New DV 2700 randomly switches off. HELP!!!

Hi all, I got my replacement 2700 about 2 weeks ago after my old dv2000 fried in november. I noticed that the 12 cell battery it came with was a little loose but payed no attetion to it at the time. I did a clean install of vista and it seemed to be fine. I have noticed a few times though that it will randomly switch off when on battery power. I think it may be the loose battery but i am not sure because it did it today again when it was on my lap. The computer is not overheating or anything. I have tried to get it to switch off by moving the battery around but that does not seem to be it. I have no clue why it is doing it and I really dont want to ask for a new one because i am sooo sick of dealling with hp. It is not shutting down randomly it is just completely powering down. SOMEONE PLEASE GIVE ME ADVICE!!!

 

Make sure the power settings aren't shutting down the computer to save battery power.

You can set it to never shut off then see if it shut off after a while.

 

Also, something in the power settings, I this was a problem in XP... Sometimes the setting would get changed to have the hard drive shut off before the screen did... ideally the hard drive should be the last to be shut down while conserving power.

 

And i hate to sound like a broken record... but if possible update your BIOS:

dv27xx drivers

 

i dont think you guys are understanding me. It is NOT "shutting down". It is instantly switching off, just as if you pulled the battery out when you are not connected to ac power. I am talking about instantaneous power off. Could this really be the bios??

 

Also I have checked my power settings and thats not the problem. It doesn not happen when it is on standby, it happends in the middle of me using it.

 

I know what your saying. BIOS is what controls most of your laptop's behind the scenes procedures... So update your BIOS before you do anything else. Once you update it use your BIOS's Hard Drive self test.

If it passes and its still causing issues, then goto: http://www.memtest86.com/ . and download the bootable ISO, burn it, and then start up the computer with that disc. That will test your RAM.

Keep us updated.

 

Thanks for the advice FunnyX. I will try that and see what happends.

 

Isn't there a memory tester in the BIOS? My BIOS has a memory tester. I think there is also one in System Tools in Vista.

 

you said the battery was loose, id look into that first.

make it run only on AC power with the battery pack off.. see if it still shuts off.

 

I just realized that i downloaded the latest bios update when i clean installed vista. Should I reinstall it? Flipfire, it has never switched off on AC power. That is what led me to suspect the it may be the battery. The thing is i cant get it to switch off by wiggling the battery around. If it helps 4 out of the 5 times it has been on my lap and onces it was on a bed. I am pretty sure it is not overheating because it was cool all of those times.

 

Did you ever let the battery drain completely? HP and many other sources warn that you can permanently mess up the calibration on the battery if you let it go completely dead. If it works when it's on AC power, then it's definitely the battery. Check the warranty on it and switch that sucker out.

-OR-

If your out of warranty and can't get it replaced, buy the exact same battery and return the dead one in its place. I don't believe in warranties - I believe in working the system .

 

I have never let the battery completely drain, so its not that. The laptop is a 2 week old replacement of my old laptop and i was told i have a new 1 year warrenty. I think I will call my case manager today. THis is really pissing me off because it is a fairly small problem, its just annoying. I just went 3 months without my old laptop till this one came in, I really dont want to go through all of this again.

 

HP does not cover any kind of battery issue. Batteries are way to unpredictable for any warranty company to want to cover them. You will have to purchase a authentic battery directly from HP.

 

Is it an authentic HP battery to begin with? The problem seems to be pointing to the battery even if you cant re-create the shutdowns.

HP isnt responsible for battery wear because batterys start to slowly die as soon as they are made out of the factory. But they can be responsible if the battery doesnt work at all or maybe your loose battery..

quick offtopic: FunnyX any chance you can make a guide on how to clean the fans for dv2000?

 

yeah I should be able to have one made come Monday night(so I can take pictures at work).

Some things to can try;

Do all these things stationary.

* With battery in. Plug your unit in, and see if it shuts down.

* Without battery in. Plug your unit in, and see if it shuts down.

* With battery in. Plug your unit in, watch the battery meter^, make sure it goes up.

* With battery in. If your unit's battery is charged all the way up, go ahead and unplug the AC power. Keep track of the battery meter^ make sure it is going down at a normal rate.... Batteries normally last 1-2 hours.... and see if it shuts down before it should have.


^ Note: the meters do not update unless you move your mouse over the system tray icon next to your clock.

 

Thanks for the advice Funnyx. I have done all of those things and the battery works fine. The problem is it does not switch off randomly often. It has happened 4 or 5 times in 2 weeks and has not happened since thursday when i started the thread. I am not sure if you caught that the battery is a 12 cell and its original. What do you guys think, should i wait till it happens again or call my case manager? To be honest i dont really feel like dealing with hp.

 

HI
i want know the lifetime of the battery (2 hrs or 3 hrs or what )
Thank you

 

Hi, sorry I have not replied for a while. My computer stopped doing it very frequently for a while, but lately it has been happening a lot. It happened again while to computer was on my desk today. It just completely turned off like before. I have no clue what this is. My battery life is fine, I can get about 4hrs of life. As I said before this is a 2 month old computer and its been doing this from day one. I really dont want to have to deal with seding it back because I know it will not be fixed (prior experience). Does anyone have any idea what could be wrong?

 

have you ruled out its not the battery?

you can ask HP for a replacement battery, tell them its very loose that its shutting down

 

well i have not ruled out the battery. Maybe I will ask hp to replace the battery, however i am skeptical that they will do it.

 

Did you ever find a solution to the problem? I have the same problem with my Dell E1505. I know it's not the batery as I borrowed a friends (same laptop as me) and it does the same thing with his battery that works fine in his computer. Tried restoring back a couple months, updating every driver I could, bios updated, turning all power settings to always on, ran Dell diagnostic on everything, full virus/spyware/malware scan, checked M-Soft website for any relevant patches, everything short of replacing parts or wiping and reinstalling. Just bothers me it started randomly happening and only doing it on battery power. I don't believe temp is an issue for me either but will run coretemp or something to make sure. But fan sounds the same speed on AC as it does battery so not sure why it would die on battery and not AC.
Seen many posts with the same problem but no nbe has ever posted a solution or what fixed it for them. Any help or suggestions would be appreciated. Thanks.
-Tim

 

I hate to break it to you, but if you are running a dv2700 then that means you have a Hitachi Deskstar HDD (junk drives). The random powering off sounds like bad sectors on your drive. If you put the laptop up to your ear, you will probably hear lots of grinding and/or noise that shouldn't come from a HDD.

By now, you probably tried formatting and reinstalling Windows with HP's recovery partition. This will do you no good since there are bad sectors that cannot be repaired. You will need to either turn your laptop into HP for a replacement drive (if under warranty) or you will have to buy a new drive.

This is not an issue with your RAM or motherboard. Good luck.