HP Stream 7 Plugged In Not Charging

[dickybilly]

As a test I bought a 5.0v 3A charger vs. the 5.25v 2A as discussed above.

This is the quick charger usually used for an ipad or iphone or ipod.

My plan is to use this charger with longer length (6' or 10') cables of variying size wires.

Before I plug it in to charge my Stream 7 does anyone think the 3A current will do harm.

So far in this thread I havent seen anyone say too much current is harmful.

PS.. I've successfully charged by Stream 7 while on at 1/2 brightness level using a Duracell charger 5v 1A and a thick 6' cable.

[ProfileEngineer]

A charging supply with 3A should not be a concern, the Stream charging circuitry will self limit at about 1.5A charging current.  So you will get no advantage to having the higher current rating, but no concern about damage either.  The biggest issue you will have with your long cables will be the  voltage drop in the cable under charging load.  We use a 22 AWG USB cable here with a 6' cable length and that is about the most length you can have and still get full charging current (1.5 A) with a 5.25V supply.  

[Estee_419]

Surprisingly this works!  

Can't say I understand the 'science' behind such a design decision but at least it's a work around. 

Would be interested in hearing from HP as to why this is designed as such and why it isn't mentioned in the user manual.  

Glad I refused the factory restore option HP Support suggested.  

[ProfileEngineer]

I would check the actual voltage on the 3.0A adaptor with a multimeter to see if it really is only 5.0V.  If it is then I can garantee that it will not charge at a very high rate.  You need at least 5.25V to get it to charge quickly, or maintain the battery while using the tablet.  A current rating above 1.5A is not helpful because the tablet charging circuitry will not accept more than that much current anyway.

[hoopharted]

had the same issue with my stream 8 , what i did was fade the screen resolution back 50% and it charges fine now, just tap the drop arrow on the right of the tool bar and tap  i believe appearance from it and then just cut back untill it starts charging

[JCMaedl]

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@TopFlight79 wrote:

...Swipe your screen from right to left.,, Click settings, now click screen. Turn your screen brightness down gradually till you get a plugged in and charging notification on your battery icon. I had to drop my brightness to just under half, Now I can charge while using my stream 7....

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I know this is even later, and everyone has likely moved on, but this worked for me.  I'm on Windows 10 so the process is different but lowering the brightness does work to engage the charger and reach full charge while the unit is plugged in and being used.

My theory is that the charging circuitry probably limits the incoming current/voltage very specifically, and what it adjusts it to is generally too low. So it becomes the case that there is just enough to charge the tablet and not enough "extra" to actually power the tablet at full bore so it can be used while charging. If asked to choose between charging and staying on, the tablet chooses to stay powered and does not charge. Perhaps this could also be related to why the batteries only get to a partial charge (80% or whatever)? Again I'm not an engineer but does anyone know if there is a difference in charging requirements as the charge in the battery increases?  It would seem that the HP genuine charger is better able to specifically supply or respond to whatever craziness is happening when other chargers cannot.

So then it is about how the circuitry balances the total load drawn by  having the tablet active and what is required to charge it.   All of the solutions about chargers, cables, etc. can help do that, but the screen is a huge consumer of power compared to pretty much anything else, which I would guess is why this seems to make an immediate difference.

Maybe they had problems with heat or something like that so they had to make a design choice.  In any case, I doubt there will be a fix.  So, I'm going to chalk it up as a poor design choice and just try to recognize it as a limitation.  I only paid $75 for this when it was on sale at MSFT, so I can live with it.