dead battery or dead zaurus?

[alberto00]

Hello.
I have a zaurus 5500 and please I have a question:
I did not charge my 5500 for some days, and suddenly when I plug the ac power cord did not charge at all, neither the yellow battery charging led worked nor zaurus worked again!!
Please this is a battery or a serious problem with the Zaurus?
this device works just with the ac power cord, or always needs a battery? since with or without it never turns on again...


thanx in advance..

[Xaser]

Well, hope that this first aid could help...
1) First remove the Z from the craddle or remove the adapter plug from the Z, switch the lacth and remove the battery cover, remove the battery from the Z, and then MAINTAIN PRESSED THE reset inside the battery bay for at least 15 seconds with the stylus (with care), with this you could try to force a total internal reset of the Z, then reinstall the battery, press one touch on the reset button again,  put the cover and flip the switch,  then connect the adapter and the plug directly to the Z, and press ON....  Good luck!

2) If the above didnt work remove the battery, press reset for 20 seconds and the leave the Z  for 24 hours witout battery and without the adapter, then mount the battery,press one touch on reset,put cover,flip switch and ON again...

3) You could test the battery with a voltmeter, and the posibility that the battery discharge at a point that damage itself I didnt believe, and always in that case,I doubt that your Z is damaged.... but may be posible that your Z expect a Battery good inside to turn on,but at last case,get out the battery,press reset again, and then put the cover without battery, flip the switch and then test the Z with the adapter only...

Best regards and good luck!

[alberto00]

Hi Xaser, I did tried 1) and nothings happened, I am gonna try the other ones, so I will tell u.

Also, I did already tried this before reading your post:
- Soft and full reset.
- Recharged with the external ac for more than 2 days.

I just need to know if it is a hardware problem or just a battery problem. Since when I plugged the device to the power cord, the zaurus just some minutes later became quite hot but neither yellow battery led worked nor zaurus workeed...

Uhmm thanx for any advise, Ijust need to know if someone had this problem and how to resolve it...

[alberto00]

Hi Xaser, I did tried 1) and nothings happened, I am gonna try the other ones, so I will tell u.

Also, I did already tried this before reading your post:
- Soft and full reset.
- Recharged with the external ac for more than 2 days.

I just need to know if it is a hardware problem or just a battery problem. Since when I plugged the device to the power cord, the zaurus just some minutes later became quite hot but neither yellow battery led worked nor zaurus workeed...

Uhmm thanx for any advise, Ijust need to know if someone had this problem and how to resolve it...Xaser, Xaser, Xaser, Xaser, Xaser,

[Xaser]

OK, well,sorry about the late answer, but I was working off town (as I usually do, in fact that was one of the reasons because I got my Z...)

well, about your issue...  the HOT sympton info could be some bad or could be worst....  ( I doubt the last because you said that the only thing before the troubles was leave unplugged your z, so I think more in a fault battery...)

well, I would suggest others steps in case that the previous 1,2 or 3 didnt help...

the issue of HOT may suggest a Battery with its internal short circuit, (or a short circuit on some part of the charger circuit of your Z motherboard...     ), well, because that is a MUST to determine WHAT is the part  that made the hot so ,hera are some few tips that could help you...

4) Try to find someone near to you that had a Z same as yours and try a test with a normal operating battery (this could be not easy because the Zs are no too much spreaded....  hummmm a theme to thing.... ) well if you didnt have a good Z near to you try the following...

5) Separate your Z and you battery, lets then  for 24 hours and mount them together...  BUT FIRST lets a light cold of both parts, some tips on this..  put the Z and the battery in separate sealing type plastic bags (like ZIPLOCK bags....), inside the bag put some silica gel  bags (the small white bags that came inside the bags with electronic stuff for absorb the moisture on the packages during delivery...), THIS IS VERY IMPORTANT!!!!... put a silica gel bag in the battery bag too.... seal them and put on the refrigerator around 20 minutes to cold down both....  check than them are cold at the touch of the finger,then CLEAN VERY WELL any moistrue of the Z and the battery with toilet paper or similar then setup the Z with the batterry and connect the adapter cable to the Z for few minutes and at the first signal of hot, unplug the Z and hurry check what part ( the battery or the Z are more hot than the other, ) so if the battery is hottest that the Z may be you had some luck and only your battery die, but if your Z is more hot than the battery then may be you had to service your Z...  or replace it...

