Dell Laptop Battery Not Charging

Unregistered.

The charger is plugged in, and the laptop is running on AC, yet the battery isn't full OR charging.

Dell Inspiron running XP SP3.

Jonathan

Were you doing anything that would consume a lot of power at the time you plugged it in?

Sometimes it will not charge if that is the case and just provides AC power to run the pc but not charge it.


Try unplugging it and plugging it in again.




Checking out maths for engineers? :P

rg2007

I had a similar problem last summer, my battery wouldnt charge at all and the only way to use the laptop was if it was plugged in, and performance was way way down, i got on the phone to dell, (and this was a year after i purchased the laptop) and they did some stuff with it, and decided to send me out a new battery and charger, free of charge and through fedex so it was all sorted in a few days.

Check the centre pin on your power adapter's tip, is it broken or bent? Did the machine throw up any error about the adapter not being recognised? It could be something else but in most cases this is it.

Check in the BIOS if the adapter is being detected, if it says {{none}} then that's your problem. Dells rely on information being forwarded from the adapter to determine the type of adapter it is. This is usually transmitted via the centre pin on PA-10/PA-12/PA-3e adapters. If the pin is missing then the machine doesn't know what adapter is connected so doesn't charge the battery.

If it's an older Dell machine with a PA-9 adapter this wouldn't apply to you though. What model is it?

Unregistered.

jmccrohan wrote: »

Were you doing anything that would consume a lot of power at the time you plugged it in?

No.

Karsini wrote: »

Check the centre pin on your power adapter's tip, is it broken or bent?

Nope.

Karsini wrote: »

Did the machine throw up any error about the adapter not being recognised?

Nope.

Karsini wrote: »

What model is it?

PA-1600-06D2.

Voodu Child

How old is the battery?

If you discharge the battery a little (ie let it run down to 10%) will it charge back up to 13% ?

uncleoswald

Similar problem here. Only now and again the battery will run down even though it is plugged in. Then the icon will say "plugged in, not charging". I usually only have to plug the lead back in and it starts working okay but its a little worrying that it might get worse. Rang Dell and they gave me a few steps to try out(basically amounted to taking the battery in and own and reinstalling the drivers) then they asked if it was okay and I told them it only happened every now and again so its hard to tell and they took that to mean it was all fixed so they closed the call.

Its irritating as my warranty will be running out soon and I just know its going to happen again. Think I'll ring them up just in case and tell them its happening again and hopefully they might send some replacement parts.

Unregistered.

voodoo_child wrote: »

How old is the battery?

If you discharge the battery a little (ie let it run down to 10%) will it charge back up to 13% ?

Nope!

x in the city

Originally Posted by voodoo_child View Post
How old is the battery?

If you discharge the battery a little (ie let it run down to 10%) will it charge back up to 13% ?

Unregistered.

About 2 years

Alanstrainor

Unregistered. wrote: »

About 2 years

There's your problem, your battery is probably dead. 2 years is good doing for a battery. It's new battery time.