Laptop Won't Charge, Works Fine on AC

Broric · 07-23-2008, 09:23 AM

Hey

I was hoping that people could help and offer some advice.

My girlfriend's laptop (a Hi-Grade one from Littlewoods (rebadged Advent or similar)) just completely stopped working. It was on and working fine, then it just turned off and couldn't be turned back on.

We assumed it was the battery so got one off ebay (confirmed working but 2nd hand) but that didn't make any difference, it stayed completely dead.

It was just over 18 months old so outside of any warranty so Hi-Grade charged £80 to collect it and after deciding it was the motherboard that was broken they charged us another £120 to replace the motherboard.

We got the laptop back with a note on it "running slowly, use the restore CD" but it seemed to work ok.

However, while it works, it doesn't appear to charge the battery and once the battery ran out it obviously can now only be run from the mains.

We phoned Hi-Grade to explain all of this and basically we got a rude response of "We fixed it, not our problem any more. Buy a new battery or pay us £80 to collect it again and £90 (!!) to put a new battery in it". As that's going to end up costing more than the laptop's was originally worth we bought a brand new battery (again confirmed work and charged) of ebay and after trying it now the laptop works but it still won't charge the battery meaning as soon as the battery runs out it's useless.

The thing is, the part that connects to the battery and converts the AC is on the motherboard so it can't be a problem with that if they replaced it. It can't be a problem with the charger itself as it works fine on AC so what does that leave? Having 3 batteries that just won't charge doesn't seem likely but I'm not sure what that leaves us with...

Has anyone experienced this before? It seems strange that through all their rigourous investigation to decide they needed to charge us for a new motherboard they never noticed that the battery won't charge.

Phew, sorry that was so long. Any help or advice would be great as I'm not sure what to do next.

Cheers

**TriggerFinger** · 07-23-2008, 10:13 AM

Hi,

Looks like it could still be the motherboard. If you have a friend with the same make/model of laptop with a working battery, I suggest you borrow their battery for testing in your laptop. Or you can test your battery in theirs.

elenanyc · 07-23-2008, 11:51 PM

]

i have a similar problem...the needle part of laptop-charger connection that is located on laptop side just fell off. so there is no contact and battery just wont charge and computer is completely dead. does anyone know if i can fix it without major replacement or just explain to mi how big damage is it for real so i dont get overcharged by local repair store.

07-23-2008, 09:23 AM	#1 (permalink)
Broric Registered User Join Date: Jul 2008 Posts: 1 OS: Windows XP	Laptop Won't Charge, Works Fine on AC Hey I was hoping that people could help and offer some advice. My girlfriend's laptop (a Hi-Grade one from Littlewoods (rebadged Advent or similar)) just completely stopped working. It was on and working fine, then it just turned off and couldn't be turned back on. We assumed it was the battery so got one off ebay (confirmed working but 2nd hand) but that didn't make any difference, it stayed completely dead. It was just over 18 months old so outside of any warranty so Hi-Grade charged £80 to collect it and after deciding it was the motherboard that was broken they charged us another £120 to replace the motherboard. We got the laptop back with a note on it "running slowly, use the restore CD" but it seemed to work ok. However, while it works, it doesn't appear to charge the battery and once the battery ran out it obviously can now only be run from the mains. We phoned Hi-Grade to explain all of this and basically we got a rude response of "We fixed it, not our problem any more. Buy a new battery or pay us £80 to collect it again and £90 (!!) to put a new battery in it". As that's going to end up costing more than the laptop's was originally worth we bought a brand new battery (again confirmed work and charged) of ebay and after trying it now the laptop works but it still won't charge the battery meaning as soon as the battery runs out it's useless. The thing is, the part that connects to the battery and converts the AC is on the motherboard so it can't be a problem with that if they replaced it. It can't be a problem with the charger itself as it works fine on AC so what does that leave? Having 3 batteries that just won't charge doesn't seem likely but I'm not sure what that leaves us with... Has anyone experienced this before? It seems strange that through all their rigourous investigation to decide they needed to charge us for a new motherboard they never noticed that the battery won't charge. Phew, sorry that was so long. Any help or advice would be great as I'm not sure what to do next. Cheers

07-23-2008, 10:13 AM	#2 (permalink)
TriggerFinger Mentor Hardware Team Join Date: Jan 2008 Location: LV, NV, USA Posts: 4,783 OS: DOS 6.0	Re: Laptop Won't Charge, Works Fine on AC Hi, Looks like it could still be the motherboard. If you have a friend with the same make/model of laptop with a working battery, I suggest you borrow their battery for testing in your laptop. Or you can test your battery in theirs. __________________ DBAN - Memtest86+ - BartPE - Linux LiveCD list - ImgBurn - HDD Diagnostic Tools - Everest Mark the THREAD as SOLVED

07-23-2008, 11:51 PM	#3 (permalink)
elenanyc Registered User Join Date: Jul 2008 Posts: 2 OS: winxp	Re: Laptop Won't Charge, Works Fine on AC ] i have a similar problem...the needle part of laptop-charger connection that is located on laptop side just fell off. so there is no contact and battery just wont charge and computer is completely dead. does anyone know if i can fix it without major replacement or just explain to mi how big damage is it for real so i dont get overcharged by local repair store.