Battery charging problem Aspire A715-71G-55KS,

George0

Aspire A715-71G-55KS, 3 year old

It happened twice in a 40-day timespan, I had disconnected the charger for a few minutes, reconnected and then it would continuously start and stop charging every ~10 seconds at ~93% charged. I tried rebooting, power resetting with battery pin, nothing worked, I left the laptop with disconnected charger overnight, and in the morning it would charge to 100% without any problems.

Today, I attempted a discharge cycle, continuously discharging the battery at ~30 watt, and at about 40% battery left, the laptop shut off instantly. I reconnected the charger, it powered on and charged normally until it reached about 70% where the previous start-and stop charging problem reappeared. After a while the battery stopped charging and now the charging light blinks orange every second.

I think that it is safe to conclude that the battery is bad and needs replacing, right?

I would like to request information about replacing the battery procedure, what's the battery model/part number and where I can order it. Thanks.

Thread was edited to add model name to the title

JackE

Some do. Some don't. You just have to test it without the battery. However, blinking orange strongly suggests the battery's own internal charge controller is failing. If it was mine, I wouldn't mess with it and replace the battery.

Battery pack is either  Panasonic AC14B3K ot LG AC14B8K. Acer part no. KT.0040G.006 . You can also google the keywords 'a715-71g' and 'battery' for vendors who ship to your location. About $40usd

To replace the battery you must remove the HDD and RAM doorsmodules and 17 screws from bottom cover. Then pry the cover off using a credit card or plastic wedge.

JackE

>>>I think that it is safe to conclude that the battery is bad and needs replacing, right?>>>

Probably. But try this first. Open Device Manager. Click batteries folder. Right click and uninstall all drivers you find in this folder. Then exit Device Manager without reinstalling anything. Then open Control Panel. Search 'button'. Click 'change what the power buttons do' in left pane. Click 'change  settings that are currently unavailable', Scroll down and uncheck the box for fast startup. Then shutdown Windows normally.

Then turn the machine back on. Then go to the elevated command prompt.  Enter 'powercfg /batteryreport'. Then return to the desktop. Open file explorer. Then search for' battery-report.html' in the c:\windows\system32\ sub-folder. Double-click to open it in the browser. Post screenshot of the first part of the report if possible that compares design full charge capacity with its remaining full charge capacity. Jack E/NJ

Easwar

Hi George0,

# Try to update the battery driver

1. Hold windows key and hit letter X.
2. Choose the device manager option.
3. Go with the option battery.
4. Under the title battery.

5. Right click on that option ----> Update all driver under the title battery.
6. Choose "search automatically". 

Check this T/S and post the result. ​

George0

I mainly use Ubuntu but also keep Windows dual boot, the battery's behavior is the same on both of them.

@JackE

I couldn't find the option "fast startup", only for lock and suspend, however I remember disabling it since windows 8 era for dual booting.

@Easwar

I followed the instructions but there wasn't any driver update.

Today, the battery has stopped charging at 78%, charging light is again blinking orange.

In case the battery causes any other problems, can someone confirm that this laptop works without the battery, only on AC adapter? Most laptops work, but in this model battery is internal and I need to open it to test it.

JackE

Some do. Some don't. You just have to test it without the battery. However, blinking orange strongly suggests the battery's own internal charge controller is failing. If it was mine, I wouldn't mess with it and replace the battery.

Battery pack is either  Panasonic AC14B3K ot LG AC14B8K. Acer part no. KT.0040G.006 . You can also google the keywords 'a715-71g' and 'battery' for vendors who ship to your location. About $40usd

To replace the battery you must remove the HDD and RAM doorsmodules and 17 screws from bottom cover. Then pry the cover off using a credit card or plastic wedge.

George0

I found that battery pack from a seller in my country yesterday, it was delivered today. Installation was easy, most frustrating part was bending the cable like the old battery so that it could reach the motherboard's connector. The old battery was a bit swollen.

It charged to 100%, I discharged it to 10% and again to 100% without any problems. It reports 49/48 Wh and 16.7 V which seems normal for a new battery. Everything now concludes that it was indeed the old battery's fault and (fortunately) not any motherboard circuit.

Thanks for your assistance.

JackE

Congratulations on your success. Thanks for reporting back.    Jack E/NJ

George0

JackE said:

Congratulations on your success. Thanks for reporting back.    Jack E/NJ

I turned the laptop on this morning, connected the AC adapter, and it's back, battery light is again blinking orange every second. Something I noticed is that yesterday the battery reported 100% life, now it is 87,5 and the old one reported 87,4.

