Category: htc

The Story of my failing battery and why it happens!

Paul

Batteries

It’s been a while!

Having had my HTC Inspire for over a few months, it was a brand new inspire.   It was actually a used one from my sister. So I got what I wanted to get an actually android working on the Straight Talk Network and all life is good!  Until recently, I’ve started to notice a few things with my phone that I wanted to share with everyone else in case you’ve had the same problem I had!  If you’ve not had this problem before you might have it later on! 

Phone just Shuts off while unplugged!

As you know this might not be the only time it shuts off but it will be a good indication that something is wrong with the battery!  There is a great explanation on how batteries work over at HowStuffWorks, I won’t go into detail about this but I will explain some of what is happening.   The rest after all should fall in place when you read the article!  Over the past 2 months or so, I’ve had the phone just randomly shut down but it didn’t start doing it like it did yesterday and today.  

Why Does it Shut down!

Basically the cell phone thinks it has more power than what the battery pack is telling it.  You see batteries that are stored in this fashion or even used can only be charged and discharged to a certain extent and thus once you hit that no power threshold in that cell batter then it can’t be charged due to fact that you might just blow up the cell.   While on the subject, what is a battery cell?  A battery cell is typically more than one battery but can also be one battery.   It is used in either parallel or sequential series, you can find out more about that by reading that article also.   This is all fascinating but what does this have to do with the battery?  You’re probably asking yourself this question.

Each battery cell has a circuit where you once it hits the charge limit it just shuts the that cell down and you can no longer access it or use it.   So when your cell phone thinks it has a full and you loose power quickly then that is basically the reason.   The battery knows how much it can send to your phone but your phone is only learning this over time.   It is definetly a process that just is crazy.  


How does this help me?

It basically is a good indication that your battery is get old in age and needs to be replaced.  If it happens to you at least once a few weeks it is probably a good idea to replace the battery.   Now I must comment, sometimes it isn’t the battery but the software.  I thought so, and I put my old Froyo OEM version of Android back on my phone and it still did it.  So if you don’t want to have to send off for that battery and pay extra to over night it, it is probably a good idea to have one who two batteries ready once you start seeing symptoms like this.   I sure learned my lesson for next time this happens.

Paul Sylvester

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How to get the HTC Inspire 4g AT&T to work with Straight Talk

Paul5 Replies

It really wasn’t hard!

I have been doing a lot of stuff with this HTC Inspire that I got from a family member.  Here are some of my observations about this phone that I wanted to share with you before we get into making it work with Straight Talk.   Afterall I want to be fair to you my readers.

 

The HTC Inspire in whole, isn’t really that bad of a phone.   There will be some caviates of the phone though.  The battery that was in the phone has been charged and discharged so many times that I can’t reliably say that the battery is bad. So with that in mind, I plan on making a trip to Batteries Plus to buy me a new battery.  The Screen on the Inspire gives you so much more than you get on most other smart phones.   The Resolution of the screen is crisp and you can do a lot with the Apps from the Marketplace.

How I did it!

If you’ve been reading my blog the last week or so, you would of noticed that I showed you how to unlock the HTC Inspire 4g AT&T Phone yourself for free.   I did unlock it successfully, because when I got the new sim it had to be set to be used it but didn’t say it couldn’t use that SIM.  If your really unsure of it yourself you might just got buy an unlocked HTC Inspire 4g AT&T Phone .  I really don’t want you to brick you phone but you can also try to get AT&T to unlock it  or you could buy the Unlock Code.   I really don’t know if they will or not but it is always a possiblity.

Getting the Right Sim Card from Straight Talk!

I’ve found in the past that if your are going to use a phone from a carrier unlocked it sometimes the best results can be continueing to use the same carrier in one aspect or another.  So choose the right Sim for the phone you have and you won’t be disappointed.  This will be a short tutorial for the AT&T HTC Inspire that I just got done unlocking.   You will need to unlock your HTC Inspire to do this successfully, but if your are successfull, you will be able to use their service for much less than you normally would.

Make sure you pick the AT&T Compatible Sim!Once you unlocked the cell phone and gotten the AT&T Compatible Straight talk SIM card, you will need to set up some Access Point Names(APNS) for the HTC Inspire 4g Unlocked Cell phone.

