The battery on my 2 year old, out-of-warranty, Dell Inspirion E1505 was
almost dead ( about 6 min. charge retention). A new Dell battery was
around 200$ and hence I bought a E1505 compatible battery from Kahlon
After I swapped in my new Kahlon battery my Dell beeped on boot-up and
issued a warning of the sort: "Unrecognized battery type; Will not be
able to charge". Pressing F1 allowed me to ignore this and continue. I
kept the AC charger connected for about 12 hrs to get the battery its
recommended initial charge. Subsequently I disconnected AC power and
proceeded to work on the battery till it empty. (about 4 hours).
Laptop worked fine. (all the while the battery charging LED blinks
green/orange) Perhaps it did not charge at all from my adapter but kep
working for 4 hours on its factory-charge?
On next recharges same warning recurs. F1 allows me to bypass. Only
difference now the battery does not charge at all. On AC adapter
disconnect the laptop immediately dies. Double clicking on the power bar
gives me all the battery details including Amp-hrs, manufacturer etc.
Charge %age always remains at zero.
I have no clue how to fix this! I suspect its the right battery but some
Dell check that prevents me from using anything other than their
expensive "official" battery. No proof but a strong suspicion.
Debug steps so far:
1. Tried booting from a Knoppix Live Linux CD. Still same warning. Will
work only so long as I have the adapter. /proc/acpi/battery recognizes
all battery details. Charge %age remains zero.
2. Looked at the BIOS. No user-changeable
battery settings at all there. Probably the Dell-custom-BIOS has the
additional features disabled?
3. Only one BIOS flash upgrade listed on Dell website for this model.
Its only an optional update. Too chicken to try it yet lest I end up
with an "expensive doorstop"
Any help at all is greatly appreciated! If I can help it I do not want
to pay Dell 200$ to inject new life into a laptop that cost $700 2 years
ago!
--
Rahul
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