Guest adamjedge Posted August 4, 2008 Report Share Posted August 4, 2008 Hello All, Received my Diamond from Orange last week, luckily ordered it before they cut the data plans. Any how, one of the "features" of the phone which attracted me to it, was the inclusion of GPS. Great I thought, I'm always going out all over the place and when your trying to find a specific drop off point in the mountains it will be a god send. Having had the phone for a couple of days, I installed TomTom on to the device on Friday before I set out for Southend from North Wales. Knowing that I'd got to go out into the wilds of Essex today, I thought I'd give it a trial run on Saturday on the way down. Knowing that GPS really does run the battery down nicely and having previously used a standalone TomTom, I plugged the phone into the in car charger, turned on the Bluetooth and away we went. Everything was running smoothly, or so I thought... After travelling for about 1.5 hours, it was time to pull into the first services, at Keele. Switch engine off, phone shows battery level of 1 bar. By the time, I'd ordered a coffee, the phone was bleeping Low Battery, to prevent data loss etc. Oh well I thought, maybe the in car charger (which I'd previously used for my S710) wasn't powerful enough. So, I dug out the charger USB lead and plugged it into a lighter socket adapter and turned the engine on and phone showed it was charging. Great, I'll turn TomTom back on. A little while later, having gone down the M6 Toll whilst approaching the M42 split, the phone died. As dead as the proverbial dodo. So, I thought, oh well maybe the 500mAh the USB adapter provides isn't enough to keep the battery charged sufficiently for the GPS + Bluetooth not to completly overwhelm it. By the time I reached Oxford services, the battery had got back to 1 bar (two little blobs in the battery state screen). Fine, I'll use the inverter and just use the standard charger. Plugged it in, phone says it's charging. Bingo! It's working, I'll turn TomTom back on and proceed to leave the services. Unfortunately, by the time I reached the M25 the phone died again. Bum. Oh well, never mind, the inverter plugged straight into the light socket (on a Punto not a good idea) can go off at the slightest bump in the road. Phone didn't feel overly hot, I'll sort it out in the morning. Sunday Morning Right, new day, new challenges. Battery fully charged, lets go for a drive. So, I proceeded to Southend High Street to see if I could find a *real* in car charger. Started off at the Orange shop who hadn't even had the phone yet, didn't know when they'd get it and were waiting for accessories stock for all new phones launched in the last 3 months! Not a good start, but, they did suggest I could try the O2 store next door!!! O2, well, they haven't got the phone released yet, so why would they have a charger I thought. Correctumondo. Suggestion from the O2 shop, try Carphone Warehouse. So, a short walk up the High Street takes me to the next pair of phone shops (they all come in pairs!). CPW looked, but no luck. No chargers are available yet. Try HTC, or the Orange shop down the road. Walk next door into T-Mobile... Nope, we've got the phones which were not allowed to sell until Wednesday, but we won't get accessories for a couple of months. So, I walked to the top of the High Street and went into Vodafone. They've got the phone and they'll sell it, but according to them, HTC haven't released the accessories for third party manufacture yet, so they won't have any car chargers until later next month. Finally, the HTC Touch Diamond is far too advanced for 3. Right, back to the Heath Robinson approach. Clearly, the normal phone charger will work, but, I would need a new extension lead for the inverter so it doesn't wobble. Off to Maplins and get said extension lead. Plug phone in, show's it's charging and is workingly fine. Don't even bother trying TomTom as I'm in my home town and hope I know my way around. Today So, having filled the car with petrol off I pootle to Crouch Vale Brewery. OK, so South Woodham isn't the wilds of Essex I previously described, but I didn't know where I was going. The journey from Leigh-on-Sea, to Rayleigh (for petrol filling) and then on to South Woodham was 35 minutes. The phone was plugged in all the way and was, as far as I was concerned, running on mains all the way. How wrong I was. Got out, at South Woodham and the phone seemed to be a bit hot. Oh well, I was using the GPS that should explain it. Got back in the car 10 minutes later and plugged it back in. Phone shows it's on external battery, TomTom working correctly. Great. Five minutes down the road, I had a call come in. I'd forgotten to put Bluetooth on (headset was dead anyway) so I pulled over. Phone by this stage was red hot, you could probably fry an egg on it. I did notice that it was showing the battery symbol instead of the mains symbol. Unplugged it, plugged it back in - nothing. Well maybe it was fully charged and automatically switched off until needed (well, you never know!). Two and a half hours later and I pull in to Warwick Services. Before, I turn the electrics off I exited TomTom and returned to the Home screen. Battery symbol still showing full charge (rather than mains), go back in to TomTom to see