[The Mack]

I just got a curve replacement for one that wasn't working, none of the buttons would work. But it seems that the battery has a red stripe on it. I assume this means water damage, but I know for a fact it hasn't gotten wet.

If I buy a new battery and put it in the phone all well be ok right?

The old battery in the new phone has a battery charging indicator and a little line through it...??

[Reed McLay]

Welcome to CrackBerry.

The red stripe is normal, if it gets wet, the red bleeds into the white patch.

The on screen battery indicator means the battery is not charging properly.

Have you installed the BlackBerry Desktop Manager from your BlackBerry Tools CD or from a download? The USB drivers are part of the package, without them, your computer will not respond correctly.

You should be able to use the wall charger until you have completed the software install.

[der_geistmx]

But it seems that the battery has a red stripe on it. I assume this means water damage, but I know for a fact it hasn't gotten wet. If I buy a new battery and put it in the phone all well be ok right?

I have a 2 old month Curve 8900, working fine till last night, I turned the device off, took the battery out to swap the simcard, put the battery back in, and waited for it to reboot. It never did, the red led just keeps blinking 3 times at intervals, and that is pretty much it.

I take the battery out, and wait, install it again, the same..

I take the battery out once more, and suddenly I noticed the RED STRIPE in the white sticker. I have been googling all day. So far it is clear this means water damage, which is kind of weird, my mobile never got wet, and last night there wasn't even liquid around.

now, nowhere in the net says clearly what the red stripe means:
a. Curve 8900 totally fckucked!
b. Battery fckucked!
c. get a new battery Curve will be alive!!!!

Does anyone have any of these answers???

[safetytx]

The red stripe on battery is normal if that stripe looks like it has bled into the white sticker then it has gotten wet.

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

[der_geistmx]

Ok so we found a definitive answer:
It seems that even ambient humidty trips also the rep stripe on the batteries (I find my self in UAE at the moment and is quite humd). Today I was looking for batteries ended up trying my battery in a new Curve in a shop, and it worked normal...

So there we have an answer, the red stripe in the battery means is humid or in the worse case something has gotten wet, and just swaping the battery probably wont make the mobile itself work again.

tried a new battery, and my battery again with my Curve, and it just does the same, the led blinks and blinks and blinks, and does nothing more...

so if the Curve got somehow blocked, does anyone knows a solution? Or is it completely dead?

[der_geistmx]

A new hint in this story:

Returning to this damn problem and red stripes. BB stops working when I tried to swap the sim card, then I realized about the red stripe on battery, then I took it to an official shop where they couldnot fix anything. And after countless hours of gooogling and finding no answers, I had to buy a new Curve 8900 (arabic keyboard �=/ which makes the letter prints on the keyboard actually smaller than they are already).

So here is what I have learned:

1. If you get the battery red stripe, or pink stripe, or any stripe on the battery that does not mean the battery is dead! is just ...there. Battery works as usual.

2. If somehwere IN your phone that red stripe or whatever indicator is tripped because the phone got wet, you are most probably doomed, no warranties, no BB anymore.

3. If you get the battery red stripe, or pink stripe, or any stripe,
and your BB has not gotten wet or been near any liquid source, and it suddenly doesn�t start again or turn on, and the Led just keeps blinking red in periodic intervals. It can mean (in my opinion:

a. Your BB got somehow fried due to any reason.
b. Your BB got somehow BLOCKED (I mean the harware, probably the processor) and there is no way to reset it.

In my case it seems I got 3b. So I took it to a shop (not official shop where they wanted to sell me another new BB) but one of those shops you find in any 3rd World Country, asked if they could fix BBs and it turns out those guys actually have seen the same problem on Curves for a while. Somehow they unblocked/reset/whatever the hardware, all info was lost and they loaded the system again, et voila! BB Curve up an running again....

I hope this info is useful for others.

[fiyota]

I'm trying to understand how the red water sensor (that's all it is, it's just ink that changes colour when it's wet).. has anything to do with the physical hardware of the phone... The red stripe bleeding means that your phone got wet somehow, and the same water/moisture that activated the stripe, fried the phone, or the battery. If it was just the battery that luckily got fried, then a new battery of course would solve the problem.

[KasiCatastrophe]

Ok so we found a definitive answer:
It seems that even ambient humidty trips also the rep stripe on the batteries

As two other people before me have stated, the red stripe on the battery itself is normal. If the red has bled into the white then it means the Blackberry has gotten wet somehow.

As for the not turning on issue, I really don't know. I have never heard of hardware being "blocked" before.

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

[JayKoz85]

Yeah, the stripes are fine, they have always been there.. it's when the stripes bleed into the white part, then that's when it's gotten wet.

[xliderider]

3. If you get the battery red stripe, or pink stripe, or any stripe,
and your BB has not gotten wet or been near any liquid source, and it suddenly doesn�t start again or turn on, and the Led just keeps blinking red in periodic intervals. It can mean (in my opinion:

a. Your BB got somehow fried due to any reason.
b. Your BB got somehow BLOCKED (I mean the harware, probably the processor) and there is no way to reset it.

In my case it seems I got 3b.

No, it just means you should follow the directions for How to Recover a Dead Blackberry, link in my sig below.

I hope you didn't pay too much money to these "guys", when you could've fixed it yourself.

[pegged_29]

The white sticker is put there primarily for warranty purposes. It's the first thing they look for to determine whether the phone is defective or whether the owner somehow got the phone wet, which in this case voids your warranty.

[hootyhoo]

It sounds like they just reloaded the OS. If you have or have access to a pc you could have done that yourself.

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

[Mr300]

The battery that came with my new 9550 has a white sticker w/no red stripe but the ebay purchased new OEM battery has a red stripeon the white sticker... go figure

[plunkingtom]

No, it just means you should follow the directions for How to Recover a Dead Blackberry, link in my sig below.

I hope you didn't pay too much money to these "guys", when you could've fixed it yourself.

A day or two in a bag of rice would not hurt before recovering phone.

WHERE DID THIS OLD THREAD COME FROM??

[heckufaguy]

I have a 2 old month Curve 8900, working fine till last night, I turned the device off, took the battery out to swap the simcard, put the battery back in, and waited for it to reboot. It never did, the red led just keeps blinking 3 times at intervals, and that is pretty much it.

I take the battery out, and wait, install it again, the same..

I take the battery out once more, and suddenly I noticed the RED STRIPE in the white sticker. I have been googling all day. So far it is clear this means water damage, which is kind of weird, my mobile never got wet, and last night there wasn't even liquid around.

now, nowhere in the net says clearly what the red stripe means:
a. Curve 8900 totally fckucked!
b. Battery fckucked!
c. get a new battery Curve will be alive!!!!

Does anyone have any of these answers???

So, your phone was working fine, you swapped the sim card and you had issues?

Why wouldn't you suspect the sim card or its proper insertion, and not the battery? (Which has now been shown to be normal, and not an issue anyways)

[frreshh]

A day or two in a bag of rice would not hurt before recovering phone.

WHERE DID THIS OLD THREAD COME FROM??

i think the second poster found it in a google search and didnt bother to check when posting? lol

[Pterocarpous]

...I have never heard of hardware being "blocked" before.

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

I think the poster means "bricked" rather than "blocked"...