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    What's going on with my battery?

    Discussion in 'Alienware 14 and M14x' started by tmaxx123, Jan 12, 2012.

  1. tmaxx123

    tmaxx123 Notebook Consultant

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    I have been leaving my battery at about 50% with charging off, and i unplugged it to take it downstairs, and the charge % dropped to 7% almost immediately and then turned off shortly after.

    Not sure whats going on. What are some programs i can run to check the health of my battery?

    thanks in advance
     
    tmaxx123, Jan 12, 2012
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  2. Nardon

    Nardon Notebook Consultant

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    Nardon, Jan 12, 2012
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  3. tmaxx123

    tmaxx123 Notebook Consultant

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    weird, everything in autopsy says my battery is still perfect. Everything is 100% of the original values.

    any otherr programs i can use to observe the wear my battery has gone through?
     
    tmaxx123, Jan 12, 2012
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  4. Nardon

    Nardon Notebook Consultant

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    everest, hwmonitor and so on.
     
    Nardon, Jan 12, 2012
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  5. wakkigy

    wakkigy Notebook Enthusiast

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    Followed the link and it wouldn't allow me to install alienware autopsy =|

    Error code: -29
     
    wakkigy, Jan 14, 2012
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  6. nuaron

    nuaron Notebook Consultant

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    Turn on laptop, run it on battery, and let the computer shut off once the battery is dead. Then put the laptop on charging for like 7-8 hours... Leave it plugged even if laptop is shut down.

    Post update if you have time to try thi.
     
    nuaron, Jan 14, 2012
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  7. Jovan for PREZ

    Jovan for PREZ Notebook Consultant

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    I really want to say it's bad hardware, sorry. But Nuaron's idea will fix it if it can be fixed, IMO.
     
    Jovan for PREZ, Jan 14, 2012
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  8. tmaxx123

    tmaxx123 Notebook Consultant

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    tried this a few days ago and it seemed to fix the issue. Im still very confused as to how a battery could magically lose 50 percent charge in a matter of a few mins tho.......

    seems kinda impossible unless there is faulty hardware somewhere. ill have to test this again soon and if it happens again ill give dell a call.
     
    tmaxx123, Jan 15, 2012
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  9. aptsys

    aptsys Notebook Enthusiast

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    The battery has some charge monitoring hardware built in which measures the net transfer of energy from charging/discharging. It also measures the battery voltage to determine when the battery is actually fully flat.

    The likelihood is that over time the remaining capacity became incorrect and shut down the laptop because it went below the voltage threshold.
     
    aptsys, Jan 16, 2012
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  10. nuaron

    nuaron Notebook Consultant

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    quite true.

    Maybe your battery wasn't calibrated properly by windows. So even if your battery had like 10% charge in reality, windows will show it is fully charged. You can check true battery charge levels by pressing the button on the bottom side of laptop right above where battery is. This shows the true battery charge level.
     
    nuaron, Jan 21, 2012
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