Diverse issues with my new Pandora


Alemarius Nexus

Still Fresh
Joined
Jan 5, 2011
Messages
27
Age
30
Hi,


So, one and a half week ago I finally held my long-awaited Pandora in hands for the first time. It was quite a new experience seeing a real OS on such a small screen, using such a small keyboard, and I'm not yet used to the controls, but sure it is an experience.


And now, after these few days, my Pandora has already given up partially.


Today I have taken my Pandora to school, in a bag, closed of course. And when I took it out in a break, what I saw was a shock: Instead of cracks in the case, which would be a well known problem of the Pandora, it has decided to just crack my LCD screen. It looks like this:





Now, how can this happen? I mean, oughtn't the clamshell design of the Pandora protect it from such serious damage? As I said, I had it closed in my bag, and I didn't hit it with a hammer. Could it be because the LCD stood under pressure from the case? You see, the upper edge of the case has wound out, and when I press carefully on the case surrounding the LCD, or on the back case, I can see the pressure on the LCD.


So: How can this happen? I certainly hope it is covered by the warranty. If I give my Pandora back to repair, getting a new LCD, how can I be sure it does not happen again in one week?


This is my main concern currently. But now that I'm writing this, maybe I can ask about some other minor issues, too.


There's the problem with the hinge. It is really annoying that it is too weak to stay at an angle of more than about 110° to the keyboard. Is the hinge really that weak? I don't like having it flipped all the way back.


Then there are the nubs. It seems like they often lose their calibration, then the mouse moves extremely slowly to the left, making the nubs essentially unusable as mouse pointer. Still, I think they have become better the last days. Is it possible that they "learn" a bit, or is this just coincidence?


Another thing: I can't seem to get USB OTG working. I have tried with different cables, but neither could charge the Pandora from my desktop computer or see the Pandora in mass-storage mode.


So, quite a lot of complaints here. I hope they can be resolved, as I do really like the idea of a mini computer with gaming controls and full X11/GNU/Linux system and would like to try porting my game to it.


Thanks in advance!
 
There's the problem with the hinge. It is really annoying that it is too weak to stay at an angle of more than about 110° to the keyboard. Is the hinge really that weak? I don't like having it flipped all the way back.
Yeah, thats a known issue. Nintendo have patents on some locking hinge designs

Then there are the nubs. It seems like they often lose their calibration, then the mouse moves extremely slowly to the left, making the nubs essentially unusable as mouse pointer. Still, I think they have become better the last days. Is it possible that they "learn" a bit, or is this just coincidence?
They have auto-calibration firmware in them, so they should improve as you use them...
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Sure it's a lot of trouble :/.


I've never seen such a crack on the screen.


It was probably cracked a bit at the assembly, then a little shock did the final blow.
 
Yeah, thats a known issue. Nintendo have patents on some locking hinge designs
Not patents, more like copyrights. There aren't any off-the-shelf multi-lock hinges that they could have used without paying licensing. They could have designed their own, but that was cost prohibitive. If you can get yourself a DS (I think lite, I forget specifically now) mechanism then it is compatible with the Pandora's hinge, you just have to swap it yourself or hire someone to do it.

They have auto-calibration firmware in them, so they should improve as you use them...
If the nubs go bad, rotate them in full circles about 10 to 20 times. That should fix the calibration. Using the "Pandora Input-Tester" in the "System" menu will help here.


There's no guarantee that the LCD won't crack again, but you're the first person I can think of that has mentioned it just casually happening. There's been a few others who have had their screen crack but they've admitted to dropping something heavy on it or something. You probably just got a bad one: no process is perfect and you can't catch all the weak links, you just try to minimize it.


As for the USB port, what OS are you using? Some people have had difficulties if they don't turn on mass storage mode before plugging it in, notably on Mac and Windows Vista. Also your PC may be adhering exactly to spec and only supplying 100ma which I think is too little power to trigger a "charging" signal and light up the charge LED. You might get some progress if you turn off the wifi and close the lid to minimize the amount of power it is using: gotta get it below 100ma. These are just optimistic speculations, of course; there's a good chance given the LCD damage that the port was also damaged.
 
To me it looks like there was a massive blow from the back of the LCD lid.. The top of the bezel looks like it popped out slightly.. Could your bag been stepped on, door slammed on it or something?


Evil Dragon been good honoring the Warranty and such.. He even fixed my LCD cable issue on my First Batch Pandora even though I bought it from Craig's shop. If you live in the US, you may be able to have it sent to Link's Pandora shop for replacement and not have to pay over seas shipping.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Today I have taken my Pandora to school, in a bag, closed of course. And when I took it out in a break, what I saw was a shock: Instead of cracks in the case, which would be a well known problem of the Pandora, it has decided to just crack my LCD screen. It looks like this:





Now, how can this happen? I mean, oughtn't the clamshell design of the Pandora protect it from such serious damage? As I said, I had it closed in my bag, and I didn't hit it with a hammer. Could it be because the LCD stood under pressure from the case? You see, the upper edge of the case has wound out, and when I press carefully on the case surrounding the LCD, or on the back case, I can see the pressure on the LCD.
Doesn't look like it broke under stress. To me the brake "pattern" looks more like there was a lot of pressure on a certain area of the lid (maybe there was something "pointy" in your bag as well ?
 
Yes, this looks like a massive punctual impact from the back.


My screen is a bit cracked too atm. But it flew around the whole room and doesnt look this bad.
 
Well, sure there might have been some pressure onto the top of the case, maybe at some time the other things in my bag (regular school stuff, books mainly) lay on top of it, and maybe I didn't put the bag down as softly as possible, but I did certainly not throw it around. I don't think there was anything that would be able to cause such damage. There is a biro in my bag, but it lay under multiple packs of tissue and did not point at the Pandora.


