Palm Vx Battery Charging

[alan14]

Can anyony help me my Palm x will not charge in its cradle. All the plugs are connected but the battery is nor recharging. I just bought the unit secondhand, the Hot-Sync operation is working correctly. The cradle does not appesr to have an indicator light on it (there is an opening to the right of the hot-sync button). The power pack is 110v so I bought a transformer. Does anyone know which pins the charging voltage should be on so I can check !!
Plaese HELP - getting desparate as battery is getting very low - Cheers

 

[BeerGood]

My palm sometimes doesn't charge in the cradle unless you "wiggle" it a bit to get a better contact after which the charging light will come on. You can also try cleaning the contacts with some isopropyl alcohol (pretty much any electronics store) and ear buds/cotton wool. Finally, get yourself a multimeter (if you don't have one, you can get virtually disposable ones at most electronics stores) and check you're getting power at the cradle itself. Heck, you could also use a couple of wires and a light bulb, but that won't tell you exactly how much power is getting through although it will tell you if the cradle itself/power pack is dead......

cradle cable Palm III,V,Vx or PalmPilot
------ ----- -----
pin 1 DE9.6, DB25.6 Palm DTR (GPIO output) -> PC DSR
pin 2 N/C +3.3V on PalmPilot and Palm III handheld
(current limited by 330 Ohm series resistor.)
not connected on PalmPilot cradle
(+4.1V) (or +4.07V measured on my Palm V cradle)
pin 3 DE9.3, DB25.2 Palm RxD <- PC TxD
pin 4 DE9.8, DB25.5 Palm RTS -> PC CTS
pin 5 DE9.2, DB25.3 Palm Txd -> PC RxD
pin 6 DE9.7, DB25.4 Palm CTS <- PC RTS
pin 7 N/C GPIO input pin for detecting hotsync, contacts
with pin 2 when the hotsync button is pressed.
pin 8 N/C GPIO (input only, not connected in cable)
(+5.5V) (or around +5.5 on Palm V cradle only)
pin 9 N/C N/C (spare?)
pin 10 DE9.5, DB25.7 Signal Ground

N/C DE9.4, DB25.20 (PC DTR not connected to Palm)
N/C DE9.1, DB25.8 (PC DCD unconnected to Palm)
(Cradle uses single sided gold PCB edge connector with 2mm contact spacing.)

See also

http://www.palmos.com/dev/support/docs/

Cheers

 

[lezard31]

Got the same problem with my Palm V. I just fixed it. It was a bad contact inside the case. I had to open it with the well knownw hair dryer method. There is a small flexible contact pîn made of brass near the connector, i guess its use is to ground the top and back metal covers of the case. I just bent this pin a little bit and now my palm is charging fine. I guess it is one of the numerous causes which can prevent the palm from charging.
Wish you good luck

 

[alan14]

Sorry I didnt advise everyone !! The problem was a faulty powerpack, sourced a replacement and now everything is sweet. Except for having to contstantly reset the Digitizer !!!