Battery charged, but shuts down immediately when running on battery..

Basq

So my Macbook has always held a great charge.. but all of a sudden something went wrong!

My battery is fully charged (says "Battery is Charged", 5 green lights when battery is clicked, light on charger is green) but as soon as the charger is plugged out, the Macbook shuts down immediately.

Information on battery below:



I know I've had a good battery life at 717 cycles.. but the fact that it was very sudden - not to mention the EXACT same thing has happened the battery in my Samsung NC10.

Any suggestions? I've thinking something's faulty on the logic board but the fact that the same thing happened my NC10 has me thinking it's something else.

EDIT: Oh.. and clearing the PMU did nowt!

Elessar

I've had similar happen to batteries on my MBP. This is all due to the age and cycles of the battery. I'm surprised yours has reached 717!! When did it last hold a good charge? And how long was it?

The only short term solution was to re-calibrate the battery for me, but ultimately, it was just too old.

Basq

Elessar wrote: »

I've had similar happen to batteries on my MBP. This is all due to the age and cycles of the battery. I'm surprised yours has reached 717!! When did it last hold a good charge? And how long was it?

The only short term solution was to re-calibrate the battery for me, but ultimately, it was just too old.

It last held it's charge probably late last week (Thursday / Friday) and it held it's charge for a good 2 - 3 hours on a fully-charged battery... it happened very suddenly!

After hearing horror stories about Macbook batteries, I've been relatively lucky with the battery in my Macbook (but my MacBook is far from it - cracking plastic, runs very hot etc etc).

Regarding re-calibrating.. do you mean fully charging it and letting it run completely dead? I would if I could but as soon as I plug out the charger, it shuts down automatically so that's not really a viable option.

EDIT: I'll gladly buy a replacement battery.. but I'd love to ensure the battery is the problem. As it appears fully charged (on inspection) and as indicated in the OS.

Sad Professor

Have you ruled out the magsafe adapter being the problem, basquille? When charging, disconnect the plug from the wall instead of pulling the magsafe from the Macbook.

You could also try removing the battery and leaving it out for a while.

Try zapping the PRAM as well.

Did the NC10 problem happen at the same time? Could there have been a power surge?

Basq

Sad Professor wrote: »

Have you ruled out the magsafe adapter being the problem, basquille? When charging, disconnect the plug from the wall instead of pulling the magsafe from the Macbook.

Will try that.. but it wouldn't charge the battery at all if that was the case, right?

Sad Professor wrote: »

You could also try removing the battery and leaving it out for a while.

Yep.. am doing that.

Sad Professor wrote: »

Try zapping the PRAM as well.

Holding down Command, Option, P, R on boot? Did it! No luck!

Sad Professor wrote: »

Did the NC10 problem happen at the same time? Could there have been a power surge?

It's possible actually.. there was 4 devices plugged into an extension lead - 2 of them were my Macbook and NC10 more than likely, the other 2 was my girlfriend's laptop and a light. But there's been no problem with girlfriend's laptop or light as far as I know.

Sad Professor

basquille wrote: »

Will try that.. but it wouldn't charge the battery at all if that was the case, right?

There could be a problem with just the magsafe part.

babypink

any chance of trying a different charger, just in case it's the charger itself and not just the magsafe?

Basq

Tried plugging out the plug from the wall (with the maglite still inserted) - and no luck.. same result!

Will try a different charger.

Sad Professor

I'd say it is almost definitely the battery.

What Macbook is it btw? It's over now, but Apple had a recall for certain MB and MBP batteries.

http://www.apple.com/support/macbook_macbookpro/batteryupdate/

Elessar

FYI I got myself a MBP replacement batter from ebay a few weeks ago - 40 euro.

Basq

Sad Professor wrote: »

I'd say it is almost definitely the battery.

What Macbook is it btw? It's over now, but Apple had a recall for certain MB and MBP batteries.

http://www.apple.com/support/macbook_macbookpro/batteryupdate/

It's a 3 year old Macbook.. and the battery worked fine til last week so I'm not worried if it was a recalled battery. I got more than enough use out of it.

Elessar wrote: »

FYI I got myself a MBP replacement batter from ebay a few weeks ago - 40 euro.

As I said.. I'll gladly buy a new battery if I can make sure it's the battery at fault.

Apparently, they sell a fantastic replacement on 7DayShop: http://www.7dayshop.com/catalog/product_info.php?cPath=777_3&products_id=107348

PS- am getting the boss to bring me in a battery from his wife's MacBook tomorrow (same model) so should be able to gauge whether it's battery-related or something more serious. Will let ye know.

