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4510L Powers off after inactivity, even on a/c power!

After a storm line moved thru Texas this Mother's Day weekend (early Friday morning in my area, before daybreak), I found neither my Mi-Fi nor my cell phone were working properly.. I was able to get thru to Verizon Tech support after *numerous* dropped calls (I'd be trying to explain the problem, and the phone would just disconnect from the network... same thing the Mi-Fi was doing, both had 3-4 bars of signal strength though which was weird!). Finally managed to keep the cell phone online long enough to talk to a tech support person for a few minutes, for some reason she had me do a full reset of the Mi-Fi unit (in spite of the fact that both my cellular devices were experiencing odd behaviour, much more likely a cell tower issue than BOTH my cellular devices developing problems at the same time!). After the Mi-Fi was fully reset (ie. remove the battery, press and hold the little reset button with a paper clip for 5 seconds, re-install the battery after another 10 seconds, etc.) the Mi-Fi seemed to work for a little bit and my phone hadn't dropped the call yet so we decided to let me try it for awhile and see if that (somehow?) solved the problem.... well, it didn't after about 20 minutes or so the Mi-Fi again stopped "talking" to the cellular network and my phone started dropping calls again.

Long story short I was finally able to get back on the phone with VZ tech support (after numerous more dropped calls) and explain that what we'd done previously hadn't actually solved anything, and they FINALLY issued a TroubleTicket to have the cell tower checked by a technician. Later that night everything spontaneously went to working VERY well suddenly for 4 -5 hours till I sacked out. Next morning (Saturday), back to not working again so I just left it all and worked outside on other things. Later that day after lunch, it all went to working VERY well again finally and seems to be staying that way now... except, my Mi-Fi appears to now be powering itself off after the inactivity timeout as if it was on battery power even though it's actually plugged in! WTF?

It has turned itself completely off 2X now for no apparent reason other than inactivity. It's like it thinks it's on battery now instead of on a/c (it IS on A/c however!). I went into the setup and increased the inactivity shutoff setting from 30 minutes to 60 minutes, but it still shouldn't be doing this. It appears to be a result of that reset the VZ tech had had me perform Friday afternoon. My admin passoword to the unit and WPA2 key were not reset they are as they were, but something is definitely different now!

Any thoughts on how to fix this? It's annoying to say the least! My area is still on 3G only if that matters. The Mi-Fi has never turned itself off while on a/c power previously, that reset seems to have introduced this annoying little glitch. :-(

ps. And what might have happened to my local cell tower during the storms that Friday morning to bring all this upon me anyhows? There wasn't much lightning (mostly far away rumbling only, no close strikes at all in my neighborhood), and barely any rain just some wind as far as I can tell (some branches and dead trees were blown down in my area, nothing tornadic however). It sure did something to that cell tower though! Arghhhh!

- Michael

Comments

John_Getzke

Michael,

Thanks for the details. This sounds like a combination of two different problems. Firstly there was most likely a service problem in your area that VZW has now resolved. Thanks for your diligence in pressuring VZW into sending a field tech to repair the damage. Lets assume that problem is fixed and that your service is holding steady again for all devices.

The second issue sounds like a hardware problem on your MiFi 4501L, or perhaps your wall charger/USB cord. Quick question, does your MiFi's E-Ink display a charging battery symbol when connected to the power source? You should see the icon make a charging motion by starting at empty, add a bar, and then fill before recycling through the sequence again.

Confirm that the MiFi is charging properly:

1. Completly power down the MiFi

2. Remove the battery

3. Confirm no lights or images are displayed

4. Connect the A/C power (from the desired power source)

5. Observe the screen and LED lights

Your MiFi should acknowledge that there is a charging resource available and display the charging symbols for you along with a Yellow blinking LED light on the side.

