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[Q] Help - weird battery issues with Nexus S!

Hey all,
My wife and I both have Nexus S phones bought together sometime in Jan. Both phones are running stock Android 2.3.2, no rooting or anything done yet.
Right now her phone is behaving weirdly, while mine is perfectly normal. I suspect that her battery is messed up somehow, but I can't figure out what to do.
For the last day or so, when her phone hits <15% battery, the low battery warning pop-up appears.. and just keeps reappearing. No matter how many times the pop-up is acknowledged, the pop-up just does *not* go away until we connect the phone to a charger. Sort of an aggressive warning
This means that the phone won't let itself be put to sleep, keep the screen turned off or anything -- unless we connect the phone to a charger. I feel as though the battery is charging slowly, but I can't be sure.
Another weird thing we're just noticing is that when we lock the phone by pressing the power button, the screen goes off and comes back on immediately. We have to press the power button a second time for it to actually switch off the display. This behavior goes away if the phone is connected to the charger. My phone does not show this behaviour - display goes off the moment I press the power button, regardless of charging status.
Any thoughts?
Alternatively, could anyone point me to how to recalibrate the battery on the Nexus S? We removed the battery and put it back in (which is basically a soft reset apparently) and now it seems as though the battery has lost calibration or something. Have not done a hard reset yet -- should I go ahead and try that too?
Thoughts/help much appreciated. This is very worrisome!

satishev said:
Another weird thing we're just noticing is that when we lock the phone by pressing the power button, the screen goes off and comes back on immediately. We have to press the power button a second time for it to actually switch off the display.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sounds like it has a glitch in the software. Try wiping everything. Go into settings, unmount the USB memory, erase the USB memory, then do a factory reset. That will reload the firmware back into active memory for the phone and wipe anything out of the USB memory that might be causing this issue. I usually do a factory reset with a new phone after I play with it for a while anyway, and it doesn't hurt the phone at all. You simply lose your texts, contacts, photos, etc. Just copy or backup anything you need to keep and wipe it clean.
If that doesn't fix it, then you need to get it replaced.
Alternatively, could anyone point me to how to recalibrate the battery on the Nexus S?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Once you do a factory reset, turn off the phone and fully charge it using the supplied AC charger (don't use the computer port to charge), unplug it and wait a minute then re-connect the charger again for another hour, unplug it, turn on the phone and start using it.
Let us know if the reset fixes the issue.

I was hoping to get away without a factory reset, but I guess we have no choice. Will give it a shot later today, and let you know how it goes. Thanks.

satishev said:
I was hoping to get away without a factory reset, but I guess we have no choice. Will give it a shot later today, and let you know how it goes. Thanks.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well a factory reset is a lot easier and faster than a return/exchange and accomplishes the same thing.

A new symptom has just surfaced -- right now, when my wife tries to lock the phone, it locks the screen but won't switch off the display. No matter how many times the phone is restarted, or the lock button is pressed, the display never actually goes off (timeout has been varied from 15 secs to 1 minute, to no avail). Phone was completely charged as of today morning, so its not popping any low battery warnings.. just not switching off display.
It definitely seems like a battery/software glitch of some kind. We've not done the factory reset yet (she's at work, and this just started happening). Just thought I'd keep the thread updated.

I went ahead and factory reset the phone, as well as manually installed the 2.3.3 update. Figured between the system reset and the update, something should get fixed
Restoring settings was relatively painless (love how everything just gets set up the way it was due to backing up everything with Google). We have the phone charging now (overnight), will update again tomorrow morning once its full charged and my wife is using it as normal.

Fixed?
Hey @satishev
I have the exact same problem, did yours get fixed?
thanks

Hey crobbie, sorry I forgot to update the thread.
After factory reset and update to 2.3.3, the phone has been working normally (so far). All issues related to battery/display are gone! Looks like it was some kind of software glitch that was causing it to read battery state incorrectly (Another symptom I had noticed was that on alarm/dock mode it would keep flashing a charging icon, despite no charger being connected). Initially after reset, the battery usage was acting wonky, but that worked itself out and everything is showing what I expect.
If interested, a blog post summarizing process/ZIPs for all updates to date can be found here.
Thanks, bfksc for all your help

