Charging in car, not so good...

[Megalomando]

I'm concerned; My admire does not seem to charge in the USB charger I have that plugs into the cars cigarette lighter. I leave it on & no talking, wireless unabled and just waiting for a call & I see the charge amount keeps going down, not up.

So I bought a new 12V to USB charger today thinking my first one was broken and it also does the same thing. The admire shows "charging" in the car but it does not go up & it goes down.

From the computer & using the same cord (one that came with the admire) it charges fine.

This isn't good...

Ideas?

 

[Unforgiven]

What is the amperage rating for the car chargers and do you have the screen on or off? Screen On is usually one of the biggest battery drains, and on some chargers it can actually drain your battery faster than than the charger can replenish it. You probably want to make sure you are using a 1amp charger. You mentioned wireless unabled, does that me wifi or data? If you still have data on, are you streaming anything?

 

[biggpat86]

i discovered the same issue yesterday on my way to work with my admire. battery level goes down as opposed to up. i am using a usb 12V adapter with the OEM charging cable. not real sure of the amperage

 

[Unforgiven]

i discovered the same issue yesterday on my way to work with my admire. battery level goes down as opposed to up. i am using a usb 12V adapter with the OEM charging cable. not real sure of the amperage

Are you leaving the screen on? I would definately recommend turning it off if you are seeing this (unless obviously you are using navigation). Even with a one amp charger, I can only hold steady (either a little gain or loss) when using navigation.

 

[blade00000009]

what pupkact said but also use some more battery tips here is a video by howtomen

How to save battery! the extreme tips! - YouTube

 

[Megalomando]

Sorry for the delay in checking back, I was in VT & no service.

As to the charger, I don't know about the one charger, it used to work great for my Blackberry. The other USB charger is in a Stanley 12V > 120V auto charger with accessory USB charging port. I'd think that one is up to the task. When I use the wall wart USB charger that came with the Admire, (the one with the USB port in it to plug the cable into) it does charge.

A friend asked me if the GPS was on and would that cause problems with power loss? I had earlier enabled in settings > location & security > to use GPS satellites and use wireless networks both enabled. I also had under settings > mobile networks > data enabled.

With my Blackberry I never had any issue with GPS satellites drawing power at rest, when I wasn't using it for directions, but disabling it made a huge difference in the speed of recharge & doing it in less time in this Admire. Even with this disabled though, I could not charge the phone from the USB charger in the Stanley inverter and I was progressively loosing battery level even though it showed I was charging and the phone was in standby with nothing but a black screen showing.

I have to use either the Samsung wall wart or be hooked up to the computer to do a true recharge.

Apparently the Samsung is constantly drawing power when it's turned off and I was amazed to find the entire battery had discharged over night after turning it off under the options of silent mode/airplane mode/power off and watching the MetroPCS shutdown screen do its thing. The phone was turned off overnight to conserve battery as I couldn't get service where I was in rural VT but 9-10 hours later when I couldn't get it to work I plugged it in and it said; 0% power & was charging.

Last night with a full charge and "GPS satellites" and "use wireless networks" both disabled, it showed 96% power in the morning as opposed to the battery being dead with 0%.

As much as I like this phone, it remains on internally when you shut it off and GPS must be turned off when not being used for GPS. I would have figured GPS would not be a draw unless you pushed the icon for MetroNav & were using it. I would never have dreamed it was active when I turn the phone off. I will leave the GPS setting and Use Wireless Networks mentioned above left off from now on. This part of the phone operation was badly designed.

 

[markyrocks]

I doubt the phone is using power when it's off. Either the battery has crapped out, or the hardware on the phone some kind of defect or damage that is completing a circuit somewhere causing battery draw. Next time if you need to shut phone off to conserve power, pull the battery out of it as well. It seems that alot of people are haveing charging issues with these phones. My easiest solution is go on ebay an buy external charger, there 5$ from china. Mine is already in route. Completely eliminates the phone from the charging equation.

Might not be bad idea to have spare battery as well so that one on external charger while other is in phone.... I got this as a spare it works like a champ btw http://www.ebay.com/itm/320809287392?ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1439.l2649


here is link to external charger http://www.ebay.com/itm/180776588374?ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1439.l2649

 

[Alphastyle09]

Battery life and charging time is this phone biggest down fall. I have the ascend, Optimus M, even the Esteem have a decent battery and charge time. This one takes ages to fill and dies quick for it's specs. Samsung should make a better battery for this device... I got the car charger and it too didn't charge at all. Turning GPS off, putting it on airplane, sound off, display off and what not just to get something charged doesn't seem practical in the car. The point of a car charger is to be able to use the phone while in the car and not lose battery life in between destinations. My Ascend would charge pretty fast on car charger. 1% every 2-3 min. That's fantastic for a Droid and that's with everything enabled.

 

[markyrocks]

Im just begining to wonder if these phones aren't just junk in general and that they know there's major flaws in the hardware and manufacturing process an that why there selling for so cheap. Right now this phone with the i clarity speaker is on best buy.com for 119$..........

I took my phone to cricket store today and its confirmed my phone will not connect via usb cable bc its defective or damaged from normal use somehow and i've only had this phone since 2/21/12 and it started acting like this two days after I got it. I'm almost ready to scratch this phone an buy the huawei mercury
http://www.mycricket.com/cell-phones/details/huawei-mercury-m886

 

[Tokenpoke]

I use an energizer universal car charger with no issue.

99% of the problems I have had with universal chargers it has been due to a wire separating in the USB end, just keep that in mind. A bit of metallic paint will stick it back w/o soldering it.