Screen turns off during phone call then will not wake up until hang up

[medicTHREE]

Definitely a glitch here, but if you push the lock/power button it should come back on.

 

[yamaha83]

im having the same issue...

 

[pilot25]

Just got back from the V store with my 3rd exchange. Camera broken and this screen blackout problem. What will be the next problem?

 

[Danthok]

Just got back from the V store with my 3rd exchange. Camera broken and this screen blackout problem. What will be the next problem?

Sounds like you have a very lenient V store. I have the broken camera but I am going to wait til the end of the month exchange period to make sure I do not get another dud from the first batch of Droids.

 

[pilot25]

Just got back from the V store with my 3rd exchange. Camera broken and this screen blackout problem. What will be the next problem?

Sounds like you have a very lenient V store. I have the broken camera but I am going to wait til the end of the month exchange period to make sure I do not get another dud from the first batch of Droids.

Wish I did what you are doing. I went in the first time for the camera before the patch was known about. Second time they called the test number they use and put the phone upside down on the desk and it blanked out 3 times in a row.

Now I have one that doesn't charge with a car charger. I think it's time to go back to my BB. Either I have a string of bad luck or this phone is a POS. I believe the latter.

 

[Danthok]

Just got back from the V store with my 3rd exchange. Camera broken and this screen blackout problem. What will be the next problem?

Sounds like you have a very lenient V store. I have the broken camera but I am going to wait til the end of the month exchange period to make sure I do not get another dud from the first batch of Droids.

Wish I did what you are doing. I went in the first time for the camera before the patch was known about. Second time they called the test number they use and put the phone upside down on the desk and it blanked out 3 times in a row.

Now I have one that doesn't charge with a car charger. I think it's time to go back to my BB. Either I have a string of bad luck or this phone is a POS. I believe the latter.

What are you using as a car charger? I ask because mine did not work as well and I do not think it is a fault with the phone. I think it was the charger not giving the right amount of power.

 

[ecdysiast]

Need a hard hangup/call switch

Same problem. Have to hit the on/off button or unfold the KB to get it back on.

 

[pilot25]

Sounds like you have a very lenient V store. I have the broken camera but I am going to wait til the end of the month exchange period to make sure I do not get another dud from the first batch of Droids.

Wish I did what you are doing. I went in the first time for the camera before the patch was known about. Second time they called the test number they use and put the phone upside down on the desk and it blanked out 3 times in a row.

Now I have one that doesn't charge with a car charger. I think it's time to go back to my BB. Either I have a string of bad luck or this phone is a POS. I believe the latter.

What are you using as a car charger? I ask because mine did not work as well and I do not think it is a fault with the phone. I think it was the charger not giving the right amount of power.

I believe you are right so I ordered an OEM Motorola charger from Tiger Direct. I was using a Boxwave charger with the supplied USB - Micro chord. I'll let you know.

 

[jamsesh]

I'm having this problem too and wanted to throw in my two cents on what I've found so far:

1) It never occurs inside or in darker environments. Covering/uncovering the sensor makes the droid respond as expected.

2) It does not occur while on speaker phone. In this mode the screen goes blank after the user-specified screen time out and you have to hit the power button to turn it back on. Reading other posts/forums, this seems to be expected behavior.

3) Outside, sunny, bright environments are the real problem. The screen works fine, but as soon as I dial or answer a phone call the screen goes blank, even if I haven't held the handset up to my hear (the sensor never gets covered). Note though that this doesn't happen every time; I haven't been able to consistently recreate the blank screen issue yet. When it does occur, I have had some luck moving the screen around trying to get the sun shining directly at the sensor, but it's kind of a crap shoot.

4) Sliding out the keyboard causes the screen to come back on when the problem occurs.

On normal phone calls, it's not really a problem letting the other person hang up. The biggest issue is when leaving a voicemail or trying to check my voicemail. You can't end the message or enter your vmail password without sliding out the keyboard.

I hope that maybe narrows down the problem for some of you. Can you try it outside in full sun and see if you have similar results? Or maybe you get some ideas about where the problem lies so we can go about fixing it?

Cheers

 

[jlevy57]

Very useful post Jamsesh.

I've found the same things... the problem is mostly in bright sunlight outside. Sliding out the keyboard is the best (only) way to bring up the screen.

I've shined a bright flashlight on the light sensor at the top left corner of the screens of several Droids in the V store. They all went blank.

I'm confused by this issue. The screen is suppose to go blank in shadow-- like when you hold the phone to your ear, not in bright light. I'm not sure if it's a software update fix or the my unit needs to be replaced.

 

[Mit]

While making a phone call the screen times out and goes blank, this should be normal to enhance battery life. However, I have had a problem with the screen coming back up when I would like to hang up or dial on the number pad. It seems to work intermittently.

