Suddenly, my 65W charger no longer works; problem with the plug

Edit: and now it's charging again.

I plugged my charger into my X220 this morning, and it didn't start charging.

Examining the plug, it's loose in the socket, and I can see about half a millimeter of shiny metal between the laptop's case and the grey plastic part of the charger's plug.

Is the smart money on damaged charger, damaged socket, or both?

The laptop is under warranty, but not onsite: should I conatct Lenovo, and of so, how long will I be without a machine?

Or should I order a new charger in hopes that it's the charger that's broken? What's the quickest way to do this?

 

Just contact Lenovo and send them the laptop and charger. Depot service is typically under 5 days, usually 3 for us at work.

 

or if you have a friend or something with the same size charger you can try theirs to figure out if its just your charger or not

 

Are you sure it's the charger and not the power manager software? It has battery maintenance settings that toy with charging levels to prolong good battery condition.

 

It doesn't help that (at least for my T420s) lenove have saved a few cents by providing no mains power light either on the PSU or DC lead (Dell's illuminated DC plug is a neat touch) or on the computer itself. The one clue when the computer is on is to look at the power status icon on the task bar. Pointing at mine reveals "94% available (plugged in, not charging)". 'Plugged in' means that there is mains power.

John