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Help Phone started overheating, anyone else?

S

SamsungVibrant

Android Expert
Okay so my phone has started running hot. I'm not talking about when I'm charging it, I expect it to get warm while charging, I'm talking about just normal use.

It gets very warm, almost hot, back of the phone, above the battery, near the camera lens/sd card/sim card area.

Again the battery is cool to the touch if I remove the cover, but the area above the battery is getting really hot, and I noticed when my phone gets hot, the battery life starts to drain like crazy.

Anyone else?
 
I suspect that you have something that is drawing a LOT of power when this happens. That causes the battery to drain fast, and produces waste heat. Next time it happens, try turning some things off. I would start with GPS, then WiFi, etc. Once you find a service that is being used, you can look for apps that use it.

Good Luck
 
scottmcgee said:
I suspect that you have something that is drawing a LOT of power when this happens. That causes the battery to drain fast, and produces waste heat. Next time it happens, try turning some things off. I would start with GPS, then WiFi, etc. Once you find a service that is being used, you can look for apps that use it.

Good Luck
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the only thing that is on is wifi,(gps bluetooth are both off).. and I was searching through aps in android market for a few mins when it started to get uncomfortably hot.

any other suggestions? can an app cause this?
 
i have seen (according to Battery indicator app) the phone max out at 119 F, it usually sits some where in the 80s for me non charge.
 
AF_Commando said:
i have seen (according to Battery indicator app) the phone max out at 119 F, it usually sits some where in the 80s for me non charge.
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how do i check my phones temperature? my battery is actually oddly very cool to the touch, its the area above the battery, especially over the sd card that is turning very hot
 
just slide your finger straight down to bring down the pull down menu. The temp is listed there along with phone condition.
 
Robinelli said:
just slide your finger straight down to bring down the pull down menu. The temp is listed there along with phone condition.
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are you talking about the slide down notification bar? Umm there is absolutely no temp nor any phone conditions listen when I slide this down.

this is my notification bar slid down, where is the temp suppose to be?

samsungvibrant-albums-notification-bar-picture1708-nonotification.jpg
 
Mine shows that info. Maybe it has something to do with the battery indicator app I got from the market. It only runs as a small icon in my notification bar. It must also provide info in the pull down screen.
 
Running hot is normal for any computer when under load. Extensive use of gps/wifi/3g and/or graphics will heat the phone up. Same thing happens with other smart phones/laptops/pcs etc. I would say under "normal" situations you wouldn't have anything to worry about, but maybe a marathon run of some 3d game or such you might wanna think about taking a break and let the phone cool down. I've never heard of Android giving a temp warning like I've heard the iPhone does. If you have a case, you can take it off to let the phone cool down faster.
 
Yesterday, just using GPS & plugged into a 5 volt outlet, my phone got up to 118 :mad: and I am sure I have felt it hotter than that. I am gonna take it back to T-Mobile to exchange it for another one.
 
SV, I've had this happen to me a few times so far especially if I am doing multiple things at a time. Does not happen often though but it does heat up and I can almost feel it holding it. But this is not unique to the Vibrant and I have seen my iPhone heat up like this on several occasions as well. I don't know if this is cause for serious concern though.
 
There's a free app called Android System Info in the market that shows CPU usage by task. Try installing that and see if a particular task is a high CPU user. One day I discovered Google Earth was using 100% of my CPU. No idea why, and it hasn't happened again. It also allows you to either stop the task or switch to it. Very handy for monitoring CPU usage.
 
get an app killer from the market. Mine does this every once in a while. As soon as I kill all apps it goes back to normal.
 
Do not get into the habit of relying on an app killer. If an app is making the phone do something you dont think it should, like high temp, notify the developer and uninstall the app.
 
wildblue said:
There's a free app called Android System Info in the market that shows CPU usage by task. Try installing that and see if a particular task is a high CPU user. One day I discovered Google Earth was using 100% of my CPU. No idea why, and it hasn't happened again. It also allows you to either stop the task or switch to it. Very handy for monitoring CPU usage.
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Good information wildblue, much more valuable than an "app killer"
 
I have experienced this when using the navigation while in my car for longer than 10-15 min. And this is all I was using at the time.
 
If you read my first post on this thread, this is normal. I've had this happen with using wifi alot, even 3g will do this. Basically the hardware that handles this heats up like any other electronic component when electricity is pumped through it. Though if it gets too hot, and I guess thats a subjective thing, you should call Tmobile. But I've never had a phone meltdown on me and I've never heard of any Android phones shutting down or displaying a message due to high temperature like the iphone does.
 
yatimameiji said:
If you read my first post on this thread, this is normal. I've had this happen with using wifi alot, even 3g will do this. Basically the hardware that handles this heats up like any other electronic component when electricity is pumped through it. Though if it gets too hot, and I guess thats a subjective thing, you should call Tmobile. But I've never had a phone meltdown on me and I've never heard of any Android phones shutting down or displaying a message due to high temperature like the iphone does.
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I have had this even with my old Samsung SGH-T809 slider not-so-smart phone. When making several phone calls or on an extended call the phone would heat up. No big deal. It's completely normal. Until my phone starts smoking or becomes too hot to touch I'm not going to worry about it.
 
This is normal and will not hurt the phone or you. The CPU/GPU is located at the top of the phone as well as the power inverter. The warming effect you are experiencing is due to a "run away" app that is doing something in the background and may even be waiting for input.

I have found that on both my old Nexus One and my Vibrant that GPS programs, such as google earth and maps, would cause the phone to heatup very quickly and even more so when plugged into a power source. Like I said this is mainly do to the power inverter and the CPU being in the same location and both being used at the same time.

Also remember that a standard Intel or AMD CPU running at 1Ghz required a heat sink to work. The chips in mobile devices are getting ever faster and are creating more and more heat, but a heat sink is not possible so the case and surrounding area is used to dissipate the heat. Again this is normal and will happen with any modern smartphone with high power CPU's and programs.
 
How crazy would it be to have a self contained liquid cooled smartphone. wow I see the geeks clamoring for it now.
 
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