what it says. It shows battery almost depleted, with "charging" underneath the battery. Exit back to Home screen, turn off engine and electrics. Bam... battery indicator down to "!" pop up, Data Loss etc. Turn electrics back on, battery symbol showing full again, rather than mains. Go and have lunch, leave it in my pocket and it cools off nicely. Get back in car, plug in. Phone shows mains symbol so it must be charging. Put TomTom back on and go on my way. TEN (10) minutes later, M40 comes to a halt. OK, while we're waiting, I'll just see what's going on. Ouch, that's hot. Phone is once again, red hot. TomTom shows battery charging but home screen shows full battery. Battery screen shows red, not charging. Maybe the phone's getting hot in the holder (bog standard PDA holder £15 from Halfords). Take phone out of holder and leave on seat with TomTom still on. Next services, no better. Turn TomTom off and pull extension from Ciggy Lighter, let it cool down. Come back, having used toilet and plug back in. Display shows it's charging. Leave TomTom off and put it back in holder. An hour later and I pull into more services. Phone still charging correctly and just moderately warm. No more than you would expect when charging. Great, so I've got a GPS phone you can't use for Sat Nav. Plug in hands free headset (from my S710), same connector, works perfectly. Phone Orange CS and endure a 25 minute wait for a response. Tell them what I think, that it would seem that if your using the in car charger with Sat Nav turned on it overheats. Bearing in mind that in Germany the O2 version comes with TomTom N7 pre-loaded (with directions to Poland), you should be able to use it as a Sat Nav with phone rather than having two separate pieces of kit. Orange CS haven't heard of one overheating yet (hmm), but I can surmise, it overheats pretty quickly when you turn GPS on (probably within 1/2 hour). They asked me how far the journey was and proceeded to tell me that they may expect it to overheat if you were going from one end of the country to the other (pardon?) but it shouldn't overheat within 1/2 hour. So, to sum up - it would seem that the HTC Touch Diamond will not charge when it overheats (correct as per the manual and as per common sense), but, turning the GPS on which will flatten the battery within 1.5-2 hours (according to independent tests) will make the unit overheat very quickly if you plug it in regardless of the charge on the battery. Ladies and Gentlemen, I present the worlds first GPS device which can't do GPS. --- P.S. Orange are swapping the phone tomorrow. I'll have to see what the next one does. If it does the same, it would suggest a MAJOR design fault (I suspect this is the case). P.P.S. I've got to go to Liverpool on Wednesday, so we'll have to see how it reacts. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest SSR Posted August 4, 2008 Report Share Posted August 4, 2008 Not sure if this is much help, but I used the Diamond with TomTom 7 for a couple of 2 hour journeys a week or so ago. I used a cigarette socket charger with USB output that I bought for a previous phone (from Boxwave.com, rated to 1000mA). The phone didn't get more than warm to the touch, and the battery was fully charged during both journeys. Silly question, but was the holder sitting near any air vents with warm air? Albeit that seems unlikely with the current weather. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest adamjedge Posted August 4, 2008 Report Share Posted August 4, 2008 No, I actually moved it to above the air vents (blowing on cold all the way) to try and cool the thing down. But with no success. I've ordered a new car charger (from HTC) and I'll see what happens with the next phone. Interestingly, Orange CS said they hadn't heard of any battery issues! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest deadphill Posted August 4, 2008 Report Share Posted August 4, 2008 If its any help, with my kaiser, if the battery is under 35% I will still get a flat battery when using it in conjunction with cameraware and the built in navizon, all while on charge in the car. If its above that, it will charge up all the way! It will get very hot, but it still works! Maybe you have a dodgy battery to begin with? One other thing you could try is a new radio/rom? Its amazing how they can help sometimes! Better luck next time anyway! Cheers Phill Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest WearTheFoxHat Posted August 4, 2008 Report Share Posted August 4, 2008 Interestingly, Orange CS said they hadn't heard of any battery issues! aye of course they would say that. Because they don't note that it's an issue. So it's something new to each CS person! