Power adapter went bang

I brought my XPS Gen2 on holiday with me. It was running happily but I was worried the battery would get flat before I finished what I was doing.
I plugged the adapter in, green light flickered a couple of times then went out.
I unplugged the power cord and replugged.
The adapter made a loud PFFHUTT/POP sound.
My laptop went from 'on and running' to 'totally off' without going through any kind of shutdown.
I spent 5 minutes trying to get it to turn back on, eventually removing and re-inserting the battery allowed it to re-start.
It appeared to run happily for 10 minutes until the battery was flat.
I have a spare adapter at home but Ive got another week of holiday before I'll be there.
Has this happened to anybody else here?
Did the recharging circuit on the motherboard survive?
Cheers.

 

Different countries have different voltages, so you should watch out.

Once I went to the USA and plugged my hairdryer into one of the wall sockets. The whole thing literally started glowing red! I was pretty freaked out coz I was worried that it was going to explode.

Luckily my notebook adapter was able to handle the voltage properly. So I'm not sure why your adapter is having a hard time.

What country are you in, and what are the voltages there?

 

all laptop power adapter could handle 90-240V.

 

That sounds like a failure-prone power supply.

I brought my 2001 Apple TiBook with me to France this summe. That's nearly a seven year old notebook (try that with a PeeCee). But, the ancient power supply still worked perfectly on 240V (it is a US 120V model).

You might have gotten too much amperage, however. If amps exceed the max of the PSU, that would do it. Were you on a boat, or some kind of unusual power grid?

 

I find it hilarious the lengths the Apple fanboys will go to try convince themselves they bought a superior machine. I still have a Fujitsu laptop bought in 2000 that I use as an emergency backup at work, and nothing has ever been replaced on it......including the Power Supply.

To the OP: Power Supplies fail......it doesn't happen often, but it does happen and it sounds exactly like what's happened with yours.

Since you were able to power on the laptop again with the battery, hopefully it didn't take any serious damage, but you won't know for sure until you have another PS to try. Good luck.

 

Enough with the Apple shoe-licking. I play critically acclaimed, ultra-realistic FPS's on my PC. Try that on a mac. Wait, you can't, all you can do is "ilife"

Anyway, if your battery survived, I'm wondering why it went flat in 10 minutes... Unless it was still discharged...

 

The OP said his battery was going flat which is why he plugged it in.

 

STFU troll. Your ignorance just makes you sound like a D-bag.

Quality costs, that's all. And most PC manufacturers use the cheapest components and methods possible.

Sure, PCs excel at games, just like a PlayStation or XBox. Bravo.

For real durability, there are workstations with UNIX. Everything else is just a toy.

I think I hear your Momma calling....

 

Thanks for the comments. I live in the UK, holiday is in a different part of UK. Adapter should have been fine, think failure is just one of those things. My only worry is the charging circuit on the motherboard as that would not have been used while running on batteries. Very glad I still have 6 months Complete Care.

 

There goes the kettle calling the pot black again.....

 

No one was talking to you, friend.

 

most power adapter of laptops are universal meaning they can handle 100V to 240V and 50 or 60hz so I do not see having it plugges in Europe vs US will cause a problem.

This is not the case with hair dryers and should be used for the rating listed on the plug

 

BoulderGeek,

I hope you're one of those stupid d-bags that stood in line 24 hours for a iPhone at launch date, and now pissed off cuz you're beloved Steve Jobs played your fan boy ass.

do us all a favour and 'iShut' you're mouth fanboy..


Visit this site, you'll enjoy!
http://www.thebestpageintheuniverse.net/c.cgi?u=macs_cant

 

Most likely a capitor blew apart pull it part take look at it if out warrenty

 

And no one asked you to bring your Apple Elitist attitude into the conversation, grasping at straws (pathetic ones at that) in order to bash PC's......friend.

Then you have the audacity to call someone else a Troll when they call you out on your comments. Grow up!

If you have something helpful/constructive to say, say it. If you want to walk in here attached to El-Jobso's dick because you're another brainwashed Apple Fan-Bot, please spare us the agony!

To the OP: As has been mentioned a few times, hopefully it's just your power brick that went poof! Keep us posted when you can try your spare one to see if your laptop is still working.

 

HAHA! Priceless.....and MasterCard wasn't even involved!

 

hahaa..

OP: My advice man, plug in you're brick, THEN plug it into you're laptop. I always worry of those things especially when a 1500-2000 dollar investment is on the other end of the cord ;P.

Likley the brick was faulty or it got a surge, something really stupid. Luckily bricks are cheap and/or you have a warranty still!

 

Excellent Advice!!

 

i have a white box win nt 4 machine which is 8 years old and the only thing i had to change was the power supply on it. it's still going strong. i also have whitebox linux machines which run months at a time without a reboot. there is no need to get "workstations" anymore. the cheapest hardware is robust enough to outlast its usefulness.

 

Yep. That site isn't even totally accurate. The last part about Quicktime and iTunes is actually incorrect anymore. It either isn't anymore or never was accurate. You can get Quicktime without iTunes. The link is on the same dang page. They just try to get you to download iTunes by showing the bundle then providing a very small link on the page for just Quicktime.

To OP: I just thought to say that there is a good chance that nothing else was damaged and it was just a faulty power adapter. It shouldn't but can happen. The fact that it blew will cut off the circuit before it can do anything. The chance exists but it is pretty low. I would bet that a bad capacitor is to blame as that would explain the "pop" sound.

 

It used to be a lot harder to install JUST Quicktime. You literally had to scour the site to find the link for just QT. Since then, they've changed it (most likely due to consumer backlash).

 

shinji257,

Maddox, posted that almost, last year very old.

 

who is this post about? hehe. i love arguing. hey, OP. i have had a problem similar to this. my laptop started shutting down when it was plugged in, just clicked off. i have now learned it's because it won't charge or run on AC power. bummer. my power sources don't fry, though. the green light shuts off (it is supposed to if it finds a fault). i have heard it can be your power jack (the connector you plug into at the back of the laptop). but, if its under warranty send it in!