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    Extensa 4420 only charges (extended) battery while it's ON

    Discussion in 'Acer' started by FalconFour, Nov 10, 2009.

  1. FalconFour

    FalconFour Notebook Enthusiast

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    Yeah, go figure! No, that's not a typo! My laptop only charges the battery while it's powered on. When it's powered off, the battery doesn't charge unless it's over 90% charged already (then it finishes the top-off charge while off). If the battery's below 90% charged, it will only charge while the computer is on.

    When it "doesn't charge", it doesn't simply turn off the battery light. It shows orange (charging) for about 5 seconds, then turns green for about 30 seconds. It then turns off for about another 3 seconds and starts all over again, over and over and over, never getting any charging done all night.

    This is with an extended (9 cell) battery that sticks out the back a bit. The battery sure lasts a good long time, I'd say over 3 hours but I never timed it. But it gets annoying when I want to charge it at night and I have to leave it on to charge.

    Really, I'm just posting this so Google will have something to go on. Right now, if I ask Google "laptop only charges when turned on", it thinks I made a mistake and really meant "NOT turned on". I'd love to know if anyone's got any ideas on this, but I'm not really holding out much hope on it.

    FWIW, it's a heavily modified Acer Extensa 4420 with a TL-52 CPU upgrade, 2gb HyperX RAM upgrade, Bluetooth module, replaced hard drive (160gb), replaced DVD drive with an LG GSA-T40N, and of course, an extended battery. Practically the only thing stock is the base system, and I hope to add a webcam (replacement bezel (41.4H001.001), LCD cable (50.4H10.001), and added webcam (Camellia_2)) soon as well. Runs Windows 7 Pro.
     
    FalconFour, Nov 10, 2009
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  2. FalconFour

    FalconFour Notebook Enthusiast

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    This problem seems to have finally fixed itself, I guess after the battery capacity started going down. Maybe the BIOS was tripping out at the higher-than-designed capacity... but I can once again charge in standby. Yay!

    edit: Oh, and I finished adding the webcam too. ;)
     
    FalconFour, Feb 20, 2010
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