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest newtonmj Posted August 4, 2008 Report Share Posted August 4, 2008 (edited) Hi Adam, What a palaver eh?! I can tell by your post that you've been pretty thorough in diagnosing that something ain't quite right, and for what it's worth I've been using my Diamond a lot over the past week with GPS - both in the car and walking - and haven't had any difficulties. I think you've probably hit the nail on the head with the heat aspect as all that energy is wasted and obviously a battery drainer. With my GPS on the device gets 'warm', but I would describe it only as warm as you might expect if it was, say, held in your hand for an extended period - i.e. something above ambient but nothing significant. All in all it sounds like a dodgy device so hopefully your replacement will solve the issue for you. It would have been interesting to make some measurements of the current draw and internal temperature during use - PowerGuard (freeware) is a handy tool for this - and it can plot such info over time. At the very least we could have perhaps compared your results with others' in order for you to be able to quantify in no uncertain terms the symptoms you observed. Regarding a suitable USB car charger I bought one from Amazon - this one - but it's out of stock. I imagine it, and similar items, are available from elsewhere but the key aspect is it can source 1A and has two ports which can be handy. Do let us know how the replacement turns out! Mathew Edited August 4, 2008 by newtonmj Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest 1straven Posted August 5, 2008 Report Share Posted August 5, 2008 I use my diamond in the car and for the charger, I'm using the one that came with my m700. Works fine and charges the phone up completely although it does get hot. Only difference I can think of is I am using a y connector to charge the phone while it is plugged into a 3.5mm plug to output the satnat directors, phone calls and music to the car stereo. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest supasox Posted August 19, 2008 Report Share Posted August 19, 2008 Adam, Any luck with the replacement phone? I just tried out my Diamond for the first time as a SatNav and had the same problem as you. I am using TomTom Navigator 6 and I found that the battery went from almost full to almost flat over the course of about three hours, even with the phone plugged in to a car charger the whole time. And yes, it got very hot! This is obviously a problem. I could maybe live with it by getting a spare or extended battery - although I really shouldn't have to! If a replacement solved it for you then I'd probably do the same. Regards Ian Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Paul (MVP) Posted August 19, 2008 Report Share Posted August 19, 2008 I have used my diamond with CamerAware and TomTom with no issues, using a charger i've had in the car *for ever*, so i've no idea where it comes from. When I arrive at my destination, the phone is invariably fully charged, and not massively hot (warm, from GPS / WiFi / 3G yeah, but not really hot)? P Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Neil5459 Posted August 19, 2008 Report Share Posted August 19, 2008 I can add my own take on this having been using mt Diamond with iGO in Italy over the last 2 weeks (alongside the X7500 for comparison!) I have not seen any overheating issues, and my old ciggy lighter charger (a Moto RAZR one actually) kept the battery charged however much the SatNav was on. But, there is still a major gotcha, and some of my colleagues over at 4WM have seen the same thing- if the signal is lost via going inot a tunnel, or due to the canyon effect, the Diamond often fails to reaquire the signal. I've no idea why this is, and it doesn't affect the X7500, so not the SatNav software itself. When in this state, the GPS Status just shows the number of visible sats (red dots in iGO) but no lock occurs and no sat data appears to download. It is necessary to turn off the GPS within the program itself, and then restart it to reaquire a lock. Not tried with Radio 07, but others have seen a similar effect even with that. Thankfully not many tunnels or canyons in Essex but I remain wary :D Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Paul (MVP) Posted August 19, 2008 Report Share Posted August 19, 2008 I have not seen a single signal-lost-and-not-regained... P Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Kushmir Posted August 19, 2008 Report Share Posted August 19, 2008 I am on my fourth replacement phone. This phone has much lower battery consumption and does not get as hot as any of the previous three, which all had ridiculously poor battery life and got surprisingly hot. Orange told me that there were no known battery issues, though on one forum (might have been this one or another one) there was a comment from an Orange employee who said that Orange were monitoring for battery problems! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest T39andcounting Posted August 21, 2008 Report Share Posted August 21, 2008 I'm using an Orange branded Blackberry car charger, (the one where they sell you a lead and the ciggy plug seperately) with my Diamond, and have seen no problems. I've probably driven over 1500 miles with the GPS since the diamond was delivered, and haven't had any charging issues (it's always full at the end of a journey) or issues with heat, (although it is mounted in front of an air vent). One thing I have had twice is that the GPS has hung... TomTom is still working, telling me I've got 19 miles to the next junction, and showing a full signal, however it's not actually changing... as if it thinks I've stopped. A soft reset sorts it. Not sure yet if this is TomTom (v6) or the phone yet, so I'll keep monitoring. