorry, gotta stop blabbing!

Car Chargers

Hey all, I know this is a development area - but there is no General section for the G9... anyway...
I have an 80 Gen 9 original none hard drive none turbo which im installing in my car. So far it looks really really good - ill post a video when i finally get the facia on it. However I am struggling to keep up with the charge power wise.
I originally brought a tomtom microusb charger - which according to form puts out 1 amp (not enough). This works fine on my HTC evo 3d, but cant keep up with the power consumption of the 80. It does not show as a "slow" charger.
I then brought an adapter off ebay that has a 2.1a and a 1a port. These originally showed as slow, so I made an adapter cable shorting the data pins so it knows its a charger - but neither port can keep the thing powered, and both these and the tomtom 1 amp seem to discharge at the same speed while plugged in.
Im waiting on one from newmp3technology that is stated as a fast charger for the archos g9...
Now, on the device i have turned off bluetooth and wifi turned off, backlight always on at around 1/2 brightness, and i have it running an external laptop hard drive off the port on the back. GPS gets turned on when necassary - but doesnt really seem to negatively affect the power situation (which was kinda surpising). Ive set the maximum CPU usage at just 600mhz to try and kerb the power consumption also. While driving i have Poweramp continually playing, and have used copilot on and off for sat nav. It doesnt drop fast - but nor is it staying fully charged. Im sure I had no problems with this while on AC power in the house.
If anyone knows of a working fast charger, or has a suggestion I would be most greatful. I may between now and then test with an invertor and ac power supply. One other idea I have is to run the USB hard drive with a powered USB hub, to move the power consumption away from the device.
I believe there was one of those dual-usb chargers from Belkin, but knowing them the charger could be pretty expensive.
It also has one 2 amp and one 1 amp slot, though I have not tried it yet.
i have this
http://www.newmp3technology.com/francais/all-Archos-model-charger.htm
This is an other option www.newmp3technology.com/francais/archos-101-80-g9-cigar-split.htm
I also need to be able to run/ charge my 80G9 turbo on the road for long periods.
first the basics, the original Archos cable must be used to get max charge (its short and has the log like thing inline near tablet) every other cable/ wall charger I have tried will only give weak charge and if using tablet with other cable it may never charge at all *if you know this great, but everyday others have to find this out the slow or no charge way
now, that applies to the wall plug for sure but with a cigarette lighter usb adapter I'm not so sure you will get enough juice just with that cable. If there is a 12V adapter or complete plug and usb cord that gives full needed output, great. until its used and proven (real world) I don't know if it exist yet.
the best alternative may be to use a Power Inverter like one below, there are so many available I don't know if the ones with usb outlets would work, I have a cheap inverter I need to try but just with factory Archos wall plug & cable (I've used it in the past to power a hand grinder etc. with no problem, car battery stayed charged up even when vehicle was off)
http://www.amazon.com/Wagan-2003-6-...?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1329710122&sr=1-17
I use the original Wall-Charger that came with the Tablet in conjunction with an HTC USB Cable that came with my HTC Desire.
It's charging as fast as with the original Archos USB Cable.
Even the small Wall-Charger from the Desire charges the Tablet very fast.
OK Ive received the so called fast charger from newmp3technology and it registers as a slow charger using the original supplied cable from archos. It took 17 days to arrive... not particularly happy with newmp3technology.
Anyway, I have found that the tomtom charger does actually charge the system while it is active - even though its only a 1 amp charger and the system requires 1.5 amp. Over about a week of driving for approx 1.5 - 2 hours a day the charge has risen from 0% to 19%. I had a USB extension (no more than 1 meter long) in line with the charger and that actually slowed the rate of charge.
The system is active the whole time - usually playing music through power amp, and sometimes using GPS via copilot. Ill test again to see that it can still maintain charge with GPS running. These devices really only require a small amount of power - I used to run a full computer in car and that pulled a bunch of power.
Here's the general section
http://forum.xda-developers.com/forumdisplay.php?f=1511
No Probs - unfortunately that section did not exist when i created this thread...

Want faster charging/Device discharging while charging/not charging? Read within!

