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Old 23-05-2009
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Default Samsung r700 battery problem!



My reportage laptop, a samsung R700, has gone nuts. The battery is full but it won't switch on without the mains power, and indeed if I unplug the mains power it just switches off - even though in windows it sees the battery and reports it being 100% full..........

When it comes to doing some race reporting and running of a generator at a national I can't rely on constant power at all, so this is a big problem as I'll end up losing work constantly as the power dips and and out during the day - and ofcourse I can't continue reporting into the evening when people switch off their generators etc.


Anyone had such a problem or can think of a way of fixing it? We only have a little netbook thing otherwise and I can't really do much of a race report on that.
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Old 23-05-2009
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is windows reporting it right?on my dell there is a little set of led thingys on the back of the battery with a button, lights up and says how much is in it,or may be a bent pin??
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Old 23-05-2009
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My old Packard Bell did this even though the battery was charged.. Bought a new battery and it worked fine.. weird
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Old 23-05-2009
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Yeah it's got a button on the battery and it lights up as full........! not looked at batteries yet but it's yet more cash to throw at something I need it to be reliable and so far I've loved this laptop - but it's let me down now and I can't trust it!
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Old 27-05-2009
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Just tried another battery from another similar Samsung and it was fine - so I guess the batteries don't last long This lappy was bought for the neo08 so its only a little over a year old and not been used that much since I have a PC at home, it's mostly used for races and mostly plugged in all the time.

The worry this weekend (before my replacement battery arrives) is that the power will go off and I lose the race report at some point(s) which will be a bit pants. Oh well it could be worse I guess.
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Old 28-05-2009
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try open office, if that is of any good for you, it auto saves your work, and has a file recovery feature.
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Old 28-05-2009
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Quote:
Originally Posted by jimmy View Post
mostly plugged in all the time.
Thats more than likely the problem. Laptop batteries don't like being just charged all the time, you have to give them a cycle often or they will start false charging.
One thing i did to recover mine (partly) was to boot into Ubuntu (boot from cd), it read the state of the battery correctly, then it all started working again. Could be worth a try.
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Old 28-05-2009
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i only use the battery in mine if im out and about, if im at home. i never have it in the laptop,3 years old now still ok
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Old 28-05-2009
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Default laptop

Southwell is right - keep pluggin em in without running them flat an then charging just screws the battery in a lap top...

Jimmy dont want to state the obvious but save your work more often pal! - you can set office to autosave at whatever frequency you like i.e. every minute (guess you know this already as you work with pc's daily)

Personnely i always use a USB memory stick to save to whilst working - just my preference ........i even have one you can have for free Jimmy if you want/dont already have...
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Old 28-05-2009
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Yeah it's just I'll have to save as a new document all the time otherwise I'll risk it corrupting the file when it dies.

Southwell, is the ubnutu cd you mention the OS on a cd - installed and working? Any idea what I might need to do once I have it?

I'm pretty sure the battery must be OK in some way - it's like it just needs a good kick up the arse to remember to act like a battery. Don't think I'll be able to get it fixed before the weekend tho.
It's a shame - I only really need the battery in when I'm on a generator
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Old 28-05-2009
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You can just run it from CD without installing it. I will try to bring a copy with me tomorrow.
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Old 28-05-2009
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Im just downloading it now, it's only 700mb.
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Old 28-05-2009
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Think of your laptop battery like the old sce/scr's, they dont link being topped up constantly and prefer a proper cycle. Everytime your on mains with the battery in, you are topping it up again and they get that classic memory effect.

The ubuntu cd Southwell is talking about is no doubt the LiveCD, you just download it and boot from it, gives you a full Linux environment without installing anything. It's definitely worth a shot, then if you get it working stably probably worth running the laptop flat, then charging and I keep the battery out of mine when its going to plugged in for a period of time. I can understand why your upset, the r700 is a nice laptop
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Old 28-05-2009
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Really happy with the R700 - I put XP on instead of Vista and it's awesome for what I do. Really sturdy laptop compared to what I had before and handles being knocked about on a race table & the rigors of living in my camera bag.

I'll download ubnutu today and give it a whirl - see if I can get any joy.
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