Troubling Power Issue[Non typical case]

hindian
hindian Member Posts: 6

Tinkerer

edited March 2023 in 2014 Archives

So I own an acer 5750G, intel 15 with GeForce GT 520m/Intel HD Family graphics, 6 gigs DDR3 and a 640 gig hd, windows 7 home premium x64.  Ever since I purchased this laptop, it's had a very odd power issue that I've heard many speculated possibilities, but none definitive...


When these conditions are met, the laptop works 90% of the time no problem;

Maximum Energy Saver [battery mode]

Using the intel HD gfx

Lowest resolution/gfx settings in game

 

 

Now, what tends to happen in ANY other situation, is that unless my laptop is at 100% battery, what will happen every 30 seconds to a minute is that the laptop stops charging the battery while plugged in.  I can be at 95% battery, but if I plug it in, it will sustain the charge barely before dying out.  I use the program BatteryCare to track my tempurate and battery %.  Now, what leads up to the discharge of power [as thats what batterycare calls it when it stops charging, that the battery is discharging..which I do know what that means, just trying to be concise as possible], is that when it happens, while plugged in, the power button starts blinking, as does the charger light on the front of the laptop.

This occurs when I attempt to run certain games, as well.  I can play original StarCraft no problem, but anything my league of legend, or gears of war...and its a ticking time bomb.

If I even try to use the Nvidia card to play these games, upon loading gears of war, or really any game, the laptop stops charging even though its plugged in and even if the battery is at 100%.  I also notice a rise in cpu tempurate when this happens.  Now, when I use the intel GFX, the tempurate will slowly rise [ticking time bomb] until the point where the laptop stops charging and the power button light/charger light start blinking.  the only way to stop this and sustain the charge again, is to close out of my game, and let the machine "relax".  I've seen my CPU temp get high as 88C, which I know is waaaay too high.

As you can see, it's a very odd, annoying issue...Using maximum battery saver with the intel gfx makes gaming terrible.  You know that screen lag you get playing games?  When I look at certain areas in gears of war, the screen "drags" instead of snapping smoothly when I move the camera...which also makes fighting in areas with a lot of textures very difficult because instead of smooth frames I'm getting chop.

I've had some amateurs try to hustle me on this, and some sound advice from good people.  List of possibilities include


Battery/unlikely

Improper Charger voltage [19.0v]/unlikely

Weak solder point [the way this was explained to me is as the fan kicks on to cool the machine, the vibrations are causing a weak solder point on the mainboard to not pick up the charge, which stops laptop from charging]
CPU needs new thermal grease/Fan area needs to be cleared[Makes sense but I'm not confident enough to open my laptop to do this]

Now I could be totally wrong and it's a battery issue, I realize the laptop is a few years old and that's the life of a typical battery, but I don't understand why it would even hold a charge?  Granted, the batterys "life" does change drastically, from 2 1/2 hours to 30 minutes, even on maximum battery life[this is of course while unplugged as i was running various tests]

A man told me a way to "confirm it was the weak solder point" by removing the battery, plugging the laptop in, powering it on, and running a game.  If the laptop shuts off when I run the game[which it did], weak solder point...


Someone offered me $60 to do a full repair on this machine if any soldering was involved.  Compared to most techs prices nowadays, thats pretty fair.  I'm very technical, however I lack any experience with laptops and for some reason its like the difference between a grill and an oven, the internals are a bit trickier and I don't want anything bad to happen because of my ineptitude.


THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR ANY ADVICE TO SOLVE THIS ISSUE.



[guess i should add I've recently optimized, defragged and updated drivers.]

Answers

  • hindian
    hindian Member Posts: 6

    Tinkerer

    Just bumping this considering I've had no response...seriously looking for some concise help.