Background
Hi all, I, for a very short period of time was suffering from the problem of my phone DISCHARGING while it was charging. This made no logical sense to me until I did some research, which I will detail below.
How USB Power works (Roughly)
Firstly let's discuss USB power provisioning. Strictly speaking, the specifications say that any given USB port should provide a maximum of 500mA (or 0.5A) at 5 volts. *Don't shoot me electronics guys, I'm simplifying for ease of explanations sake*. Imagine that ampage as the actual force of the charger, how quickly it can ram power into your phone. Like the rate of flow on a pipe.
The beginning of the problem
This was all fine and dandy when all USB was really used for was Keyboards, Mice, Memory, etc, low current draw devices. Something else I should mention here is that the Ampage that a port CAN provide is not the Ampage it DOES provide - the device draws a certain Ampage and if the USB controller agrees it outputs said Ampage. Later, when USB was beginning to be used for more power hungry applications, ie External hard drives, these required more power than the port could (In theory) provide. However, most more modern motherboards/USB controllers were more than capable of supplying plenty more Ampage if it was requested. This was breaking the specification but not in any massively dangerous way so as such nothing bad happens.
This is where we get to the actual issue people are experiencing here. The Nexus 4 is a standards compliant device in the respect that it seems to only draw 500mA from any USB port no matter what it's potential, unless it's an AC Wall wart. If you're experiencing problems with wakelocks (see XDA) and other things, this causes your phone to draw more than 500mA which means your phone actually discharges while it's charging! Terrible!
This is quite easy to get around, but again I'm going into detail so let's explain how the phone tells the difference between a dumb wall wart and a USB controller. Easily! The USB controller obviously makes use of the data pins found within the USB cable, whereas a wallwart just (almost always) shorts them out. The Nexus 4 can detect this short, and as such draw more power *While still in quotation marks staying in spec*.
The root problem is not with how the N4 is charging, it's with the wakelock you're experiencing which is causing the phone to draw so much power while the screen is off. While the screen is off and the phone is in Deepsleep (A CPU state where it uses very little power) - it should draw no more than 50mA leaving 450mA for charging the battery, but you guys are probably experiencing a wakelock of some sort.
Solutions to the problem or How to break a specification for the good of mankind
The simple solution is to install this app: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.rootuninstaller.batrsaver
This forces the device into a Deep sleep when the screen goes off by killing applications and turning off all internal chipsets that have wakelock capability, most commonly networking on the Nexus 4. This will allow your phone to charge (slowly) off USB without an issue. Another common wakelock is when the device is picked up by your desktop as a media device. The USB controller inside the Nexus 4 forces a wakelock which keeps it from charging. Stupid design, I know.
* A more hackish solution is to install Francos kernel, buy his app, and tick the Fast charging option in the kernel settings dialog. This will force the phone to think that everything is an AC adaptor and will force the phone to draw as much current as it can from the USB port (which on most modern motherboards is fine, and results in extremely quick charging).
* An even simpler solution than all this is to just use a 'USB Charging cable' - this is simply a cable that does not have the Data pins, and as such does exactly the same as what enabling USB fast charge above does. http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Micro-USB...487076?pt=PDA_Accessories&hash=item51a465d124
If you live near a Poundland store here in the UK they sell a 4 in one USB cable type thing which turns 1 USB port into Ipod sync connector, Nokia connector, MicroUSB and MiniUSB, and this doesn't have the data pins and as such is excellent.
One final point, an excellent app for monitoring whether your device is actually charging or not and how quickly is Current widget: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.manor.currentwidget&hl=en
This widget will tell you how much Ampage is going into or leaving your battery. If the battery icon is green, then it's discharging, if it's black/white then it's charging. The bigger the number, the faster the discharge/charge. This is an extremely easy way to test speed of chargers too.
Recommendations
Another solution, just use an AC Wall wart - they're cheap as hell and the one supplied with the Nexus 4 is an extremely fast charging one. Shame I've gone and lost mine.
A way to roughly monitor charging current draw
I'd also recommend you install https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.manor.currentwidget&hl=en and monitor, if the battery is green while charging it's discharging and you need a more powerful charger/to figure out what's causing your phone to use so much power.
General good values in Current Widget
I generally saw a max draw of about 750mA for charging (not including draw for powering the device, the Nexus 4 can draw more power to charge and power the device) on my old Rev10 first generation Nexus 4. On my new Rev12 board I'm noticing this increase to about 850mA.
Are higher amperage chargers any benefit to anyone?
Yes and no. You will not notice faster charging unless you use your device while charging. Your nexus will draw as much power as it needs to power the phone while charging at the fastest rate. For example on the stock 1.2a charger
1200mA | 800mA goes to charging 400mA goes to powering the phone idling
Let's say you start a stability test. Your phone will obviously be using a lot more power so this will happen
1200mA | -600mA goes to charging and 1800mA goes to powering the phone stability testing
That minus value above may look strange! Let me explain. If the phone needs more power than the charger can supply, it will draw from the battery. That's the minus number.
If you have a higher ampage charger like for example a 2.5a charger
2500mA | 800mA goes to charging 400mA goes to powering the device
Stability testing
2500mA | 700mA goes to charging 1800mA goes to powering the device
Can you see the difference?
