Printable View
A friend of mine has a Playbook that seems to have a charging problem. She probably let it run down by failing to turn it off. Now, when she plugs in the charger, the red light comes on for a bit, then goes out and she can't turn it on and it won't charge. She doesn't look for answers on the web, so I'm asking for her. What's the problem? It's not even a year old, so the battery can't be pooched, can it?
Plug and unplug the tablet in succession approximately 6 times which has been known to fix the issue. However, be very careful NOT TO BEND the USB port connector inside the tablet. And use the Blackberry OEM wall charger not the USB charger.
It is called Stacked Charging. The final suggestion, shorter periods, has been used more recently.
Locked, bricked
I was told about "stack" charging, 6 cycles of charge no charge, for 2 minutes each, charging for never more than 2 minutes.
Plug the PB in with the factory charging cable (red light comes on for a several seconds, then goes off). Wait about 10 more seconds. Unplug PB for about 30 seconds.
Repeat n times.
n == 6 for me. Finally my PB light switched to green, then began to oscillate, signalling charging. After a few more minutes my PB came back to life.
You might want to UNplug/Replug at the wall/socket end to avoid using or damaging the weaker usb port on the pb itself.
Just talked to tech support, because i'm impatient sometimes. Here is the initial process they gave me to try.
Plug in the charger for 2 mins, unplug for 10 sec -> Repeat 6 to 8 times
Then while unplugged perform the Hard reset (POWER, VOL + and - at the same time) . **When the red light comes on PLUG IN THE CHARGER**
The playbook is supposed to then start charging/boot.
...........................
Some have now found a shorter sequence works:
Oh man I fixed it. I stack charged it! But not for 2 minutes.
Every time my PB red signal goes off I removed the connection from the wall charger and placed it back within a second. I repeated it for almost 25-30 times and all in the sudden a big charger button showed up on the screen and a green light on the charging LED. I left th e power connection for 2 more hrs and started using it.
Thanks BB9700CA and F2. I tried doing that with no success so far. When first plugged in, the light flashes once. The next time it flashes again, but a lot dimmer. The third time it maybe flashes, but it's barely perceptible. After that, nothing. I didn't try the reset with the buttons yet, but can't see what that would do if the battery is completely dead.
I've also been searching the web and there are suggestions to hook up the PB to a PC and download the desktop app. Can that revive the battery? A lot of the "help" out there is really lame and confused, especially on Youtube.
This method seems to be working better from the responses I have seen lately.Oh man I fixed it. I stack charged it! But not for 2 minutes.
Every time my PB red signal goes off I removed the connection from the wall charger and placed it back within a second. I repeated it for almost 25-30 times and all in the sudden a big charger button showed up on the screen and a green light on the charging LED. I left th e power connection for 2 more hrs and started using it.
So as soon as the light goes out, unplug, wait a second and plug back in. Repeat....