When the MiFi does not behave as described then there is a hardware problem...somewhere. The easiest thing to check is charging the MiFi from another location, wall charger or USB cable. Compare a few different scenarios and look for trends. If you cannot change the behavior of the MiFi then your MiFi or the battery must have gotten fried somehow. I dont believe VZW cover's battery replacement but they should replace a bad MiFi under the one year warranty.

Post back your findings for addtional suggestions.

Michael211

Thanks John for your response, however Yes it was indicating charging prior to the 2 self power-down's it did on it's own. Right now in fact it's showing full battery charge (still plugged into the same A/c plug and outlet, nothing about that has been changed).

I did enable the Logs yesterday, but it has not self powered-down again so far. Also there was a Software Update it said available Monday morning when I checked so I let it download and apply the update... took it from 2.23.01 to 2.28.02. The updates was Successful. Since then no self powering-down while on a/c has been observed... new behavior has though!

Now the thing flashes steady purple 100% of the time any wireless device is connected to it, even if said wireless device (my Motion LE1700 Tablet PC) isn't sending/receiving anything from the internet. The send/receive purple light only goes solid purple now when NOTHING is connected to the MiFi. I'm BSCS degreed and have Microsoft Product Certifications in Windows, I'm positive my TabletPC is not "talking" on the internet Automatic Updates are disabled and there is 0% utilization of the wireless internet connection according to Windows Task Manager's Networking tab... I watched for 15 minutes late last night as the MiFi flashed purple but the Tablet PC indicated 0% activity. My TabletPC was the only wireless device connected to the MiFi, I confirmed this thru the MiFi's admin screen (and the WPA2 passphrase is set and nobody else knows it but me). What's up with that? Did this update change the behavior of the MiFi's led?

Thanks again. Sorry to be so long winded I try to get all the detail I can down.

- Michael

John_Getzke

Details are good, keep them coming.

Now it sounds like the device behavior has shifted. Instead of having a power issue now there is a possible data leak. Its true the LED blinks only when traffic is detected. I don't think we have ever confirmed that the LED blinks for local, internet or both kinds of traffic, but it should blink none the less. The only way to know for sure is to set up a sniffer and monitor the connection between the two devices, background traffic can come from more than just windows update. It might just be a keep-alive/heartbeat between the MiFi and your connected devices.

When I watch my MiFi (also on 2.28) I notice it is steady purple when not connected. Connecting my Win7 Laptop to the MiFi causes my MiFi to blink purple similar to what you are describing. This may or may not be a new feature with the new firmware, I no longer have access to the older version to confirm. I'll play around with WireShark and try to sniff out any traffic with my own equiptment.

Michael211

I took the MiFi and my TabletPC both to my local Verizon Wireless store today around noon and showed them what it was doing... they were suprised at the constant flashing "violet" LED even though my TabletPC wasn't accessing the internet just connected to the MiFi. Then I disconnected from the MiFi and the violet LED went solid on. They then went and checked their own in-store MiFi and found it behaves the exact same way as mine.

I swear before the software update I did to the MiFi Monday morning it never flashed the LED unless my TabletPC was actively communicating on the internet, just being connected to the MiFi didn't cause the LED to flash. Now it flashes full time whenever anything is connected to it... while at the store they had me disconnect from it, saw that the LED stopped flashing and went solid, then they connected a store laptop to my MiFi and sure enough the LED went back to flashing constantly even though their laptop wasn't doing anything online either.

This is in fact new behavior and contradicts the manual's descriptions of the LED behaviors.

Something's still wrong out here with my local cell tower I believe, web pages are failing to load far too frequently it's like the MiFi is barely getting thru to the internet even though it's running a steady 3 to 4 bars of signal strength. This thing has given me nothing but trouble since Saturday morning when that storm front blew thru the greater Houston area! Prior to that it had been very fast, reliable and generally trouble-free in fact. Weird!

So far it has not self powered-off since Sunday night. I let it run off it's internal battery the entire trip to my local VZ store and back and now have it plugged back into A/c again. Log is still enabled if it does power itself off maybe the log will capture the reason why.

Thanks John!

- Michael

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