Nokia Lumia 520 problem - some demystification!!!

[Muse]

This phone which I received middle February has IIRC always worked fine. Got it off Amazon. I bought a replacement battery off Amazon which appeared to be exactly like the original (1430mah), but seemed to hold a better charge. Tired of always having to tether the phone when charging either battery I looked around for a battery charger and bought one that's presumably (it says) specific to this battery, a BL-5J. Got it off ebay, but it appears to be exactly the same as one you can get at Amazon.

BL-5J battery charger I bought at ebay

which looks to be the same as this:

BL-5J battery charger sold at Amazon

Today, I put my replacement battery in the charger (the phone said it was 57% charged before I did this), and it seemed to be charging fine and the indicator light finally changed from pink to blue signifying a full charge. I shut off the phone, and swapped batteries but the phone wouldn't power on with this, the replacement battery which had just been topped off by the external charger. I swapped batteries again and the phone would still not turn on! Finally it turned on.

Now things are quirky. It turned on a couple of times with the replacement battery (the one I charged in the external charger) but instead of powering on as usual it just showed a low battery indicator. Most of the time it doesn't even do that when I press the power button. With the original battery in the phone, it did turn on once or twice, but most of the time it either won't respond to the power button or else it seems to try to turn on and then turns off. Oddly, it will start the power on process, go dead and then start it again, go dead, start again (this cycle takes about 18 seconds, first time was way shorter, about 5 seconds...all this without my touching it), etc. etc.! At the moment this is what happens when I plug the charging cable from my laptop into the phone. That normally just turns on the phone and begins the charging process. Unplugged, the phone is not responding to the power button. This is using the original battery.

This is nuts and I don't know what to think. Is the phone acting crazy (borked or something), are the batteries to blame (one of the batteries was never put in the charger)? If I can get the phone to start again the first thing I'm going to do is go to the apps list and write down all my apps. I will never be able to remember all of them if I have to get a replacement phone.

The phone has an Airvoice microSIM in it and a 32GB microSD card.

Could be coincidences going on here but logic tells me that the charger fucked up the replacement battery and that that battery then fucked up the phone! What do you make of this?

 

[notposting]

Weeeird.

It could happen I suppose. Though i would think the phone circuitry would protect it, but hmmm. Try cleaning battery and battery receptacle contacts with an eraser.

Also, your apps are listed on your account online, so from that perspective it's less of a worry.

 

[Muse]

Weeeird.

It could happen I suppose. Though i would think the phone circuitry would protect it, but hmmm. Try cleaning battery and battery receptacle contacts with an eraser.

That is a really really good idea! Thank you!!! I suppose it's possible that something got on the battery contacts from the charger and that's caused this problem... :thumbsup: Doing a ton of yardwork at the moment, great therapy! Will try that out in a while.

Also, your apps are listed on your account online, so from that perspective it's less of a worry.

That is really good to know, 90% of them escape my mind. I hope they're there. I presume that the ones I paid for can be added free to a replacement 520, if it comes to that...

 

[Belegost]

That is really good to know, 90% of them escape my mind. I hope they're there. I presume that the ones I paid for can be added free to a replacement 520, if it comes to that...

Yeah, just visit the Windows Phone Store from your PC, sign in from the menu in the upper right corner. After signing in that menu will have a Purchase History option that will show all the apps you have downloaded, paid or free.

As for the problems with the phone - if cleaning up the contacts doesn't help, I would probably factory reset the phone, it's possible that in removing/replacing batteries the software got corrupted from a bad power down.

 

[Muse]

Cleaned the contacts on the phone, can't really reach the contacts in the batteries. Used q-tip with rubbing alcohol, the old standby. Doesn't seem to have changed anything. Afraid the phone is fried, to put it colloquially. Could try ordering another battery and see if there's a difference I guess.

 

[Muse]

Came back a few hours later, still the phone would not turn on. This time it also wouldn't do the pseudo turn on it was doing in cycles when plugging into my laptop. But a couple of tries later and it turned on and actually went to the tiles. I flicked to the apps and typed them all into a file, so now I know what was on the phone. Went to Nokia's website and put in the IMEI and it said it's in warranty. Well, I'm not terribly hopeful it's alright and figure I'll probably have to RMA it. I figure if I get a new phone I should probably get new batteries and new charger. I don't trust the ones I have, for reasons documented in the OP...

Interestingly, I go to one of my favorite apps, "Battery." It plots the battery level over time and some other things. For the last few hours (when the phone wouldn't turn on) it shows a flat line at 78%, the current level of charge. This would seem to signify that the unit was aware of the charge of the battery that whole time. Or maybe it just interpolated from back when it was last on to where it is now... Anyway, the phone has seemed to work normally for about 15 minutes now. I'll leave it on and put it in my pocket, knocking on wood.