DISCLAIMER: I am not an electronics engineer nor do I claim to be, I am simply a hobbyist and this is what I've found to be the case. Please correct me if I've made any mistakes, I want to learn.
Thanks!
Thanks so much for this post. It's very helpful.
kn100 said:
Another common wakelock is when the device is picked up by your desktop as a media device. The USB controller inside the Nexus 4 forces a wakelock which keeps it from charging. Stupid design, I know.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This isn't true for everyone then as mine connects and charges just fine off of my laptop and desktop when connected as a media device. In fact its on my laptop right now charging, gone from 68% to 81% in about 30 minutes and it shows connected as a portable media player.
Great info! Thanks for writing this!
In certain use cases the Nexus4 discharges faster than it charges and this is a very useful guide.
I use my phone for navigation in my car and having the GPS on and the screen at high brightness
drains the battery faster than the 0.5A car chargers can supply. Car chargers rated for 2.0A work well.
I haven't tried a 'USB charging cable' with the data pins shorted, it may work as well.
-Mindroid- said:
Great info! Thanks for writing this!
In certain use cases the Nexus4 discharges faster than it charges and this is a very useful guide.
I use my phone for navigation in my car and having the GPS on and the screen at high brightness
drains the battery faster than the 0.5A car chargers can supply. Car chargers rated for 2.0A work well.
I haven't tried a 'USB charging cable' with the data pins shorted, it may work as well.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
was over in Nexus 7 forums and the 4.2.x kernel should have solved the problem at least for having to use shorted cables. have to wait and see if 4.2.2 brings any more changes.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1984838
Section 6 in this link is about power supplied through USB
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Serial_Bus
I can't tell if we have an updated kernel allowing faster usb charging as I'm limited by the power output of the usb port in my laptop. The output (5V at 500mA max) is controlled by the laptop (USB Standards) and it doesn't matter what the phone or cable is capable of as that's the max it will give out and that's about what I'm charging at. If I had a dedicated charging port in my laptop then it would be different and I could see if its able to draw more power. I have a 1.0 amp port in my car and it does charge at the higher amperage, I would assume it would do the same thing if I had a 2 amp usb port in the car. So I think the stock kernel has the fast usb charge built in it just depends upon if you have a usb port capable of providing a faster charger, it has nothing to do with the cable as I'm using a standard unmodified micro usb cable and its able to draw the max a usb device is able to put out.
thanks
thanks for a great detailed post!!!
I have the same trouble with my N4 when I was charging while using my phone...
I find it very slow... I guess I've been spoiled by my previous iPhone (which charges fairly fast)....
i might be stating the obvious but I find the phone charged "a lot" faster when it's OFF
if you are running low with your battery and need a quick 10 min charge, just do yourself a favour by turning off your phone...
the difference is quite significant!
kzoodroid said:
This isn't true for everyone then as mine connects and charges just fine off of my laptop and desktop when connected as a media device. In fact its on my laptop right now charging, gone from 68% to 81% in about 30 minutes and it shows connected as a portable media player.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yup, me too. It only discharges while charging when I am playing like NFS most wanted.
Sent from my Nexus 4 using xda app-developers app
The issue with cables is with the LG usb wall charger as the one supplied isn't capable of getting the 5 volts at 1.2 amps that the charger is rated at, mine is getting around 300 - 400 mA. The micro usb cable I have in my car and use with my laptop (for charging and data transfer) is able to handle the higher amperage, it gets around 1 amp with the LG plug. There are no specs on these cables so I can't list a definitive difference and I would assume that the cable mod in the OP might help with the LG cable. It also might just be simpler to only buy those cables capable of handling higher amperage as obviously they are out there from my experience.
The cable I'm using is an RCA coiled charging/syncing cable model AH732CBR (has data pins). The maximum I'm getting from this is about 870 mA regardless of the amperage of the usb port, I've tried a 1.0, 1.2 and 2.1 and they are all around 870 mA on current widget. I would suppose if I could find a strictly charging cable I could get higher (link to ebay in OP is outdated) but this is still 2x that which I'm getting from the LG cable supplied with the phone which only puts out 300-400 mA. Our phone also has Qualcomm's quick charge which is supposed to improve battery charging times by 40%.
http://www.droid-life.com/2013/02/1...allows-your-device-to-charge-up-to-40-faster/
How do you measure how much mA the device draw from the charger?
Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk 2
omrij said:
How do you measure how much mA the device draw from the charger?
Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk 2
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
current widget, link is in the OP
kzoodroid said:
The cable I'm using is an RCA coiled charging/syncing cable model AH732CBR (has data pins). The maximum I'm getting from this is about 870 mA regardless of the amperage of the usb port, I've tried a 1.0, 1.2 and 2.1 and they are all around 870 mA on current widget. I would suppose if I could find a strictly charging cable I could get higher (link to ebay in OP is outdated) but this is still 2x that which I'm getting from the LG cable supplied with the phone which only puts out 300-400 mA. Our phone also has Qualcomm's quick charge which is supposed to improve battery charging times by 40%.
http://www.droid-life.com/2013/02/1...allows-your-device-to-charge-up-to-40-faster/
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Bit of a late reply but please bear in mind the Nexus will NOT draw anything more than about 800mAh from the wall for charging alone. That is the absolute max and is a hardware limit - If the cable is transmitting that and it's showing in current widget you've got a good setup. See the added section in OP for more info on higher amperage chargers.

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