5) for be sure , at last this is a advice that I read somewhere (i Use it to diagnose the battery of my notebook and the battery was dead)... repeat the procedure of colding but ONLY FOR THE BATTERRY, and put some silica bags on the same bag together with the battery inside the same sealed plastic bag and put in the refrigerator for 24 hours, then CLEAN VERY WELL any moistrue of the battery surface with toilet paper or similar...and retest the whole thing again,  if for some minutes the things work and after the things goes hot the almost for sure you had a die battery...

6) About battery replace, I didnt know about  similar, but by know some cellular phones use batteries that are very similars to the Z\'s in a  very suspected way...so If you need to change your battery, I suggest you that start by searching a replacement in a large cellular pnoe battery store and may be you could find a nice replace... the phone that I saw with similar batteries are motorola, but never tested of know somthing more, I noted it some weeks ago when I had some trouble with my cell pone and had to go toa cellstore for some service, and the girl borrow me a motorola 130 or something like that but in that time I didnt had my Z with me or rememnber the voltage of the Z...


GOOD LUCK and best regards!  

Xaser

[Xaser]

OK, well,sorry about the late answer, but I was working off town (as I usually do, in fact that was one of the reasons because I got my Z...)

well, about your issue...  the HOT sympton info could be some bad or could be worst....  ( I doubt the last because you said that the only thing before the troubles was leave unplugged your z, so I think more in a fault battery...)

well, I would suggest others steps in case that the previous 1,2 or 3 didnt help...

the issue of HOT may suggest a Battery with its internal short circuit, (or a short circuit on some part of the charger circuit of your Z motherboard...     ), well, because that is a MUST to determine WHAT is the part  that made the hot so ,hera are some few tips that could help you...

4) Try to find someone near to you that had a Z same as yours and try a test with a normal operating battery (this could be not easy because the Zs are no too much spreaded....  hummmm a theme to thing.... ) well if you didnt have a good Z near to you try the following...

5) Separate your Z and you battery, lets then  for 24 hours and mount them together...  BUT FIRST lets a light cold of both parts, some tips on this..  put the Z and the battery in separate sealing type plastic bags (like ZIPLOCK bags....), inside the bag put some silica gel  bags (the small white bags that came inside the bags with electronic stuff for absorb the moisture on the packages during delivery...), THIS IS VERY IMPORTANT!!!!... put a silica gel bag in the battery bag too.... seal them and put on the refrigerator around 20 minutes to cold down both....  check than them are cold at the touch of the finger,then CLEAN VERY WELL any moistrue of the Z and the battery with toilet paper or similar then setup the Z with the batterry and connect the adapter cable to the Z for few minutes and at the first signal of hot, unplug the Z and hurry check what part ( the battery or the Z are more hot than the other, ) so if the battery is hottest that the Z may be you had some luck and only your battery die, but if your Z is more hot than the battery then may be you had to service your Z...  or replace it...

5) for be sure , at last this is a advice that I read somewhere (i Use it to diagnose the battery of my notebook and the battery was dead)... repeat the procedure of colding but ONLY FOR THE BATTERRY, and put some silica bags on the same bag together with the battery inside the same sealed plastic bag and put in the refrigerator for 24 hours, then CLEAN VERY WELL any moistrue of the battery surface with toilet paper or similar...and retest the whole thing again,  if for some minutes the things work and after the things goes hot the almost for sure you had a die battery...

