Zen V Plus Power/Charging Problems

[BobbyRS]

Originally Posted by KodiakRV

You cannot leave it plugged in overnight to charge. Here's my take on it -- It will not let you turn it "off" while plugged into a charger. If you turn it off, it comes back on.

The Zen will not power off because it is made to accept power over USB. As long as it is connected, it will stay powered on.

Originally Posted by KodiakRV

I believe that it charges the battery for the first few hours until the batter is fully charged. Then the charging circuit cuts off, but the player stays on. It sits there the rest of the night in the "on" state, draining the battery with the charging circuit off. When you "wake" it back up in the morning, the battery is nearly drained back down to nothing.

This is not how a charging ciruit works. The charging circuit does not cut off. The charging circuit will stop the charge when reached full and switch to bypass to allow for power directly without charging. Once the battery's charge level drops below a full charge again, the charging circuit should keep applying a topping-off charge when detected a drop in charge below full. This process will repeat as long as you have the Zen plugged in and on.

If your Zen is not doing this, then you may be having a hardware issue.

[CrowdAds]

[Awesome Man 990]

Funny, when I had mine it didn't do that. Go to settings, and look for "Idle Shutdown time" If you have it off, then it will more than likely stay on all the time. But, if you have it set for a low time, with it not doing anything, then it will shut off by itself.

[phantomlynx]

I'd tried everything to get my dead Zen V to take a charge. I'd left it connected to a computer for days, tried connecting directly to a USB hub... nothing worked. In dispair I connected it to my mini-USB phone charger (same one you use for a Windows smartphone, Blackberry or Tomtom)... left it a while and voila! It is taking a charge now

[Awesome Man 990]

Wonder why...

[warren]

Hi guys, i'm new to this forum and need help.
My zenv charges ok from the pc but will not chagre from the creative travel charger either 2 or 3 pin. When it is connected the player switches on but the green thunder symbol does not come on. left it overnight and just drained the battery. Bought another non creative charger with output 5volt dc 700mA but this does not work at all. Am going on holiday soon and won't have access to pc so must sort mains charging. If possible keep answers simple as you are dealing with a technophobe.

Thanks
John

[Awesome Man 990]

Firstly, welcome.
Secondly, it might be easier to purchase a wall charger to use over the holiday so that you can plug it into the wall outlets in wherever you are staying, wether it be a hotel, summer home, relatives', etc. (it's quicker too.) As far as the car charger goes, did you check all connections to see if they were niceand tight?( not sloppily placed or shoved in?)

[warren]

Hi Awesome man,
The problem we have is with a wall charger. It's the travel version with the interchangeable heads for different countries power points. This one does power up the zenv but it does not charge. so we bought the alternative and that does nothing at all.

Thanks
John

[Awesome Man 990]

oh, my bad. Thought you were talking about a car charger. As far as that goes, there might be an issue with the heads being interchanged constantly and getting worn off (for those who constantly travel.) maybe with the actual outlet (maybe a loose connection) etc. I'm sorry for the confusion,hope it helps. If problems pursue, you might have to get a universal usb charger like I have for my P2. Like you previously stated, it charges with the computer, but not with the wall charge, which if I remember correctly does not use the USB port to charge (correct me if I'm wrong.) I'll post a pic if you want a reference as to what I mean.'
Hope it helps better than the last post.

[warren]

Thanks again, the travel charger I have is very new so should be ok, this uses the D socket of the Zen V. Have also tried 2 other chargers in the same socket to no avail. The usb carger from the computer also uses the same D socket. Is it possible to use the small jack line in socket to charge?
Thanks
John

[KCCutie]

My V Plus won't charge

First let me say I have let it set for several months without being used and the battery was low the last time I used it.

I tried plugging it in to a PC with a USB cable and here's what happens:

1. The screen comes on with a Low Battery screen.
2. The blue lights behind the play and back buttons flash.

This lasts about 30 seconds then it goes dark the blue lights stop flashing. When I try to turn it on while plugged in sometimes the blue lights will flash again but they never continue to flash. I tried the reset button and that didn't seem to do anything.

So I thought maybe it just wasn't charged enough for the USB cable to work (got a new laptop w XP so if the Zen would turn on long enough I think it would recognize the new hardware but it won't) so I found a mains charger (for a mobile with the same UBS 2.0 port) and I tried that and it's the same as the USB charger. it's been plugged in totally dark now for an hour but still nothing.

What can I do?

[ZenChick]

Originally Posted by KCCutie

My V Plus won't charge

First let me say I have let it set for several months without being used and the battery was low the last time I used it.

I tried plugging it in to a PC with a USB cable and here's what happens:

1. The screen comes on with a Low Battery screen.
2. The blue lights behind the play and back buttons flash.

This lasts about 30 seconds then it goes dark the blue lights stop flashing. When I try to turn it on while plugged in sometimes the blue lights will flash again but they never continue to flash. I tried the reset button and that didn't seem to do anything.

So I thought maybe it just wasn't charged enough for the USB cable to work (got a new laptop w XP so if the Zen would turn on long enough I think it would recognize the new hardware but it won't) so I found a mains charger (for a mobile with the same UBS 2.0 port) and I tried that and it's the same as the USB charger. it's been plugged in totally dark now for an hour but still nothing.

What can I do?

If your player sat for an extended period of time with a low battery, then chances are good that the battery slowly discharged below its safety threshold and disabled itself. This is a safety feature with Li-ion batteries, as depleted Li-on batteries can become extremely unstable when a charging current is applied, causing it to explode quite violently. Unfortunately, it means you're going to have to seek out a replacement battery.

[Person012345]

Originally Posted by kazek

I've had my creative zen v plus for a few weeks now and it's been giving me trouble. Almost everytime I leave it overnight to charge I find it off. And when I try turning it on the normal way (on button) it doesn't work so I hit the reset button and it works fine.

Now last night I left it to charge and this morning it was the same drama all over again but this time the player wont go on at all. The blue light just keeps blinking. I've tried holding down the on switch down and hitting the reset button but nothing works.

When leave it in connected to the pc long enough it does go on and shows the battery is red then goes off and on again. Just as it goes off, the battery low caution icon comes on for a split second. And the cycle continues


Is there some way I can reboot it and start afresh. I don't mind losing my files as long as it fixes this problem.

Basically this. It has happened before, and it actually just started working again after 2 days. So I will try leaving it alone for a while and seeing what happens, but is there an actual solution to this?

Additionally, when I plug the player in, the lights pulsate, but the computer does not recognise the device.

Edit: Saying that, I've just plugged it in again, it recognised it this time and says the battery is dead so I'll let it charge. Is this a known problem with leaving them charging for extended periods of time (I've had it for numerous years now, so no longer have any documentation that might advise me against it >.> )?

Double Edit: Looking up this thread a bit, it seems to be a fairly common problem. I doubt that many people have "hardware problems" (unless said problem is in-built).