I mean, the damage has to come from some kind of pressure onto the back of the case because I had it closed all the time. And now, if I press onto the back of the case with only slight pressure, I can see exactly the pattern of the cracks lighting up on the LCD (you know, like when you press a bit too much with the stylus), but that may just be because of that upper edge popping out a bit.


I'll contact ED then and hope he will replace it.

As for the USB port, what OS are you using?

On my PC I'm running Fedora 17. I have also put Pandora into mass storage mode (for file exchange), but it didn't help. At least it is not shown as charging in the XFCE battery monitor. I also tried it with my external battery pack with which I successfully reload my mobile phone. According to that battery pack's specs, it is able to deliver 500mA.


I'll have to accept the hinge then, because I don't have a DS. It's not that bad I think.


Thanks for your help!
 
On my PC I'm running Fedora 17. I have also put Pandora into mass storage mode (for file exchange), but it didn't help. At least it is not shown as charging in the XFCE battery monitor. I also tried it with my external battery pack with which I successfully reload my mobile phone. According to that battery pack's specs, it is able to deliver 500mA.
lsusb and dmesg might help figure this out, but if your battery pack isn't even giving any indication of charging then I'm going to suspect that the port itself has become damaged. Putting it into mass storage mode and plugging the Pandora into itself to copy a file from one card to another (over USB) is part of the test process that all are supposed to go through before they're shipped out, so it probably had something to do with shipping.

I'll have to accept the hinge then, because I don't have a DS. It's not that bad I think.
You can buy replacement hinges for under $10. In a perfect world OPT would have been able to do this themselves but licensing restrictions prevents it. Nothing stopping an end user from modifying their own device though.
 
I've just tried to connect the Pandora to itself via USB/USB OTG, and with one of my two cables it seemed to work in mass storage mode. When I connect the Pandora to my PC, lsusb does not show it, though. Also, with none of my cables I seem to get any real charging. However, I have noticed that when my Pandora is in standy mode with USB OTG connected to my battery pack, when I power the battery pack on, Pandora leaves standby mode, so I guess the port is at least not entirely dead, but still I do not see the Pandora charging from it (my battery pack does not show if it's charging other devices, unfortunately). Maybe the XFCE monitor is just wrong? I'll leave it this way for some time now and see if it is actually charging.


I'll think about replacing the hinge by myself when I have a new LCD, but I don't know if I want to void my warranty just for getting a better hinge. Depends on whether I can get used to operate with the screen flipped entirely back, I guess.
 
Screen fully open is better when you hold the unit.


When it lays on a table, indeed, a blocked hinge would be better. You can use a bit of paper to block it...
 
You could also glue small rubber pads between hinge and case to provide more friction. My rebirth pandora doesnt need such treatment though: screen stays open at any angle.
 
I've just tried to connect the Pandora to itself via USB/USB OTG, and with one of my two cables it seemed to work in mass storage mode. When I connect the Pandora to my PC, lsusb does not show it, though.
Hmm... This reminds me of my PSP years ago. I had a lot of problems with it, no one could figure out why, I replaced the cable and suddenly had no problems.


Short USB cables are cheap, if you don't have a bunch just lying around like I do then it may be worth it to just step out and get a new one, just to try. It couldn't hurt.
 
Nubs are horrible.


Pandora button>Settings>Pandora Nub configurator → reset Nubs. Do this 1-2 times and your Nubs should be fine (at least for some time).


I smashed some LCDs in the Past but they had cracks in the touchscreen.


I never saw such heavily damage before on a Pandora screen.


There had to be some heavy pressure. My Pandora is on my belt and while in train I more or less sit on my Pandora. There isn't even a crack in the case. maybe the edge of a book caused the problem but you it's also verry unlikely if you/some one else didn't smash you bag.


As it doesn't make sense to use you Pandora this way you may send it in and I'll replace the screen.


Maybe EvilDragon and I can identify what might have caused the problem.


Edit:


I can't say whether it's free or you have to pay the screen.


EvilDragon has to decide after we checked your unit.


Edit 2:As I talked to EvilDragon today and we both came tothe conclusion that it's not out fault as a heavy punctual pressure must have caused the problem.


Please send EvilDragon an E-Mail about your issue. It's verry likely you have to pay for the screen.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
I have just sent a message to ED via his shop. It's really disappointing to see that after waiting patiently for such a long time and finally buying the 1GHz upgrade, which made the device nearly twice as expensive, I'm still forced to pay more money to use it. I honestly can't imagine what could have happened to it that caused such heavy damage, as I have been carrying my mobile phone with exposed screen in my bag for years without it ever being damaged, but I realize that it looks like, and perhaps is my fault, so if the new LCD and repair do not strongly exceed the 85€ mentioned as a price for the LCD screen, I will accept that. That is, if no other causes can be found.


Concerning the USB OTG problems: I thought about the cables as a cause, too, but then I couldn't believe that both of these cables that I'm regularly using for other tasks are bad ones. I'll see if I can find some other cables to try when my Pandora is repaired.


For the hinge, I sure could use something to force it to stay at a lower angle. Looks a little annoying to me, but I will try how well it works.
 
I couldn't believe that both of these cables that I'm regularly using for other tasks are bad ones.
Believe it to happen. That's my story with my PSP too and the reason I never thought to change the cable: it worked just fine for everything else I was using it for. What bizarre magic was involved in that I'm not sure, all I know is I misplaced that cable one time, had to get a new one quick, and was stunned that it worked.


Not saying that that is the case here, especially if you've already tried two, I'm just being optimistic and hoping to find a cheap solution: USB cables cost practically nothing and it doesn't hurt to try.
 
Back
Top