Power Management problem---battery not charging icon not appearing

[Guest]

I am using WinXP Pro on my notebook with NiMH battery the problem is that
when I use AC power it shows in the task bar ON AC POWER and when I unplug
the adaptor from the laptop, it shows ON BATTERY but when I reinsert the AC
adaptor, it show simple ON AC POWER instead of charging with Lightening sign
on the AC plug. If I disable APM then it stops going to standby when battery
reaches critical that is obvious but on APM it goes to standby even if the
battery remains 40% or 30%. I tried recharging after fully discharging the
battery but to no use. When I plug AC power if the battery is 0% then it will
charge upto 10% and stops, then I have to reinsert the AC power plug after a
5 second pause, then it starts charging again and stops at 20%, so struggling
so hard to get it to 100% when I try to use the notebook on battery power
which is on 100% now, it shows low battery and starts alarms on 70% and
sometimes at 80%. So I have to reinsert the AC plug to stop the alarm and
immediately the LCD shows 0% instead of 70 or 80%. My battery was doing good
on Win98 but when I installed WinXP Pro it is giving me only 10-15 mins of
backup as compared to about 2 hours on Win98.

 

[Quaoar]

I am using WinXP Pro on my notebook with NiMH battery the problem is
that when I use AC power it shows in the task bar ON AC POWER and
when I unplug the adaptor from the laptop, it shows ON BATTERY but
when I reinsert the AC adaptor, it show simple ON AC POWER instead of
charging with Lightening sign on the AC plug. If I disable APM then
it stops going to standby when battery reaches critical that is
obvious but on APM it goes to standby even if the battery remains 40%
or 30%. I tried recharging after fully discharging the battery but to
no use. When I plug AC power if the battery is 0% then it will charge
upto 10% and stops, then I have to reinsert the AC power plug after a
5 second pause, then it starts charging again and stops at 20%, so
struggling so hard to get it to 100% when I try to use the notebook
on battery power which is on 100% now, it shows low battery and
starts alarms on 70% and sometimes at 80%. So I have to reinsert the
AC plug to stop the alarm and immediately the LCD shows 0% instead of
70 or 80%. My battery was doing good on Win98 but when I installed
WinXP Pro it is giving me only 10-15 mins of backup as compared to
about 2 hours on Win98.

IMO and YMMV, the battery is nearing the end of its useful life. The
reason that you see the problems is that the battery is only partially
charging. The system uses voltage to determine the state of charge, and
there is not much more than the critical voltage even when full charge
is indicated. This is not so much due to XP, but the age and number of
charge cycles of the battery.

Q