Acer Spin 5 Laptop - battery life damaged by using another charger for just a few seconds?

I bought a new Acer Spin 5 laptop about a month ago, and as mentioned in the title, I'm concerned that I may have damaged the battery. Essentially here's what happened: I have a setup for a Dell work laptop that allows you to connect to a monitor docking station with a USB C cable. I plugged in my Acer (via USB C) for about 5 seconds to see if it would work, then realized I probably shouldn't use a different charger and unplugged it. I know it doesn't sound like a real issue being that it was so short a time, but since then it seems like the laptops battery drains about half as fast.

Here are the specs for the chargers:

The Acer charger output is 19V - 2.37A.

The Dell docking station charger output is 19.5V - 6.7A.

Does anyone think that this incident would potentially cause a problem? I know this is a common question, but I can't seem to find anything similar to my situation. My thinking was that with the minor difference in the voltage and short amount of time that it wouldn't be an issue. But it's hard to account for the battery drain, which granted could just be perceived to be faster.

Thanks in advance for any advice anyone can offer!

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Ecip

I dont really know the exact answer here, but if your battery suddenly discharges at half its normal rate then thats probably a good thing. I'll always take more battery life over less.

Balatekie

Hi, the Amp rating of charger (Docking Station) you used to charge the Acer is more than the actual Amp rates of Acer laptop. This may be the root cause for battery discharging.

To overcome this, I recommend you to condition the battery. To do that, charge Acer laptop to 100% with actual Acer charger. Then get into BIOS of the computer and let the computer battery to drain completely and go off. Then re-connect charger and charge unit to 100%. Then again get into BIOS and let the battery to drain and go off. You need to repeat this cycle for 3 times. Later use the laptop and that should have improved your laptop battery backup.

JackE

Ecip>>>if your battery suddenly discharges at half its normal rate then thats probably a good thing. I'll always take more battery life over less.>>>

That seems like common sense to me. If it were my brand new Spin5, I'd take @Ecip 's advice and fahgeddaboudit! Seems like ya done good. Maybe you should try it again.

Jack E/NJ

Ecip

Balatekie said:

Hi, the Amp rating of charger (Docking Station) you used to charge the Acer is more than the actual Amp rates of Acer laptop. This may be the root cause for battery discharging.

To overcome this, I recommend you to condition the battery. To do that, charge Acer laptop to 100% with actual Acer charger. Then get into BIOS of the computer and let the computer battery to drain completely and go off. Then re-connect charger and charge unit to 100%. Then again get into BIOS and let the battery to drain and go off. You need to repeat this cycle for 3 times. Later use the laptop and that should have improved your laptop battery backup.

That's not what OP said, at all. He claims that his battery now discharges at half the rate it has before. In other words, he has double the battery life. I kind of find it hard to believe.. Windows or whatever OS he uses probably just is reporting incorrect values. As we all know, it's not possible to suddenly get greater capacity out of a battery unless you increase the size of the battery itself.

yerbluez

Hi all, thanks for the responses, sorry for the delay here but i didn't receive any notifications that there were replies. To clarify, what I meant was that the battery life seems HALF of what it was, which means way less than it was. Ecip, so you think that it's possible I could have damaged it even just connecting it for a few seconds? Perhaps I will try Balatekies suggestion. Anyone else have any thoughts? It really sucks to have a brand new laptop that has the batter life of a 4 year old laptop. It could be that this is just the normal battery life of an Acer Spin 5 too, which doesn't say much for Acer...

yerbluez

Balatekie said:

Hi, the Amp rating of charger (Docking Station) you used to charge the Acer is more than the actual Amp rates of Acer laptop. This may be the root cause for battery discharging.

To overcome this, I recommend you to condition the battery. To do that, charge Acer laptop to 100% with actual Acer charger. Then get into BIOS of the computer and let the computer battery to drain completely and go off. Then re-connect charger and charge unit to 100%. Then again get into BIOS and let the battery to drain and go off. You need to repeat this cycle for 3 times. Later use the laptop and that should have improved your laptop battery backup.

Balatekie, thanks for the suggestion. So in your opinion using a charger with a higher amp rating even for a few seconds could cause this issue? I haven't used the charger since and have only been using the supplied Acer charger. Still, it just seems like the battery life should be longer on this thing as it's brand new.

JackE

@yerbluez >>>what I meant was that the battery life seems HALF of what it was, which means way less than it was. >>>

How did you determine the life seems like half? A brand new battery needs to be cycled several times to make a judgment. In my opinion, the higher amp rating charger did absolutely no damage to your battery. Jack E/NJ

yerbluez

JackE said:

@yerbluez >>>what I meant was that the battery life seems HALF of what it was, which means way less than it was. >>>

How did you determine the life seems like half? A brand new battery needs to be cycled several times to make a judgment. In my opinion, the higher amp rating charger did absolutely no damage to your battery. Jack E/NJ

Thanks Jack. It's just that it seems like half or certainly less, I didn't perform any tests, i just know that after I did that it seems like this thing only lasts a few hours rather than the 11-13 or so they claimed. I've probably cycled the battery through a handful of times. It could be that I'm just over worrying, but I thought i've read that a higher Voltage and Amperage can damage a battery, granted it was on .5 Volts higher.. So in your opinion, it's not likely that it would cause an issue?

Ecip

Ok, so, if you download and run CPUID HWMonitor, it will show you Designed battery capacity, current battery capacity, and full charge battery capacity. Maybe start there, and see what it reports back to you.

yerbluez

Ecip said:

Ok, so, if you download and run CPUID HWMonitor, it will show you Designed battery capacity, current battery capacity, and full charge battery capacity. Maybe start there, and see what it reports back to you.

Thanks, that should definitely help at least to determine whats going on with it.

yerbluez

Ecip said:

Ok, so, if you download and run CPUID HWMonitor, it will show you Designed battery capacity, current battery capacity, and full charge battery capacity. Maybe start there, and see what it reports back to you.

Image: https://us.v-cdn.net/6029997/uploads/editor/dk/bqvgqlnn5oqw.png

@Ecip I attached a screenshot of the CPUID HW monitor program details. The battery is currently at 13% as I'm trying to discharge it. How do these numbers look?

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