Hello everyone,
I've been trying to pin down a problem with my AT&T GS3 for the last few days and I can't really find anyone describing quite the same symptoms (or maybe I'm slow and missed something somewhere). The problem seems to be that my phone isn't recognizing the battery has a full charge more often than not. It started a few days ago and seems to have gotten worse, as in when I first noticed the problem my phone would still turn on for brief periods of time before failing to 'see' a charge > 0% and then dying. Right now, it just powers up ever so briefly- sometimes it'll just die after it says Samsung or briefly into the boot screen.
Today, I took it apart to inspect the motherboard and connections but I didn't see anything obvious like broken connections or burny, burny components, but idk, everything is small and I didn't have a microscope. I wish I had looked closer at the power IC chip and stuff like that but I'm blind and probably wouldn't have seen anything anyway unless it was super obvious.
Occasionally, instead of showing a sad empty battery when I power it on (plugged in), it'll show 100% like I would expect and it would get slightly further into the boot sequence before dying again and go back to showing empty and making me very sad and confused. I can almost swear this happens more often when I'm holding it a certain way or whatnot. One other thing I noticed is that when this first happened, my battery was about 32% and after a while of 'charging' it would show 86% when I got the 'correct' battery charge to display... next instance was 94%, then 99% and finally 100%... so I can only assume the battery is somehow charging but the phone just hasn't gotten the memo. I bought another battery (OEM) and tried to no avail, so I assume it's not the battery. I've tried multiple chargers and no luck there either.
So, has anyone ever seen anything like this? And if so, do you think it's the power IC, the capacitor in that circuit, or something else that I'm not thinking of entirely? I see that there's 4 battery pins/terminals/whatever and after internet'ing around a bit about phone batteries, it seems that 2 are the normal pos/neg (obvs), one is a thermistor for temperature, and one 'talks' to the phone to tell it all about the battery's voltage, charge, etc because the old way of indicating charge was kinda shoddy apparently. I'm definitely suspecting something to do with that last thing too, but I have no idea what part of the circuit that is.
Any sage wisdom here would be very, very appreciated and thank you in advance.
P.S.
I have some background working with electronics, but not electronics for ants, if that helps at all.
Done / Fixed
Never found out what was wrong with the motherboard but I did buy a GS3 w/ a broken screen off eBay to do the fix for cheap.
$100 (broken phone) - $65 (resale of parts) + unscrewing/rescrewing 10 tiny screws + detaching/reattaching some cute ribbon cables = phone worky worky
If you have an S3 or similarly easy to disassemble phone, I'd highly recommend doing some research and ebay scrounging before dropping a metric crapload of cash on a expensive repair or replacement.
Hi all!
So, I've got quite an annoying problem here. Whenever I plug in my phone (when it's at least beneath 50%, haven't tested it above 50%) it just drops like 20%.
The battery has only been in operation for a few days, it's an entirely new original battery I bought a previous week, means it couldn't be the battery causing it (I replaced it just for that reason that it drops when I plug it in).
So, does somebody know what the problem could be?
Battery: Can't be.
ROM: Possibly, but I've had it on another ROM too, sure of that.
Phone: Could be, but I can't just buy a new one yet.
Thanks in advance!
Bump
Isn't the battery non-removable? Or did you replace it at a support centre or remove the screws to get access to the battery?
From what it looks like, there is probably a short circuit somewhere in your phone's circuit board. There is also the possibility that the charging cable you are using is damaged/burnt on the inside. I recommend you first use a different microUSB cable to charge your phone to see if that solves the issue. I had experience with the latter and solved it using this method.
Heres my issue. i recently replaced the screen and digitizer and lcd....went well..the screen works when the charger is connected but it will shut off as soon as i put the battery in. i take the battery out while connected and it comes back on. I have two batteries...both charged up with my portable charger..but still not working correctly, Does anyone have anyone have any idea of what it could be...i dont want to pay the warranty charge for it..when its be cheaper to do it myself. HELP!!!!
Before flexible-homebutton-softkeys-charger port part replacement :
1. Battery already swollen
2. Home button unresponsive most of the time
After flexible-homebutton-softkeys-charger port part replacement :
1.home button still unresponsive most of the time
2. Charging the phone only reach 15% max, then it goes down to 14%, then goes up to 15% again in infinite cycle
3. Had to use external battery charger in order to get the battery charged to 100%
Which part in my e988 is the real source of this problem ?
Paleskin said:
Before flexible-homebutton-softkeys-charger port part replacement :
1. Battery already swollen
2. Home button unresponsive most of the time
After flexible-homebutton-softkeys-charger port part replacement :
1.home button still unresponsive most of the time
2. Charging the phone only reach 15% max, then it goes down to 14%, then goes up to 15% again in infinite cycle
3. Had to use external battery charger in order to get the battery charged to 100%
Which part in my e988 is the real source of this problem ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I had similar home-button issues with Galaxy R after DIY screen assembly replacement. Can be button having bad physical contact with board (manifested by dropped button, short clicks, hard button or even too soft button; button has to be in level with front panel glass and has to be soft-ish, but shouldn't get stuck or too hard to press), can be board's bad connection with motherboard - check that micro connector, it maybe didn't fit properly or there is possibly some dust in it (this was my issue with Galaxy R).
