Comment by mattwdelong | Hacker News Reader

Comment by mattwdelong | Hacker News Reader

Interestingly enough, my beloved Nexus 4 just died this past month. I noticed it getting extremely hot, and then one day started a boot loop that I could not fix. I figured some hardware broke. My uncle also picked up one around the same time, and is going through similar problems - overheating and rebooting, though has no boot loop issues. I will warn him of this battery issue.

On another note, I just purchased a Zenfone 2. I accidentally dropped it from about a foot (getting out of the car) and cracked the screen. I noticed most other Zenfone 2 phone that has a cracked screen appears to have it crack in a very similar spot (top right). I guess all phones have their weaknesses. Though, my nexus 4 looked like it went to war and back having been dropped (at excessive heights), and never broke.

I was having lunch with a friend yesterday and as we were getting up to leave he pulls his phone out of his pocket and announced "My Nexus 4 just exploded." As he shows it to us you can see the bloated battery had almost completely separated the back cover from the case. It had apparently been acting up for about a week before the battery expanded. Surprisingly it was still on and working.

Of course this happens with other manufacturer's batteries too. I had this happen with a kindle fire (first generation) and Amazon replaced the unit free of charge. I also had this happen with the battery for my late 2011 17" MacBook Pro. I walked into an Apple store handed it to a clerk and said I needed that one to be disposed of and to purchase a new one since I was out of warranty. He took it to a genius who said something along the lines of "Oh shit, that's a defect just give him a new one" and off I went with a free new battery.

My Nexus 4 screen started to turn yellow due to the discoloration of the adhesive between the lcd and the digitizer caused by heat. Unfortunately my phone developed a dead sport on the digitizer and no longer registers touch input there.

I just ordered a new screen. I would most likely end up giving the phone to a friend whose phone is dying

My Nexus 4 screen started to turn yellow too, and a few weeks later (coincidentally, at the end of last week) the battery bloated like in the OP. So be aware that you might just be covering up symptoms of an imminent death of your phone's battery.

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