(solved-post #7) Bricked phone+black screen

I have been running the new cm9 ics ROM for about 2 days now, and had just got all my data and apps sorted and fully working. I sat down, watched some TV, and after 30 mins i checked my phone. Black screen ( i assume its locked) i tap the power button, nothing, again nothing. I now think i must have turned my phone off. I now hold the power button, nothing, again, nothing. I grab my charger, put my phone on charge and notice no orange or green light. I have repeatedly tried to revive my phone but nothing works. I don't know if its the software, battery, charger, Im so confused. Please if anyone has had the same problem, or has any suggestions, i would appreciate it very much. Thanks.
some extra details: i charged my phone over night the day before, so it shouldn't have died ( i know you shouldnt charge overnight, but i do :/)
i wasn't trying to flash anything or messing around with files, it was in my pocket.
i didn't drop it

Gaff3rs said:
I have been running the new cm9 ics ROM for about 2 days now, and had just got all my data and apps sorted and fully working. I sat down, watched some TV, and after 30 mins i checked my phone. Black screen ( i assume its locked) i tap the power button, nothing, again nothing. I now think i must have turned my phone off. I now hold the power button, nothing, again, nothing. I grab my charger, put my phone on charge and notice no orange or green light. I have repeatedly tried to revive my phone but nothing works. I don't know if its the software, battery, charger, Im so confused. Please if anyone has had the same problem, or has any suggestions, i would appreciate it very much. Thanks.
some extra details: i charged my phone over night the day before, so it shouldn't have died ( i know you shouldnt charge overnight, but i do :/)
i wasn't trying to flash anything or messing around with files, it was in my pocket.
i didn't drop it
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Don't panic. Stay calm. The most of our ics roms suffer from reboots or freezes at this stage of development. Your phone simply froze, this can happen with screen on or turned off. If the three button combo (power and volume + -) does not work, You need to wait until the battery drains out.
if you pull the battery there is a chance to freeze your emmc chip and really brick your phone. If you connect the phone to PC before pulling the Batt there's a little lower risk. But I still don't recommend to do so. After your phone is running again, you should overvolt by 25 to hopefully prevent your phone from freezing again.
Ps.
Really, please stay calm, this happened to me about 20 times on ics roms and I'm not the only one.
Sent by my fingers to your head.

thanks, i will just wait then, is it normal that adb won't recognise the device? and also two things, how long roughly will it take to drain completely? and when it is completely drained, what do i do? charge as normal?
thanks a lot

Gaff3rs said:
thanks, i will just wait then, is it normal that adb won't recognise the device? and also two things, how long roughly will it take to drain completely? and when it is completely drained, what do i do? charge as normal?
thanks a lot
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
1. Yes, if it's frozen adb does not recognize the device
2. Depends on how much loaded your battery was. Could be between 1-12 hours
For me very often it didn't need that long, phone restarted by itself after some time.. (30 mins?) But sometimes I also had to wait long..
3.yes, charge normal
Edit: since your screen is off it could take even more than 12 hours
post your results
Sent by my fingers to your head.

Nothing yet i think i will have to wait to tomorrow
EDIT: 11:00 am GMT still nothing, it's been almost 24 hours; should I just keep waiting?
And is there any way to tell wether it's frozen, or the Emmc chip is broken? Thanks

Hey, I've been looking around the forums, and it seems to me that my phone's emmc chip is fine. I admit I did, in a panic, pull out the battery and re-insert it, but on other forums people with a 'fried' emmc chip can at least boot their phone, mine is just completely un-responsive, with a black screen and nothing, when you put it on charge. Am I right or could you shed some light on the problem?
Thanks

Gaff3rs said:
Hey, I've been looking around the forums, and it seems to me that my phone's emmc chip is fine. I admit I did, in a panic, pull out the battery and re-insert it, but on other forums people with a 'fried' emmc chip can at least boot their phone, mine is just completely un-responsive, with a black screen and nothing, when you put it on charge. Am I right or could you shed some light on the problem?
Thanks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Seems to me exactly like the freeze I and a bunch of others are suffering from. If you think you can take the risk, you could try pulling the battery.
1. Connect to PC first.
2. Pull battery.
3. Pull USB cable
4. Insert battery after few minutes
5. Try to reboot recovery with adb
As I said there is a chance of freezing your emmc. You might succeed, but you might totally brick your phone too. I'm not responsible, I told you the risk..
Sent by my fingers to your head.

