[Solved] Notebook battery not charging anymore

.:B:. · 2007-10-01 00:17:30

I just noticed this today. I mostly work with my laptop on AC and take the battery out. A few days ago, I put in the battery, unplugged AC, and used the lappy for a while. Battery was at 96% when I shut down.

Today, working on AC. I put in the battery, it shows 96%. After 30 minutes, still 96%. I take it out (still on AC), plug it in again, now it says 95%.... XFCE battery plugin nicely says it's 'Charging' though, but I'm not so sure about that. The percentage is certainly not rising. It looks like it refuses to charge? ACPI info tells me the thing is charged, not charging. I know it worked before (this is a new laptop, but I already charged my battery...)

Kernel version:

[stijn@hephaistos ~]$ pacman -Qi kernel26 | grep -i version
Version        : 2.6.22.9-1

ACPI info:

[stijn@hephaistos ~]$ acpi
     Battery 1: charged, 95%

[stijn@hephaistos ~]$ cat /proc/acpi/battery/C23B/info 
present:                 yes
design capacity:         5083 mAh
last full capacity:      5083 mAh
battery technology:      rechargeable
design voltage:          10800 mV
design capacity warning: 255 mAh
design capacity low:     51 mAh
capacity granularity 1:  100 mAh
capacity granularity 2:  100 mAh
model number:            Primary
serial number:           02195 2007/08/04
battery type:            LIon
OEM info:                Hewlett-Packard

[stijn@hephaistos ~]$ cat /proc/acpi/battery/C23B/state 
present:                 yes
capacity state:          ok
charging state:          charged
present rate:            0 mA
remaining capacity:      4857 mAh
present voltage:         12445 mV

Any clues? I should have kept my pacman cache this time

Edit: Scrap that, after unplugging my USB mouse and a reboot it looks like it works . Strange things!

Last edited by B (2007-10-01 01:57:11)

sfauzia · 2009-02-01 07:42:45

I'm having the same problem, and I'm wondering if it's because of the latest (6?) updates that installed. I know this is an old thread, but it's the only one I found via Google that is identical to my problem. But I don't use any extra peripherals. I've tried restarting with and without my AC adapter connected, and no change. My battery has been on 64 percent for ages, and that's how I noticed it--my battery doesn't usually take this long to charge. Now, after disconnecting the AC, and reconnect, 60 percent. Any ideas?

 pacman -Qi kernel26 | grep -i version
Version        : 2.6.28.2-1

cat /proc/acpi/battery/BAT0/info
present:                 yes
design capacity:         66240 mWh
last full capacity:      66260 mWh
battery technology:      rechargeable
design voltage:          14400 mV
design capacity warning: 3313 mWh
design capacity low:     200 mWh
capacity granularity 1:  1 mWh
capacity granularity 2:  1 mWh
model number:            93P5032
serial number:             788
battery type:            LION
OEM info:                SANYO

cat /proc/acpi/battery/BAT0/state
present:                 yes
capacity state:          ok
charging state:          charged
present rate:            0 mW
remaining capacity:      40090 mWh
present voltage:         15261 mV

Last edited by sfauzia (2009-02-01 07:51:56)

iBertus · 2009-02-01 07:55:46

If you've fixed this, please mark as solved.

.:B:. · 2009-02-01 08:53:20

My bad - but I think the other guy still has a problem .

rebugger · 2009-02-01 08:57:16

There are laptops, that aren't charging if their charge is higher than >95%/93%/...

.:B:. · 2009-02-01 09:20:10

I think that's the case for mine, but I don't think sfauzia has this kind of 'problem'. His charge is 2/3 of the max charge.

sfauzia · 2009-02-01 19:16:51

I'm not a he--perhaps I should put in my signature that my name is Sara. But yes, I connected the computer to the charger for the whole night, and it's only charged 55 percent. About the same when I shutdown the computer. It's a little scary... I didn't have this issue before the latest updates I do not have the testing repo enabled.

