Battery and charging issues

[trfalsone]

I have a DROID X and have been having issues for the last few weeks with my phone staying charged and charging. I have had both my home and car chargers replaced. Everytime I charge my phone it says that it is charging bit the battery level does not improve. When I use my roommates charger it charges fine. Also the battery says I have a certain % of battery left then the next minute it goes down 10%andthat that happens whether it is charging or not. I don't know if a certain app could be causing this or if the phone is junk and I need to get it replaced. Its getting annoying that I have to charge it every night and can't be away from home because I wont have a charger. PLEASE HELP!!!

[gerio]

It could be an app, the only way to be sure is to uninsrall your apps to see if anything changes.

You also might have a bad battery or possibly a bad charger port on the phone. How old is the phone? Batteries do go bad, although I usually can get over a year out of these batteries.

Finally, what you describe does sound like a real problem. However. I keep several chargers, both home and car, for charging when necessary. I leave the house with a full charge and by 3 or 4 pm, I'm down to 30%, needing a charge on the ride home. Battery life with the Droid X2 hasn't been great, but as bad as what you are describing.

Good luck,
Geri O

[dirkbonn]

You say your phone charges fine with your roommates charger....  Sounds to me like you have a bad charger.  Have you tried your charger on your roommates phone?  If his/her phone won't charge with your charger, it's almost a certainty that your charger is the problem.

Good luck!

[trfalsone]

I got my phone in february. I have a Verizon home charger and a Verizon car charger and a 3rd party charger.

Yes it charges on my roommates charger just fine but any of my chargers don't work, they say the phone is charging but the battery life doesn't improve. I have not tried charging her phone with my charger. Sometimes my phone will charge on my chargers if my phone is off. But they are new chargers. I have a new battery on the way to try.

[trfalsone]

What app or type of app would you think could be causing the problem? I don't want to uninstall or factory reset my phone...if I wanted to do that I would just get a replacement phone. I do have an ATK on my phone...

[demmo86rt]

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trfalsone wrote:
What app or type of app would you think could be causing the problem? I don't want to uninstall or factory reset my phone...if I wanted to do that I would just get a replacement phone. I do have an ATK on my phone...

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From your home screen, press menu>settings>about phone>battery use (unless Moto moved it).  This will give you a list of apps with a percentage of how much battery they have used.  Also an app called system panel in the market will help you to monitor what  is using system resources.  I would also personally recommend uninstalling ATK, though not all users would agree with me.  Maybe try turning off autokill and see if that helps.  I do agree with dirkbonn, though, that it sounds like a bad charger,

[trfalsone]

Sometimes when I have my phone plugged in it seems to take away battery life instead of improve it.....im just trying to figure this out and try whatever I can without losing all my stuff again

[trfalsone]

Oh ok.....im confused about the ATK some say get rid of it others swear by it. As far as my charger they are brand new just got them.

[demmo86rt]

I'd say google android task killers and do some research about it, then make your own decision cause, you're right, some (like me) say they're evil and the bane of any android users existence, and some say your phone won't work without it.  Could be (assuming you're using a third party battery monitor app) that ATK is messing with it, but your issue sounds worse than that.  Also, if I remember correctly, Moto phones only report battery % in 10% increments, so that could be the problem.  I'm thinking that you need to do some more investigating into what is killing your battery and, if nothing apparent pops up, call tech support and see if you can get a replacement.

[B33]

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trfalsone wrote:
Oh ok.....im confused about the ATK some say get rid of it others swear by it. As far as my charger they are brand new just got them.

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trfalsone now i'm gona ask a question what kind did you get was it Motorola OEM or a off brand. an as for those task killers get them off your phone. here's a good one to use Its called Task Pannel i have it. An use it alottt there is a Paid version or a free version there both good to use i like the paid one better its $2.99 give it a try.

[keiffers]

you can pickup a blackberry charger if the plug is the same as the droid X - I have one I keep at work and while it doesn't charge as fast, it still works like a champ. Only drawback is that it was $20

[Cody21]

I would also try booting into SAFE MODE and plug in the charger and see if you get the same results. This would rule out 3rd party Apps ...

To boot to SAFE MODEL

- Power Off

- Press & old MENU button (far left button)

- Press POWER UP - continur holding the Menu button

after about 1-2 mins the phone will boot saying "SAFE MODE" in lower left corner

Plug in your charge and see if it behaves the same way.  If it does NOT - e.g., charges properly - you have a 3rd party App sucking the life out of your battery.

To get out of SAFE MODE, just power off/on as usual.

PS - I use the MOTO Car charger - it works great .. much better than the Verizon one. Maintains a 100% charge when in my car even when running a ton of apps at the same time.

Good luck.