I had a spare battery lying around, did what you said above, instead putting the other battery in and not going on adb, but nothing happened. I think I am going to have to try what you said above ^^^
Oh and once I have put the battery back in do I turn the phone on? It might sound stupid but I don't want to get it wrong :/
Alright a few details:
My phone connected to the computer with a battery in (I don't have a clue how full it is) is not recognised as a 'device with removable storage'
It won't charge (or the orange light won't come on)

Yes, to see if it's booting, I would suggest to turn it on
As I said, try to reboot via adb.
And I would recommend to reboot into recovery and flash another ROM or backup, you don't want to freeze your phone again today, do you?
Sent by my fingers to your head.

I've taken my bay out and am just waiting a few minutes :/

Alright it seemsbe booting, could be a boot loop though
Edit : it's working I'm on the home screen of cm9
You don't know how much I love you right now thanks so much for all the help (I didn't even need adb, it just booted normally 0.o)

Keep your fingers crossed
Edit: glad you already solved it.
You're welcome mate
Sent by my fingers to your head.

As I said, overvolt by 25 to hopefully prevent the phone from freezing again.
Or simply do flash a stable ROM. I would prefer this as I don't like to freeze my phone and brutally pull the batt
Sent by my fingers to your head.

I'm trawling through pages and pages of ROMs I think I will stick to stable ones now

If you want sense, try endymion, by far the best.
No sense - reaper, fastest ever.
Just my personal opinion.
Sent by my fingers to your head.

I may have not the thread in its entirety..
But did you try VolumeUp + VolumeDown + Power button combination.
Which can often reboot a hung/stuck phone?

[Q] HTC Sensation Unresponsive

Hi guys,
I have had my Sensation rooted with ARHD for about 4-5 weeks and everything has been smooth till now, when yesterday I was just reading an text message and my phone's screen went black but still lit up. I replaced the battery, SIM, SD and tried rebooting but it would still just appear as a black screen with the backlight on, but the keys are not lit up. Occasionally, the HTC splash screen would appear after taking the battery out and restarting, but then would again, go to the black screen. I can't go into Boot Loader either (i think i had my phone set to fast-boot cause I need to frequently switch my phone off).
Anyone have any ideas as to what I should do?
Cheers in advance

Try the taking out the SD card and then booting with the power/vol dn combo to see if you can get to the bootloader. If successful, may have to reload your firmware (P58IMG) and possibly ROM.

Just fyi fastboot has absolutely nothing to do with how fast your phone turns on lol.

Kevc44485 said:
Just fyi fastboot has absolutely nothing to do with how fast your phone turns on lol.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Enable fastboot in settings, power off your phone and then power it back up again (without taking out the battery).
Your phone will boot in a jiffy. This more of a Sleep-Wake than a Power Off & power On, but yes, enabling the fastboot option will boot up the phone faster.

nabbyboii said:
Hi guys,
I have had my Sensation rooted with ARHD for about 4-5 weeks and everything has been smooth till now, when yesterday I was just reading an text message and my phone's screen went black but still lit up. I replaced the battery, SIM, SD and tried rebooting but it would still just appear as a black screen with the backlight on, but the keys are not lit up. Occasionally, the HTC splash screen would appear after taking the battery out and restarting, but then would again, go to the black screen. I can't go into Boot Loader either (i think i had my phone set to fast-boot cause I need to frequently switch my phone off).
Anyone have any ideas as to what I should do?
Cheers in advance
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
There were threads a few weeks ago simiar to this with Sensations randomly dying.
What version of ARHD were you running, kernel, and firmware?

gustav30 said:
What version of ARHD were you running, kernel, and firmware?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm running ARHD 6.5.5 with 3.32.401.5 (can't remember anything after 5) and selected the Sebastian kernel when I installed the ROM ...

Kevc44485 said:
Just fyi fastboot has absolutely nothing to do with how fast your phone turns on lol.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
He means the feature that just suspends your phone instead of powering off. Ironically, both methods don't fully turn the phone off. Coincidentally, it's also called Fast Boot. You're thinking of that set of bootloader tools.
As per OPs issue, I have no idea. It sounds hardware related, but intermittent. Perhaps crack it open and see if there are any loose ribbon connectors or anything? I'm thinking the ribbon responsible for the screen may be loose. If it's loose but still kind of in place, the pins responsible for power might still be in contact but the ones responsible for sending data to the LCD might not. That could be why it turns on but it's only solid black. Pulling the battery and putting it back in might just coincidentally be "helping" because the angle of the phone is affecting a loose ribbon. Mind you, this is all speculation, and it might not be hardware at all, but that's my best guess.
Also, if you can get it resolved, never use HTC's Fast Boot. It's convenient, but tends to be a major pain when you have legitimate issues.

