[Maze Alpha Questions & Answers] lukesan:
Just checked, and yes it is the correct manual. But lets say that even me, a veteran (with no patience), had issues with it. It is 100% correct but ... well see later on where you get.

Ok, first couple of things come up in my mind. Could still be the cable, the charger or even the the charging port that is broken. Been in the electronics business since the late 80's and these things can go wrong or broken any minute even thinking that a firmware update caused it.

Charger you can easily check if you just connect it to another charger or a pc usb port. A PC usb port will only deliver (mostly) max 400mA to 500mA .. meaning it will charge, if it still does, extremely slow. So I would keep it connected to a pc all day long or night before trying to switch it on. Trying to switch it on during charging and batt at low level will probably not work. You could try to power on after 2 or 3 hours or so and if it powers on then I would power it off again to get at least some juice in it to play around.

Cable, I would go fetch another one, they will come in handy in the future too. If it doesn't fit properly because the port is to deep in the Alpha then just take a knife and carefully cut a very small piece of the plastic, just 1mm is enough. I've done this on the 2 extra cables I have here and it works perfectly and I don't even see it aesthetically so no harm done on mine.

Now if that still doesn't work we can try the next step. But be very careful to know that that will delete all data, pictures, etc off of the phone. Because of all my toying with this phone I stuck an sd-card in it and doing a backup before I play with it again.

The manual states that you have to press the volume up button.. Well you can already test that without hurting anything as long you don't press anything on the flashtool. So only volume up and then insert the usb cable to a pc. Now the mistake I made in the beginning was to also push the power button.

So on the pc open up your device manager. If you do volume up (not in any of the other modes like fastboot etc, so from a standpoint that the phone is completely off) hold it for 2 or 3 sec and plug it into the PC. Now you should hear the typical usb connection sound and see something happening like an extra device in the manager. Probably you do not have the correct drivers installed for starters. Look for mtk drivers for your OS. Be careful, a lot of crap and virus links out there.

Now another issue that I fell for the first time is that you have to connect it twice like that to the pc to actually flash. First time ... press the 'scan' and let it do it (think the top field will become green) and then disconnect the phone and do the same volume up and connect and then it will allow you to flash.

But first check what is happening before we have to flash it.

Btw I know about their attitude. Well, as a Chinese company they must understand that by this attitude they will not going to sell any products anymore. I only bought mine because it was a special deal and I wanted to test an MTK chipset. They never replied to me why there is no real fast charge on it etc.

I also very very highly recommend you to invest, well for the price of a sandwich, to buy a usb charging doctor which will allow you to see the voltage and current. You don't need to be a doctor to us it and at least you see something instead of having to guess. Also while you are at it buy good quality chargers and a couple of cables. They will always come in handy and take some of the guesswork away if needed.