Acer Swift 3 SF314-41 Charging Issue

[frase]

I have replaced the Jack in the laptop, plugged in the charger.

Though the charging stays at 0% forever?

Is running Win11

HAVE TRIED -

I reset BIOS to DEFAULT (Rebooted then battery showed 100%, I reset system and went back as before 0%)
Unplugged internal battery and purged power (holding down power button for 60seconds)
Reseat RAM
Tested charger reads 19.34 which is normal.
EDIT: Am attempting the RESET button on the board.
NOPE DID NOT DO A THING

Ran Battery info Health is at 86.7
Power State - Discharging, AC Power
No Capacity in.

If the charger was not working well it would not power on?

Could not resolve issue customer picked up laptop. I hate it when I cannot fix an issue, just frustrates me.
I think in the end it was a board level issue. As I changed the DC Jack, charger was fine so must be a power related issue on the board itself.

 

[Blues]

Did you test or replace the battery? It may have been a dead/faulty battery that is refusing to charge.

 

[frase]

Did you test or replace the battery? It may have been a dead/faulty battery that is refusing to charge.

No it was not the battery either.

I tested the battery as stated in the OP with numerous methods to be sure, that result came back fine. I was not purchasing another battery to be stuck in the same place and out of pocket.

 

[NviGate Systems]

Batteries have a lock out chip, so it's possible a condition was met for that and the battery locked out.

Without replacing the battery you won't know

 

[sapphirescales]

I was not purchasing another battery to be stuck in the same place and out of pocket.

So buy one that's returnable. They're not very expensive to begin with. It's very possible for a battery to refuse to charge even though the "health" shows a high percentage. If you really don't want to even bite the shipping costs, tell the client that it should just need a new battery. Make it clear that if replacing the battery doesn't fix it, you won't charge them any labor but the battery is non-refundable. I do this all the time and I can count on one hand the number of times it's been the motherboard and not the battery.

 

[frase]

Batteries have a lock out chip, so it's possible a condition was met for that and the battery locked out.

Without replacing the battery you won't know

Never knew that? Something I have never came across.

 

[Blues]

Yeah sadly when I say test battery I mean test replacing it as like said those test effectively lie to us or fail to tell us the full story of the battery.

 

[Larry Sabo]

Besides the possibility that the battery is locked because of a (possibly spurious) fault, some Acer models have a problem with the DC jack not detecting that the charger is fully plugged in. There's a connection in the jack that feeds a signal to the EMC (Embeded Micro Controller aka SuperIO chip) to tell it that the charger is fully pushed in. If there is an open connection on that line, the EMC won't enable charging the battery. So it could be a battery, motherboard, DC jack or charger plug problem. Trying with a known-good battery would help determine which.

 

[frase]

Ok thanks all I am grabbing the laptop back, asked the customer if they would like to try and change the battery.
Said yes, will try anything better than purchasing a new laptop.
I am being resent another DC Jack as well to test and can return if same issue.
If that does not work then it has to be a mobo related issue.

It is just that if everything does not work, I will simply have to charge my diagnostic fee and leave it at that.

 

[ThatPlace928]

Ok thanks all I am grabbing the laptop back, asked the customer if they would like to try and change the battery.
Said yes, will try anything better than purchasing a new laptop.
I am being resent another DC Jack as well to test and can return if same issue.
If that does not work then it has to be a mobo related issue.

It is just that if everything does not work, I will simply have to charge my diagnostic fee and leave it at that.

May be a long shot but perhaps the CMOS [battery..... thanks, @Larry Sabo] is at the end of its life?

 

[Larry Sabo]

May be a long shot but perhaps the CMOS battery is at the end of its life?

 

[frase]

It was purchased in 2022 though, so I would not think a battery would run out that quick.

 

[ThatPlace928]

It was purchased in 2022 though, so I would not think a battery would run out that quick.

I bought a package of 10 one time and not a single one was good. I bought some fresh at Walmart yesterday and they work great. You never know how long they've been sitting before someone put it in. Anyway, just a thought. If that's the problem, it's the least expensive fix I know of.

 

[Diggs]

Batteries have a lock out chip

Almost all lithium batteries have a BMS (Battery Management System) that monitors each cell. Every laptop battery has one. If one cell goes bad it may go into protection mode and refuse to charge or turn off discharge. BMSs have come a long way fast. The 52 volt BMS (14 cells in series) I use on my ebike batteries have Bluetooth built in and use an app to tell me the state of charge of every cell group from my phone and they cost almost nothing. If the BMS has failed, it explains what you are seeing. Old laptop batteries used Li-Io cylindrical cells and the BMS was always in with the cells. For some reason I thought the BMS on new laptops with Li-Po pouches may be in the laptop and not in the battery pack. I've taken apart a few Li-Po packs and don't remember seeing a BMS inside.

 

[NviGate Systems]

On the internal Thinkpad battery I took apart the BMS was on the connector PCB. That was a non replaceable battery.

However, even if the BMS is on the motherboard , chances of it failing is lower than a cell. (I think)

I've had cells test as 100% Health and the unit shut off when unplugged. Or it discharges fast. I feel like lithium monitoring has a long way to go, much like how SMART for disks drives has a long way to go.