I have been having similar issues. My phone will be fine and all of a sudden it will turn off. Receiving calls, changing tracks from the lockscreen or playing games. Sometimes just unlocking my phone to use it will cause it to crash. Then getting it to boot again can be a royal pain in the behind. Anywhere from the first bootsplash to first unlock / loading the UI can make it crash and it's usually a pull of the battery SIM and SD to get it to boot.
Age of the ROM is something I have noticed to be a factor, the older the ROM, the more likely it is to do this but wiping cache and Dalvik from 4EXT has no real effect on stopping it from happening for any noticeable length of time.
Also to note, battery life seems to be very jumpy when this happens. I have had 4% battery life for hours, listened to music (at volume) and it's remained at 4%. Hardware LED isn't lit and it's just the OS with it's UI warning me so every so often, with the battery indicator staying at the 4%. It'll change again if the phone crashes again. Either to an accurate reading or to another fixed percentage, but it seems to like the 4%.
Not sure if it's the ROM, or firmware, but my previous ROM's have been using Bricked Kernel. I don't know it that's a deciding factor or not.
Sorry for hijacking the thread, but I too have stability issues and been wanting to say something on here for a while.
I'll post version details later on as I'm just about to get ready for a road trip.
Mark

kgs1992 said:
Enable fastboot in settings, power off your phone and then power it back up again (without taking out the battery).
Your phone will boot in a jiffy. This more of a Sleep-Wake than a Power Off & power On, but yes, enabling the fastboot option will boot up the phone faster.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
fastboot has nothing to do with how fast your phone boots up. take your battery out and put it back in then start it and see if it starts up fast. you're thinking of quick start from basically hibernate
http://android-dls.com/wiki/index.php?title=Fastboot

Did I fry my phone?!

I really dont understand what happened.
I'm running one of sean's builds for a few weeks now and everything has been running as expected. However, after charging from a higher amp charger, (An ASUS transformer wall charger) my phone now only bootloops. The only time I broke the bootloop was when I plugged it into my car charger.
I don't know what to do, is it possible to save or did I fry it with my charger?
Also, the phone powers on to the first and second samsung boot screens, then the screen goes dark, the phone vibrates 5-6 times, and restarts.
EDIT: I managed to get into recovery mode once, but it turned off from the seemingly bad power.
I have also tried a stock battery as well as an extended battery.

I used a 2A charger to charge my phone a couple of times, the phone only takes as much as it needs so I doubt that's the cause.
Can you get into recovery with OEM charger connected? And what about download mode?

Liquidmetal6 said:
I really dont understand what happened.
I'm running one of sean's builds for a few weeks now and everything has been running as expected. However, after charging from a higher amp charger, (An ASUS transformer wall charger) my phone now only bootloops. The only time I broke the bootloop was when I plugged it into my car charger.
I don't know what to do, is it possible to save or did I fry it with my charger?
Also, the phone powers on to the first and second samsung boot screens, then the screen goes dark, the phone vibrates 5-6 times, and restarts.
EDIT: I managed to get into recovery mode once, but it turned off from the seemingly bad power.
I have also tried a stock battery as well as an extended battery.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
There have been issues with the power button getting stuck and causing what seems like a boot loop. Check that first.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I727 using xda premium

Is it possible something on my ROM spontaneously corrupted?
And my phone can do anything, except it always turns off. Sometimes I can get to the boot screen, but it turns off and tries to restart. So, I'm basically screwed with my warranty because there's enough for them to tell I'm rooted, but the phone won't stay on long enough to Odin.
Also I checked my power button, it doesn't appear to be stuck.

can it stay in dl mode w/o restarting, if yes go back to stock

To be honest the way you describe the issue it sounds like the power button is internally stuck or something. Try measuring how long since it boots to when it restarts if its always the same and around 10 seconds it's probably a hard reset from the power button.

I will start measuring that in a minute, thanks.
And after numerous attempts I finally managed to get it to go into download mode!

After timing it, it's always on 7.5-8 seconds of the reset.
So if that's the issue, is that fixable?

sounds like the power button, press really hard repeatedly on the button until it unsticks

vincom said:
sounds like the power button, press really hard repeatedly on the button until it unsticks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This turned out to be the issue, thanks for the help!Got it fixed at the warranty repair center today.

