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[Tiruin]

sounds like the cells inside have failed alright.

outside warranty == boned.

What do o-o

I've no idea what to do and the orange light is still flickering >_>

* Tiruin calls for aid. x.x

[Thanks by the way, wierd c:]

[wierd]

Normal thing to do:
Call the battery pack maker, and ask if they can give RMA service even though it just left the warranty period. (they will likely say no, but it does not hurt to ask and be sure.)
If they say yes, do the RMA thing and send them the battery, get new one in the mail in exchange.
If they say no, recycle old battery/dispose of properly, and buy a replacement.

The not normal, but some people do it anyway thing to do:
Disassemble the battery's case very carefully, document the cell types inside, check each one with a digital multimeter to see if they are healthy (above 3.5v), then order replacement cells. When replacement cells arrive, desolder and replace/resolder new cells one at a time into the bundle, reseal the case with contact cement, and charge to 100%.

Further reading:
Lithium Ion battery packs have protection circuitry inside that monitor charge, discharge, and temperature cycle data for each and every cell inside the pack. This circuitry monitors for anomalies during charge or discharge, and then disables the cells if it thinks they are showing signs of defect. This is to prevent the battery pack from catching on fire. (no, really. ON FIRE.) Often, this causes the protection circuitry to disable cells prematurely (maybe the laptop got hot because you used it on a hot train ride or something, and the temperature sensors in the battery pack felt this was dangerous-- etc.), but one can never be certain without extensive forensic testing of the supposed defective cell inside the pack (that cell really COULD be a timebomb waiting to explode in your lap if you charge it). The charge controller does not take chances-- it disables the cell, and never uses it again, does not let it charge, anything. This is most likely what has happened to your battery pack for your laptop, and why it is "charging too fast to 100%" and has "terrible life" now. The few cells still "healthy" in the pack are supplying all the charge to the laptop, because the others are disabled. This is what the blinking charge light is all about-- the laptop realizes that the battery pack is incorrectly reporting 100% charge, and keeps trying to charge the battery. The pack says "Hell no, I am as full as I will allow you to charge me!" and aborts the charge cycle. Rinse, repeat. Rebuilding the pack yourself (not normal option listed above) often can convince the charge controller to re-enable those cells again (after you replace them), and the pack will function normally again afterwards, but this is NOT for the faint of heart, the inexperienced, or the unskilled. The sensible option is to see if the manufacturer will honor a replacement, and depending, replace in the appropriate method.

[Tiruin]

If they say no, recycle old battery/dispose of properly, and [...]

How are these done? I still have the old battery before this one in safe storage.

[Details]

Thank you so much! I'll try and contact the local supplier this weekend.

In the meantime, do I directly charge my laptop with the charger between now and then, or do I keep the battery inside? I do recall having done the former without any problems but have been told that it may not be healthy to the laptop.

[wierd]

If there are any industrial battery suppliers in your area, they will often buy back old lithium ion packs, or will at the very least, offer battery disposal services that properly dispose of the cells. 

[Tiruin]

If there are any industrial battery suppliers in your area, they will often buy back old lithium ion packs, or will at the very least, offer battery disposal services that properly dispose of the cells. 

Thanks a ton! Still curious about the power in the meantime without the battery and any savings I had and will have for the next months, but thanks.

[wierd]

Most laptops will function without the battery installed, as long as the charger is connected. There are some exceptions to that, but for the most part, this is true.

[BigD145]

Some laptop battery packs can have their cells replaced, although some will brick themselves if a certain chip loses power.

Don't mess with electricity if you don't know what you are doing.