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest jimbouk Posted August 21, 2008 Report Share Posted August 21, 2008 I went to Cornwall and back last week (round trip of 600 miles) - and Copilot worked flawlessly on my diamond. The car has sat nav anyway, so I was using Copilot to warn me about speed cameras and I thus compared the performance of the £2K system in the car (albeit with tv/computer etc etc) with the £25 (off ebay) copilot live 6 software and my free diamond. Having been used to a Tytn2 with GPS, I am amazed at how fast the Diamond gets a fix. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest estechco Posted August 21, 2008 Report Share Posted August 21, 2008 (edited) I'm using an Orange branded Blackberry car charger, (the one where they sell you a lead and the ciggy plug seperately) with my Diamond, and have seen no problems. I've probably driven over 1500 miles with the GPS since the diamond was delivered, and haven't had any charging issues (it's always full at the end of a journey) or issues with heat, (although it is mounted in front of an air vent). One thing I have had twice is that the GPS has hung... TomTom is still working, telling me I've got 19 miles to the next junction, and showing a full signal, however it's not actually changing... as if it thinks I've stopped. A soft reset sorts it. Not sure yet if this is TomTom (v6) or the phone yet, so I'll keep monitoring. I had this big styley trying to negotiate a tricky return of a hire car in Rome. Wondered whether it was the "canyon" effect of the buildings or the fact that the car was overheating (it was 35c outside). Managed to fall out with my wife who had the paper map and as I pulled in to the kerb to get bearings managed to shred the hire car tyre...bloody great!!! To cut a long story short, it happens on TT7 as well, although I think I've seen suggestions that the HTCGPSTool that has been doing the rounds also demonstrates this symptom, so it possibly it is some kind of h/w problem (possibly heat related)? Edited August 21, 2008 by estechco Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Neil5459 Posted August 22, 2008 Report Share Posted August 22, 2008 Looks similar to what I reported above, though iGO didn't 'hang', it just lost all the sat signals (though it 'knew' where they all were because the scatter map kept updating); This wasn't an obvious heat issue (though it was 35 degrees outside!) as it 1st happened very shortly into a journey. Always happens when you need directions to the Airport doesn't it :D Since being back in UK it has been good as gold :D Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest SSR Posted August 22, 2008 Report Share Posted August 22, 2008 I've only had the one hang with TT7, but overall I find the stability excellent. Would be nice if TT was a bit quicker though. Also I'm finding the GPS fix very quick, often within seconds. It would take several minutes at times on my old combo of TyTN and separate Bluetooth receiver. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest estechco Posted August 22, 2008 Report Share Posted August 22, 2008 Since being back in UK it has been good as gold :D Wot you mean it isn't 35c where you are? :D Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Neil5459 Posted August 22, 2008 Report Share Posted August 22, 2008 Nearer 35F today :D (and 100% humidity!) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Rapier Posted August 22, 2008 Report Share Posted August 22, 2008 (edited) ...One thing I have had twice is that the GPS has hung... TomTom is still working, telling me I've got 19 miles to the next junction, and showing a full signal, however it's not actually changing... as if it thinks I've stopped. A soft reset sorts it. Not sure yet if this is TomTom (v6) or the phone yet, so I'll keep monitoring....Same for me not with TomTom but with Garmin XT Mobile 40.20.50 (latest version). Unfortunately I wasn't paying much attention to the screen and I went 60 km in a wrong direction :D .So I think it is a phone issue not Garmin, TomTom, iGO, or other navigation software. After flashing with a newer firmware (1.93.xxx.3, I was using 1.37.401.3) the GPS signal is aquired much faster and the software does not get stuck...but this is only a 2 day test (since I've flashed it), so I cannot tell if it solves this issue for good Edited August 22, 2008 by Rapier Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest pioko Posted August 24, 2008 Report Share Posted August 24, 2008 Hi All, Yesterday I had the same problem with my T-Mobile Ameo! It was running TomTom v6 and after about 1 hour of driving it became very hot. Also I noticed it was not charging the battery. It is not a placement issue (sunny windscreen), as recenty there is no sun in Wales, where I live. I think this problem may be related to the TomTom software version 6 only. For some reason it is preventing the PDA from charging the battery. It may be that the software is forcing the CPU to run at its full speed/power and the charger cannot provide sufficient energy for the 100% running CPU. I was thinking to use some third-party software to slow down the CPU speed and see what happens. Does anyone know a good free software like that for WM5? Cheers, Piotr Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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