1 yr. ago • 92%

Should the EU make it compulsory for Android phones to still work without a battery?

Reason for posting this question - my laptop battery died and it turns out the bios gets reset every time I turn it on now.

Made me think of the old phones I have which cannot be repurposed without getting new batteries..

I guess mandating replaceable batteries is enough but IMHO it should go further

17 comments

They should do it. Old phones can be repurposed for stuff like smart mirrors, not having to worry about the battery in that case would be great.

Nowadays, pretty much every phone supports battery idle mode anyways, which is the same thing: They don't trickle charge the battery, they just run off the charger entirely.

If we get replace batteries, implementing this too is a negligible amount of effort.

19
- I did not know about battery idle mode, thanks. Would those phones work with the battery removed somehow? Possibly not.
  
  I found a hack online for one phone with a removable battery, involving soldering a capacitor or something. Will test when I have time
  
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- I don't think that many phones support the idle mode I think Sony has one, Samsung only has a battery bypass when you're gaming. I think it's still a pretty rare feature but if you know something I don't please share
  
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If your bios is getting reset it's possible your system uses a cmos battery and it is dead. It's separate from the main battery and handles date/time/bios.

Just look for something that looks like a button battery inside your laptop. Sometimes it's wrapped in plastic. My old Dell had it wrapped in rubber which held the wires in place and had a special connector.

Newer systems don't have them - they just rely on the main battery. But if yours is losing time/settings you might have one with a separate battery. It's usually a cr2032 or similar.

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Wouldn't using a degraded battery and a constant wired connection already be sufficient for this use case?

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- No because the battery could potentially start swelling
  
  5
- No, battery will blow up possibly!
  
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  I was thinking about using my old android device as home server and now I'm concerned 😥
  
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You want a landline?

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- You might have missed it, but nowadays phones have large displays and fast processors, even cameras and microphones and other sensors.
  
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  Yeah they're ready-to-go touchscreen interfaces/displays that can be implemented in tons of ways. I've been thinking about setting up my old Note 4 as a touch screen interface for my 3D printer, and old tablets as wall mounted interfaces for Home Assistant, which are just two possibilities.
  
  Unfortunately the Note won't run off USB power alone so I'll have to hack together a solution that tricks it into thinking the phone is being charged with a battery in it.
  
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  If I were to tell someone from 70 years ago, "hold on let me get my phone," while talking about taking a picture, they would think I'm nuts.
  
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  Yeah, my old phone works very well as a ghetto stream deck, and I'm 100% underutilising its capabilities.
  
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  I was poking fun at the seeming desire for a physically tethered phone as to power a device without a battery, it would need to be plugged in.
  
  But also, you may have missed the likes of ELKeyko Wireless Phone 2021 The 4G LTE Android 10 Fixed Wireless/Cordless Desktop Phone with VoLTE, WIFI,BT and WIFI HOTSPOT Smart Phone Cordless landline https://amzn.eu/d/ffotKoV
  
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- Permanently Deleted
  
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- With a camera, microphone, GPS, accelerometer and touch screen? Yes I do :)
  
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