notebook battery problems

[webcrawler42]

i have an hp n3250 notebook and the battery doesnt charge above 10%. i tried my friend battery(we have the same notebook) and it still wont charge above 10%. i have the newest bios and tried restoring the bios to default. any ideas?

[navyones]

i have an hp n3250 notebook and the battery doesnt charge above 10%. i tried my friend battery(we have the same notebook) and it still wont charge above 10%. i have the newest bios and tried restoring the bios to default. any ideas?

My experience with laptop batteries gives me a pretty good idea on what the problem is. If you leave your laptop plugged in normally without letting the battery drain, that will kill cells on the battery. A good rule of thumb is to let the battery drain completely every few days, then recharge it completely. This will prevent damage to the battery on the laptop and allow it to keep a decent charge.

Your best bet is to buy a new battery at a decent price, because it sounds like the damage has already been done.

[AlpineJay]

My experience with laptop batteries gives me a pretty good idea on what the problem is. If you leave your laptop plugged in normally without letting the battery drain, that will kill cells on the battery. A good rule of thumb is to let the battery drain completely every few days, then recharge it completely. This will prevent damage to the battery on the laptop and allow it to keep a decent charge.

Your best bet is to buy a new battery at a decent price, because it sounds like the damage has already been done.

Actually from what he's saying, it appears that it's a board problem. Probably a voltage or a current regulator problem within the mobo that won't let it go through all the way. I get that idea from this:

i tried my friend battery(we have the same notebook) and it still wont charge above 10%.

If the laptop has gone through two different batteries with the same charge output then I'd say the culprit is definitely on the laptop. You should probably get this serviced if possible. The last thing you can try is to try your battery on your friend's laptop and see if it charges completely. Needless to say, if the battery charges completely in your friend's laptop then it's most certainly the laptop's fault. Additionally, I'm not certain where you're getting the 10% charged figures from, but if it's from your Windows monitor and/or HP battery monitoring system, it has known to be off occasionally... A way to check that will be of course to actually use it on battery power (preferably both your friend's and yours) and seeing if your system will last what you'd normally get out of a 10% charge (shouldn't be long at all).

[webcrawler42]

it charges 100% in my friends laptop and the 10% is from the windows 98 battery meter, and i know its right because my battery used to work and it would say 100%. actually the batterys don't even charge at all, if i unplug the ac adapter it turns off and wont turn on

thanks for the posts, any other suggestions?

[AlpineJay]

At this point, Google your problem and see what you run across. I'm inclined to say that you've got a bad motherboard, which could be a complex problem, but I don't know that for sure.

Let us know what you find or if you'll need additional help.

[webcrawler42]

i have googled it thats why i posted here, so i will need your additional help please

[SnowSurfer]

im gonna vote for laptop problems, at first i just thought the battery cells were shot but i dont think that is the case considering that your friends battery doesnt work either..

[webcrawler42]

is there anyway we can find out exactly what it is or its just something wrong with my mobo

[glockness]

Agreed... it is safe to say it isn't the battery. You have an internal component issue that has left the laptop incapable of charging. Hopefully you are under warranty and can take it in for repair. I am assuming that since you are pursuing this on here that you aren't. :(

[brainsmile]

My experience with laptop batteries gives me a pretty good idea on what the problem is. If you leave your laptop plugged in normally without letting the battery drain, that will kill cells on the battery. A good rule of thumb is to let the battery drain completely every few days, then recharge it completely. This will prevent damage to the battery on the laptop and allow it to keep a decent charge.

Your best bet is to buy a new battery at a decent price, because it sounds like the damage has already been done.
I don't think it's a drainage issue

[cruelpupet]

My experience with laptop batteries gives me a pretty good idea on what the problem is. If you leave your laptop plugged in normally without letting the battery drain, that will kill cells on the battery. A good rule of thumb is to let the battery drain completely every few days, then recharge it completely. This will prevent damage to the battery on the laptop and allow it to keep a decent charge.

Your best bet is to buy a new battery at a decent price, because it sounds like the damage has already been done.


Actually...that was true for NiCad, and possibly also NiMH batteries.

Im guessing that this laptop isnt 6 or 7 years old.

So assuming the batteries are Litiom Ion, the bast way to make the batteries last longer is to leave the laptop plugged in as much as possible, and do not purposly drain the battery if you dont have to.

[webcrawler42]

it is Lithium Ion and my warranty is over

[AlpineJay]

This will probably piss you off, but you will have to grab a new/refurbed/working mobo. The charging unit is sadly integrated into the motherboard and without doing extensive circuit testing, it's safe to say that your motherboard unit is toast - at least the part that charges the battery.

At this point you have to wonder whether or not this laptop is worth salvaging. From what I saw before, you run Win98 on your machine which tells me your laptop is fairly old! Some laptops can be had for around 500 dollars and I'm willing to bet that it'll blow your machine away in terms of performance - even today's ultra-budget ones. You'll also get a new OS and a new computer to boot. Motherboards, unless you find one on eBay at a great price, will cost almost as much, if not more, than a brand new entry-level laptop. So you do have to make a decision at this point.

I'm sorry to be the bearer of the bad news - hope it goes well.

[webcrawler42]

i got this laptop for 500 and no its not worth a new mobo and i love win98 is so much better than XP so dont judge a machine on its OS beacuse ive got win98 on my 2ghz. but thank you for the bad news AlpineJay. and i was wondering if there are any turorials on doing circuit testing to trace it back, im pretty handy with a multimeter and a soldering iron.

[Grimm]

Is there an external charger you could buy?

[webcrawler42]

i have never seen one nor heard of one, a link would be nice