Notebook Battery won't charge

Hi. I have a Dell Inspiron 8600 notebook that I am working on for a friend. Initially this computer had coffee spilled on the back of the machine. After that, the owner stated that they couldn't get the battery to charge. The machine was plugged in at the time of the incident. The computer would still run from the A/C plug, but couldn't get the battery to recharge. The owner had thought that battery may have been damaged when the coffee was spilled on it and purchased a 2nd battery. The computer worked under the power of the 2nd battery, but wouldn't recharge. Upon taking the computer apart, the area around the A/C plug-in was corroded and charred causing a short. I have replaced the mainboard on the system. Now when I turn the computer on under A/C power, the battery recharge light flashes orange 4 times, then green once, then repeats this cycle. The battery still won't charge, but operates under A/C power. I would suspect that the system would operate under battery power if there was a charged battery. Any ideas what the problem could be? I suspect that the systematic flashing is a code of some sort, but not sure. According to Dell, the battery is no good, however the 2nd battery was purchased after the initial spill and isn't more than a couple weeks old and did work at the time of purchase. Could it be possible that the short fried the 2nd battery?

The flashing sequence is binary which is telling you a fault code. The problem is having the info to decipher it. You'll need a repair manual which the warranty service people have access to.

yeah, I assumed it was more than coincidence that it was the same flash pattern. According to Dell "technical" support, this indicates a bad battery, but I just can't see how that could be, it is basically brand new.....

Dell "technical" support is right. People who have ZERO technical background or training and have no college degree.

If the computer will operate off of a charged battery, but just will not "charge" the battery thats not a bad battery. The recharging circuitry is damaged and it may be damaging other batteries. I think that changing the battery again will just result in the same thing and maybe a 3rd "bad Battery."

That is what I was thinking as well. I am making the following assumptions...the 2nd battery was purchased prior to the mainboard being replaced. This being said, the replacement of the mainboard should have taken care of any damaged recharging circuitry. So, my thinking is this. The charging system is now working properly, but both batteries were damaged by the old "bad" mainboard with the bad recharging circuitry. Unfortunately the only way to test this is to get a new known "good" battery, which is additional cost, but I don't see any other way to get around it.

This would probably be the best assumption.

WC

Thats a reasonable assumption IFF (that's not misspelled) the recharging circuitry is located on the motherboard and not anywhere else, or its another problem not motherboard specific that is damaging the batteries. If you had another notebook to test the batteries on that would be great.

Yes, I agree. It would be great to try the current batteries in another system, or another battery in the "new" system, but the chances of coming across either of these options is fairly slim...hehe

Anyway. Thanks for the additional insight gang. I just wanted to run this past somebody else for a "fresh set of eyes" looking at the situation. I was hoping to find out out what the diagnostic flashing was for certain, or a place to find out....without getting transferred to India and being put on hold for an hour.......

Look up their warranty service centers and call one of them. Explain the problem and maybe you'll get someone helpful who will look up the code for you. (Maybe).

The only thing worse than Gateway Tech Support is Dell. I remember argueing over gateway over a burnt out powersupply I had, the so called tech kept insisting I had bad RAM and that needed to be replaced. I told him no less than 10 times it was the powersupply, he finially listened to me (or so I thought) and said they would send me a new one, I get the box and it was new RAM, which did not fix the problem at all I went around in circles with them for about a month, finially went out and bought my own power supply and low and behold the thing worked. I sent gateway the old one along with a bill for the replacement part and demanded a letter of apology. Got absolutely nothing.

Hi,
It might be to late for this guy but i hope this helps someone....
I have an Inspiron 8600 and my battery wouldn't charge but the notebook would power up and be usable
on the AC adapter. The battery light would flash 4 orange and one green. I talked to Dell and they said my battery was dead. I thought i would try one last thing before spent the $60.00-100.00 on a new battery. I borrowed an AC adapter form a friend with a Dell laptop. I plugged it in and one 1 1/2 hours later i had a charged battery That lasts about 5 1/2 hours. : ) I hope this helps...
-Dillon

I had the same problem. The computer was working on battery for less than 6 month then it went dead.

I called tech support and they shipped me a new battery. The battery went dead again after few days and I had to run always on the power adaptor.
It's very frustrating not to be able to rely on their customer service.

Now my Dell Inspiron 8600 won't boot up at all and I'm out of the warranty.

I already tried to plug it to an other outlet. the power adaptor get the green LED anyway. When I start it up, I would get a blank screen or a blinking cursor.

does anyone has an idea to fix it, if it is possible without paying too much ? Or how much would a repair cost me ?

Hey,
If you live close i would be more than happy to look at it for ya.. Just let me know.

yes dillon.

I live in Ireland (Cork).

might be kinda hard for me to look at it then lhahaha sorry