iPhone 6(S)/Plus What happened to my iPhone battery?!? (iPhone 6)

[Hoff]

I have an iPhone 6. Bought in 2017, so only 1 year old or so.

Battery was working perfectly fine. I would get 2 days out of a charge with my level of normal use.
Then I charged it using the cigarette lighter USB charger, and it hasn't worked right since.

Now, instead of 2 days use, I only get 1/2 day. The battery drains four times faster than it did just the day before charging it in cigarette lighter. It's almost unusable now, because it drains so fast.


DETAILS:
I ran out of battery on the road, and needed to take photos and use GPS. I was at 0% battery.
I charged it using the device in the pictures attached.
(takes a long time to charge it, I don't think it gets enough voltage or something this way).
It got up to about 5% battery.
Then I stopped to take photos. Battery ran out again.
Charged it to about 3% again as I drove.
Got out, took more photos. Battery died again.
Same thing. Charged to about 5%, then drained it again taking video.
Then plugged it in, used the GPS as I drove home.

Ever since, the battery's been dying 4x faster than normal.
It's warm to the touch (even when I haven't been using it).

I tried charging it all the way up with normal wall charger a few times. No improvement.
Strange thing is, if it's in airplane mode, sometimes it doesn't hardly use any charge at all.
6 hours overnight and it's still at 100% in airplane mode.
When not in airplane mode it drops 10% every hour, even when not being used for anything (and all apps are closed).

Today I used the phone and it's down from 100% to 16% in 4 hours.

Anybody know how what might have happened inside the iPhone or how to fix it?
Does it need battery replacement?

 

[Newtons Apple]

No telling if the device harmed your phone, no one here can tell you that.

You need to get your phone to the Apple store and have them do a diagnostics. It is free and will tell if you have battery problems or more serious hardware problems. It is the only way to know for sure.

I would not use your cig lighter charger.

 

[JPack]

You burned the Tristar (U2) chip on your iPhone. This is a common problem using inexpensive cigarette lighter chargers because the voltage from the car is unregulated.

Don't use cigarette lighter chargers.

The chip (NXP1610) costs only $2-3 but the labor to replace it is about $100.

 

[Hoff]

Thanks very much for your inputs. Will get it to the Apple store for diagnostics/repair. Is it possible they could replace the parts without updating the iOS from 10 to 11?

I would not use your cig lighter charger.

Don't use cigarette lighter chargers.

Lesson learned. I won't anymore. But if we do need charging in the car, would plugging the normal wall charger into a 110v inverter like one of these be safe?

EDIT: I see they all have USB slots in that picture, but I'm talking about using the normal three-prong outlet with the normal wall adapter on these.

 

[JPack]

Thanks very much for your inputs. Will get it to the Apple store for diagnostics/repair. God, I hope they can fix those parts without updating the damn OS.





Lesson learned. I won't anymore. But if we do need charging in the car, would plugging the normal wall charger into a 110v inverter like one of these be safe?

EDIT: I see they all have USB slots in that picture, but I'm talking about using the normal three-prong outlet with the normal wall adapter on these.

Repair
Apple will do a device replacement. They cannot do a board level repair. If you want to keep the device as-is, you need to seek an independent iPhone repair shop to replace the Tristar chip.


Inverters
Using a cheap inverter produces a fake sine-wave. This risks damaging your Apple wall charger. A pure sine-wave inverter costs over $100.


Solution
If you want to charge in the car, the safest way to do it is using a power bank. This results in DC to DC charging with no fluctuations.

Purchase a good power bank.

Some of the best power banks on the market are made by Xiaomi. They use battery cells made by ATL and Lishen. These two companies supply Apple for the iPhone. Xiaomi also uses Texas Instruments power management chips in their power banks. Finally, Xiaomi power banks are encased in aluminum metal. In the event of overheating, it will reduce the likelihood of melting or fire.

https://www.amazon.com/Portable-Charger-10000mAh-Charging-Aluminum/dp/B075Q5G3JN?ref=ast_p_ei

Some people may recommend Anker or Aukey because they don't know better. These two companies produce mediocre products but have great mindshare because they spend a lot of money on marketing and paying for Amazon reviews. If you want to pay for good marketing, purchase Anker or Aukey.

 

[Hoff]

Apple will do a device replacement. They cannot do a board level repair. If you want to keep the device as-is, you need to seek an independent iPhone repair shop to replace the Tristar chip.

Does that mean at the Apple store I'd have to pay for a whole new phone?

Thanks

 

[BrianBaughn]

Take it in and see what they say. Could be a coincidence that your battery went bad when it did.

Be sure to let us know what happens.

 

[JPack]

Does that mean at the Apple store I'd have to pay for a whole new phone?

Thanks

If it's out of warranty, the repair cost is $299.

https://support.apple.com/iphone/repair/service/pricing

 

[Hoff]

Update:
Again last night, the battery lasted all night in airplane mode.
Seven hours later, it's still at 100%. It only drains when connected to interment (wifi or cellular data).

Could it be a virus?

I know iPhones are not supposed to get them. But why would the battery drain so much when connected, and not at all when it's not connected?

(I did look at a few pictures of pretty girls on Pinterest around the same time, possibly from Russian sources. Maybe that gave my iPhone a virus. I changed my email and banking passwords, and don't use either from my phone anymore. I deleted Pinterest and it's data, but no change. Still drains battery super fast.)

 

[JPack]

Update:
Again last night, the battery lasted all night in airplane mode.
Seven hours later, it's still at 100%. It only drains when connected to interment (wifi or cellular data).

Could it be a virus?

I know iPhones are not supposed to get them. But why would the battery drain so much when connected, and not at all when it's not connected?

(I did look at a few pictures of pretty girls on Pinterest around the same time, possibly from Russian sources. Maybe that gave my iPhone a virus. I changed my email and banking passwords, and don't use either from my phone anymore. I deleted Pinterest and it's data, but no change. Still drains battery super fast.)

If the charger let unregulated voltage into the iPhone, any of the power management chips can be damaged.

It's not a virus. You plugged your phone in a $0.50 charger and there's clear evidence the regulator was burned in the process. A virus these days will likely steal banking information while you use your phone. Not discourage you from using the phone so it can't collect data and send it back.

 

[BugeyeSTI]

Take it to Apple and have them diagnose it. Any information you get here is pure speculation.

 

[tonybarnaby]

It's going to cost more to repair it than its worth most likely. Maybe step up to a 6s, 7 or se?

 

[Hoff]

Take it in and see what they say. Could be a coincidence that your battery went bad when it did.

Be sure to let us know what happens.

Turns out it was an app running in the background.
The Mail app, for some reason, had used up 50% of my battery in one day. Even though I didn't really use the mail app that day. I had used it only to send a few pics sometime in the last week. That seemed to trigger it to just keep running and running...

I deleted all accounts from the mail app. Problem solved. Except I'm not using the Mail app now : P

Today the battery level is back to normal.
(60% remaining after 7 hours of pretty heavy use. Instead of 30% after 7 hours of no use).

I'm happy

 

[Reno Raines]

Glad that was all it was!