Unofficial Pinephone Battery Case

[lllsondowlll]

Picked up an S20 Ultra battery case with 8,500 mAh battery. I've left my Pinephone Pro off the charger for two days straight without charging and it's still at 100% with battery case showing only 50% capacity. Combined the Pinephone Pro's battery 3,000 mAh battery with the extended battery case 8,500 mAh battery gives the Pinephone Pro a whopping 11,500 mAh charge to work with. I've used about 3 hours screen on time both days (6 hours screen time total) without seeing much drain at all, and this is with suspend completely disabled.

While the official Keyboard case does offer a similar solution with a 6,000 mAh battery, I decided having a keyboard in my face in public is not ideal.

The buttons line up perfectly with the case buttons, but has a half inch gap at the top between case and phone. Also be aware the thickness of the phone is doubled to almost the size of the keyboard case and does add a little extra weight but feels durable.

The case, however, offers no protection if your phone would to fall screen face down, so be aware of this as well.

I've had the charging case for 48h on Manjaro so reliability and lifespan of the case still hasn't been assessed, but for $25 I feel it's pretty low risk. The case takes about 6-8 hours to charge from zero but this fine for an overnight charge while sleeping --did this as soon as I got it. You do not need to take the phone out to charge case.

The Pinephone Pro in this case seems to only reliably work in Manjaro at the moment as Arch power management is still early and drains faster than the case can charge it, but this is a bug which should be worked out soon. Have not tried with Postmarket or Mobian. I've also not tested peripherals such as OTG cables / hubs in the USB C port but will report back once I've done so.

The battery can be toggled with the power button on the back and Manjaro will report immediately when charge is active. Turn it off if you wish to power the phone down as the constant charge causes the phone to boot again

Here is a link to the case if anyone is interested:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08ZN5416W/ref...UTF8&psc=1

Pictures below: - ignore 80% charge, was running Arch at the time.



 


Feel free to ask any questions I didn't address here and I'll do my best to answer them.

[yajirobi]

Would be very cool to have this, but the gap at the top is a problem ...
Did you test peripherals with the USB port?

[slvr]

I made a 3d printable spacer to fill the gap. Haven't tried it in a galaxy s20 ultra case yet though.

https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:5247600

[yajirobi]

I made a 3d printable spacer to fill the gap. Haven't tried it in a galaxy s20 ultra case yet though.

https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:5247600

Awesome, thanks. This could work, I might give it a try.

[kmsgli]

I made a 3d printable spacer to fill the gap. Haven't tried it in a galaxy s20 ultra case yet though.

https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:5247600

Awesome, thanks. This could work, I might give it a try.

Has anyone tried just a regular s20 case not the big battery? I want a better case and the standard pinephone case is a poor fit especially with the Qi charging back cover.

I was thinking something like this;
https://www.amazon.com/Spigen-Liquid-Des...25&sr=8-10

[lllsondowlll]

I made a 3d printable spacer to fill the gap. Haven't tried it in a galaxy s20 ultra case yet though.

https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:5247600

Awesome, thanks. This could work, I might give it a try.

Has anyone tried just a regular s20 case not the big battery? I want a better case and the standard pinephone case is a poor fit especially with the Qi charging back cover.

I was thinking something like this;
https://www.amazon.com/Spigen-Liquid-Des...25&sr=8-10

S20U cases will fit the same with the gap at the top but should have aligned buttons. As for the screen, it may come out over the lip for the screen guard since PPP is a little thicker than S20U. Your call though, the reason for this thread is to increase battery life but you can experiment and return the case of your choosing if it doesn't work for you.

[kmsgli]

Yea, I am currently using a stretchy universal case for protection and its OK but id like a more traditional case. The pine64 case is awful it has no lip on it and with the QI back it no longer fits proper.

[TRS-80]

Do any of these work on regular (original) PinePhone? I am not sure what the differences are between the body of that and the Pro (if any).

[wibble]

The original and Pro are similar enough to both fit the keyboard and the cases Pine sell, although the Pro is slightly thicker - at least according to what I've read as I don't have a Pro. On that basis I would expect the original to fit pretty well in the same cases as the Pro.

[arzach]

Yea, I am currently using a stretchy universal case for protection and its OK but id like a more traditional case. The pine64 case is awful it has no lip on it and with the QI back it no longer fits proper.

I wanted some protection but wasn't able to find a stretchy universal case at the local big-box store.  But for the same price as the stretchy universal cases I found a cheapo store brand case that says it's for Samsung Galaxy A21.  It fits well enough that I can access the buttons on the right side.  The usb port is mostly in the right position...mod with a knife in order to plug the cable in.  Headset hole is totally wrong but that's another easy mod.   Camera sensor opening aligns but flash doesn't...another easy mod.

Some protection, easy to get on and off, and doesn't totally suck.