Hi,
my laptop is about 3 years old. For a time now, I can't work with it on
battery (just with AC power), cause the computer doesn't see it's
charged (battery manufactur is SANYO) or the battery is dead.
The battery light is blinking 3 times red and one time green and on the
power meter (small icon on the bottom of the desktop) the status is
charging all the time, but still it's allways on 0%.

My question is how do i know if i need to buy a new battery or it's
some other problem (like the computer doesn't see it's charged)? Any
test I can do to test the battery load or battery charge?

CG22 wrote:
> Hi,
> my laptop is about 3 years old. For a time now, I can't work with it on
> battery (just with AC power), cause the computer doesn't see it's
> charged (battery manufactur is SANYO) or the battery is dead.
> The battery light is blinking 3 times red and one time green and on the
> power meter (small icon on the bottom of the desktop) the status is
> charging all the time, but still it's allways on 0%.
>
> My question is how do i know if i need to buy a new battery or it's
> some other problem (like the computer doesn't see it's charged)? Any
> test I can do to test the battery load or battery charge?
>
This appears to be a common problem.
Google "smart battery workshop"
That will lead you to a zillion hits on the problem, but not much on the
solution.
This whole issue is shrouded in mystery, cause the vendors don't want
you messing with their cash cow, the battery replacement business.
The SBW guys have reverse engineered a bunch of stuff and offer SBW
as a free download. You have to build a small interface to read your
battery. They keep changing their policies, but last I looked, they'd
take the readout and "fix" the battery data file and send you the file
for $15.
It's not clear, but it looks like you have to go soldering on the chips
inside the battery to input the new data. For $80 or so, they'll unlock
the program so it can reprogram anything they support, but the program
is hopelessly locked to one computer. While there's been much
discussion, I haven't seen any responses from anyone who has actually
used the service or bought the program. I also did some serious looking
for a crack without success. The published information is very
sparse...they want your $80 first. It's clearly not worth $80
to "maybe" fix the one battery most of us have.

There's also the issue that the program only resets the battery data.
It doesn't fix the bad cells. It doesn't prevent the battery sw from
turning itself off again. You may reset the chip and still have a
3-year-old battery that sux.

I built the interface and read out some batteries from a Dell Latitude.
You get lots of data, but the interesting part is the data that tells
the lapotp how much charging voltage and current to supply.
here's that part from a battery that flashes like yours:

ChargingCurrent: 0 mA
ChargingVoltage: 0 mV

This is the same data for a good battery:

ChargingCurrent: 2000 mA
ChargingVoltage: 16800 mV

Looks like the battery is telling the laptop that it can't be charged.
I've got enough data from 5 batteries that I think I can reverse
engineer it and reprogram the chip. This data is documented in the
battery specification. Problem is that there's also another bunch of
"vendor specific" "undocumented data" inside the battery.
I'm not finding any interesting correlation in the data from multiple
batteries in this part of the data.

It's be suggested that this is a deliberate attempt to cause the battery
to fail after some number of cycles. My info on the cycle count data
doesn't support this.

More likely, the battery was overcharged, overheated, undercharged...or
something else bad and the battery permanently shut itself down to
protect the vendor from liability.
Of course, they care a LOT more
about their liability than your battery costs.
If you're buying a $2000 laptop, a $150 replacement battery is no big
deal. For those of us who use $1 laptops, replacement cost is an issue.

Another interesting thing I've seen with several dell batteries is that
ALL the cells are open circuit. Only way I can think that happened is
if there was serious overcharge that got it hot enough to pop ALL the
internal pressure switches on the same cycle.

There are also differences in the way the laptop reacts to the battery.
My flashing battery would not even run a C600, but it just complains and
works fine in a much older CPi.

I kinda lost interest when I sold off my extra dell laptops.
I've swtiched to a similar issue on a compaq laptop. I'm chasing my
tail on the bad laptop vs bad battery question as we speak.

I would be interested in hearing from someone who used the SBW service
or bought the program.

Bottom line is that it's possible that your laptop is busted, but I'd
vote for the bad battery. Borrowing a battery is the quickest way to
tell. Unless you're a serious hardware jock with experience
soldering surface mount parts with the power on, I'd not try to fix
the battery.

Ask me to tell you how I managed to get a test wire jammed in the only
**** place in the world where it could short. Couldn't have done that
on purpose with four hands. Fortunately, the wire was the only thing
that caught fire.

mike

Thanks for the detailed explanation.
I'm not an expert on laptops, my laptop is about 3-4 years old and
several days ago I had to replace it a hard disk and one of its
memories (128x2 MB), that suddenly stopped working. So, the battery has
suddenly become less important issue. Though, it still very anoying,
"charging 0%".

I was offered to buy a new battery or to recharge the old one, for half
price of the new one, but I'm not sure I want to invest more in this
laptop.
Any suggestions: new or recharge?

Thanks for the detailed explanation.
I'm not an expert on laptops, my laptop is about 3-4 years old and
several days ago I had to replace it a hard disk and one of its
memories (128x2 MB), that suddenly stopped working. So, the battery has
suddenly become less important issue. Though, it still very anoying,
"charging 0%".

I was offered to buy a new battery or to recharge the old one, for half
price of the new one, but I'm not sure I want to invest more in this
laptop.
Any suggestions: new or recharge?

Most likely its the battery. I have 1/2 dozen bad ones in my garage - all with different issues. Get a new one and if that doesn't prove to be the issue then return it. Ask these folks. They also sell new ones with 6-month warranty (I think it's 6-months. You may want to ask first.).
Parts-People - Parts and Service for Dell Laptops - Home

Put you Dell 8100 battery in another similar notebook, if the problem haven't fixed, I'm affrad you must be change a new Inspiron 8100 battery . if the battery work normal, clear the battery bolt.

just slip your battery in a mates charger and laptop, if its not holding a charge then you neeb a new battery, you can get a rechareable replacement at batteryTrader, here is a link Dell Inspiron 8100 battery its a common battey which fits a number of other dell batteries.