PDA & Project54 András Fekete on 19 Jul 2007 03:57 pm
Symbol MC50 battery
So get this…. A couple months ago, I thought I bricked one of my Symbol PDAs at work. Yeah, people made fun of me for being a bit thorough in my testing. As it turned out, it was nothing I had done. Only today had I found out what the true nature of the problem was. When the battery gets low, the PDA for some reason shuts itself off. When you press the power button, the PDA tries to start (showing the fancy splash screen), but cannot finish loading because the battery dies. So why not put the PDA in the cradle you ask. Well I tried that, but unfortunately the PDA has to be up and running before it can charge the battery. I am 100% certain it is an issue with the battery, because I switched batteries with an identical PDA, and the one that got the dead battery refused to start.
András Fekete
on 19 Jul 2007 at 6:00 pm 1.andrewkun said …
So what do you do if a battery dies? How do you get the PDA to work again?
on 20 Jul 2007 at 7:40 am 2.Fekete Andras said …
Ah, good question. Unfortunately, the only way I’ve found to charge the batteries is to put it in the cradle’s charger. But while it charges, the internal battery of the PDA gets depleted, and you lose all your data. Even if you put the PDA on the charger.
on 06 Aug 2007 at 1:21 pm 3.Tim said …
Hi, I repair them. First it’s a POS, buy something reliable instead. The device is plagued with defects, including constant failures with the backup battery but not just the battery itself.
To answer your question though, the main battery can get so depleted that you can’t get it to charge while in the device. You have to take it out and use the AUX charger to get started. You only need to leave it there 30 seconds or so to get enough on it to start the normal charge. Won’t deplete the int battery. Just get a base charge going in AUX then put in the device and drop in the cradle as normal.
on 09 Aug 2007 at 10:27 am 4.andrewkun said …
Tim, thanks for the post, we’ll give this a try!
Andrew Kun
on 14 Aug 2007 at 12:11 pm 5.Jules said …
I too had the same problem with MC50 battery, so I followed Tim’s advice and put the battery in the AUX slot but I got busy working and left it in there for about an hour. When I put the battery back in the MC50 it appears that all the set-up for the program we use it for has been lost. Is there any way to retrieve it or do I have to do the setup again?
Thanks,
Jules
on 14 Aug 2007 at 4:18 pm 6.András Fekete said …
Unfortunately when the main battery dies, the internal battery takes over and keeps the RAM alive, but the internal battery has only enough charge for 30 minutes. So if you want to do a hard reset anytime, just take out the main battery for about 30 min. There is a simpler way by holding down a button combination which I can’t remember. To keep the story short, your programs are gone forever, and have to reinstall.
on 22 Aug 2007 at 5:41 pm 7.Verne said …
OK. I am new on this. I just purchased a Symbol MC50. I tried to turn it on the first time and the Splash screen come up and then I have seen the Windows Pocket PC screen for about a minute or so and the its gone. Since that I try to turn the unit on, but only the splash screen comes on and nothing else. Is my Pocket PC OS is gone now? How can I reinstall that so my MC50 would work ok?
Any help appreciated.
Thanks
Verne
on 22 Aug 2007 at 6:21 pm 8.András Fekete said …
Sounds to me like a problem I had countless times when the battery in the handheld doesn’t have enough charge left to start the unit. Follow the suggestions given in previous posts and place the battery in an external charger and charge it for an hour or so. Then put it back into the MC50.
-Andras
on 22 Aug 2007 at 7:16 pm 9.Verne said …
Thanks for the fast reply. Well I did that yesterday and it was charged fully for 7 hours. Still nothing. Just the splash screen. I tried the Hard reset with pushing down Power+Right Action and Reset on the back. Nothing. I have it in the cradle now, but the battery is OK. It can stay like that for long time.
Is there any button I should push to boot it up?
Thanks
on 22 Aug 2007 at 10:17 pm 10.Verne said …
Anyway Andras?
Csak a nev magyar vagy nem ?
on 24 Aug 2007 at 4:00 am 11.András Fekete said …
Verne,
I’m not sure what the problem could be with your unit. Did you try starting it while in the cradle, and from out of the cradle? Also, try not having the USB plugged into the computer. Then (though it shouldn’t make a difference) only plug the cradle into the USB and not the wall wart plugged in. It’s worth trying out these permutations, because I’ve seen some pretty strange things with todays electronics.
Please report back on your successes/failures.
-Andras
U.I.: Igen magyar vagyok.
on 24 Aug 2007 at 6:26 pm 12.Verne said …
Well Andras,
I can’t get through. This system freexes on the splash screen. Strange. I tried all kind of combinations you suggested nothing. I even tried to take out the battery and charge it for 30 min. before every attempt. Nope, this thing is just stays there.
Any more trick in your pocket?
Thanks,
Verne
on 27 Aug 2007 at 2:20 pm 13.András Fekete said …
Well, can’t say I have seen that problem. I just got back from vacation, and had one of my Symbols dry up its battery while I was away. Tried to turn it on, nothing, cradled it, nothing. Took out the battery, charged it for a bit, put it back in and now I have it up and running. Perhaps try returning it under warranty? Or get in touch with someone at Symbol. Do keep me posted on your progress.
-Andras
on 24 Sep 2007 at 10:08 am 14.Verne said …
Well, Guess what? Symbol didn’t help. I wrote an e-mail for them, then they said I have to register my company whith them first and after that they can help. So I started to look into my self. Off course the problem was not big. When I’ve got the unit, it was raw. Totally empty. I had to reprogram it. After I reprogramed it, it is working fine now.
The reprograming was easy. I downloaded the DCPMC50W-1.03.04 program, installed it and that’s it. The only trick is that I had to do a reboot and I kept pushing the wrong combinations. The right combinations is. Push POWER and both SCAN Button and then push the RESET on the back. Then let go off the RESET button and only let go off the rest of the buttons after the ILP screen comes up.
But there was a PDF file about how to do that.
Thanks for the help anyway.
on 24 Sep 2007 at 10:40 am 15.András Fekete said …
Nice! First off, I appreciate you getting back to me on your progress. Secondly the file was a little hard to find on symbol’s website, so I’m pasting a link here
This news opens up more possibilities for me to test on these devices. One thing I have to suggest as I’ve learned it the hard way is always keep the buggers plugged in. They have a nasty habit of running the batteries down and erasing themselves. Also, Symbol gave me a hint about a program for the MC50. It is called StartupCtl. It gives the ability to automatically install applications if the device undergoes a hard reset. It also gives the ability to start applications on a soft reset.
Might come in handy to have it installed.
-András