[Big Will1]

I have a Dell Inspiron 1545 laptop and it's battery recently became almost unusable because on a full charge it would only last like 20 minutes. Dell wanted 135 dollars for a replacement battery which I thought was outrageous so I bought a third-party one off eBay for 35 bucks, and a 9-cell one at that. Good news is the battery fits fine and works like a charm. My problem is that the little red x keeps showing up on the battery indicator in the bottom right corner of the screen when my battery gets below like 50% charge it will say I need to plug it in and the red x will come up. Even though there will be plenty of battery life left and will last for a couple more hours depending on what I do with it.

So my question is how can I stop this annoying little thing? Any help is greatly appreciated.

 

[brobarapas]

1 Right-click on the task bar.

2
Click "Properties."

3
Click "Notification Area."

4
Clear the check box next to "Power."

5
Click "OK." This will disable the "Battery" icon on your Windows XP-powered tablet PC.

 

[Fred Garvin]

You battery needs to be calibrated. Click your F2 key when you start the computer and look in your BIOS for an option to calibrate the battery, usually under a *Battery* heading.

 

[Big Will1]

Thanks guys!

 

[Big Will1]

Sorry to annoy you guys anymore but I got one more small thing that annoys me about my laptop. I had to reinstall Windows Vista on it when it had it's hard drive replaced and ever since then whenever I boot it up it has the safely remove hardware icon in the bottom right of the corner with all the other icons. I click on it and it says safely remove drive E:

Only problem is that I have nothing plugged into my computer to remove so why is this showing up anyone know, and how can I stop it?

 

[Fred Garvin]

That icon is there all the time in case you plug in a USB device and you should use it when you want to unplug one. E: could be a memory card reader, just a guess. I wouldn't worry about it.

 

[Big Will1]

Ok I won't worry about the safely remove hardware thing but I tried both of your suggestions and my battery still pops up a red x when it gets to about 55% or so. Even though it will have plenty of juice left. I tried the first fix and all that did was hide it. I don't want to hide it I just want it to function properly lol. I can understand a red x when it gets low on battery but not when I have over half a charge left. So does anyone else have any ideas because I've tried everything I know to try. Tried the recalibration thing and it didn't work.

 

[Fred Garvin]

Big Will, I would check your owner's manual for any additional info on calibrating your battery, or download the manual from Dell's site. I'd also run the calibration again. Recalibrating is the proper way to let your computer correctly identify the charge level of the battery. I can't say for sure whether the aftermarket battery you have is part of the problem, but I have successfully recalibrated aftermarket batteries before to +/- 5%.