6) About battery replace, I didnt know about  similar, but by know some cellular phones use batteries that are very similars to the Z\'s in a  very suspected way...so If you need to change your battery, I suggest you that start by searching a replacement in a large cellular pnoe battery store and may be you could find a nice replace... the phone that I saw with similar batteries are motorola, but never tested of know somthing more, I noted it some weeks ago when I had some trouble with my cell pone and had to go toa cellstore for some service, and the girl borrow me a motorola 130 or something like that but in that time I didnt had my Z with me or rememnber the voltage of the Z...


GOOD LUCK and best regards!  

Xaser

[alberto00]

Hi , I haven´t try refrigerator procedure, but since I have been tryng to recharged the battery, I have noted, that zaurus deivce is really hot, but not the battery. In this case do u know what exactly is damaged? how come did the device break itself? How much could cost sharp service?
best regards and again thanks for your time
--------------
if the battery is hottest that the Z may be you had some luck and only your battery die, but if your Z is more hot than the battery then may be you had to service your Z...  or replace it

[dhns]

I have noted, that zaurus deivce is really hot, but not the battery. In this case do u know what exactly is damaged? how come did the device break itself?

I have had some system crashes (when heavily modifying system files) after which a \"Reboot\" brings the Zaurus in a similar state as you describe. The display is on, there is a vertical white line on the screen and the image on the screen blurs in a strange way. In that situation, the Zaurus heats up rapidly so that I have always taken out the battery as fast as possible. After that - good luck - I always got a fresh, hard resetted Zaurus.

So I suspect, that there is a state of the power and/or LCD controller which drains a lot of power. And a system kernel crash can bring the Z into this situation. IMHO it appears to happen when overwriting shared libraries that are in use.

I can imagine two cures for this situation:
* reflash the ROM
* have the Zaurus repaired because the ROM or some other circuitry itself is damaged

Finally, replacement batteries are still on stock of some smaller resellers.

-- hns

[alberto00]

My problem is not just about Z getting hot, I can not do anything, since it can not be charge. Z did not power on anymore, even when I plugged it to ac cord, did not work at all,  Z begins really hot, but not the battery. In this case do u know what exactly is damaged? how come did the device break itself?

[Ram]

Tested my bricked sl5000d with no battery, once you try and turn it on the battery light starts to flash. It does not actually switch on so I take that a battery does need to be installed for it to boot up.

[Ram]

Update on my last post.

Plug power directly to Z and did a D & P soft reset and got the Diagnostic Menu up without the battery in stalled.

This was test with my bricked sl5000.

[dhns]

Update on my last post.

Plug power directly to Z and did a D & P soft reset and got the Diagnostic Menu up without the battery in stalled. 

This was test with my bricked sl5000.

And what did the diagnostic say? Could you do some \"factory reset\"?

-- hns

[Ram]

Page 1 option 5 - On each press of the \'OK\' button it scrolls through sreen tests then power and mail lights.
Page 2 option 4 shows battery state.


My bricked Z passes all tests apart from :-
Page 1 option 2 \'Aging\', where it crashes doing a Ram Check (Write) at about 50% or on,
Page 2 option 5 \'Ram\', Ram Check (R/W) [Write] at about 50% crashes.

I suppose it could be fixed by removing the chip and replacing it.

[sa8nt]

I think I just bricked my sl-5500 upgrading to the cracko ROM. :cry:

I\'m able to get into the Diag Menu but have no clue as to what all the info means. I went throught the test for Page 1 option5 with no problems.

I then went to page 2 option 7 (Flash Sum) and had the following message: NG. csum=f873, sum=8aef
I attempted to do google search and found no info.

Also, after exiting the Diag Menu my led lights were working normally so I attempted to reflash my unit...no luv.

Any help would be appriciated.

[bredroll]

ram, you might be able to re-flash your sl5000d by using a rom that only formats 1/2 the memory, you will need to have some fun building initrds and the like, but who knows, you might get a usable machine out of it.