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Another Miracle Fix: Non-working cellphone
Old 12-05-2014, 07:46 AM   #1
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Another Miracle Fix: Non-working cellphone

In a previous thread, I mentioned how I was turning into Mr. Reboot since a repair tech taught me that my cracked refrigerator water filter could have been prevented by unplugging the refrigerator, waiting a few minutes, and then plugging it in to reset some circuit that had gotten stuck in the wrong state.

Here is the latest venture. Cellphone that I have used daily successfully for the past several days for automated phone calls using the keyboard only suddenly decides that it will transmit conversation from a human on the other end but not transmit my end of the conversation. I find out that the phone reps are very patient asking at least 3 times each (multiple reps) if they can help. One Schwab rep even offers to call me back to see if the reception is better that way....................it isn't.

Googling suggests that this problem is not uncommon but no obvious fixes.
The most common suggestions are to use the speaker phone mode (doesn't help here) or get a new phone. I had forgotten about the reboot but DW had done that w/ no success. Finally I run across a suggestion to remove the battery for 5 min,then reinstall. There is no followup response that suggests this will work but I am excited because I did that once for a non-working Mac laptop.

Long story short.........it worked! And even the morning after.

The other lesson is that Google is your friend. I couldn't find any screws to undo or panels to slide to access the battery. The front display seemed liked it wanted to move under some force but I discovered that it didn't want to come off but to slide, revealing a keyboard I never knew existed. You can laugh but in my defense this is DW's phone and I only get to use for normal use.
Google showed a picture of how to remove the back panel revealing a notch that I had not noticed in the not-so-bright night lights and so a thumbnail worked when I thought I might need a jeweler's screwdriver to remove a tight- fitting back panel. Very clever , these designers.

So a deeper level reboot, not accessible with an on/off switch and Google saved the day.............hopefully useful to someone someday ...perhaps even me.
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Old 12-05-2014, 10:16 AM   #2
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One thing I dislike about my iPhone is that you can't access the battery. I imagine these things can be booted remotely by the NSA. Probably a stealth mode boot that doesn't light up the screen but does turn on voice monitoring and GPS locator.
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Old 12-05-2014, 11:56 AM   #3
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Gosh, I never heard of anyone having that particular problem before, kaneohe. That's terrific that you managed to find a solution via Google.
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Old 12-05-2014, 12:05 PM   #4
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Quote:
Originally Posted by donheff View Post
One thing I dislike about my iPhone is that you can't access the battery. I imagine these things can be booted remotely by the NSA. Probably a stealth mode boot that doesn't light up the screen but does turn on voice monitoring and GPS locator.
The I phone battery is easily accessed by taking the two screws out of the bottom edge (one on each side of the charge port) and sliding the back cover off. Then the battery is removed by removing two cable clamp screws holding the battery cable in place, then lifting the battery out (adhesive holds it firm).

I've changed a few batteries over the years in these Iphones. There are lots of UTube clips on this simple job.
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Old 12-05-2014, 12:09 PM   #5
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Removing the battery allows a complete discharge. I had problems with PCs ( seemed to be mostly Dells desktops) where the USB ports would stop working. Just turning the PC off didn't do anything but unplugging it from the electric outlet did. When it was plugged in it was still drawing a trickle charge to the motherboard maintaining the messed up status of the USB controller.

A soft reboot sometimes doesn't do anything whereas a hard reboot ( power off ) will clear things up.
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Old 12-07-2014, 10:25 PM   #6
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Today the charger (power adaptor, Magsafe) for the old Mac seemed to have a problem. The indicator light stayed green even though the battery was not at 100% charge and the Mac indicated that there was no charging. A old (intermittent) Magsafe had the same problem that suggested it (Magsafe)was not the problem. Ended up doing the same thing as for the cellphone.....power off, battery removal for 5min, battery reinstall, Magsafe connection......now problem apparently gone and indicator light is amber and Mac is charging.

One stone, many birds.............
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Old 12-08-2014, 09:12 AM   #7
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Reminds me of the joke card I once got:

"If I'm ever on life support, unplug me.
Then plug me back in.
See if that works"
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Old 12-08-2014, 01:47 PM   #8
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Quote:
Originally Posted by marko View Post
Reminds me of the joke card I once got:

"If I'm ever on life support, unplug me.
Then plug me back in.
See if that works"
me like!
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Old 12-09-2014, 06:28 PM   #9
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Quote:
Originally Posted by aja8888 View Post
The I phone battery is easily accessed by taking the two screws out of the bottom edge (one on each side of the charge port) and sliding the back cover off. Then the battery is removed by removing two cable clamp screws holding the battery cable in place, then lifting the battery out (adhesive holds it firm).

I've changed a few batteries over the years in these Iphones. There are lots of UTube clips on this simple job.
I've been told by Apple store "Genius Bar" that battery removal by user voids the warranty.
Regardless- it remains a PITA to change an iPhone battery when most phones only require a simple removal of back panel. Having a spare cell phone battery has saved my bacon more than once.
Fixed battery, and lack of storage expansion (microSD card slot) are why I do not own iPhone despite being a 20+yr Mac user.
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Old 05-09-2015, 09:25 PM   #10
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Yet another example of the one stone gets many birds...........a week ago the
CATV set went to blue screen with the same error message on all channels:
something like "channel temporarily unavailable, be back in a few minutes."
The minutes turned into hours so I called finally Comcast. The first rep wanted to know the serial no. of the cable box. When I called back w/ the number, the second rep, more street-smart, told me to turn off the TV and cable box for 30 seconds. He might also have sent a signal to the cable box.
Instant fix. Since then, the problem has recurred a few times both with single channel and all channel "temporarily" unavailable. So far, the problem has been "fixed" by the "reboot" w/o any action by Comcast.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/c...eboot/3287051/
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Old 05-11-2015, 11:07 PM   #11
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I have to turn off/on my phone about once a week, otherwise it will forget to ring when someone calls sending them straight to voice mail.
Missed a few calls before I realized the issue.
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Old 11-25-2019, 08:19 PM   #12
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Guess it's been a while...........old thread...........tonight I thought I was going to go hungry. Microwave wouldn't work......let me program cook time but wouldn't start . It would beep when I tried to clear the cook time but did nothing. Couldn't make it do anything. No power switch so I ended up pulling the plug. Plugged it in again and the clock display was wrong so fixed that, then went thru the cooking motions again. Worked normally so I didn't starve. Just a PSA to remind..........
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Old 11-26-2019, 06:14 AM   #13
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A minor drift from thread. My Dell laptop, for over a year has been warning me to use the original Dell charger that was provided at purchase, despite I was using the original charger. Overnight reboots worked until they didn't this past week. Warnings, going into safe mode, eventual no charging at all. I couldn't even use laptop while it was plugged in. I ended up purchasing a Dell charger on Amazon for ~$25 instead of the same charger directly from Dell, $70. Plugged it in and everything back to normal. Perhaps the transformer in the charger was breaking down and messing with the voltage output to charge the battery.
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