Basq

Tried someone else's Macbook battery this morning and worked fine with that.. so it's definitely the battery!

Odd that it's indicating (both on the LED indicator, and in the OS) that it's full.

NUTZZ

basquille wrote: »

Apparently, they sell a fantastic replacement on 7DayShop: http://www.7dayshop.com/catalog/product_info.php?cPath=777_3&products_id=107348

Nice one, thanks for this link! Can someone just confirm for me that this battery (http://www.7dayshop.com/catalog/product_info.php?cPath=777_3&products_id=107352) is the correct one for Mid 07 MacBook Pro (3.1)?

Basq

OK.. I'm officially puzzled!

Have left the battery out of it since the night before last as I was planning on letting it discharge slowly.

Went into work today and tried another Macbook battery.. and it worked fine. So I thought great, I'll order another battery.

Came home and said I'd give the old battery a try.

And amazingly, it seems to be working fine now.. and says there's 3 hours left on it!

Anyone wanna hazard a guess?!

Sad Professor

Weird alright. I dunno. My only thought is that if there was a power surge it might have messed the battery up for a while. I've experienced surges in the past that caused all kinds of weird (and scary) problems that later sorted themselves out. You may not have left the battery out long enough the previous night.

Anyway, glad to hear it's working again. Are you still going to get a new battery?

Basq

Sad Professor wrote: »

Anyway, glad to hear it's working again. Are you still going to get a new battery?

Probably not.. as I'm still getting 2 - 3 hours out of the one I have on a full charge.

Am more worried about my NC10 as I'm thinking the battery on that is actually dead.. but am gonna try leaving it out of the laptop for a day or two.

Basq

Well.. feck!

Put down the lid of my MacBook (sleep) while I was getting my dinner.. came back and lifted up the lid. Now it's back to doing the same thing!

Am wondering whether that new battery today was just a fluke!

Sad Professor

Test it with the other battery again. But I'd be inclined to think (or hope) that the old battery working again was the fluke.

Basq

Sad Professor wrote: »

Test it with the other battery again. But I'd be inclined to think (or hope) that the old battery working again was the fluke.

Yep.. possibly!

Gonna try the other battery tomorrow and will let you know.

buzzymam

I recently had similar bizarre issues with the battery of my MBP. Went for working fine, 200 odd cycles to suddenly not holding any charge and only working of mains where it would not recharge, even off mains power, it stayed at 12% for days. I spent hours and hours trawling mac support forums trying all number of useful and appreciated tips to resolve it. I know Macs are supposed to be "virus proof" BUT.... i had been getting e mails from a friends, auto-generated telling me to open attachment which was a virus. Now i never open it as far as i can remember. I downloaded this free anti viral software http://www.clamxav.com/ ran it and it immediately battery normality was restored. 2 weeks later after another round of auto generated virus e mails, same problem...ran anti viral and fixed it. That was months ago and battery still holding its charge now and working fine. I blocked my friends e mail from my inbox and have no bother since.

It might help, might not. No harm giving it a lash. I'm now a firm believer that Macs are not virus proof!!

Basq

Will give it a try buzzymam.

Basq

Gave the Macbook to my boss yesterday to bring home with him and try the battery that worked again!

He sent me a text saying it's been working all evening with my original battery, put it into sleep mode and took it out again, shut it down, restarted it. All without a problem!

Arrived in and it's on my desk.. I took it out of sleep and it seems fine alright. It's back in sleep mode again... wonder what's the best thing I can do for the battery while it's like this. Possibly to let it fully discharge and charge it up full again. Any ideas?

It really is a bit baffling!

Basq

Well.. the battery remained fairly volatile!

Would work one minute, not the next. But it only chooses to work about 10% of the time.

Ordered a new battery from 7DayShop last night - so will let ye know how that goes!

Sad Professor

Yeah, hopefully that fixes it.

Annoying problem though as it's hard to be sure the battery is the problem.

Basq

Sad Professor wrote: »

Annoying problem though as it's hard to be sure the battery is the problem.

Yeah.. if the worst happens, I'll sell it on!

I can probably live with the MacBook on a charger as I don't really use it outside the house. But the maglite is irritating.. as if anyone moves past it or even jiggles the wire, YOINK!

Sad Professor

basquille wrote: »

But the maglite is irritating.. as if anyone moves past it or even jiggles the wire, YOINK!

Yeah mine falls out for no reason at all. It's mostly a good thing though. My old iBook had quite a few near misses.

Sad Professor

Did you ever get to bottom of this? Did the new battery fix it?

Basq

Oh yeah.. was meant to update ye on this.

The new battery fixed it thankfully.