what does it mean when your laptop says "plugged in, not charging" in win7

VirtualLarry · 10-31-2010, 09:55 PM

Using the factory-supplied charged on my Emachines E627. Win7 HP 64-bit.

Laptop was unplugged and turned off. I plugged it in, and turned it on. Could have sworn it said "charging", initially. But now it says it is at 94% capacity, but not charging.

Does anyone know why this happens?

Laptop is less than a year old.

Edit: I hibernated, pulled the plug, removed the battery, reattached the battery, connected the AC plug, and turned it back on, and now it says that it's at 100%.

Perhaps the problem was that it was in fact fully charged, but windows reported that it was only at 94% somehow.

Zap · 10-31-2010, 11:32 PM

I think they don't charge if you are near 100%, to avoid wearing out the battery from constant trickle charging if you're usually on AC power.

jvroig · 11-01-2010, 07:42 AM

I see the same behavior with my laptops (old HP Pavilion, MSI Wind) even 3-4 years ago with Windows XP. When it's close to 100%, it won't start charging. I usually have to let it drop to close to 90% before it does, otherwise at high 90s it just doesn't start charging.

corkyg · 11-01-2010, 08:48 AM

As Zap indicates, that is by design to protect the battery from constantly charging when plugged in. That would shorten battery life. So, there is a threshhold designed into the chargingb system. I have observed this on 6 different l;aptops I have owned, including my current two Lenovos.

The only time I regularly use my laptop is when I travel. When at home I run them every few days to keep them sync'd and updated. I keep the battery removed and stored at about 50%, and run only on the A/C adapter.

My observations show the charging threshhold to be in the low 90% region. IOW, what you report is perfectly normal.

jvroig · 11-01-2010, 10:06 AM

Oh yes, of course, it's a protective function for the battery. I figured out as much when I first saw it happen and saw that it was consistent and repeatable.

I was merely throwing my own anecdote, using a different OS (XP) and two different laptops (one much older, and one more recent) for VirtualLarry, to reiterate that it is normal and by design as Zap mentioned.

xibanezrg5x · 02-05-2011, 12:10 AM

this may be true but in my case it isnt. i also have the e627 and it shows 0% not charging. i need help

corkyg · 02-05-2011, 07:13 AM

0% Not Charging can be one of four things. 1. A dead battery 2. A faulty A/C adapter 3. A bad charging circuit on the mobo 4. A bad connector

The most common one is 1. 2 and 3 can be eliminated by removing the battery completely and running on A/C power only.

wirednuts · 02-05-2011, 08:23 AM

it can also be a tripped monitoring circuit on the battery. if something happened to the battery that the battery didnt like (100's of causes) then it simply wont let anything charge it.

corkyg · 02-05-2011, 11:53 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by wirednuts

it can also be a tripped monitoring circuit on the battery. if something happened to the battery that the battery didnt like (100's of causes) then it simply wont let anything charge it.

Good point. Is there a fix for that condition? If not, it is just another form of "dead."

xibanezrg5x · 02-05-2011, 11:57 PM

well could the battery be toast?, it runs off the A/C power so i dont think its the adapter but the orange light on the outside keeps blinking on and off. as soon as i unplug it, it automatically dies

hans007 · 02-06-2011, 05:18 AM

thats a good thing. most batteries wont charge when they are 90% plus to protect them from being destroyed.

i had a dell d620 at work that DID not have this sort of protection. had it plugged into a dock all year and just assumed it would have it, finally had to go to a business trip and use the laptop.... totally dead.

wirednuts · 02-06-2011, 05:40 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by xibanezrg5x

well could the battery be toast?, it runs off the A/C power so i dont think its the adapter but the orange light on the outside keeps blinking on and off. as soon as i unplug it, it automatically dies

if you left the laptop unplugged for long enough, and the battery went totally flat, then it very well might be dead. one of the safety circuits is too low of voltage. it can permanently disable the battery pack, and the only way to fix it is send it in to have the firmware reflashed. and even sometimes the battery pack will disable the flashing ability of the chip (in severe alarm faults) resulting in a battery pack that will never work again no matter what.

your cheapest route is probably to buy a generic battery for $30 on ebay, and see if that charges. if it does, then you know your old pack is fried.

in my case, ive taken the cells out of these so-called "dead" batteries and used them in other projects... but its not the safe thing to do.

ascent1729 · 02-09-2011, 04:17 PM

On my old Dell Latitude D820, I had the problem that the AC adapter would keep the computer on but wouldn't charge the battery. After letting the computer discharge on battery power to, say, 75%, the battery level would stay there even after plugging it in. In my particular case, Ubuntu would make the power icon disappear because the AC adapter was plugged in, while Windows 7 would show the battery at its true level. If you used the computer unplugged until it reached a lower level, like 50%, then the same symptoms would result, except that the battery would not charge higher than 50%. Since I used this computer mostly on the AC adapter, only really unplugging it when it was suspended, it took me a month or two to really diagnose what was going on.

It turned out that the old AC adapter was faulty, so I bought a new generic adapter. That particular adapter didn't work for very long, so I eventually bought a genuine Dell adapter online and it fixed the problem for good.