Should I make a new thread for my issue? Now that it seems that they have different causes. I don't think this is a kernel issue because I upgraded my kernel without noticing this problem. I feel that it's related to the updates on the 30th for Arch 64--readaline was among them (but I only upgraded yesterday). I still have my pacman cache available... does anyone know what specifically I should try downgrading?

[EDIT] My battery has went up 1 percent to 56 percent! It might be a good sign; I tried removing the battery and reinseritng it, and it seems to be locked in better now. I'll have to wait and see if it continues charging. [/EDIT]

It's now up to 61. I think it's reasonable now to say that it was pure human error at work here. Solved!

Last edited by sfauzia (2009-02-01 20:19:20)

R00KIE · 2009-02-01 20:23:23

As far as I know all laptops behave like that, just what shows up is different. Batteries have self-discharge and it's pointless that if you always work from AC to do a top-up charge if it discharges just 1% so the charge controller circuit waits until the charge gets below 95% to do a top-up.
You will see any laptop recharge for a little while every few days if you turn it off everyday and leave it disconnected from the charger during the night. What differs here is that (and I'm guessing a little here) what is reported or calculated I don't know. My old laptop would top-up recharge every 3 or 4 days just like the new one I have now but on the old one it would always say AC if plugged and only show charging when it was really doing the top-up charge, this new one actually shows the charge percentage, no concern there.

As for the laptop battery not recharging completely overnight even with your pc turned off .... something is broken, most probably the battery I guess. But please note, if you leave the pc ON and its using quite a lot of power and if the charger can only supply a little more power than the pc is using then that can happen. I guess the charge is stopped after a certain amount of time as a safeguard, also if while recharging the batteries get too hot, the charge is also stopped, again its a safeguard. Try turning your pc off, let it cool down (the battery mostly if it is warm/hot) and let it recharge then with the pc off so all the power supplied by the charger is used to recharge the batteries.

sfauzia · 2009-02-01 22:51:05

R00KIE wrote:

As for the laptop battery not recharging completely overnight even with your pc turned off .... something is broken, most probably the battery I guess. But please note, if you leave the pc ON and its using quite a lot of power and if the charger can only supply a little more power than the pc is using then that can happen. I guess the charge is stopped after a certain amount of time as a safeguard, also if while recharging the batteries get too hot, the charge is also stopped, again its a safeguard. Try turning your pc off, let it cool down (the battery mostly if it is warm/hot) and let it recharge then with the pc off so all the power supplied by the charger is used to recharge the batteries.

If I hadn't been so keen on blaming poor Pacman, I probably would have turned over my computer sooner and saw that the battery wasn't actually locked in. As I usually grip my ThinkPad by the battery that extends out the back, I must have loosened it so that it couldn't charge. Thanks for the advice, though, I definitely agree that it's always good to charge the computer when its off, to prevent the batteries from overheating. Thanks everyone for all your help; being able to post here probably prevented me from panicking .

Last edited by sfauzia (2009-02-01 23:16:59)

kludge · 2009-02-02 00:20:09

damn it! i was totally hoping this thread would unearth some battery arcana that would help me figure out the battery weirdness on my thinkpad a21m. regardless, i'm glad it was something that simple.

always check your contacts.

Arch Linux

#1 2007-10-01 00:17:30

[Solved] Notebook battery not charging anymore

#2 2009-02-01 07:42:45

Re: [Solved] Notebook battery not charging anymore

#3 2009-02-01 07:55:46

Re: [Solved] Notebook battery not charging anymore

#4 2009-02-01 08:53:20

Re: [Solved] Notebook battery not charging anymore

#5 2009-02-01 08:57:16

Re: [Solved] Notebook battery not charging anymore

#6 2009-02-01 09:20:10

Re: [Solved] Notebook battery not charging anymore

#7 2009-02-01 19:16:51

Re: [Solved] Notebook battery not charging anymore

#8 2009-02-01 20:23:23

Re: [Solved] Notebook battery not charging anymore

#9 2009-02-01 22:51:05

Re: [Solved] Notebook battery not charging anymore

#10 2009-02-02 00:20:09

Re: [Solved] Notebook battery not charging anymore

Board footer