(PS - i am of the camp to remove the ATK ...  you really should not need it and unless you really know what you're doing, can cause more harm than good .. YMMV)

[B33]

The reason i stress on using OEM chargers for devices like the Droid X is there desighned to work with them when for instance your using a Motorola Home OEM charger when it's done with its charge say it takes 2 hours to charge an X at the instant it's reached 2 hours that charger dips down to trickle charge an its safe to leave the phone on it. Were as a non OEM i would stress leaving it hooked up to the device no longer than when its done charging.  an the voltage going into the device is critical as well like my Moto chargers all three of them pute out at 5v @ 850 mA. You use a charger that puts out more mA's its going to burn out the charging final in the Device an when it does how you gonna explain how your phone got damaged. i would'nt want that on my shoulders i rather pay a little more an have peace in mind i'm using the right charger for the device it was intended for. B33

[gerio]

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B33 wrote:

The reason i stress on using OEM chargers for devices like the Droid X is there desighned to work with them when for instance your using a Motorola Home OEM charger when it's done with its charge say it takes 2 hours to charge an X at the instant it's reached 2 hours that charger dips down to trickle charge an its safe to leave the phone on it. Were as a non OEM i would stress leaving it hooked up to the device no longer than when its done charging.  an the voltage going into the device is critical as well like my Moto chargers all three of them pute out at 5v @ 850 mA. You use a charger that puts out more mA's its going to burn out the charging final in the Device an when it does how you gonna explain how your phone got damaged. i would'nt want that on my shoulders i rather pay a little more an have peace in mind i'm using the right charger for the device it was intended for. B33

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B33, I need to slightly correct some of this post, if I may. I certainly don't want to step on toes in doing so, but there are a couple of things to note...

It is the voltage output of the charger that needs to match the device it's trying to charge. If it's less than the 5VDC, the charger won't work, but if it's more than 5VDC, it can burn up the device it's connected to, unless that device has overvoltage protection (and I don't know that phones don't, that's just the general assumption).

The current output(milli-amps, or mA) of the charger is what the charger is capable of providing. The device won't pull any more current than it needs to charge, but if the phone is capable of pulling 850mA and the charger can't provide that much current as the device is asking for, then the device won't charge, not to mention getting hot and possibly damaged (or even catch fire, as I've seen happen with another device connected to the improper wall wart PSU). This is also why the USB port of a computer can't properly charge a Droid X (and others, I'm certain) phone because it is capable of providing only 500mA (and someone correct me if that isn't right) of current.

I don't know what's so special about the OEM Moto chargers. Outwardly, they appear to be the same as any 5.1VDC 850mA charger. But my daughter bought a Generic, labeled for Moto Droids, 5V charger that was capable of 1000mA (yes, that's 1 amp) and it STILL didn't charge her Moto OG Droid properly (No, the .1 voltage difference shouldn't have made any difference worth mentioning). Of course, a Taiwanese Charger company would NEVER misrepresent their products, would they...

All this boils down to the point that it's just easier for non-techies and the general folk to get the OEM Moto (or whatever brand yer phone is) chargers. And I've been getting those oh-so-popular Moto home and car chargers on Ebay new in OEM Moto packaging (As best as I can tell, anyway) for between 12 and 14 dollars. I buy three or four of them at a time, too.

And anyone feel free to elaborate or modify my explanations of this as I'm working off of old school memories and experience, something that is rough at best these days....

Best, 

Geri O

[B33]

Hey Geri its all good.   Heck i'm glad you said somethin you came in explained on the issue an thats what we need here you did'nt jump down my throat. And you ask others to elaborate on the issue. I've stuck with OEM's so if there were a Warrenty issue they Verizon or Moto could'nt lash at me an say you were using a different product an thats what messed your device up an were not going to warren your device. i guess i've scared myself into this but i don't have $600.00 big one's floatin around to pay for a new one. that i messed up. Thanks again Geri. B33

[trfalsone]

Im trying to investigate the problem...that is why I am here.

[trfalsone]

As far as the chargers they came from Verizon....I lost the one that came with my phone in a car accident. And I have a quikcel car charger.

[trfalsone]

After doing a little research...I believe that I need my original charger from Motorola, but I can't afford another charger of more than $30. I don't know what to do. Ill try calling Motorola in the am and see what they suggest.

[B33]

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trfalsone wrote:
After doing a little research...I believe that I need my original charger from Motorola, but I can't afford another charger of more than $30. I don't know what to do. Ill try calling Motorola in the am and see what they suggest.

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trfalsone can you afford a little over $14.99 im gona pute a link on here its of the Moto travel charger an its $14.99 plus a little S & H

this charger works good why do i know i've got one an was using it on my X when i responded to your post. so if you can afford it. Its a good charger. Here's the link if you need a car charger i'll get you a link for one of those as well.

http://store.androidcentral.com/motorola-micro-usb-rapid-travel-charger/5A17A3049.htm  <<<  right click your mouse on this link.

Update: I  went ahead an pute the link for the Car charger on here as well so you can look at both of them.

http://store.androidcentral.com/motorola-micro-usb-high-performance-car-charger/5A47A3044.htm <<< this one is for the Car charger.

Good luck too ya an i hope one of these will help you out  B33 

[trfalsone]

Thank you all....im still waiting for my new battery to come. But now I am also waiting on a motor charger. I called them and they are sending me a new one. Hopefully that will work.

As far as mu chargers go....the one from Vzw. Output is 5.0V and the quikcell is 750mAh. So im not sure all that talk confused me....lol

[gerio]

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trfalsone wrote:
Thank you all....im still waiting for my new battery to come. But now I am also waiting on a motor charger. I called them and they are sending me a new one. Hopefully that will work.

As far as mu chargers go....the one from Vzw. Output is 5.0V and the quikcell is 750mAh. So im not sure all that talk confused me....lol

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Ehhh, don't think that 750mAh charger is gonna be sufficient. However....try it and see. Try charging your phone for a couple of days and see if it works. 

As I said earlier, I get my OEM chargers from Ebay. Do a search in the "cellphone accessories"  section of Ebay for "Motorola OEM chargers. You should see a boatload of vendors selling the charger for 12-14 bucks new and in the OEM packaging. 

But try the one they are sending you first. 

Geri O