[Addendum (June 21st, 2007): I noticed that this entry has been getting quite a bit of attention. I’d like to clarify that the blinking LED had this pattern: 3 amber flashes, followed by 1 green, and they just repeated that way; 3 amber, 1 green, 3 amber, 1 green, and so on. -End of addendum-] I can personally attest to that. I had my notebook’s battery replaced last year, a few months after the warranty had expired. That replacement set us back by some RM400. What was the problem, exactly? Here:

Dell Notebook Batteries | Narrowband.org

Notice the icon in my taskbar? It says that my battery was charging (I had the AC adapter plugged in, and switched on). However, the amber (which appear reddish) LED kept blinking - meaning something was not right with the battery. How did this affect me? Well, the battery couldn’t be fully charged. On top of that, it could only power my notebook up to about an hour, before I needed plug in my AC adapter to continue using.

So, remove the battery completely, you say. Then why the heck did we buy a notebook in the first place? It’s supposed to be mobile. With the battery in place, the amber LED kept blinking regardless of whether the AC adapter was plugged in or not. This of course, could get a little distracting. Above all, we knew that the battery was faulty - so how safe was it exactly, if we continued to ignore the warning? It’s not like we haven’t seen a Dell notebook exploding before, because of its battery.

In one of the emails the Dell Support team sent me last year, I was told to self-diagnose the battery and tell them the results. For this particular battery model, there are 6 green LEDs that are supposed to show you if the battery is OK, or not.

Dell Notebook Batteries | Narrowband.org

If the battery is OK, all 6 LEDs should light (refer to inset). If the battery is screwed, somehow only 3 of the LEDs would light. My old battery is still with me (environmentalists say don’t simply dispose of your batteries irresponsibly. Therefore, I don’t know how I can get rid of it. Any idea?). I don’t usually complain about Dell notebooks, because my family uses 3 Dell notebooks, and a desktop - also a Dell.

However, recently, my sister’s notebook’s battery is suffering from the same problem. Exactly the same symptoms, and same battery model (although different notebook model). We called up Dell’s Sales Dept., only to be told that a sales rep would contact us on the matter. To date, no calls have been received.

Here’s another juicy bit: Just two days ago (Monday, May 14th), my friend, Hui, asked me how I dealt with my faulty battery last year, because her notebook is now suffering from the same problem! She uses the same notebook model as mine. I was almost speechless. I said we paid RM400 for a new battery thinking it was an isolated incident. But now I know two other similar cases of faulty Dell notebook batteries (what are the odds?) - and it wasn’t even our fault that the battery had spoilt.

Dell Notebook Batteries | Narrowband.org

I somehow came to understand that the person-in-charge of my sister’s notebook’s Service Tag number has resigned. I was wondering if this was my problem at all.

To be fair, my notebook has not given me any other problems in the last two years. But the same cannot be said about my sister’s notebook - her LCD screen is playing up and I have strongly suggested that buying a new notebook would be a smarter choice, especially since her battery is also faulty. Furthermore, new notebooks these days don’t cost as much as they did 3 years ago. On a brighter note, since no one from Dell has returned our calls, we have had more time to consider buying a new notebook altogether. This time though, it might just not be another Dell.