 

[Muse]

After that one recent "normal" start when I got a chance to write down all my apps' names, I slipped the 520 in my pocket in its usual place. In the morning it would not start (the battery, the original, the one that has never been put in that external charger I described and linked in the OP, has to be ~85% full). I put it on the AC receptical charger it came with and it vibrated, signaling imminent startup procedure and it then displayed the aforementioned low battery screen (it's an image of a very large battery, e.g. a C alkaline cell, with a small red area indicating small charge left). That quickly disappeared, leaving a faint grey screen, and it's sitting on the plug-in charger. If I press the on button at this point it shows that battery image and a flashing plug for a few seconds, indicating that the unit is charging a severely depleted cell (the cell can't be that depleted, as I say). I don't expect this thing to come back to normal life and will obviously have to RMA it. I have to figure that battery charger is poison, somehow.

 

[podspi]

This happened once to me when I used an external charger on the BL-5J.

If you let the phone charge the battery for a bit (off) it will fix it. Now I just use the phone to charge up both batteries and try to just use one as a backup. No idea why this happens, but glad to see I'm not the only one...

 

[Muse]

This happened once to me when I used an external charger on the BL-5J.

If you let the phone charge the battery for a bit (off) it will fix it. Now I just use the phone to charge up both batteries and try to just use one as a backup. No idea why this happens, but glad to see I'm not the only one...

I don't think this is the case here. Now, in accordance with my recent post (Post #7 in this thread) this morning about the phone showing a low battery indicator when plugged into the AC charging cord, it's been on that for hours and nothing has changed. Evidently the battery is not charging and the phone still isn't turning on. I believe that the battery is sufficiently charged. The phone is not functioning. Well, a couple of times it seemed to, but in general it will not. I am rather pessimistic that it will function. It's a nutty scenario. I have to think that the charger did something to the battery I put into it that made it wreck the phone. The battery in the phone right now was never put into the charger. Frankly, I'm thinking that the heads up thing to do is to RMA the phone and toss the batteries I have and either toss the charger or return it to the seller. I'm not willing to risk using my batteries, and I wouldn't dream of using that charger again or a replacement from that seller. Odd thing is that charger looks to be the same as the one Amazon sells, but I'm only judging from what I see on my monitor. You should be able to see for yourself from the links in the OP.

 

[notposting]

Yeah, they might look the same but can still be fakes.

Bought an extra battery on Amazon for a Canon P&S and it was dead after one use. I believe it was a fake but it was listed as legit, sold reputably...and heck, the cheap factories these things come out of probably change labels and what not so it could hard to tell.

Same with cheapo RC/IR helicopters, ran into counterfeit Syma's, but for $20 choppers I also don't expect them to ensuring things are identical between batches either. So maybe they are counterfeit, or maybe they are just the cheaper version.

 

[Muse]

My concern at the moment is the Nokia Lumia 520 warranty. I bought it new (not refurb) off Amazon. When I search I find a Nokia page that lets me put in the SN (IMEI), and it comes up in warranty, but doesn't indicate when that expires. I bought it on Feb. 11, 2014, so 3 months would be in less than a week. Does this have a one year warranty?

Just now I had the phone plugged into the Nokia supplied cord AC wall charger for around 3 hours and the screen was not dark, it was grey, and pressing the power button brought up the same large battery icon indicating low charge. Unplugging, it did start up after a few tries of the power button, and seems to be acting "normally." The battery app shows 76% on the battery.

Well, the chances that this battery (the original supplied with the phone and never inserted into the death battery charger I got off ebay), is the culprit seems slim, very slim, however I figure I need to order a new battery in any case, but if the warranty on the Nokia is not more than 3 months, I figure I should initiate the RMA process on it right now, not wait for a new battery.

I'm going to buy the most legit seeming replacement battery I can. I don't know what that will be. At Amazon there are a bunch, and none comes off as a for sure OK battery...

 

[Belegost]

The Nokia warranty page that I followed from the Lumia 520 support page suggests 6 months on replaceable parts like the battery, and 12 months on the hardware.

I would suggest calling and talking to Nokia Care, they're usually quite helpful.

http://www.nokia.com/in-en/support/manufacturer-s-limited-warranty/

 

[Muse]

The Nokia warranty page that I followed from the Lumia 520 support page suggests 6 months on replaceable parts like the battery, and 12 months on the hardware.

I would suggest calling and talking to Nokia Care, they're usually quite helpful.

http://www.nokia.com/in-en/support/manufacturer-s-limited-warranty/

Ah, thank you. Well, I suppose then that the battery and phone are warranted. I figure the battery's probably alright although I would personally not trust it if I were liable if it didn't work. I'll likely call them later today...

