Puppy Linux Discussion Forum

jethin · Joined: 25 May 2010 Posts: 9

I've installed Puppy 5 on an old HP laptop that I inherited. Everything seems to be working OK except that I can only boot the machine when it is plugged in to a wall socket (ie not from battery power). I clicked on Puppy's battery monitor icon when powered up and everything appears to be OK with the battery as far as I can tell. (though I couldn't get the battery info window to close, but maybe that's another thread.) I've also noticed that there's a little green light that's only on when the computer is plugged in.

My (uneducated) guesses are that it might be the BIOS or maybe GRUB. (GRUB works, but I have to select Puppy from a list at boot time. Maybe I gummed up something on the install?) Otherwise I'm at a loss.

So, can anyone help me troubleshoot and/or fix this problem? I'm new to Puppy and Linux, but I'm looking forward to diving in. This is the one issue that's keeping my old workhorse from being resurrected.

Much obliged, Jeremy

cthisbear · Joined: 29 Jan 2006 Posts: 3487 Location: Sydney Australia

Probably the battery is kakas.

But why not power off, disconnect the cord and take out the battery.

Then after all that hit the power button for 20 seconds
to discharge any stored power.
Costs you nothing to do this.

Put everything back together, turn on boot Puppy
and leave on for an hour to charge up.

Then test just with battery again.

Post your HP specs or model.
Puppy 5...>> means Lucid Pup right.

http://puppylinux.org/news/

HP Notebook PC Battery Pack Replacement

http://bpr.hpordercenter.com/hbpr/

Battery Does not Power Notebook or Hold a Charge

http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/document?lc=en&dlc=en&cc=us&docname=c00259897&product=18703

What is the Battery Check?
The HP Battery Check is an easy to use utility that is available on HP Notebook PCs that provides information on the status of the batteries installed in the notebook PC. It reports on the condition of both the primary and secondary battery if the individual notebook is equipped with a secondary battery.

http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/document?lc=en&dlc=en&cc=us&docname=c00625471

ftp://ftp.hp.com/pub/softpaq/sp41501-42000/sp41862.exe

http://www.computing.net/answers/windows-xp/notebook-battery-not-charging/132294.html

Chris.

Béèm · Posted: Wed 26 May 2010, 04:29 Post subject:

To close the battery info window, just click on it.
You could take a screen-shot of this window and post here.

When booting with the power cord attached and working in puppy, what happens if you pull the power cord? Do the PC powers down? What says the battery info?
Be aware, that if the battery is bad and the PC powers down, you may have corruption, so have a backup before doing so.

jethin · Joined: 25 May 2010 Posts: 9

Thanks for your replies. I'm at work right now, but I'll test all of your suggestions tonight. Beem: When I pull the plug while the machine is on I'm pretty sure it loses power immediately. So perhaps the problem is the battery after all? The only reason I thought not was because the battery monitor window in Puppy seems to indicate that the battery present and charged. The battery detection appears to be working properly -- it only detects the battery when it's physically installed. Perhaps it's reading the charge wrong? The machine is quite old -- maybe the battery is fried after all?

Just had one more thought: This HP laptop has a really strange, old timey design. It actually has an lcd clock (and various DVD control buttons) on the front of it. I wonder if maybe the internal battery has been completely drained and isn't recharging. Might this have anything to do with making a successful boot from the battery or switching to battery power while the pc is on?

Thanks again, and more later.

rjbrewer · Joined: 22 Jan 2008 Posts: 4422 Location: merriam, kansas

Béèm · Posted: Wed 26 May 2010, 13:33 Post subject:

jethin · Joined: 25 May 2010 Posts: 9

Hello again. Still no luck. As I thought, the machine does immediately cut out when I unplug the power cord even when the battery is installed. But everything I can see indicates that the battery is 100% charged and recognized by the system.

Attached is a pic of the battery info screen in Puppy (5.0 Lucid Puppy). Unless I'm missing something everything seems kosher there.

The machine in question is a Hewlett Packard Pavilion N5470 (F2407M) PC Notebook. Specs here:

http://www.dealtime.com/xPF-Hewlett-Packard-HP-Pavilion-N5470-F2407M

It only has Puppy frugal on it -- I toasted the old Windows install. I've no data on it yet, so I'm not afraid to start hacking at things.

My thoughts are that it's either 1) A bad battery despite all the signs indicating the battery is OK or 2) Something with the BIOS or Puppy that is causing the machine not to switch to battery power when the AC power adapter is unplugged. I'm also wondering if it could be some type of issue with the power management -- ACPI or APM.

Many thanks, Jeremy

rjbrewer · Joined: 22 Jan 2008 Posts: 4422 Location: merriam, kansas

The meter doesn't tell you if the battery is good or bad.
My battery has about a 25 min. usable time; not running videos
or streams.
Even the Xp Battery monitor says it has 100% charge with more
than 5 hours usage remaining. It stays that way for the 25 mins.
and then instantly drops to 7% , and says immediately recharge.

If the battery is still capable of taking "any" charge, the meter will
show that while it's charging.

p310don · Posted: Thu 27 May 2010, 01:28 Post subject:

From my limited knowledge of rechargeable batteries, as they age, they continue to indicate that they are being charged / discharged correctly, but due to crystalisation in the cells, the usable capacity significantly decreases. I would suggest this has happened in your case.

Look into getting a new battery. Not sure if you want to spend money on an old laptop, but try http://www.dealextreme.com/search.dx/search.hp%20battery for cheap laptop batteries.

rjbrewer · Joined: 22 Jan 2008 Posts: 4422 Location: merriam, kansas

Béèm · Posted: Thu 27 May 2010, 16:44 Post subject:

jethin · Joined: 25 May 2010 Posts: 9

So to recap: Something is wrong with the battery monitor info displayed by Puppy, which indicates that the battery is fully charged and essentially functional when it's actually dead. The first step in trying to resolve this problem is to replace the battery. If this doesn't work for some reason then the problem likely exists elsewhere in the computer's hardware -- not the OS, config (ACPI/APM), or the BIOS.

Please let me know if I've got any of this wrong. I'll begin looking for a new battery and will plan to update this post once I get one and try it out.

Thanks again for all the info and suggestions. I'm glad to know that Puppy has such a helpful community of folks using it.

rjbrewer · Joined: 22 Jan 2008 Posts: 4422 Location: merriam, kansas

jethin · Joined: 25 May 2010 Posts: 9

It was indeed the battery after all.

Maybe I' missing something -- and I don't even know if it's possible -- but I think it'd be great if someone wrote a "battery health" type app that could measure whether a laptop's battery is able to hold any charge at all and perhaps give an approximate amount of life it has left rechage-wise. It would be awesome if this could be integrated into the current Puppy battery app/info.

Just a thought. Anyhow, thanks again for all the help.

looseSCREWorTWO · Posted: Sat 05 Jun 2010, 03:58 Post subject:

Instead of spending big money on a battery for a 7 or 8 y.o. notebook, I would be looking at buying a 4 or 5 y.o notebook from a second-hand shop. Something with Windows XP on it. You have to be able to see the PC before you buy it (which generally rules out eBay) cos before handing over the cash you want to do a few simple tests such as:-

- play a movie DVD with the AC power-cord removed. Is the picture OK? Sound? How's the battery holding-up? Playing a movie DVD in Windows gives the CPU a good work-out and also checks if the DVD Drive is reading OK.

- take a blank DVD-R disk with you and try burning something to it.

- take a few Puppy CDs with you and see if any of them will boot up the PC. Then go into Menu > System > Hardinfo and check what Puppy says about the PC against what the seller is saying.

The second-hand computer shops love me.