[Arx]

Linux Mint 17.1 is giving me grief with the package repositories:

W: An error occurred during the signature verification. The repository is not updated and the previous index files will be used. GPG error: http://packages.linuxmint.com rebecca Release: The following signatures were invalid: BADSIG 3EE67F3D0FF405B2 Clement Lefebvre (Linux Mint Package Repository v1) <root@linuxmint.com>

W: An error occurred during the signature verification. The repository is not updated and the previous index files will be used. GPG error: http://extra.linuxmint.com rebecca Release: The following signatures were invalid: BADSIG 3EE67F3D0FF405B2 Clement Lefebvre (Linux Mint Package Repository v1) <root@linuxmint.com>

W: GPG error: http://archive.ubuntu.com trusty Release: The following signatures were invalid: BADSIG 40976EAF437D05B5 Ubuntu Archive Automatic Signing Key <ftpmaster@ubuntu.com>
W: Failed to fetch http://packages.linuxmint.com/dists/rebecca/Release 

W: Failed to fetch http://extra.linuxmint.com/dists/rebecca/Release 

W: Some index files failed to download. They have been ignored, or old ones used instead.

I've tried a whole bunch of things that apparently should fix it. The only thing I haven't tried is trying to point to a repo other than trusty. Anyone have any experience with this? Searching around isn't helping too much.

[wierd]

It is telling you that it cannot verify the integrity of the packages, because it does not have the correct repository signing public key in the keyring.


I do not know how to purge the old key in a clean and safe way.

You can get the new key with these.

sudo apt-key adv --recv-key --keyserver keyserver.linuxmint.com “missing key number”

gpg --export --armor "Missing Key Number"| sudo apt-key add -

Trailing hyphen is important!

[Arx]

Alright, thanks. I've looked around a bit on that new information and found a couple of things that seem promising. I'll fiddle around some more in the morning.

Edit: Well, it's working fine since rebooting on university internet. I'm not entirely sure what to make of that, it could have just needed rebooting, or it could be because varsity internet. I know my university mirrors a lot of Ubuntu stuff, not sure if that includes the repo (or if it even can include the repo).

[wierd]

It might.

However, failure to have properly signed packages is concerning if they are redirecting to the local mirror. It means they are not maintaining a proper mirror of the distro's packages.  Try using a manually set DNS to escape their redirect next time, say google's 8.8.8.8 DNS server.

[Sensei]

Hey, I'm having a problem I'd really appreciate some help with:

I have a laptop which won't charge: It's a Lenovo Flex-3 1580, which came from the store running Windows 10, though I think it may have been designed with Windows 8 in mind.

At first I thought it was the cable, and replacing it seemed to do the trick. After a while, it didn't. I found that it could be a problem with the power management software, so I downloaded an updated version, and it worked! Then, it stopped charging once again. After reinstalling the same software, it seems that it still charges, but with a twist: not all the way. At first it would only charge to 70% when on the cable, and I thought it might be some sort of battery protection- this only happened after the laptop was being used for a couple days.

After some hassle I managed to get into the Lenovo Settings (Win10 App version) and found the "battery protection" setting which limits the battery from charging fully- but it was turned off. At this point my best theory was that the regular Windows 7/8 version of one of the lenovo settings programs (there's like, four different ones) was installed, but I couldn't find them by searching (which is oddly useless in Windows 10, for finding programs on your computer which aren't Windows Store apps) or by looking in the Lenovo folder in Program Files or Program Files X86. However, the battery indicator says "Plugged In: Charging" rather than "Plugged In: Not Charging" like it normally would if it was limited from charging all the way.

Anyway, just recently, the laptop refused to charge any higher than 29%. Earlier it would continue to charge up from a lower percentage until it hit 70%, but now it seems as if whenever the laptop is used off the charge cable, the battery loses charge and will not gain it back. So, that's where I've left off.

Preferably, I would like to not reformat the laptop, but there is a D:\ recovery drive which will probably allow me to reset it to factory settings. If the problem is likely to be with the battery hardware, that sucks- the battery is not removable, so the laptop might not be repairable. It was purchased from a Staples with basically no return policy, and I think the manufacturer's warranty is expired.

[Rose]

Does it run off the power cable with the battery removed?

[Sensei]

Again, the battery isn't detachable.

[wierd]

Lots of people on the lenovo forum having the same exact problem with that model.

Looks like Lenovo pushed an update to the charge/power management software, and afterward a whole bunch of people have had this problem.

more than likely, this is related to a battery firmware, since it affects users even at the bios/when the system is turned off.