On the Inspire itself hit:

MENU > Settings > Wireless & networks > Mobile Networks > Access Point Names

There you will see two APN’s already set by AT&T.  They are MEdia Net and MMS (Wap.cingular).   Mine were locked but I left them alone on my phone   In order to get both internet and mobile calls on you phone you will need to create two APNS:  (This would be a good time to bookmark my site in case you need to come back to it!)

Only fill in the ones I tell you, Leave all the rest blank or <Not set> and it all CASE Sensitive:

MENU > Add APN

Name : straight talk

APN: ATT.mvno

MMS protocol: WAP 2.0

MCC:  310

MNC:  410

MENU > SAVE

MENU > Add APN

Name: mmsc

APN: ATT.mvno

MMSC:  http://mmsc.cingular.com

MMS Proxy:  80

MMS protocol:  WAP 2.0

MCC:  310

MNC: 410

APN type: mms

MENU > SAVE

So if you have done this right, it is now time to reboot your HTC Inspire 4G unlocked Cell phone.  Hold the power button down for 3 seconds and hit RESTART once you have done this you should be able to use both internet and make calls on the Straight Talk Network with your SIM.  Remember you will need to register the sim with Straight Talk before you can use it but if you haven’t now would be a good time to Activate the SIM and associate that SIM with your Account.

I hope this helps you figure out how to use your new found freedom with yoru android device and thus you should be all set to make calls and surf the web with your HTC Inspire 4G.   If you have any questionns please feel free to contact me or leave a comment.  

Paul Sylvester

 

Spying on Spyware.ISpynow!!

Paul

[ad#digg-right]This is another Virus that is going around and thought I’d tell you about it:

Spyware.ISpyNow monitors files, network traffic, and keystrokes. This Spyware gives the person who installed it a Web-based interface with summaries of logged information on the host computer.

[Via Symantec]

[ad#ad2-left]Now this one isn’t to hard to figure out what happened.  You have to manually install it on your system to get infected.  Symantec has a great way on uninstalling this annoyance.  I also suggest checking out my other program list just in case you don’t want to buy Symantec Anti-Virus programs.  Some other things to check out is:

This is just the beginning in getting your system clean.  You have to keep all you programs up to date and one way I do that is with Appsnap.  This little program keeps you programs up to date from Virus to Firewall.  I hope this helps people prevent and control spyware.

Avg detected Trojan Horse Generic 12.htc?

Paul2 Replies

Just got a warning from AVG about, trojan horse generic 12.HTC, haven’t heard of it, anyone out there hear if this one? apparently it infects explore.exe, and after months of explore.exe crashing I’d say it’s a legit virus.

[Via Answer Bag]

Some tricks and tips to remove this little virus is quite simple. It is embedded in your system so how do you remove this threat? Easy follow these steps and you will have a better chance of getting rid of the virus:

  1. Find out all you can on the virus — Finding out the extent of where the virus lays is really a good idea.  Just because you found one place doesn’t mean it isn’t also hiding some other place.  Some good ways to figure out where it might be is to download Hijackthis and Then onces you download it and install.  Run it, and when you get the LOG file you will want to go to HijackThis Log Analysis Site 1 and HijackThis Log Analysis Site 2, and see what it says.

  2. See if you can remove the Hidden Virus — After you find out what the extent of virus may lay.  You will need to download these programs.  Run whichever ones you like to see if you can locate and delete the virus.  You may also consider using one of the several onine services to see what they might suggest or see if they can find this virus.

  3. Check your services and reboot sequence — After you think you’ve gotten rid of the virus, reboot and do a rescan.  Usually the Virus will respawn after you reboot, some of them have a command in the reboot sequence.   You may want to check your reboot sequence, by check with MSCONFIG.  Sometimes it is hidden but if you check through the MSCONFIG for any files that might not need to load.  Also check the services tab and see if there is any services that may not be needed.  The best bet is to google search each service or program that is in there and see if that might fix the problem.

  4. Might be time to re-install Windows — Although this is the hard for people, this can sometimes fix the most challenging virus.  You need not have to loose your important data.  The only thing to remember when you back up is when restore you data after you re-install windows.  Just remember one thing, if it is  an .EXE, .COM, .BAT, and .MSI extensions than that might risk you getting the virus all over again.  Although remember that you will need the other tools I talked about on #2 to keep from getting the virus again.

These are some tricks I use to get rid of a virus and now I’ve shared them with you and now it is up to you do the work.  If you have any tips or tricks to get rid of a virus leave a comment.