[ltp] Further In My R31 Battery Issues

[Ted Frater]

Simon Royal wrote:
> Ted
>
> So is this a prob with the laptop or the battery. From what I can make 
> out it is the battery not reporting to the ThinkPad correctly.
>
> Simon
>
> On Thu, Jan 6, 2011 at 10:36 PM, Ted Frater <ted.frater@virgin.net 
> <mailto:ted.frater@virgin.net>> wrote:
>
>     Simon Royal wrote:
>
>         Hi
>
>         Brief history: Bought R31 which came with dead battery about
>         two weeks ago. Bought a second hand battery from ebay,
>         reputable seller of laptop parts. Guy said battery lasts about
>         90 mins.
>
>         Today: The replacement battery arrived today and it has been
>         struggling to charge all day.
>
>         When I first put it in it did not register. It took about 5
>         mins before the machine recognised a battery was there.
>
>         Earlier today I could only get the battery to charge to 27%
>         and it took about 20 mins to do so. Then it sat there for a
>         while then suddenly charged to 33%. It sat there for a few
>         hours and went up to 35%. I then ran the battery out
>         completely and started charging it again. It charged to 37%
>         and stopped.
>
>         If I pull out the adapter in Ubuntu, it will hang the machine
>         - flashing the caps lock and scroll lock lights. The same
>         happens if the battery runs too low - this I have been told is
>         a kernel panic.
>
>         This doesnt happen in XP. You can remove the power adapter and
>         put it in and it accepts the AC adapter.
>
>         I have noticed something very odd. It charged to 37% according
>         to the Battery Maximiser Gauge. However, I have been running
>         it for about 30 mins and the percentage hasnt dropped. The
>         little battery icon in the task bar of XP warned me it was low
>         about 20 mins ago and is sitting with a crossed out battery
>         stating 0% remaining.
>
>         So Battery Maximiser Gauge still says 37%, but task bar says 0%.
>
>         While it is great that I actually have my ThinkPad running
>         without an AC adapter and running for quite a while, I have no
>         idea how long this battery is going to last and no way of
>         finding out.
>
>         What is going on? I cannot trust either meter. Do I need to
>         recalibrate or something. I am not bothered how long the
>         battery lasts but it would be good to know how long it is
>         going to last. I would also like to get this working in Ubuntu.
>
>         Can anyone help.
>
>         Simon
>
>         -- 
>         --- Twitter: http://twitter.com/SimonRoyal - LowEndMac:
>         http://tinyurl.com/macspectrum - Skype: Simon-Royal.
>
>         --- IBM ThinkPad R31 running Ubuntu 10.10 & Windows XP Home.
>         Apple PowerBook G3 'Pismo' running OSX 10.4. Sony Ericsson
>         Xperia X10 Mini Pro running 2.1
>          
>
>     we had an after market battery in a thinkpad that worked fine till
>     we decided to upgrade the bios. Then the lthinkpad wouldnt charge
>     the battery.
>     so we then downgraded the bios to the previous version and the
>     battery worked fine again.
>     so check what version bios you have, The previous owner may have
>     upgraded it from the original.
>     However downgrading the bios needs a good battery see IBM's notes
>     on bios changes,
>
>     -- 
>     The linux-thinkpad mailing list home page is at:
>     http://mailman.linux-thinkpad.org/mailman/listinfo/linux-thinkpad
>
>
>
>
> -- 
> --- Twitter: http://twitter.com/SimonRoyal - LowEndMac: http://tinyurl.com/macspectrum - Skype: Simon-Royal.
>
> --- IBM ThinkPad R31 running Ubuntu 10.10 & Windows XP Home. Apple PowerBook G3 'Pismo' running OSX 10.4. Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 Mini Pro running 2.1
>   
>
>
Its IBM doing what it can to suppress after market battery sales The 
bios looks for a bit of data in the battery software if it matches then 
it will accept it, if its not an IBM then it rejcts it.
The early bios didnt do that.
.