Battery no longer recognized, HELP!

I have a 5 month old AW17, turned it on today and it will not recognize the battery all the way from BIOS (I have to enter F1 to bypass) and once it boots up into windows it says "Plugged in, not charging"

Here is what I have done so far:
1) Unplug battery, discharge unit, plug back in
2) Updated the bios to A08 via USB stick, tried unplugging battery again, still nothing
3) Swapped power adapter, also verified the power adapter is being recognized as 240W in the BIOS

At this point there is nothing I can do to get the battery to charge. I believe a new battery is in order... I called Dell, was transferred to 6 different agents over 3 hours, provided them with my Service Tag and was told the service tag is attached to a "exchanged" unit and that they will not be able to help me. I yelled at them for a bit and decided it was no use, I can fix it on my own.

Any advice on how to get a replacement battery or where to go from here?

 

Service tag is attached to an exchange unit. Is your entire warranty invalid? This would be a time to contact the BBB. Because if this system is infact new you are getting screwed out of your warranty when they should just overnight you a battery.

 

Ok so... you bought this computer new 5 months ago? did you buy it directly from Alienware or through a 3rd party, or perhaps second hand? All Alienware's come with 1 year of warranty if they were purchased new and you didn't extend it so you should be under warranty. It sounds like some wires are getting crossed somewhere when your talking to support. Who did you call? Dell, or Alienware because there is a difference. There is no way your battery should be done after 5 months, maybe after 2 years but not 5 months. I would call back again and ask for specifics as to why you do not have any warranty, especially if the machine was purchased new. Remember to always remain calm but firm, yelling is not going to get you the resolution you want and is going to make the rep even less likely to want to help you. Explain that you called in and you don't understand why you are not able to have this issue resolved with a brand new laptop.

Let us know what they say. If worse comes to worse and you absolutely can not get any help from Alienware or it turns out that for whatever reason you do in fact have no warranty then purchasing a replacement battery may be in order although it could also be possible that is not the problem and it could be motherboard related. I assume you don't know anyone else with a 17 you could test their battery in your machine?

If you do decide to purchase a new one , pull yours out and locate the part number on the battery. It should be either G33TT or KJ2PX although I don't see either on Ebay, you might be forced to buy from Alienware.

 

I bought this computer from a 3rd party in Canada at a huge discount, who purchases all returned units directly from Dell. There was nothing wrong with the unit, it came brand new in the box never used, just returned. I would suspect I cannot extend the warranty on it, but it should still have the 1 year of hardware warranty. I called 6 times now and have been very polite but the only answer I can get it "you have to take it where you purchased it....or a local shop to fix it"... to which I replied I bought it from a holdings company(basically a liquidator) and I can fix computers myself I have been in the business a LONG time I just need to know how or where to get the parts. When I give them the service tag, it comes up as "Returned to Dell" and they sit there and scratch their head as to why I have the unit. The last person I talked to told me Dell currently has the unit.... to which I replied I am looking directly at the unit and they don't know what to do or say. They put me on hold or transfer me and mysteriously the call drops. Obviously, the underlying issue is the service tags are not being updated if Dell is selling these to a liquidator.

I've emailed DellCares Social Media account, called Alienware directly who can't do anything until Dell fixes the "red flag" attached to my Service Tag.... not sure where to go from here

I have been working a lot lately and this computer has maybe 30-40 hours of total gameplay on it so the battery problem is concerning to me, I feel Dell should just overnight me a new one. For the time being it still powers on directly plugged in and I can play, but as soon as I disconnect from power to move it, black screen.

 

Just be aware that the battery usually has a shorter warranty at 6 months as a consumable, though in your case that should not make a difference.