We now know a little more about the reasons that would have pushed Google to voluntarily kill some Pixel 4a with its update deployed at the beginning of January. Hector Martin, security specialist and also at the origin of Asahi Linux, a Linux distribution dedicated to Macs running on an Apple Silicon processor, has conducted his little investigation. And by analyzing the new kernel of the latest update deployed by Google on the Pixel 4a, he made a particularly interesting discovery.
Google would have chosen to cap the battery voltage, thus reducing its maximum charge capacity. A decision that would have only been applied to Pixels embedding the battery of a particular manufacturer, most likely for security reasons. This could also explain why Google deleted old updates to prevent you from going back.
A battery cell supplier in the crosshairs
By digging a little deeper, Hector Martin discovered that Google was using several different management profiles for the battery of its devices for the Pixel 4a. A practice that is apparently common in the industry and to which the Pixel 4a would not escape and which could be explained by the fact that the battery cells used by Google come from several different suppliers.
In a long post published on Mastodon, he shared his discovery. We thus learn that for one of the battery management profiles, Google had voluntarily lowered the maximum charging voltage from 4.44 V to 3.95 V, thereby reducing the battery capacity.
And apparently, the profile on which these modifications were made would concern the battery of a particular manufacturer. According to his research, the Pixel 4a would be equipped with batteries manufactured by SWD (Sunwoda) with cells from two suppliers: ATL (probably Amperex Technology Limited), and LSN (probably for Lishen). It is the cells of the latter, LSN, which would be affected here by this battery problem which got the better of certain Pixel 4a.
By digging a little, Hector Martin also found a battery profile named "debug" which he suspects is not a simple debugging profile, but rather a bridled profile. This would indicate that the capacity of the battery would go from 3080 mAh to 1539 mAh, or half of the original capacity of the latter.
He also explains how to physically know which battery model equips your Pixel 4a. Each battery has a QR Code next to which is written a number. Batteries stamped 8230015901 correspond to batteries using ATL cells. These batteries are not a priori affected by the problem. On the other hand, batteries stamped 8230020501, which would therefore integrate cells from the manufacturer LSN, would be those at the heart of the problem. If you plan to change the battery of your device yourself, it is therefore better to ensure that your battery uses cells from ATL.
While for the moment nothing has been officially confirmed, we can quite easily imagine that Google has voluntarily reduced the battery charge of the Pixel 4a concerned for safety reasons. Because if the company identified problems with some batteries, it probably wanted to take the lead to avoid more problems.
A few years ago, Samsung had to massively recall its Galaxy Note 7 after problems with defective batteries that caused some devices to explode.
A catastrophic management of the problem by Google
While we cannot blame Google for wanting to be cautious on this point, the Mountain View company managed the problem in a rather catastrophic manner. Because not all Pixel 4a users are on an equal footing, and that is the problem.
In Germany, Canada, the United States, India, the United Kingdom and Singapore, Google is replacing the battery of the affected devices free of charge, and therefore allows users to continue using their smartphone. In other countries, however, the Mountain View company is offering compensation of $50 or $100 towards the purchase of a new Pixel.
A pill that is hard to swallow. And rightly so. Because the victims of this update probably did not plan to dig into their pockets to buy a new smartphone when their Pixel 4a worked perfectly before the update. Enough to significantly tarnish the image of Google (and its smartphones) among the main stakeholders who now swear: "Google Pixel, never again".
Source: Android Authority
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