The phone turns on sometimes, it turns itself off inexplicably, restarts randomly, crazy stuff...

 

[notposting]

Ah, thank you. Well, I suppose then that the battery and phone are warranted. I figure the battery's probably alright although I would personally not trust it if I were liable if it didn't work. I'll likely call them later today...

The phone turns on sometimes, it turns itself off inexplicably, restarts randomly, crazy stuff...

Since you can't possibly know for sure anyway, I would leave out the part about a sketchy eBay battery charger. Possibly even the part about the second battery, since currently the original battery is having trouble too.

Could be a horrible coincidence.

 

[Muse]

Since you can't possibly know for sure anyway, I would leave out the part about a sketchy eBay battery charger. Possibly even the part about the second battery, since currently the original battery is having trouble too.

Could be a horrible coincidence.

Yeah, my thinking exactly, and I'm about to call them (Nokia Care) as soon as I figure out their phone number. Going to go hunting for it online right now...

I took it to the gym just now, was listening to MP3 and it suddenly shut off, typical of its behavior the last couple of days.

 

[Muse]

I call Nokia Care's toll free number and get an ESL woman with mediocre communication skills at best. However, we stuck it through. After this machine not seeing the phone I went to a different machine, which already had Windows Phone App for Desktop (WFAFD) installed. That nor Explorer saw the attached phone, but changing cables and plugging into a different USB port (my idea) did get the phone seen. I synced and then she had me copy Music, Pictures, etc. from the phone internal memory to the computer in order to enable restoring the phone if I reset it (or replace it, I assume).

She wants me to follow the steps on this page:

My phone does not work or respond as expected

I believe she told me to remove the SIM card, and I'll do that before going through the troubleshooting steps. Also, I'll yank the microSD card.

Presumably I'll be able to restore apps, etc. from WPAFD by virtue of the sync.

If that doesn't get the phone working acceptably, I call them back, and I presume the RMA process is initiated.

 

[Muse]

Ah, well, the phone works sometimes, displays strange new info on the screen, turns on randomly, turns off randomly, just lately acts 100% dead and the troubleshooting steps may as well have been performed on a pet rock. Looks like I'm sending this to them UPS...

I had yanked the SIM and the microSD card, but I figure it should still start, right?

 

[RossMAN]

I had yanked the SIM and the microSD card, but I figure it should still start, right?

It should, my wife's Nokia 521 works without SIM card or microSD inserted.

Of course without the SIM card you don't have cellular voice/data connectivity but otherwise it should power on just fine.

 

[Muse]

Well, a page has turned...

Last night, about to crash, I decide to fetch the 520 and press the power button, you never know, it could start up. The battery in there was close to 100% charged (the original battery). Nothing happens. Press several times, nothing. I figure call them in the morning and initiate an RMA. Then the idea occurs to me... the batteries, it seemed to me, have been slipping into the unit a little easier. The thought had occurred to me that maybe the prongs (solid metal studs, 3 of them) protruding from inside the 520 case were not making solid contact with the 3 clips of the batteries. The second post in this thread suggested that, cleaning the contacts with a pencil erasure. I tried that with the studs, but the clips are inaccessible to something like that. The idea occurred to me that maybe the external charger I bought had some residue that had gotten on the battery clips that prevented good electrical connections.

Well, I took a needle-like probe and poked into the clip receptacles in my original battery, reducing the space between the clip faces in each of the 3 clips, put the battery back in, pressed the button and it started. Seemed to act normally. Hmm.

I fetched the other battery, the OEM one I'd bought off Amazon that seemed to be exactly like the original except that it seemed to hold a charge significantly better. This is the battery that the phone said was at 57% charged when I put it in the external charger the other day. It sat in there a couple of hours or more until the light changed from pink-purple to blue, signifying full charge. I'd placed my multimeter's probes across the battery's clips and the voltage I got was less than that of my other battery, which was a little less that full charge (90%, IIRC). That was a concern. I then put the just-charged (on the external charger) replacement battery in the 520 several times and the unit failed to turn on every time.

So, I do a similar action on this battery (that since charging in the external charger had never turned on the phone) and reduce the space between each of the 3 clips' cheeks with the needle-like probe, put it in the 520 and it turns on. However, it did not turn on normally, it showed a large battery icon indicating extremely low charge. I plugged it into a charging cable and it began to charge, apparently normally (attached to a laptop), and my Battery app indicated a 5% charge level (very low). Now, after a few minutes I check, expecting it had maybe moved up to 9% or something but instead it said 100%! Wah? I disconnect the charging cable and recheck the charge level with the Battery app after a few minutes (maybe 10 minutes), and it had the extremely low battery image again! Put it back on the charger and very soon it said 100%. My thinking was maybe there was poor contact with the battery clips, or else the battery is screwed up now. I turned off the phone and went to sleep.

