Hey guys,

I know plenty of posts regarding battery life, but I am curious if this little issue is normal.

This has been a very busy couple of months for work, and I havent had a lot of time to read. I plug the charger in occasionally overnight to keep it charged between readings. A week goes by that I haven't read, and a bar is missing. I do the reset the meter with the charger trick, seems to go to full bars until I open it to read at length, and the one bar goes down and stays down. I fully charge it again. If I hadn't read in a week, the same thing happens after a full charge and a week of non use.

A few weeks ago, I hadn't read at all in 2 weeks prior, and the meter was down 2 bars, which is leading me to believe reading or no reading, the battery will lose charge no matter what. I understand the slow discharge if I hadn't read in a month or 2, but this is only weeks. I also want to note that during long reading and heavy use, I don't lose any bars, this seems to be just a time with or without use issue.

So basically, I am curious if others have experienced this same issue. It seems that heavy reading dosen't move the bars for me, just time. I am looking forward to your responses, thanks.

You would expect the Reader to use a small amount of power when it's "off", because it never really IS "off" - turning it off just blanks the screen and disables the detection of key presses. The operating system is still running - looking to see if you've pressed the power button, plugged in the charger, running the clock, etc etc.

I'd say, therefore, that what you're seeing is perfectly normal. I too find that the Reader will lose perhaps 1 bar of power in 10 days or so.

I think with a card inserted it drains the power a bit faster than without. So you might try pulling the card out if you're leaving the Reader for a long time.

I think with a card inserted it drains the power a bit faster than without. So you might try pulling the card out if you're leaving the Reader for a long time.


No card in there, I had one at first, but when the drain began, I took advice from fellow Mobilereaders and removed it.

The same here. I am loosing about 1 bar per week. So I never reach 7000 pages limit in one go. I think I never got more than 1000+ pages, because that is how many pages I read within a month.

Man, I thought my battery was faulty but maybe I'm not reading enough.

I think I'm going to take the Reader apart tonight and measure what is the battery drain when in standby mode. If someone wants to know something specific please let me know so I can take a look/measure when I open it up.

Can you see if you can find the terminal connectors? If you need, I'll find the CPU pin info, but I hear the board is pretty hard to trace...

Can you see if you can find the terminal connectors? If you need, I'll find the CPU pin info, but I hear the board is pretty hard to trace...


If you have the pin info that would be great and I will check it tonight. ;)

Rechargeables do not stay charged.

I work with NiCads in my tools and it takes good charging management to prevent being marooned. I've read that NiCads typically lose from 4 to 8% of their charge per day with a deceleration of loss as it nears complete drain.

I don't know the particularities of the battery the Sony uses but I'm quite sure that this is the phenomenon that we're noticing in this case.

Lithium Polymer that Sony uses can hold a charge quite good as far as I know. What I want to find out is what the standby current is. Tonight we will know. ;)

Here's the CPU info files:
Data Sheet (http://www.freescale.com/files/32bit/doc/data_sheet/MC9328MXL.pdf) (has the pin-out info).
Reference manual (http://www.freescale.com/files/32bit/doc/ref_manual/MC9328MXLRM.pdf).
Product summary page (http://www.freescale.com/webapp/sps/site/prod_summary.jsp?code=i.MXL) (has more documents).

Thanks for the info Igor. I will have to do it tomorrow because I left my tools at work.

It seems from the data sheets that Sidd3 on page 18 (mislabeled as to be 150 MHz) is the standby power consumption valued at 35 uA.

Well I opened it and tried to measure the current. Problem is that it's very hard to measure it. I needed a very, very thin wire to make a circuit and measure the current but I didn't have one at home. The only thing I could do on the spot was cutting the wire but that I found a bit going to far. I can do it but I will need some shrink tube so I can fix it afterwards. ;)

I will give it a try soon but I need to set something up to do it correct. Igor, I couldn't find the terminal and I didn't dare to measure so close to the CPU. If I blow a port I have a big problem. One thing is for sure, you need to measure to find it.

What I did do is rip the "recycled" label from the battery and get the full type description.

It is a:

Sony Fukushima Sew
US473850 A7T
01C45NI22V

I found this type but only instead of "A7T" it ends with "A8T". I can't say what and if they are different.

Click (http://www.battery.com.cn/products/product_detail_29276.html)

Igor, I couldn't find the terminal and I didn't dare to measure so close to the CPU. If I blow a port I have a big problem. One thing is for sure, you need to measure to find it.

Is it possible to check if the terminal contacts are present on the cradle connector?

Is it possible to check if the terminal contacts are present on the cradle connector?
Igorsk, it's impossible to check CPU's pins, because this CPU does not have pins at all, all contacts are located at the bottom surface and are unreachable. Seems cradle connector does not have terminal input/output.
From left to right on the picture:
1) gnd 2) cradle LED (charge) 3)=10) ? 4) gnd 5) usb+ 6) usb- 7) gnd 8) +5V 9) not connected 10)=3)? (3 and 10 are interconnected)
I found no activity (checked with oscilloscope) on pins 3 and 10 in different modes of operation (start up, soft reset, hard reset,...).
http://www.msh-tools.com/ebook/s_pr.gif http://www.msh-tools.com/ebook/connector.png

D'oh! Stupid surface-mount technology (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surface_mount)!
I found no activity (checked with oscilloscope) on pins 3 and 10 in different modes of operation (start up, soft reset, hard reset,...).I assume you're measuring against ground, but my anal nature (and engineering training, in a previous life) forces me to check anyway. :shy:

"Engineering is at least 90% confirmation, and it tends to bleed over."-- me

How do you open up the Sony Reader?

How do you open up the Sony Reader?

Two screws under the SD cover. One screw on the back. Two screws next to the cradle port. The chrome bumpers you have to "slide/pull" out, but do it very gently because they are very fragile!

When you have the bumpers off there are three screws on the left side and four on the right. ;)


EDIT: Please be careful with the chrome bumpers because the edges are sharp. I have many cuts on my fingers by trying to get them of. :stars: