My AC Adapter seems to die

Hi Folks,

long time without to post. I writing because I have a weird problem. From yesterday my g73jh seems to disconnect itself form the AC outlet. I suspected the cable was a little loose so I disconnect the ac adapter (the huge G73's brick) and reconnected... everything continued as normal. Today, during gameplay I noticed the g73 performed slowly compared as normal, so, I went back to windows to close apps running in background. Then I realize I was playing in battery mode regardless the power adapter was connected to the outlet and the green light was on. So I disconnected/reconnected several times but the laptop was still running from battery.

Because I was on 37% of power remaining, I shut the laptop off and I tried to boot without the battery, only with AC... but nothing happened. So I connected the battery and the laptop boot again. Back in windows the laptop continued in battery. So, I move to a different outlet but the problem persisted. Finally I tried an old AC asus adapter and now I'm connected to AC. The problem this old AC is lower in power giving me only 19V-4.74A (vs 19.5V-7.7A of the original g73jh AC adapter). At least, the battery is charging but I'm afraid to go games since the lower energy of this old AC adaptor.

Now, meanwhile I write this post, I tried several time to went back to the original AC adapter without good result. Only the old AC adapter works.

After this, I concluded my G73JH adapter died, so I wondered how I can replace it???

BTW, my laptop in in full warranty since I bought it on May 2010.

Any suggestion??


Thanks in advance.

More info: my battery is charging since the charge increase to 54%, but since the AC adapter is not the original, sometimes the laptop goes back and forth from battery mode to AC mode several times, before to stay stable in ac mode, probably because the adapter is giving to the laptop less power than needed.

 

You can RMA it or buy a better AC adapter. I'm using a Targus adapter after mine stopped working and it's been perfect. You might want to avoid using lesser power adapters because when I was forced to use a weaker adapter for a week before my Targus came in it actually increased my wear level on my battery by like 10% in that short time.

 

Let's see how many times I can post this link....

Targus APA05US 180W Universal Notebook AC Adapter w/3 L-Shaped P [APA05US-BULK-R] - $38.75 : Computer Parts, 423-650-4286

 

chastity, your link indicates is a refurbished adapter. BTW, this apa05us is generic? since looking for this code on amazon found a lite-on brand with exact specs.

in addition to that, this adapter gives 180w, 19v and 9.5A, a way more wattage than the original adapter but less voltagr. its is dangerous to fry the laptop itself?

 

IF you are under warranty, I would call the RMA dept and ask for a replacement. They should just send you a replacement. For anyone out of warranty:


http://us.estore.asus.com/index.php?l=product_list&c=1627

 

1) 19v vs 19.5v is within the same spec tolerance, and is not an issue.
2) The unit powers our laptops just fine. Never had an issue, and battery wear is only at 5% after using it since April.
3) If mishandled, the cable connector at the base of the unit can separate, and thus the reason this brick gets RMA'd. Easy fix, and you don't spend a lot of $$ for a good brick.
4) Plenty of people on this forum, and I am yet to hear a negative, except by you of course.

 

More watts in this case doesn't mean it provides more power to fry the machine...it's the rated watts - how much power it is capable of providing while still staying within it's design limitations. So a 180W/9.5A adapter can be better than the 150W stock adapter as it will probably run cooler and it can handle the spikes in current draw that exceed 150W on the G73s. Note that while using an adapter with a higher watts/amps rating is fine, the adapter you choose should have the same voltage and connector polarity!!

 

OK, just ordered the Targus APA05US. So far I'm still on 90W adapter. Just wondering what can I do safely at so low wattage. So far, internet, youtube and a couple of programs cpu demanding are fine. As precaution, the screen is dimmed and the keyboards and laptop light are off to safe energy. Just wonder if I can continue my games on 90W.

Thanks

 

The laptop won't max out power draw when you're using it, and the 150watt rating is a sustained rating. Generally, it'll be good for about 170w or so, but you lose some to heat, etc.

If you're using a 90w power plug, you could run HW monitor to see what makes your power consumption spike. The 5870m is 50 watts at maximum, and I think it idles at 10, the CPU idles around 20 ... but turbo boost will put it to 55-60 (TDW for the i7 720qm is 55, IIRC).

That's not including the chipset, DVD, screen, etc. Dimming your screen will help too

Using P4G (if it's still installed) you can limit your CPU speeds, as well.

 

I have been using the 180w Targus adapter on and off for about 2 years as i bought it for my Gateway FX back in the day and its still going strong .. Good investment and yeah it works great on the G73..

 

That's nice: I ordered my new adapter unit on Saturday morning and toda Monday I received a nice email which says:

Please Allow 4-9 Days For Order Processing!!!!

damn, 4 business days just for ship! Sadly, the adapter was unavailable at either Newegg nor Amazon.


OK, now, my report.

After a couple of days of some testing with 90w adapter here I can show what can I do and what not:


No games!!! - regardless the settings or screen dimming, or even how demanding is the game, the laptops shift to Battery mode every time I started my testing. The weird thing the system start a loop of battery mode/AC mode every second a P4G became crazy as hell with the splash screen. Of course the game is unplayable with a constants hiccup. At hardware level, regardless the battery is a 100% charge, the system move to battery mode and try to recharge it.

No HD content!!! - Yep, similar to games, I cannot watch wmv files. The unit behave similar to game testing and constant hiccup became presents. The weird thing I'm able to watch videos using VLC.

Also, I was not able to use the laptop and recharge battery at the same time. If the battery was not a 100%, the laptop try to recharge but P4G became crazy again with the crazy Battery/AC mode loop. The only way to recharge is with both laptop off or sleeping. The laptop behave as normal with battery at 100%.

BIOS screen works as normal, I was even able to update to BIOS 213

Normal (non-demanding) internet surfing. Youtube plays as normal (no HD tested)

Pendrives, external HDD usb-powered, screen half-way brightness, touchpad, wireless mouse, non-demanding apps works are normal.

So, the obvious conclusion, the super-high-demanding-power-consuming-piece of hardware in the G73 is the VGA.