Hello everyone,

I have a problem with my HP Prime G2 (2AP18AA). I just received it a few days ago, brand new so this is the first charge. When the device is off, I plug in the charger, the screen lights up and the icon says charging. I saw the screen light so I decided to turn it off (while still plugged in the charger), as soon as I pressed [Shift] + [On] keys to turn off the device, the screen suddenly flashed and there was a small noise with a slight smell burned and the calculator turned off. I immediately unplugged the charging cord, removed the battery and the cover. After removing the lid to look at it, I noticed that one component was burned and had a strong burning smell. I don't understand why it happens because I usually turn off my Ti84 plus CE while charging and nothing happens. Previously I also had HP Prime, version NW280AA, it also died while charging for no reason.
I don't understand how HP Prime can be damaged so easily, it's clearly a hardware or design fault.
According to the information I find out, the burnt component is the A476 tatalum capacitor. Please help, where can I find this part to replace the burnt part of my HP Prime G2, will it work again?
Thank you everyone!

I've never heard of this happening before so I'll bet you got unlucky and got a defective unit. Personally I'd contact HP and use your warranty to get a replacement calculator since a new capacitor could just immediately burn up again (there could be a different component that caused the capacitor to burn).

If you want to try repairing it anyways, digikey.com and mouser.com are good places to look for discrete components. A quick search on Digikey for A476 led me here: https://www.digikey.com/en/products/filter/tantalum-capacitors/59?s=N4IgTCBcDaIAQEEAsB2AbCAugXyA Unfortunately I won't be able to assist in finding the exact replacement component.

Were you using the same charger? A cheap, poorly-designed charger can easily destroy devices. Some horrific chargers can present high voltage on the output side. This may not immediately fry the device; instead, the plastic case acts as insulation, waiting for any excuse to discharge.

Thank you for the suggestion. I emailed HP with email address "info@hpofficesupply.com", I'm not sure if this is HP support email for Calculator or not.
Maybe I'm just unlucky and my HP Prime is faulty. Ever since the first prime failed for no reason while charging, I was very careful and a little stressed when charging this time and also the first charge after buying a brand new device. Very disappointed with the quality of HP prime

I think this charger is not too expensive but also not a nameless charger (China's xiaomi brand), I am using it to charge my phone everyday and no problem, as soon as my Prime dead, i measured the voltage right at the output of the charging cable, it shows correct 5 volts, ripple noise around 80mV. However, I will pay attention to consider the charger in more detail. Thanks

Given the legend on the board, it looks like that's a tantalum capacitor that failed so I'm inclined to agree that you just got a bad unit, or possibly it was damaged in shipping (excessive vibration?), though I'd think a device that fails in that way would have been marginal from the factory.

My HP prime G2 was in good condition when received, with no signs of damage. I also connected to the computer to install some APP, use it for a few days normally. It worked fine until I charged it for the first time today.

I suspect it's a faulty unit. When working on my last two games I turned my calculator off and on while charging multiple times (at least 20 times) and nothing bad happened other than two calculator crashes/reboot with the "your calc has encountered an issue and will reboot in 3 seconds" message, and then it worked fine again. Could a bad firmware damage a calculator?

5 days ago I updated my HP prime G2 to Firmware version: 2021 12 02 (14603). I find out that there are a few cases of bugs after updating to new firmware, but there have been no cases of causing component fires. So I don't know if it's hardware or firmware update, it's confusing.

Assuming it's not a counterfeit Xiaomi charger, it's surely fine.


That . . . shouldn't happen. It could just be poor power management code causing a brownout, but it could also point to a more serious hardware design flaw. HP should definitely fix that.


It depends entirely on the hardware design. You hope that the hardware engineers designed it so software can't do anything that would cause damage, but that's not always the case. That said, calculators aren't exactly the bleeding edge of consumer electronics innovation, and if you stick to standard design practices, you won't end up with a design that lets bad software cause hardware damage.

Have a nice day everyone,

I'm feeling happy because my HP Prime G2 has been fixed
After looking up the specs of the damaged capacitor I got a 47uF capacitance (A476), voltage unknown because I don't have the HP prime G2 datasheet. Compared the boards of the two versions of HP prime that I have and found that in version 2AP18AA there are several places where A476 capacitors are used, on the circuit board of NW280AA version there are also a few capacitors printed on the label as "47 10V ". They are not of the same brand but may have similar functions and specifications . So I tried replacing the 47 10V capacitor from the old board to the new one. Good thing that brought the HP prime G2 back to life .
Now it is working and charging normally .
I will not turn off my HP prime G2 while charging again even though there are some 47 10V capacitors on board NW280AA

That's great it works again! Good job figuring out how to repair it so quickly! Keep us posted if it starts acting up again.