Funny story: I was calling a friend and got his voicemail when this issue happened so I could not hang up to stop recording. So my friend got about 30 seconds of me cussing at my phone trying to get it to respond. Needless to say hilarity ensued.

Anyone else having this issue?

I had the same issue... sliding open the keyboard worked for my phone. Hope this helps...

 

[jamsesh]

Hey I was just talking to some people on a motorola forum. One of the guys figured out a good way to diagnose it. Download a free app called "Sensor Test," which gives you info about the accelerometer, light sensor, proximity sensor etc.

From the other forum: "In the App under "Proximity" It should show "2.14...." when nothing is being detected at the proximity sensor and "3.0' when there is. If you put your finger over the upper left corner of the Droid you should see it changing between those 2 readings as you move your finger over and away from the sensor. On mine that would work properly in a dark or dim room. I then tried the same thing with a bright light (or in the sunshine) and the sensor would get stuck on "3.0" which means it's constantly detecting something there.. even though there isn't. Which would explain why the screen dims out and never comes back. I'm not sure if everyone is having the issue only in light.. but that's the way it was for me, amongst a few other people in this thread. Hope I helped!"

I'm going to try this tomorrow to see if mine gets stuck at 3.0. Try it and see what happens!

Cheers

 

[andjarnic]

I too have the problem in bright areas, like outside in the sun. I am guessing there is some software fix to be done for the sensor from Motorolla themselves as I would guess it's a hardware sensor issue with the software. Either that or we're going to see a recall in a few months and all be very pissed lol

 

[devinhfox]

I too have the problem in bright areas, like outside in the sun. I am guessing there is some software fix to be done for the sensor from Motorolla themselves as I would guess it's a hardware sensor issue with the software. Either that or we're going to see a recall in a few months and all be very pissed lol

I have the problem where the screen won't wake up until the other person hangs up.
It started happening today at work. I am inside a normal office building with flourescent lighting, not outside. It appears it doesn't really matter where you are. It turns on again when I press the power button.
It's strange because it used to work so well, why does it do this all of a sudden? It still turns off correctly, just not back on.
I power-cycled the phone, and it seems to have fixed it (temporarily).
I didn't need to take out the battery.

Just seems like some software bug that needs to be fixed for sure.

 

[jamsesh]

Allright I just did some testing with the Sensor Test app and phone calls to get more info. Also, since a lot of you are saying that pushing the power button brings the screen back up, I tested that again and confirmed that the power button does not have any effect.

Here's my test procedure:
First I started with the sensor test app to watch actual numbers. I stood under the sun, with the screen pointed directly at it (incident angle = 0deg). The proximity sensor read 2.147E8 (uncovered, 3.0 is covered). Ok, good.

Next, I tested when the sensor would trip by slowly rotating the phone back and forth on both axes. This way, I had the sun coming in from the left, right, top, and bottom separately. For left, right, and top, the sensor would trip to 3.0 when the incident angle went over ~45deg (I had no way to measure, so that's a guess). Rotating the phone so that the sun was shining more bottom-to-top, the sensor never tripped. There seems to be a 90 degree window of left to right and it trips bottom at 45 deg from the top. As long as left or right never went over 90 degrees, rotating the phone horizontal (like you would set it on a table) did not make it trip. I'm not sure why the bottom would be different from the other three unless it somehow works in combo with other sensors.

Finally, I tested the actual sensor (rather than phone position). With the phone in the sun, uncovered, 0 deg incident angle, the sensor was at 2.147. Covering the sensor tripped it to 3.0. Ok, good, that's what we would expect. Here's the kicker: Any sort of shadow between the sunlight and sensor would trip it to 3.0. I held my free hand 3 feet away from the phone, and just barely let my shadow cover the upper left corner of the phone and boom blank screen. Whoa. So I went under a tree; started in the sun and moved under until the tree's shadow hit the screen. Again, blanked out right away.

Lastly, I repeated everything using the actual phone app. Same results, which confirmed that the sensor test's readings were accurate. I wanted to try a call where the phone started in the shade rather than in the sun. So I stood with my back to the sun, phone in my shadow. As soon as I dialed and the call began... guess what? Screen went off. No buttons worked, power button had no effect etc. Moved it out into the sunlight and hey! screen is back! In conclusion, the screen seems to be nonresponsive in-calls while outside, unless a lot of sunlight is hitting the sensor.

I also confirmed that sliding out the keyboard while the screen is blanked brings it back, but this is an annoying extra step.

Sorry for the long post, I know it's a lot of info, but I wanted to include everything so that you can replicate my test and compare the results.

Cheers