Battery one is probably connected multiple factors, including broken battery, because I think that charging electronics in E988 won't allow charging of broken batteries on high currents - mine didn't even want to start with broken or replacement batteries without temperature sensor (so had no luck finding good replacements - funny enough, friend with F240K could use all of those). Capacity reading can be also false (but if battery is charging with powerbank, but not with charger, small chances for that) - you may want to check what dmesg reports - it gives constant battery percentage and voltage updates during charging, and also check Ampere measurements while on charger to make sure device actually has some juice coming in.
Last idea was from experience, I've connected mine (while it's pot was 100% functional) to a friends cable, device charged up to some percent (maybe 20%), and started playing same game due to really low charging current it was getting from that cable. Back then I didn't have Ampere, but I was accustomed to things like that from the begging, when my brand-new E988 didn't want to charge on Samsung and Nokia cables Had to trade some really nice and long Nokia cable for crappy LG's one longer than 50cm because of that...
P.S. How did you get that part all in one? Isn't home button/softkeys one assembly, and USB/OTG/MHL/Charging another? Or my old E988 somehow differs from yours. I'm looking for charger assembly because I gave my phone to a family member who asked for it and knew about a problem, and they are already whining how "it works only with one cable and I can't use phone while it's charging!"
ShadySquirrel said:
I had similar home-button issues with Galaxy R after DIY screen assembly replacement. Can be button having bad physical contact with board (manifested by dropped button, short clicks, hard button or even too soft button; button has to be in level with front panel glass and has to be soft-ish, but shouldn't get stuck or too hard to press), can be board's bad connection with motherboard - check that micro connector, it maybe didn't fit properly or there is possibly some dust in it (this was my issue with Galaxy R).
Battery one is probably connected multiple factors, including broken battery, because I think that charging electronics in E988 won't allow charging of broken batteries on high currents - mine didn't even want to start with broken or replacement batteries without temperature sensor (so had no luck finding good replacements - funny enough, friend with F240K could use all of those). Capacity reading can be also false (but if battery is charging with powerbank, but not with charger, small chances for that) - you may want to check what dmesg reports - it gives constant battery percentage and voltage updates during charging, and also check Ampere measurements while on charger to make sure device actually has some juice coming in.
Last idea was from experience, I've connected mine (while it's pot was 100% functional) to a friends cable, device charged up to some percent (maybe 20%), and started playing same game due to really low charging current it was getting from that cable. Back then I didn't have Ampere, but I was accustomed to things like that from the begging, when my brand-new E988 didn't want to charge on Samsung and Nokia cables Had to trade some really nice and long Nokia cable for crappy LG's one longer than 50cm because of that...
P.S. How did you get that part all in one? Isn't home button/softkeys one assembly, and USB/OTG/MHL/Charging another? Or my old E988 somehow differs from yours. I'm looking for charger assembly because I gave my phone to a family member who asked for it and knew about a problem, and they are already whining how "it works only with one cable and I can't use phone while it's charging!"
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This is the part, which I bought online
Yet, it still doesnt fix the problem, is it possible that the IC chip on the board is the real culprit ?
Paleskin said:
This is the part, which I bought online
Yet, it still doesnt fix the problem, is it possible that the IC chip on the board is the real culprit ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm pretty sure my USB board looks like one from the attachment, without all that plastics around... I may be wrong, though, it was long time ago I've opened my device, and I can't really grab it now and open to check out.
As for the IC, chances for that are small. Have you tried charging with other cable/charger pair? If buttons aren't working you can always use on-screen ones, but port is a greater issue.
ShadySquirrel said:
I'm pretty sure my USB board looks like one from the attachment, without all that plastics around... I may be wrong, though, it was long time ago I've opened my device, and I can't really grab it now and open to check out.
As for the IC, chances for that are small. Have you tried charging with other cable/charger pair? If buttons aren't working you can always use on-screen ones, but port is a greater issue.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That plastics are the softkeys, and in the middle are the home button and micro usb port
Tried many cables, all give the same result
Hi! I found my old nexus 5, it has no battery and i replaced the phone because the motherboard didn't charged the battery anymore...
In case, I also have another motherboard with others problems (the video output) obtained from a friend.
So Yesterday i tried to power it on without battery...
Following the battery connector i found the 3 mini pad near the battery connector.
Starting from the right i have positive, negative and the one which i assume is for getting status from the battery.
I tried giving +3.7 to the first two pins and using some resistences to ground to the third pin.
But no video at all. The most of tries, when i turn on the phone, it keeps draining something like 20mA.
Only one time i saw something on screen and it was because i also connected the charger.
Can someone help me? Maybe just to know how to "use" the third pin, or someone which has done the same...Thanks!
Did you ever get any answers? I have a friend that used to do phone repairs and was very active during the Nexus era.