HETP replacement battery for Note 5 won't charge at all

[Android Central Question]

As of late, the battery in my Note 5 has been showing some signs it's on its way out; putting off ridiculous amounts of heat, periodically losing it's ability to charge, and the screen time has been getting less and less. So, I purchased a 3200mAh replacement battery from HETP on amazon, and after following some tutorials, was able to disassemble my Note (without breaking anything) and remove the OEM battery. Thing is, when I snap the new HETP battery's connector into the motherboard... nothing happens. I plug the phone in to a fast charger and it still won't turn on, my computer doesn't recognize it, it doesn't even show the red charging LED. And I know it's not the phone, because I was able to snap the original battery back in, and it works just the same as it did before. Even when the phone is completely disassembled, if I snap the original battery in, it's alive, if I swap it out for the HETP battery, it's dead as a doornail. I've tried to wait and see if it just needed to charge, tried to force a reset by holding the power/volume buttons, I checked the pins on the new connector, I've disconnected and reconnected the new battery several times... did I just get a dead battery or is there something else wrong here?

 

[B. Diddy]

Welcome to Android Central! Do you have a voltmeter to check the battery? https://www.techwalla.com/articles/how-to-test-a-cell-phone-battery-with-a-multimeter

 

[Redd Carpenter]

I just got back from the hardware store with a multimeter, and after testing the battery, it is showing a voltage. Could it just be that it's not making proper contact with the motherboard? I tried disconnecting/reconnecting it several times and the pins don't look damaged.

 

[B. Diddy]

Does it seem loose or snug when you snap the battery in? Also, what voltage does it read? If it's too low, that could indicate a faulty battery.

 

[Redd Carpenter]

Does it seem loose or snug when you snap the battery in? Also, what voltage does it read? If it's too low, that could indicate a faulty battery.

Seems to snap in just like the OEM battery, fits snug to the motherboard connector the same too. Voltmeter reads around 3.8V, which is what it says on the box so I guess that's not it either.

 

[B. Diddy]

Strange. Could it be that the positive and negative terminals were switched?

 

[Redd Carpenter]

Strange. Could it be that the positive and negative terminals were switched?

On the battery itself? I doubt it, but I could test that to be sure. The connector and flex cable seem to be in the same orientation as the OEM battery.

 

[Redd Carpenter]

Strange. Could it be that the positive and negative terminals were switched?

Okay, I just had a chance to test it, and it seems like the terminals are in the same direction; both give positive voltages in the same orientation. Odly enough, when I connect the phone to a charger with no battery attached, the "battery charging" symbol flashes, but when I actually snap the battery in, it's completely unresponsive again.

Another thing I noticed, the batteries give two different voltages; my OWM battery is at ~4V and the HETP one is at ~3.85. My OEM battery says the "Charge voltage" is 4.4 but the "nominal voltage" is 3.85, same as the HETP. Will this matter at all?

 

[Redd Carpenter]

I'm officially at my wit's end with this thing. The battery and cable are undamaged, the connectors look undamaged, the voltage and current are there just the same, it snaps into the motherboard just fine and by all accounts should be making contact... but for some reason, whenever I snap this damn thing in and try and charge it, absolutely nothing happens. Matter of fact, less than nothing happens; at least when the battery is completely disconnected, connecting the charging cable will get me a flash of the "battery charging" icon, but snapping in the new battery wont even give me that. This is quickly moving past just malfunctioning and towards malicious.

Unless anyone has some last-minute prophetic insight into how to fix this, I'm sending this thing back to amazon with a 1-star review soon to follow and getting my $15 back, and this week, I'm making the long-overdue trip to Verizon to get some new hardware.

 

[B. Diddy]

I'm betting it's a bad battery. But let me light up the Bat-Signal and see if someone else with more technical wizardry can help -- whaddya think, @Rukbat?

 

[Rukbat]

The normal voltage of a fully charged lithium battery of the type used in cell phones is 3.85 Volts. 4 Volts is a bit overcharged. 4.4 Volts is the amount the phone puts on the battery to make it charge - think of water - to get it to flow, the source has to be at a higher level then the destination. The same with electricity.

The original battery may be bad - that 4 Volts bothers me. (I've never seen it in a lithium battery unless it was being charged at the time.) But there's something wrong with the phone - it should work fine with 3.85 Volts, even if that sags a little under load. (And a Note 5 battery, sitting on the shelf all this time, won't be in too good condition either - at very least, you'd have to condition it - 3 cycles of full charge followed by discharge until the phone shut off (normal usage is fine for the discharge phase).