Battery ID chip - help needed

[Christian Gagneraud]

Risto H. Kurppa wrote:
> On Wed, Jun 10, 2009 at 9:56 PM, Christoph Pulster<openmoko at pulster.de> wrote:
>> Openmoko, please can you release relevant infos or chips, so we can
>> built high-power batteries ?
> 
> +1

According to the schematics of the FR, the ID line of the battery is 
not connected to anything (R1769 is marked NC). I checked my FR rev A6 
(from your shop Christoph!;)), and this resistor is not populated.
So it means the ID line of the battery is definitely not used.

Now I'm not saying it is safe to use whatever battery, i'm just saying 
that the power management chip (the PCF 50633) is not able to read any 
information out of the battery you fit in your FR (like battery ID, 
serial number, etc...).

I would say that as long as you use a 3.7V single-cell Li-ion battery 
that has built-in protection, it should be safe to test with your FR.
The only drawback you'll get is a longer charging time.
<not-really-sure>
The FR is designed/programmed to charge at 500mA max. It should be 
possible to change the charging rate in software (u-boot and/or 
kernel), or perhaps by doing some HW mods.
</not-really-sure>

I'm not a battery expert, complementary information welcome!

According to the FR battery page [1], they say that FR use a smart 
battery (model number CT-GTA02 [2]) but i can tell you that i don't 
have such a thing in my phone, i actually have a battery marked 
"Model: GTA02", which is definitely not a smart battery (it has only 3 
pins), this battery correspond more to what's describe on the Neo 
battery page [3]. Moreover, the schematics of the FR show that it use 
only 2 signals of the battery: V+ and V-.

Chris

[1] http://wiki.openmoko.org/wiki/Neo_FreeRunner_Battery
[2] http://people.openmoko.org/tony_tu/GTA02/hardware/GTA02/CT-GTA02.pdf
[2] http://wiki.openmoko.org/wiki/Neo1973_Battery




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