The Galaxy S II Epic 4G Touch has just been released to the United States market and everyone and their mother appears to have purchase one. With this comes the possibility for every single tiny flaw in the hardware and/or the software to be uncovered – and of course that’s what we want to do, and we want to find flaws as soon as possible so that the manufacturers and/or the carriers can alleviate concerns before they become explosive. Today’s report comes from the wild streets of XDA where they say they’re getting hot, hot, hot. Temperature-wise on their Galaxy S II Epic 4G Touch units, that is, and with both temperatures listed and screenshots shot, we’ve gotta treat this one as a real concern with need for fix for certain!
Now I’ve got to stop you there and note that I’ve personally reviewed this device right before it was released and yes, I do have it right here beside me on the desk. I can report here and now that the device has indeed gotten at least a little bit hotter than I’d like it to get, but from what I’ve seen, it’s gotten no hotter than any other smartphone with basic high-load-bearing lifestyles. That means that because I run one whole heck of a lot of videos through here, for example, I’d expect it to get at least a little bit warm. For more information on my review, head on down to… well… my review.
Also feel free to ask any additional questions I don’t answer in the review so that you might get the best vision of this device before you purchase.
That said, several folks over in the XDA Developer forums have reported their unhappiness with the heat inside their devices, their own scans revealing temperatures between 112 and 121 degrees farenheight. One fellow even appears to have picked up a grand total of 134 degrees, goodness gracious! Then there’s an odd screenshot provided by a fellow named “whatsitsnamenow” that shows the charging of his Epic 4G Touch’s battery being stopped because of heat.
Of course you’ve got to note that people at XDA being hackers and developers we can expect that they’d very possibly been doing some overclocking of their processors, taking their devices on trips to the moon, dipping their devices in hot vats of water, but the problem does still very possibly remain.
Have you experienced any of these problems? Found any solutions?
[via XDA]
Dudes are probably overclocking them. Why even post this, Android phones getting hot is not news, especially when you are overclocking them.
Yea but if stock handsets are having the same issue, then this becomes news and a problem.
We are looking into it
I have a stock handset. Picked it up a week ago and haven’t done anything but install some apps, etc. Was playing a game today though, but quit when the device got to 122 degrees!
My E4GT gets a little warm when charging, but not enough to be alarming.
yea I think most get a little warm during charging, but If I’m seeing the warning pictured above I’ll be a bit worried.
YesI bought my epic touch the day they came available and the first timeI charged it the warning came up and slooked exactlys the pix…..I had to unplug it and remove back cover for about 10 min for it to cool down, not rooted our over clocked
Stupid swype making me look like an idiot
My got extremely hot the other day while charging it. I noticed it had barley charged over a couple hour period and I picked it up and it was way hot. Not normal temperatures at all, I bought the case from Sprint with it and the metal kickstand was way hot. I turned it off and a overheat warning came up so i unpluged the charger and let it set for 20 minutes to cool down no issues since. But even when i charge it and feel the front at the top it seems really warm.
When I turned the phone off the overheat warning was like a yellow road sign with an exclamation point on it. And a thermometer that was about to burst.
This is my 3rd phone in less than 24 hrs. Battery overheated, phone died, replaced it, same thing happened. I’m on my 3rd one now, had the Sprint guys charge it up for me overnight. I am attempting to recharge it. It’s been plugged in for at least 3-4 hours, and battery is still “critically Low” WTF??
dear god…. someone please help me with this charging of the Epic 4G Touch… I’ve gone through 3 phones in 24 hours. Current phone is still alive, but it’s been charging for about 4 hours and it is still at 12%, which is 1% more than when I plugged it in
…gets kinda warm when i play STARBLITZ,but other than that this phone is a SUPERB.
I have an original Epic, even with it’s slower 1ghz Hummingbird processor when charging it (particularly in the car, or in a place where it gets exposure to the sun), and especially when doping this while using GPS and CPU intensive apps, the phone gets pretty hot (I’ve seen my battery read over 130F once this summer when I had been driving w/ it mounted on the windshield dock). The OEM Sammy batteries are pretty hardy and this shouldn’t be to much of an issue in my experience (it doesn’t seem to degrade the batteries faster either). When in the car dock I have gotten the “Charging paused” popup as you describe, if the temperature reaches higher levels the popup comes more frequently. I recommend first turning off unneeded radios, try to keep it from direct sunlight, and if possible cool it down by holding it near an AC vent for a minute or two.
I’ve had the epic 4g touch since release date, the only time i’ve had a heat issue is when playing a highly graphics intensive game while the unit was charging. I recieved no warning but it was noticeably hot and then the screen started to freak out, registering touches all over the place and not responding well to my own touches. I turned the phone off, took out the battery, and turned it back on still hot. The problem continued and basically rendered it unusable (my phone is stock and this was occuring with no apps running, not even widgets, 5-10 tries to register a home screen change). Anyway, after i let it cool for 10 minutes with the battery out it was completely back to normal.
solution: If your going to use this phone while plugged in, take the cover off (protective cover not battery cover). I purchased the 30 dollar sprint cover with kickstand. I played 4 straight hours on a graphic intensive game (new gameloft releases) with the cover off to see if it would help. It helps dramatically. The phone was noticeably cooler and has been ever since. I play on my phone while it’s plugged in ALOT now and the problem has never reoccured- no apps have been changed since the assumed “over heat”.
Yes I experieced the same on a stock Sprint Epic 4G device. Not only did it get hot, but it would stop its charging cycle with the error message “Device temperature either too high or low to charge”. Even with the keyboard slid out, it would not cool off when playing video or charging. I will never get another Samsung phone again.
After this happened a few times (got really hot, like 122F) the battery life dropped by about 30%. I could easily kill the battery in about 4 hours of heavy use. Also, when looking at the battery life vs processes that used the battery, the AmoLED screen consistenly used better than 95% (often 98-99%) of the battery life.
Yes, it is a beautiful and superior looking screen to most I’ve seen, but its not that pretty when its black due to needing to be charged, and actuallly pretty ugly when its says its too hot to charge. Also, the phone really started bogging down when I loaded about 100 apps from the market. Backuped up those apps and transferred them to my EVO 3D and no problems with bog at all. Luckily I decided to return it during the Sprint 30 day eval, and exchanged it for an EVO 3D and never looked back. The hTC is a superior device in almost every way and has a balanced power plan that consistenly gives me 12+ hours of regular use without charging, and the screen uses less than 50% of the battery life.
Last night, my Epic 4G Touch’s battery was down to 24%. So while I was sleeping, I had it plugged in to charge. Roughly 7 hours later, I go to check the time and my phone was so unbelievably hot, I couldn’t hold it. My fingers were still burning and sore to the touch for a good ten minutes after. Anyways, back to my phone, I popped out the battery and let it cool down…took about an hour. Popped it back in and the battery was dead, wouldn’t even turn on. Now its charging rather slowly and the page passing and apps are in such a lag.
My Epic 4g Touch lags when I plug it in to charge. Especially at the unlock screen. When I got this phone I was really expecting it to be a super fast “no lag” phone. Like all the reviews on YouTube etc. I try my best at taking care of this phone… I don’t understand why it acts like this. It actually lagged on the very first time that I plugged it in. It got really hot and it lacked response when I tried to text back etc… Overall it is a great phone. Its just EXTREMELY disappointing. I was expecting MUCH MORE than that.