4G Elevate Mobile Hotspot Not Charging

I'm sorry you're having an issue with the Elevate. As I noted a few weeks ago, we are waiting for updated softward. 

You can also keep an eye on the Sierra Wireless site for updated software. 

From a reviewer on Amazon.com, covering the unlocked AT&T Elevate 4G hotspot, covering the over heating issue:

"I get 3-5 hours on a full battery charge. I am in a rural area and if there are
dual power settings, my Elevate must be using the high power setting to connect.
I believe the reviewer with limited battery life may have inadvertently lessened
the battery capacity.

The Elevate, like all devices with a Lithium
battery, really shouldn't be used while the battery is charging. In use charging
really heats up the battery and causes diminished runtime and premature failure.
I disconnect the charge cable before I use the Elevate. BTW, this applies to
laptops as well, either run them on a charged battery or remove the battery and
run from 120 volts."

Very good review, he has more good suggestions in the whole review, but as you can see, it is not only the Elevate, but laptops as well.  I ordered a new Elevate 4G, and since I do not need to run over 2 hours at a time I shouold be good to go.  If I had to run one all day I would buy extra batteries and charger.  I liked the idea of larger battery until I read report of that causing overheating.

The reviewer on Amazon would be correct in that favorable results can be achieved by using the unit unplugged. This is in fact what I have been doing since using the extended battery.  There is no way that I can do this with OEM battery however as it just isnt practical since I use my hotspot 8 hours per day in the office and two hours in the car.  So i'm using my hotspot 10 hours at least per day.  If one is doing less demanding task then the battery could last quite a while, but if one is streaming Videos, music, or podcast then the battery gets depleted very quickly.

Taking the above into account this is nothing more then a work-around, hence a band-aide solution.  The charging circuit should be intelligent enough to control the charging to the device.  In no manual that I have read including the one for this hotspot is it ever noted that the charger should not be connected while using a device.  I have so much technology devices ranging from laptops, tablets, and phones and have used all them while plugged in and charging.  I have not had any issues except with wireless hotspots.  I have three hotspots from different manufactures and they all get extremely hot when pushing/pulling data.  IMO the Sierra wireless ones are the worst however.  I believe that the heat is primarily coming from the radios in the device and is only made worse by the normal heat coming from the battery during the charge process.

All of the hotspots that I have seen are designed poorly in that there is absolutely no ventilation to allow heat to escape.  This seems like a no brainer to manufacture the device properly with ventilation , but all of the hotspots that I have seen are designed with this oversight.  Most if not all residential routers are designed to ventilate so why not design the portable devices the same way?  I have ordered another hotspot from another wireless carrier, and have been reading that this hotspot is also overheating.  It is a newer model from the elevate, but none-the-less has the same issue.

Glad to hear the large battery does not cause overheating.  When you have AC power, have you tried taking the battery out of unit and running on AC only?  I tried my new Elevate 4G and it ran fine on AC only, should let unit run with less heat, not needing to charge battery while running Wi-Fi and 4G data.

HiCap.  Where did you read that the larger battery does not cause overheating?  I believe that you may be somewhat confused because the unit still overheats with the larger battery.  As stated earlier I believe that the overheating is caused by the radio and to a lesser extent the battery.

The advantage to running the bigger battery is that you can pobably squeeze an entire day out of the unit per charge without having to plug the unit into the power adapter.  Even if the unit is not plugged in it can still get quite warm depending on how much data is pushed/pulled from the internet, and also the bradcast range.  If the broadcast range is set long instead of short the unit will produce more heat.

I  have my broadcast set on short, and I also attempt to use the unit unplugged from the adapter until such point that it must be plugged in because the battery has gotten dangerously low on it's charge.

What I am saying is that the larger battery does not cause it to overheat anymore than the regular battery, as long as it is running only on the battery.  If you plug in the AC power and try to run unit and charge the battery at the same time, then you will get more heat buildup.

Have you tried running the unit with battery removed and AC alone powering the unit?  It should run with less heat build up?  I just received my Elevate 4G Hotspot today, and did run it with AC power only, to make sure it would work that way.  If this helps please let me know. 

Page 12 of User Guide

"No battery.

The mobile hotspot is powered on and connected to the AC charger."

My unit will not be on for extended periods of time, as I have DSL at home, it will be used to share data in outback camping, and as backup for DSL at home.  I plan to run it on battery power, with no AC, only charge the battery when low, without unit in operation.

HiCap...Thank you for the clarification.  You are correct that the higher capacity battery does not create anymore heat then the OEM battery, but it takes longer to charge obviously due to it's higher output.  I have not ran the elevate without the battery and probably won't even try it as a test.

It just isn't practical in my situation. I require a mix of running the unit on the battery and AC adapter depending on if I'm near an AC outlet or car charger at any given moment. 

This device appears to have been designed without any thought to how it would actually be used. Instead, it seems to be a hastily thrown together smart phone without the phone and without the apps. 

A phone is typically NOT used while it is charging. A MyFi WOULD typically be used while it is plugged in to power - either via USB or wall charger. The fact that these things overheat if you use them while they are charging is evidence of the lack of thought about real world use cases.

What I have found with my unit is that (according to the information provided by the "About Your Mobile Hotspot" in the admin interface), the unit temperature goes from a reasonble 28 degrees to an unreasonable 44 degrees C in less than FIVE minutes. The operating temperature range for this device is 0-32 deg C. The I have seen temps reported as high as 51 deg C (). The dramatic increase in temperature (the battery temp ALSO goes up to harmful levels. This occurs regardless of whether the device is attached to its wall charger or to the USB port or to NO POWER SOURCE AT ALL.

What I have ALSO found is that if I connect to the device from my wife's laptop that uses 802.11n Wi-Fi, there is no appreciable temperature increase.  The termp only soars if I connect to the device via wi-fi from my laptop that has an older 802.11g Wi-Fi. 

This would seem to me to indicate that while, the device can work with the older 802.11g interface, it gets very hot very fast, eventually reaching temperatures where it starts behaving erratically. More than 5 minutes of testing would have made this malfunction pretty clear to the developers of the device, so one can only speculate as to whether they lied about the results, didn't test for more than a minute or two, or didn't object when the marketing guys insisted on claiming that the device works with 802.11b/g/n.

I am on my 2 replacement unit and all three of them malfunctioned in much the same way, so this is not a matter of one bad unit. This is part of the design - which apparently includes a very inefficient wi-fi radio when using the 802.11g standard.

Support from AT&T for these problems is non-existent. They do not seem to have anybody in their support organization who is sufficiently familiar with them to know how they are supposed to work, let alone to understand what might be causing a problem with them. The solutions - "change the battery", "try another unit", "keep the unit cool", "take the battery out and put it in a cool place" - indicate that they have no idea what a MyFi is or how one would use it... no more, apparently than, the folks at Sierra who foisted this half-baked piece of junk on a trusting public.

I just wish I knew where to find a MyFi that DOES work properly with 802.11g and how to get my money back for this piece of useless equipment. Any suggestions would be appreciated.

I find that all carriers support and knowledge of the devices to be lacking, if I have any issues with the service or billing I call the carrier, device issues I call the manufacturer of the device - they designed it, they built it, they understand it, thier support is light years ahead of ANY carrier.