Vostro 1400 battery light flash code: meaning?

I have an olde Vostro 1400 which I powered up today to do somestuff.
On powerup the on-screen battery status showed "27%, charging" and the
power/battery LED was solid blue. Later I went to recheck the status
and it said "3%, charging" - which was weird. So I powered it off to
give the recharge a free shot.

Later, the LED is blinking a pattern - four short orange then a long
blue. Nowhere in the 145 pages of manual does it spell out flash
codes. Quick press on the battery pack status button lights no LEDs
(aka flat) but a long press/hold ("health check") also shows no LEDs
aka no loss of condition.

I'm confused by the contradictory info and the lack of a flash code
explanation anywhere. Does anyone have any further insight (other
than "your battery's probably shot")?

pedro wrote:
I have an olde Vostro 1400 which I powered up today to do somestuff.
On powerup the on-screen battery status showed "27%, charging" and the
power/battery LED was solid blue. Later I went to recheck the status
and it said "3%, charging" - which was weird. So I powered it off to
give the recharge a free shot.

Later, the LED is blinking a pattern - four short orange then a long
blue. Nowhere in the 145 pages of manual does it spell out flash
codes. Quick press on the battery pack status button lights no LEDs
(aka flat) but a long press/hold ("health check") also shows no LEDs
aka no loss of condition.

I'm confused by the contradictory info and the lack of a flash code
explanation anywhere. Does anyone have any further insight (other
than "your battery's probably shot")?


I think 4 amber/orange - 1 blue means "battery overheat"
If the battery isn't hot then the sensor inside has likely failed and
you need a new battery.

You could try a trick - Take the battery out, toss it in a baggie and
into the freezer for an hour or so. Bring it out and wipe it off.
re-install it and see if it charges.

--
Steve W.

On Sat, 22 Nov 2014 15:58:59 -0500, "Steve W."
wrote:

I think 4 amber/orange - 1 blue means "battery overheat"
If the battery isn't hot then the sensor inside has likely failed and
you need a new battery.

You could try a trick - Take the battery out, toss it in a baggie and
into the freezer for an hour or so. Bring it out and wipe it off.
re-install it and see if it charges.

That didn't work, unfortunately. After deep digging on Dell's website
(which isn't a shadow of its former self) all I found was
downloadable/interactive diagnostic tests. The main PCdoctor-based
one never completed, always timing out after exactly five minutes.
One of the other ones though gave the following disturbing info:

Sunday, 7 December 2014 12:09:01 AM

Product Version: 3.5.6426.22
Microsoft ACPI-Compliant Control Method Battery
Battery Name: DELL MN1278
Manufacturer Name: Panasonic
Type: LION - Lithium Ion
Current Charge Percentage: 0
Designed Capacity Percentage: 88
Charge Status: No Activity
Current Charge: 0.00 Wh
Full Charged Capacity: 49.43 Wh
Designed Capacity: 56.61 Wh
Voltage: 4.96 V

What you post has done though is reinforce my view that somewhere,
sometime those flash codes were documented and available.

At this stage the lappie doesn't justify expenditure on a new battery
if that isn't the fault (i.e an on-board failure), and my leaning is
the charging circuit itself. I base this view on the fact that it
keeps reporting"0%, charging" when it isn't, so I figure that its
sensing of charging is upstream of the problem. If the battery went
into UVLO first, I would have expected that report to be different.