8GB Clip will not power up or be recognised by computer...

MP3 players Sansa Clip | Clip+
1

I had the music playing music for some hours, so it is entirely possible that the battery had just run down…

Having read a number of threads concerning similar problems, I have tried the “soft reset” and then power up option a number of times, with no signs of life…

I have also tried the "switch to the orange “hold” position, and hold centre button whilst connecting the USB cable to the computer, with no acknowledgement of the unit in the “My Computer” window of my computer…

Have I got a definitively dead unit??.. This would be a real shame, as this player was just getting run in, and producing very creditable sounds for a portable player…

I had been listening to music from the Clip via a mini-jack to mini-jack cable, connected to my computer speakers, and the Clip was static on my computer desk, with no vigorous movement or concussion to suggest a potential disconnection of internal wiring…

Any ideas for resurrection?..

2

Plug it in to the back USBs on a desktop machine and let it sit for a while. As for the static make sure your 3.5 mm cord is plugged in all the way, it might need to be pushed a little harder than you would think.

3

Thanks for the response… A possible complication might be that both computers in our household are laptops, and thus there is no way to follow your specific recommendation…

That said, the USB connections on my Fujitsu laptop have previously been very effective in charging the Clip, with times of under 2hrs comparing very favourably to the 3-3.5hrs quoted on earlier forum pages…

I have deliberately avoided leaving the Clip connected to the laptop via USB lead, as I am sure I recall some suspicion on earlier pages of a non-charging connection resulting in a power drain on the battery, which would naturally be rather counter-productive… :o)

I’ve got rather fond of this little unit, and would be most upset if it can’t be restored to life…

4

Make Sure the Lappy is plugged in.The other thing you could try (Im not sure it works ont he clip) is to hold the power button up for 30 seconds or a little more. Also you could try an AC charger.

5

The Lappy is fine (that’s what I’m using now), and I have tried the USB cable into all 4 of the computer’s USB ports…

Holding the power button on for 30 secs+ and then trying to switch on also yielded no results…

I may be reduced to leaving the unit for some hours to see whether the battery recovers sufficient minimal charge to allow it to be recognised via USB connection to the computer…

Whether or not you are in a position to give further advice, thanks for that given so far… 

6

One thing that some people have had luck with in this case is to get a wall charger and try that.

7

Thanks for that suggestion… I’ll try to source one of adequate power (probably circa 1 amp) locally…

8

“One thing that some people have had luck with in this case is to get a wall charger and try that.”…

I sourced a 1000ma Motorola charger, connected the Clip via the provided cable, and left it powered up for a few hours whilst I did other things…

Sadly there has still been absolutely no indication of life from the Clip, so I have passed the problem on to Technical Support, but fear the worst…

9

“Sadly there has still been absolutely no indication of life from the Clip, so I have passed the problem on to Technical Support, but fear the worst…”…

Spoke to Technical Support, who indicated a warranty replacement would be required…

BUT…

Yesterday I received by post a mains USB 1000ma charger I had ordered some while ago… Since I already had disembowelled the player from the packaging to provide Technical Support with the (absolutely miniscule!) serial number, I thought, “To Hell with it, I might just as well try it…”, and connected up to the new charger…

The good news was that at least there was sufficient life on the OLED screen to show that the battery had absolutely no charge, but also indicated that no charging was taking place…

A little downcast, I left the Clip connected to the charger whilst I took my dog for one of her energetic “runs”…

When I returned about one and a half hours later, when I checked the Clip’s screen though it gave no indication of current charging activity it showed the battery containing about 30% charge!.. :o)

Not wanting to get carried away, I then disconnected the Clip from the mains charger and connected to one of the USB ports on my laptop, and was delighted to note that vigorous charging now appeared to be taking place, and that the “My Computer” window also indicated the presence of the music files previously stored, apparently unaltered by recent events…

I left the unit to fully charge, disconnected, and was delighted that - after the expected “Refreshing database” notice - after connecting the Clip to the Klipsch computer speakers, my music was again delivered without apparent problem…

After playing the playlist to completion that had been running at the time of the problem (just to confirm that there was no inherent file-related problem waiting to bite on some future occasion) I recharged the battery, and left the unit switched off overnight so that I could (today) establish whether any problems still existed…

I am delighted to say that the player, the battery, and the music files, are now all performing exactly as intended… :o)

I will in future make damned sure that the Clip’s battery is never again allowed to get to the stage of being completely exhausted…

The recent resurrection has been very welcome indeed, and has again placed a broad smile on my face…

(All of my music is stored and replayed on the Clip as uncompressed (.wav) files, ripped from CD using Exact Audio Copy.)…

Message Edited by Latteman on 03-12-2009 03:11 AM