Rockbox.org home
release
dev builds
extras
themes manual
wiki
device status forums
mailing lists
IRC bugs
patches
dev guide
translations



Rockbox mail archive

Subject: Battery Questions not in FAQ

Battery Questions not in FAQ

From: SteamShip <steamship_at_sbcglobal.net>
Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2003 21:51:19 -0500

I read through the FAQ's and did not find this scenario answered. If I
missed the information elsewhere, I apologize for asking now.

I just found my Recorder's ( 20GB #500277) batteries completely dead after
having been plugged into the charger for about 12-14 hours, which puzzled
me. I verified that they were dead with a battery tester. I am sure that
the unit was turned off, and its' USB cable unplugged before charging. I
have not yet flashed the archos firmware, and am running the standard 2.1
Rockbox version. I made sure that the Deep discharge was "off"; and Trickle
"on" before and after this event occurred.

I know the charger is working because the default Archos "Battery Charging"
screen comes on when plugged in, although I don't have testing equipment to
verify the actual voltage output of the new (out of the box) Archos charger.

These were older Radio Shack 1800 mAH batteries, that had been charged in a
Radio Shack external charger, put into the Recorder, and used for two hours
prior to this event. While it is possible that these older batteries have
been charged several hundred times, and have suddenly died, it left me with
some questions:

1) If I do not flash the FIRMWARE, with the unit's power off & upon
connection to the charger, is the battery charging process controlled ONLY
by the hardware?

2) If I DO FLASH the FIRMWARE, with the unit's power off & then upon
connection to the charger, is ANYTHING related to battery charging
controlled by the Rockbox firmware?

3) The battery FAQ discusses the deep/trickle charge settings, but don't
those functions require the unit to be powered on with the Rockbox software
"engaged" before charging begins? If so, it seems somewhat
counter-intuitive to turn the power on in order to use these features.

4) If all power off battery charging is hardware related, is there a built
in deep discharge cycle that may have been responsible for my dead
batteries?

5) Curiously, if the power is off and I recharge, the LED display lights
up, and stays on indefinitely. If the power is on (booted into the Rockbox
software), the display turns off with that menu option, but I'm not sure if
I should be charging with the unit turned on, or if flashing with Rockbox
firmware alters the power off==>charging mode.

Thanks in advance for your clarification. Maybe some of this could be added
to the Battery FAQ's.
Received on 2003-12-19

Page template was last modified "Tue Sep 7 00:00:02 2021" The Rockbox Crew -- Privacy Policy