Touchstone Car Charger (simple how-to guide)

Touchstone Car Charger (simple how-to guide)

I am posting this for anyone interested in making the touchstone work in your car. Its very easy and helpful because

1.I dont have to worry about being out all day without a charger

2. Youve probably noticed by now how tough it is to open the little side plastic thingy and insert the micro USB connector (specially if you dont have any nails

3. With the touchstone car charger, just place the phone on the charger, no hassle with wires.

5. If you connect your audio jack into your cars stereo audio input, you can use the phone like a hands-free speakerphone (just answer calls in speaker mode). the sound will come through the car speakers

HERES HOW TO DO IT (you`ll slap yourself silly at how easy this is..)

1. Buy the sprint palm pre car charger.

2. take a small sharp knife, or paper cutter and shave about 5 mm of the hard plastic from the front of the plug (on the top side) (starting from the connector, going backwards) basically that is to allow the connector to go into the recessed space and connect into the micro-US input in the back of the touchstone)

3. Insert the micro USB connector of the car charger into the touchstone and the other side into the power input.

4. Your phone should show the 'charging' message'

5. Place the touchstone somewhere conveninent on a flat plastic smooth surface of the car. (I put mine next to the cup holder and the stickshift)

see photos attached. (Just remember, all you have to do is make the car chargers front narrow enough to go into the touchstones recessed USB input. thats all it is) .
enjoy,
Reload 006

exactly what i want to do! any issues with the phone coming off the stone going over a bump or stopping short?

Very clever, will be purchasing another touchstone for the car, thanks a buunch for the idea!!!!

yea I need to come up with something as well.

I wasn't going to and went back a few days later and got the Touchstone. I have to admit I really like it and need one to move around in my Cars.

Also remember they do sell more then just the Back and Stone . They sell different packages with like 2 Stones and extra charger and all

I was going to do that, but I don't like the Sprint charger. I ordered the one on Palm.com instead and when that one comes will return the Sprint one. The Palm one looks to be a little less cumbersome and probably is the same cable as what is on the TS.

i used my mini-USB adapter (from the original Palm Pre) that i plugged into the car charger which can take any USB cable and it would not charge power up the touchstone

i do have the Sprint car charger but i have not tried it yet

1. IS there any concern with the touchstone in car? why is Palm saying we should not be using in the car ?

2. Do you think that in order for touchstone to work in a car it has to use Sprint charger and the cable that came with the car with the USB-car charger that i had from before ?

It won't work with the one from Palm.com as that one converts to usb power and uses a microusb cable. It is dumbed down power and the same reason the touchstone won't work from a computer usb port. The one from Sprint does not convert to usb power apparently and allows a full bore charge like the wall adapter. Therefore, it has enough power to power the Touchstone. I'd cancel that order from Palm if you bought it intending to use it with the Touchstone.

I have been using the Palm Brand car charger (Got it from Best Buy) in my 2009 Honda Odyssey, and plugged it into my Touchstone and it has been working just fine. The only thing is, every once in a while when the van is idling say at a stop light and my A/C is running full blast, the amperage going to the accessory outlet is cut back slightly, but then all it does is act like it disconnects and reconnects from the Touchstone (only once per instance.) My guess is, it depends on the amperage of your accessory outlet in your vehicle.

The MicroUSB cable that came with the car charger is a fully functional cable, its just about half as short as the OEM cable that came with your Pre, but it's the exact same thing, and plugs in just perfectly to the Touchstone.

I love taking my Touchstone with me, I might get another one if Palm or Sprint decides to come down on the price any, especially since I just picked up another Pre for my wife today!! Hope this helps!

Well, I stand corrected. I'll bet my outlet just sucks. I'll have to look into that again.

Sweet - the biggest reason why I wanted the Palm one was because if it was the same type cable that comes with the phone (and it looks like it is according to rocklobster) I'd like to pull it out of the car and charge up from a friend's laptop if I'm at a friend's house and need some juice.

Yeah man! The cable is a fully functional MicroUSB cable that supports charging and data transfer. I personally like the using the shorter cable better anyways when I need to transfer Music, Wallpapers, etc, and it's always in my van when I need it. Also don't want to risk losing or damaging the OEM MicroUSB cable.

It sure beats having to pay the same price for Sprint's dedicated charger (plus I think it's ugly as crap) and the Palm car charger just compliments the Pre and Touchstone very well. Also included in the car charger kit is an adapter that will charge Treo devices as well!

My advice: Don't let your Sprint rep suck you into their charger, (if they haven't already) go down to Best Buy or Palm.com and get it for the SAME price. The only Pre accessory that Best Buy does not sell is the Touchstone (as of right now.)

I tried to use the USB port in my 2008 BMW 535x1 for charging. If I plug in the micro USB cable to the car port and then to the pre directly, it works great. If I plug in a touchstone into the cable, no charge capability. Perhaps it is that amperage thing listed above, but it really pisses me off. It works direct cable to pre. Go figure...

*just found a RIM USB charger and it works with the MicroUSB/Pre. Only thing that concerns me is that the BB charger has DC output of 5v =0.5A whereas Palm is 5V = 1.0A. Should that be a concern?

This won't be a problem at all, since the charger is only pumping half of the juice as what the Palm charger does. The only thing is, the RIM charger will charge your Pre at least half as slow as the Palm charger, which with my experience with all kinds of rechargeable batteries, is not a bad thing, it actually prolongs the overall life of the battery if you were to say, charge your Pre overnight using the RIM cable to get a full charge, then using your Palm cable when you need a juice boost.

Have you read into the Touchstone's technology any by chance?

(Here's a Wikipedia link explaining Inductive Charging)

The Touchstone uses "Inductive Charging" (popular in electric toothbrushes) to charge the device. Inductive charging is basically creating a transformer when the Pre is docked on the Touchstone, and transferring electricity through non-conductive materials (plastic, rubbers, etc) so it is going to take more juice to complete the circuit.

This also makes sense in lieu of what jboucicaut was saying about RIM's MicroUSB charger's output amperage compared to Palm's charger. (By the way, 5v 0.5a or 500ma is the DC output of a standard USB port) The Palm charger's extra half an amp was designed to power the Touchstone's extra power needs.

Nice. I'm amazed on how fast the Palm charger is. Takes me like 30 min to get me from 30 to 100.

I'm right with you on that one! Palm gets a high 5 for being awesome.

AWESOME advice!!! I followed the instructions and now am using the Touchstone in my car as a much easier way to charge on the go... now I'm just debating on whether to buy another Touchstone to keep in the car or keep transferring the one I have now from the car to the home. But thanx for the advice, it worked like a charm!

Awesome! Thanks

i loved it so much i had it hard wired into my BMW 335i convertible

i can confirm that navigation and touchstone work just fine for 3-4 days now