This morning I turn it on and it says 100% in the Battery app. It's been on for 1.5 hours, I've used it to check email, check out deals on Newegg via the web, watched a video on the device (I'd put my SIM and microSD card back in), it still shows 100%. It should not say 100% at this point. I'd think it should show under 95% for sure, probably less.

So, what's up? Dunno. I figure I'll try probing those clips in the batteries again, maybe I'll get normal behavior. Or maybe the extra battery I bought is now a dud, dieing or such. I did order another OEM battery off Amazon yesterday, the best I could find. I figured I'd need another, assuming the one I'd already bought was now useless. That one, of course, will have fresh, unbent contact clips.

What's evident from all this is this lesson: These devices were not designed to have the battery swapped frequently! Even the plastic cover on the batteries is starting to deform from my poking at it with my finger nail when I remove the batteries. The clips will lose their ability to firmly grab the posts in the phone. It's something I can remedy, although the process is not really easy. I have magnifiers, not a hands-free magnifier, that's a tool I could use for this! ... I guess I can jury rig something.

Edit: I turned off the phone and with digital calipers measured the width of the posts in the phone and the battery charger (thinking that if they are wider in the charger that would help explain the widening of the clips of at least that one battery that was inserted in it), but they are pretty much the same. Put the battery back in the phone, started it and it still showed 100%. However, a few minutes later it's down to 99%. Still, seems to me, it should be much lower...

Edit2: More than an hour later, been playing MP3 off it and the Battery app shows 92%. It seems to be behaving now, but wonder, of course, about the crazy stuff last night. I figure I'll tweak that battery's contacts again and see how things go.

 

[cpacini]

What's evident from all this is this lesson: These devices were not designed to have the battery swapped frequently! Even the plastic cover on the batteries is starting to deform from my poking at it with my finger nail when I remove the batteries. The clips will lose their ability to firmly grab the posts in the phone. It's something I can remedy, although the process is not really easy. I have magnifiers, not a hands-free magnifier, that's a tool I could use for this! ... I guess I can jury rig something.

Out of curiosity, why were you swapping batteries out in the first place? Were you not able to get through the day on a single charge?

 

[notposting]

One thing I forgot to mention was making sure to hard reset your phone before bothering to send it in -- one to see if it will fix anything, and two, to make sure the phone is wiped of personal information.

Also, the battery apps would need to be reset every time you change batteries. Do a search at Arstechnica, they just had an update on battery usage. Should help you formulate a good plan going forward.

 

[Muse]

Out of curiosity, why were you swapping batteries out in the first place? Were you not able to get through the day on a single charge?

Well, I'm not in the habit of putting the phone in charge mode at bedtime. Doing so would indeed make life easier. When the battery won't hold a charge until bedtime simply order another one (or swap it for one of my other ones, I have one extra now and will have a 3rd because I ordered one a couple of days ago... I can keep extras in reserve with ~40% charge in the refrigerator, recommended practice to store li-ion rechargables).

The reason I don't? Just some quaint notions I picked up about the inefficiencies of charging Li-ion batteries to full capacity and leaving them there. They deteriorate at an accelerated rate when you do that. However, as said, it can be easier to just do that and not bother with other habits/policies.

 

[Muse]

One thing I forgot to mention was making sure to hard reset your phone before bothering to send it in -- one to see if it will fix anything, and two, to make sure the phone is wiped of personal information.

Apparently the phone is operating normally. The problem obviously has to do with unreliable contact between the phone's battery studs and the battery clips. The phone has been acting normally with the OEM replacement battery installed for over a day. I think the contact now is working but also believe (based on details that I included in my long post about discovering the battery contact problem, #19) that that battery's clips could use some more tweaking, but so far so good, don't fix it if it ain't broke, I'll cross that bridge when I come to it, I know what to do now...

Also, the battery apps would need to be reset every time you change batteries. Do a search at Arstechnica, they just had an update on battery usage. Should help you formulate a good plan going forward.

Can you link me to the update? I'm not familiar with the site.

 

[notposting]

http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2014/04/ask-ars-the-best-way-to-use-a-lithium-ion-battery-redux/

 

[Muse]

http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2014/04/ask-ars-the-best-way-to-use-a-lithium-ion-battery-redux/

I just read through that whole thing. Interesting, not very technical or convincing though. Here's one of my favorite sites on batteries:

Battery University

Their page on prolonging life of Lithium ion batteries