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redbird19

10 Posts

23877

October 26th, 2012 00:00

Laptop randomly stops recognizing ac adapter

I'll be on my laptop, working like normal and suddenly the screen will dim and the battery icon in the system tray will change from a battery with a plug, to just a battery.  The ac adapter's blue led light remains on, and is plugged into the wall.  I've disconnected it, reconnected, unplugged it, plugged it back in, and all combinations of each.  I've also tried a few other ac adapters I have from other dell laptops, but none are recognized.

Ironically, as I was in the middle of typing this, the screen brightened and the battery icon in the system tray changed from just a battery to a battery with a plug.  So suddenly the adapter is recognized again....

Any idea what's going on?  This has been happening every 3-4 days or so for the last few weeks. 

It can't be the adapter as it does this with various adapters.  I also don't move my laptop around a lot so I don't think it's due to a damaged outlet or something.

FYI, this is fairly new (about 3-4 months old) Dell XPS 15z running Windows 7 64 bit Home Edition.

Dell-Rajesh R

6 Operator

 • 

3.3K Posts

October 26th, 2012 01:00

Hi redbird19,

Let me first appreciate the fact that you have tried the steps to resolve the issue .

Issue might be with the adapter port on the motherboard/adapter.

To isolate the issue let’s try few more troubleshooting steps.

  1. Check with a different wall outlet. Connect the computer to a different wall jack and see if the same issue persists.
  2. I recommend you to remove the battery and disconnect the adapter, press and hold the power button for few seconds and release to drain the flea power .Now put back the battery and connect the adapter and power on the computer and check if the adapter works with the battery.
  3. Also update BIOS on the computer from the below mentioned link: http://www.dell.com/support/drivers/us/en/19/DriverDetails/Product/xps-15z?driverId=377DW&osCode=W764&fileId=3080913887
  4. If the issue still persists, disconnect the battery and just connect the adapter to the computer and check if the computer works continuously on adapter.

Above steps would drill down the issue to battery, adapter, or power port on the motherboard.

Let me know the status.

Awaiting your response!

DELL-Royan S

6 Operator

 • 

3.8K Posts

May 23rd, 2013 02:00

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