From the DC end the charger is 19.45 V.

JackE

>>>It reports 49/48 Wh and 16.7 V>>>

Can you check this battery voltage again with charger unplugged and charger plugged in?

George0

JackE said:

Can you check this battery voltage again with charger unplugged and charger plugged in?

After 5-6 hours, battery light stopped blinking, it charged fully and now it is blue, as it should.

plugged in: 16.69-16.7

unplugged immediately after: 16.48 V, without doing any heavy tasks, high load induces a voltage drop.

JackE

Full charge voltage looks good. So both charger & battery seem to regulating voltages well to match each other. Voltage should drop to about 15volts under high load unplugged.

BUT, you also said>>>I turned the laptop on this morning, connected the AC adapter, and it's back, battery light is again blinking orange every second.>>>>>>After 5-6 hours, battery light stopped blinking, it charged fully and now it is blue, as it should.>>>

The blinking orange suggests that the battery somehow drained to near its critical charge level (about 5% or less) before even you turned it on. This can quickly degrade the battery. So try this. Open Control Panel. Search 'button'. Click 'change what the power buttons do' in left pane. In the box that pops up, click 'change settings that are currently unavailable' . Scroll down and uncheck the box for fast startup if not already unchecked. See if that resolves the issue the next time you turn the laptop on in the morning unplugged. By the way, no harm should result from keeping the laptop plugged in even when shut down and fully charged with blue LED light showing.

George0

The blinking orange suggests that the battery somehow drained to near its critical charge level (about 5% or less)

But it was fully charged before shutting down and in the morning it was at 90-95 %. Fast startup on windows is disabled, and on linux I use everyday there is no equivalent, I also don't use hibernation. Usually I leave the laptop plugged in overnight but yesterday I disconnected it for testing. I will continue monitoring, maybe today's orange blinking was unrelated.

JackE

>>>battery light is again blinking orange every second>>>

Could this possibly have been the power LED and not the battery charge LED?

George0

Could this possibly have been the power LED and not the battery charge LED?

I am pretty sure it was the battery LED. The power became blue as soon as I powered on the laptop, then I connected the charger and the other light started blinking.

JackE

>>>But it was fully charged before shutting down and in the morning it was at 90-95 %.>>>

If it's semi-calibrated (started at 99-100% blue LED), this'd be a worrisome overnite loss turned off & unplugged.

George0

If it's semi-calibrated (started at 99-100% blue LED), this'd be a worrisome overnite loss turned off & unplugged.

The capacity/life changed as well, it was 100% and the energy reported was 49 wh, and in the morning it was 87.3 % with 42.3 wh when full. Maybe it was due to calibrating-something.

JackE

>>>in the morning it was 87.3 % with 42.3 wh when full.>>>

If both battery widgets show 99-100% & battery LED blue just before you turn it off tonight, unplug the charger after turning it off. Then plug it back in in the morning without turning it on. The battery LED should almost immediately (only a few seconds) turn from steady orange to steady blue.

George0

JackE said:

If both battery widgets show 99-100% & battery LED blue just before you turn it off tonight, unplug the charger after turning it off. Then plug it back in in the morning without turning it on. The battery LED should almost immediately (only a few seconds) turn from steady orange to steady blue.

I did this exactly, left it 8 hours unplugged overnight, plugged it back before turning on and it lighted up blue. Powered on the laptop and the battery was fully charged, there was no discharge overnight.

Then after about 40 minutes it started blinking orange, https://youtu.be/U_AA8esbmQ8, I never disconnected the charger and now the battery somehow reports 0.8 watts discharged at 97%.

I rule out that it was caused by any small power outage, electricity is stable here, I have other devices running 24/24 without battery and I would have seen it if the laptop was running on battery.

JackE

>>>Then after about 40 minutes it started blinking orange>>>

Did you put it to sleep, turn the screen off? Or do you have it on a sleep timer after so many minutes of inactivity?

George0

JackE said:

Did you put it to sleep, turn the screen off? Or do you have it on a sleep timer after so many minutes of inactivity?

No sleep, I have a 15min timer for turning screen off, but I don't remember it turning off, I was actively using the laptop this whole time, I restarted two times for unrelated reasons but it didn't happen while restarting.

JackE

>>>I was actively using the laptop this whole time,>>>

Was it perhaps under intensive CPU/GPU or GPU load at any time during this period? The reason I ask is that if the power demand  exceeds the charger's power output, the battery kicks in to meet the demand. At those times, the battery is draining even though it's plugged in.