Test your 7811FX: Random Reboot on Battery Power?

Hey everyone! Can 7811 fx owners tell me if their system experiences this too? (note there are two battery locks on the laptop).

1. Put your laptop on batter power.
2. Make sure your battery is inserted until it 'clicks' and engaged the automatic lock, but the manual lock is not engaged.
3. Apply gentle pressure to the battery by lightly 'pulling' the battery without disengaging the automatic battery lock.

Does your laptop shutdown? I noticed that my 7811 will lose battery connection when only the automatic battery lock is engaged. Simply put, I need to engage the manual battery lock in order to safely use the computer.

Is this a defect or the way it's supposed to be?

 

... Are you serious? You're asking whether or not its a defect if the laptop turns off when you disengage the manual battery lock and pull on the battery?

 

Thats not exactly what he is asking.

But anyway, to the OP: uh...why do you even care about it? Are you looking for an excuse to return/exchange?

 

I think you should read his steps again... I'm pretty sure thats exactly what he's asking.

1) Run on battery power.
2) Lock battery in, but disengage manual lock.
3) Lightly pull on the battery.

He then asks does it shut off, and is it a defect. So I'm pretty sure what I said is an accurate paraphrase of his question. Sorry but it's just slightly silly for a first post. Not only is it NOT a defect, but it's something that could even be expected.

 

Oh my hell. I'm definitely subscribing to this one.

I'm going to attempt to answer your question without sarcasm, as I'm not quite sure if you're joking or not but I certainly hope you are. The result of your "test" is perfectly normal and expected operation. There's a reason that manual battery lock is there and it's not to make french toast.

 

let me offer another defect,

remove the battery, boot your pc on ac power
lightly pull the cord out off the notebook
anyone experiencing sudden shutdown ?

i guess computers needs power feed after all

 

lol have mercy on the newbies

 

Well I've owned three laptops before this and they only had an automatic lock on the battery, so this manual thing was new to me. I didn't expect the manual lock to be required to run when not plugged in...

I am perfectly happy with this laptop, but I just wanted to make sure that everyone else's required the manual lock engaged as well to work on battery.

Another question:
Was there a disk with drivers in your package? The manual references it, but my box only came with the OS disk (with only vista drivers). Many of the laptop's drivers are not on this disk.

 

It only comes with the OS disk.

You will need to make your own drivers/apps disk.

 

you can make a drivers dvd using the gateway recovery console, just type "gateway" in the search box after pressing the vista orb, you will see it.
if you already did a clean install and missing drivers, there is a thread 7811 thread with download links.

 

So it does still come with a clean OS disc like Dell gives you? That's awesome news.

I don't see the 7811 on Gateway's support site yet for drivers, but at least if you can generate those manually, then just do a clean install that's pretty nifty.

 

Pulling out the battery when the laptop is only on battery will always make it shutdown unsafely because you just removed the power source!

-.-

 

That's a roger on that. I was quite impressed with Gateway's attention to detail on this: you can make a full restore DVD (2 actually) or just the drivers disk (or both) and the included Windows disk is simply Windows Vista, no added crapware, in both 32 and 64 bit versions. So Gateway understands most of us want to do clean installs, and instead of hindering actually helps! Now if they only understood my burning desire for a BIOS that supports RAID on the 7811...

 

Oh wow, that is SO well done! That makes Gateway only the second major vendor to do that

They're also the only other major vendor that's participating in Nvidia's official driver program.

Between all of that, and just how well thought out and priced the FX notebooks are, it's obvious someone at Gateway is really on the ball. Hopefully their sales are going to reflect all this-I mean this laptop to me seems like a big enough deal that it could and probably should dominate a lot of sales.

 

I agree that it is pretty silly, but he is not asking if its a defect that the laptop turns off when you pull the battery out, not as far as I can tell. Sure, one of his methods tell you to "pull" the battery out, but he is just testing to see if it works without the manual lock.

 

^ I had to say it.

He was pulling on the battery!

 

I think I know what he's saying, and yes, I'm serious. Perhaps the battery is easily dislodged from its connector with little pressure. If you jostle the machine slightly and that cuts the power then THAT is an issue.

 

Which doesnt happen if the manual lock is engaged, like it's supposed to be.

 

one of his methods? what other methods of this extremely technical sabotage do you see him doing?... you're right, hes not asking if its a defect when you pull the battery out, i didn't say that, we're talking about simply pulling on the battery, not all the way out, which is still exactly what i initially paraphrased. it's just plain silly