Liquidmetal6 said:
This turned out to be the issue, thanks for the help!Got it fixed at the warranty repair center today.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Glad to hear.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I727 using xda premium

I use a galaxy tab charger with no issues seems to charge faster and get hotter but sall good
CM9 Skyrocket

Battery?

So I just picked up this s3, it will turn on but shuts off halfway through galaxy splash screen. Boots into recovery and Odin mode just fine, prior to purchasing we plugged it in, got it to boot and did a factory reset, to clear privious owners data, and it went fine, did it reboot and took me to setup. Satisfied with its performance I went ahead and made the purchase, upon unplugging it shut off, as I expected if battery was indeed shot. What gets me is I let it charge, unplugged, booted, shut off at splash screen, plug back in and says its still fully charged. Boot into recovery and indeed, 100% battery. I haven't gotten around to flashing twrp or rooting, was wondering if anyone has experienced this?
Sent from my HTC Desire HD using XDA Free mobile app

Anyone got any ideas? Just got home, am able to boot past the splash screens as long as its plugged in but once I try to start using it (going through setup/tutorial) it ends up rebooting, computer can read phone in odin/recovery modes but don't see a point reflashing stock firmware if this phone was never touched, completely stock unrooted, just a factory reset upon purchasing. I've read somewhere about a stuck power button, is that common among the Verizon s3? If so ill pop it open and check it out.

Phone was already on 4.4 when I got it, I downloaded and flashed stock firmware (ne1) via odin, I got the whole way to the end of setup and as soon as it started loading the homescreen it cut off and went to the green battery charge icon when phones off. Everytime I try and boot it, she'll go through all the splash screens and ill catch a very short glimpse of the homescreen and it shuts off. Also it HAS to be plugged in still, or else it just shuts off halfway through initial "galaxy s3" splash.. I don't understand...

Have you tried a new battery? Even if it's plugged in it won't run if the battery is completely shot.
Also if you indeed have a Verizon S3 on NE1 firmware you will not be able to install TWRP as the bootloader is locked. You will be able to root, however.

Muhff said:
Anyone got any ideas? Just got home, am able to boot past the splash screens as long as its plugged in but once I try to start using it (going through setup/tutorial) it ends up rebooting, computer can read phone in odin/recovery modes but don't see a point reflashing stock firmware if this phone was never touched, completely stock unrooted, just a factory reset upon purchasing. I've read somewhere about a stuck power button, is that common among the Verizon s3? If so ill pop it open and check it out.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The stuck power button seems to affect users IN recovery mode too, it seems like phone randomly reboots in recovery.
You can pick up a new battery from amazon for like $7 I think, its been a while, but might be worth it.
It could also maybe be some issue in transferring charge from the battery to the main board, meaning maybe bad connections/contacts.
Is it plugged in when it reboots, because that may indicate poor contacts, since the charger alone isn't able to power the device (ex I used to be able to take out my LG Ally battery when plugged in and it functioned fine).
Good luck!
Sent from my SCH-I535 using XDA Free mobile app

XdrummerXboy said:
The stuck power button seems to affect users IN recovery mode too, it seems like phone randomly reboots in recovery.
You can pick up a new battery from amazon for like $7 I think, its been a while, but might be worth it.
It could also maybe be some issue in transferring charge from the battery to the main board, meaning maybe bad connections/contacts.
Is it plugged in when it reboots, because that may indicate poor contacts, since the charger alone isn't able to power the device (ex I used to be able to take out my LG Ally battery when plugged in and it functioned fine).
Good luck!
Sent from my SCH-I535 using XDA Free mobile app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Turns out it was the battery all along, found a battery that the contacts matched on (even though it was only 1650 mAh) wedged it in with paper and it booted just fine. Found a battery on craigslist that night and has worked great ever since, unfortunately PO had already updated to 4.4.2 so im stuck with that Thanks for the response, I just found it odd that the battery held a charge just didn't work.. maybe I should check the contacts on that and clean them.

Muhff said:
Turns out it was the battery all along, found a battery that the contacts matched on (even though it was only 1650 mAh) wedged it in with paper and it booted just fine. Found a battery on craigslist that night and has worked great ever since, unfortunately PO had already updated to 4.4.2 so im stuck with that Thanks for the response, I just found it odd that the battery held a charge just didn't work.. maybe I should check the contacts on that and clean them.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm glad you fixed the problem!
Sent from my SCH-I535 using XDA Free mobile app