Inspiron 1100 battery issue

Question

OK, I have two DELL Inspiron 1100s that are about 2.5 yrs old. All of a sudden, I noticed the battery light on the front of one of them (Laptop A) started flashing (4 times orange, 1 time green). I thought maybe the battery was dead, but it was plugged in and the battery meter showed charged. My second Inspiron laptop (Laptop B) was working fine and the battery light wasn't flashing at all. I decided to swap batteries between the two to narrow it down to either the laptop or the battery itself. When laptop B got the battery from laptop A, same problem. 4 orange blinks, 1 green blink. This told me there was something going on with the battery. I read some posts here with similar issues and I even tried some suggestions (remove it and let it cool, go into the BIOS and see the status, etc.), but nothing has worked to stop the flashing for this battery. The odd thing though is that it still seems to charge according to the power meter and I can have it run on the battery alone and without AC power (for about 45mins). I know there have been other similar posts about this, but any idea how to get rid of this blinking? Or is something else going on here. Message Edited by northview on 05-30-200609:24 PM

TigerTechs_LHS · Answer

I had a similiar issue with the Latitudes 500's and 600's series.. Most of the time it is the battery but as it seems the batteries tested okay. My issue was the motherboard of the system I had to replace that. I did some research on it to make sure similiar instances happened with the inspirons as well and they do. I have verified this with the article below, so you may have to get the System Board replaced. Sorry!

http://forums.us.dell.com/supportforums/board/message?board.id=insp_power&message.id=40929&c=us&l=en&cs=&s=gen

or

http://forums.us.dell.com/supportforums/board/print?board.id=insp_general&message.id=184277

But check out the first link as it might be just a connection to save it from replacing the system board.

northview · Answer

Well, I don't think it is the system board because I basically swapped batteries between two identical Inspiron 1100s and the 'blinking light' issue essentially switch computers as well. It will hold a charge too. Not for long, but pretty much the same as the other Inspiron 1100. I'm gonna try draining it all the way down & then recharge it to see what happens. Maybe this will help get rid of the flashing light.

TigerTechs_LHS · Answer

If it does not hold the charge well the its definately the battery then. They only have a 1 year warranty and often tend to go after 1.5 years of constant use. You can try what you are doing but I don't think you will have much luck but now it definately sounds like a battery issue.

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Inspiron 1100 battery issue

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