NEW Battery Tip - Applicable to some T, X, R models and batteries

[iyogee]

Without going into metaphysical analysis of the discriminatory treatment  -  I could simply conclude that buying the expensive and unreliable Lenovo products is NOT GOOD VALUE FOR MONEY. That is the bottom line. I will neither buy nor recommend Lenovo.

[fongj]

I have two X61 Tablet's, and suddenly the battery showed flashing orange and "There is an error" in the Power Manager, and the battery details (e.g. cycle count) don't show anymore. 

FRU: 93P5032

ASM: 42T5209

This is very disappointing.  It seems odd for the recall to not be extended to the tablet batteries that have issues just like the other models. 

[chifly]

Similar story.  My battery IS on the recall list and died in November outside the warranty period.  My Fujitsu and other IBM 770Z (really old) are still going strong on their batteries.  Call a spade a spade instead of citing rhetoric about how to use a battery.  These batteries are defective and should be replaced.  I am willing to replace my battery at a reduced cost but not replace it entirely because it just stopped working one day well before they should have.  I doubt this is planned obsolescence - rather faulty products to which Lenovo does not want to acknowledge.  This is a PR nightmare.

Note from Moderator:  Please don't post the same message in multiple boards/threads as it splinters the discussion.  Duplicate(s) removed.

Note from Moderator:  A comment which violated the forum rules was removed.

[erichoffer]

Help.  All had been great with my battery, but a few days ago, the battery meter began to fall like a countdown from fully charged - and when it gets down to about 50%, it suddenly drops to about 4% and hibernates.  My batter is one of the FRU P/N's listed, so I ran the diagnostic - but it says the batter is acceptable.  It very much appears to be the same issue as what is posted here.  What can I do next to get this addressed?

Signed,

Losing Power Quickly

[astra4]

Hi, I have the same kind of problem as reported by tclcom and elad1 in preceding posts.

When 100% charged and I pull the power cord, it will run only a few minutes, until 96% charge is reached, and then instantly drop to 4% charge, and only 1 or 2 seconds later the screen goes black, the session is safed to disk and the computer shut down.

I have an x61s type 7666 and the battery is FRU 92P1227

Turned on and connected to AC power again, the charge indicator stays at around 10% for a very long time and then suddenly jumps to 100%.

Performed a battery gauge reset, but that didn't help anything.

Tried the battery diagnostic tool, which tells that no error is found and the battery is normal for its age and number of charging cycles.

The computer and battery are 16 months old, so the battery is out of warranty

I experienced with other computers that the charge held by batteries diminishes over time, but I never had one that simply failed like this. This never happened to me with Dell, Acer and Compaq. This is my first Lenovo...

[cwilkens]

I have two X61 batteries that have fallen victim to the "low battery capacity" problem in the last two years (and both with valid FRU's for replacement). The 8-cell lasted about 1.5 years (with 148 cycles) after which I reveerted to the original 4-cell. After about 6 months and a mere 19 charge cycles, it, too, is useless.

Unfortunately, when the 8-cell died, the replacement program was not available, and now that the 4-cell has died, the tool claims that it is too late. Both batteries are about 26 months old, so the tool says that they are over 12 months out of waranty. Nevermind that the web page does not say that this is a requirement, nor did either battery actually last for a full 24 months before it died.

Can Lenovo help in any way? or am I stuck?

Thanks.

[iyogee]

It seems to me that Lenovo social media rep in these forums is helping people seleceltively  (based on some yet to be deciphered profiling criteria). I give up ... these machines are not for general public. Thye are only trying to appease corporate buyers.

[iyogee]

Interesteting to see how prompt the MOD is to filter and censor your message and how slow to actually remedy anyone's problems.

[bananaman]

Hi iyogee!

The handful of mods are all volunteers, with an occasional Lenovo employee flying by. Posts violating the Community Rules are edited or removed.

In addition to attracting those with the premature battery issue described in the first post, some with normal end of life battery symptoms are posting here.

I too wish that batteries lasted as long as laptops, but they don't, and you don't get to choose whether they stop working gradually or suddenly .

I don't do anything to prolong the life of my batteries and they last 12-18 months, whether Lenovo, Sony, Dell... they all use the same group of battery manufacturers.

[x61suser]

mod, and any Lenovo employee who happens to be reading:

Myself, and I am betting the majority posting in this thread, are experienced professionals.

We are simply posting because we know that a) it is a REAL issue and b) this is a place where we can potentially get the message to Lenovo employees beyond the call center.

Based on years of our positive experiences with Thinkpads, is why we corporate users choose to make Thinkpads our personal laptops, and purchase new models like the Ideapads for our family and friends - all the while using our corporate discounts, of course.

Surely with Lenovo announcing more models this week than I have fingers and toes, and taking bold new steps (red Thinkpads! an IBM branding employee must be spinning in his grave!), this is especially a time you do not want to be alienating your truly hard earned and deserved clientele.

I think we would be happy with pro-rated replacement batteries, based on amount of cycles. What we need to know is, is this simply a problem with certain production runs of these batteries, is it a problem with the power hardware within all x61 units, or is it a problem endemic to all Thinkpads produced today. Without this certainty, we cannot in good faith continue to purchase future Lenovo hardware for ourselves or any of us within our firms.

Thanks - now is the opportunity to make this right.