How to reset the EEPROM in a DELL laptop battery ? Help please !

Wow. So DELL sticks it to me again. I had the same problem about a year ago and now I am hoping there is a cheaper solution.

The problem stems from the FACT that DELL supplies their laptop battery with an EEPROM which counts the number of chargers you apply to it. The thing that is silly is that if you unplug your laptop to move it (even if its turned off), the EEPROM counts this unplug/replug as another charge. So when the counter expires, it shuts down the charging ability of the battery regardless of the condition of the cells. STUPID. It should be criminal.

Anyway, I have been doing some searching and only found one application (so far) which gives user access to the EEPROM. The program is called Battery EEPROM Works but it requires an external I2C adapter (whatever that is).

Is there any software which can be installed on the associated laptop which would give the same reset ability ???? Is there anything else I can try ?

I have tried running the battery dead but no good, the EEPROM still keeps its memory.

PLEASE help me.

PS... Stop buying DELL !

Hi Green. What error message is it giving you when attempting to charge the battery? How old is the battery?

As far as the EEPROM, I've never heard of a method to reprogram it via software only.

You might want to check Dell's battery recall page. Maybe you can get a replacement for free.

Good luck,
-JT

GreenClocker said:

Wow. So DELL sticks it to me again. I had the same problem about a year ago and now I am hoping there is a cheaper solution.

The problem stems from the FACT that DELL supplies their laptop battery with an EEPROM which counts the number of chargers you apply to it. The thing that is silly is that if you unplug your laptop to move it (even if its turned off), the EEPROM counts this unplug/replug as another charge. So when the counter expires, it shuts down the charging ability of the battery regardless of the condition of the cells. STUPID. It should be criminal.

Anyway, I have been doing some searching and only found one application (so far) which gives user access to the EEPROM. The program is called Battery EEPROM Works but it requires an external I2C adapter (whatever that is).

Is there any software which can be installed on the associated laptop which would give the same reset ability ???? Is there anything else I can try ?

I have tried running the battery dead but no good, the EEPROM still keeps its memory.

PLEASE help me.

PS... Stop buying DELL !

Click to expand...

Please do me a favor, provide a link to a site that is not shilling their software which shows that the # of times you plug in the charger, determines the life of the battery.

I was previously a Dell, Compaq, HP mobile tech and Im pretty sure that my P3 500 Laptop with its original install of Win2k, and the original battery has a count that is well over some magical number. Heck Im pretty sure that the Dells I support at 3 different sites currently have battery counts in the thousands.

Please dont spread FUD. It doesnt help.

http://en.community.dell.com/support-forums/laptop/f/3518/t/19361367.aspx

Adragontattoo said:

Please do me a favor, provide a link to a site that is not shilling their software which shows that the # of times you plug in the charger, determines the life of the battery.

I was previously a Dell, Compaq, HP mobile tech and Im pretty sure that my P3 500 Laptop with its original install of Win2k, and the original battery has a count that is well over some magical number. Heck Im pretty sure that the Dells I support at 3 different sites currently have battery counts in the thousands.

Please dont spread FUD. It doesnt help.

http://en.community.dell.com/support-forums/laptop/f/3518/t/19361367.aspx

Click to expand...

Respectfully, I must retort.

This is the link to the battery (and subsequent replacement) on the Dell website.

http://accessories.us.dell.com/sna/...ynoteSearch&baynote_bnrank=0&baynote_irrank=0

If you look under the "Tech Specs" tab you will see that Dell actually specifies the 'Max Recharge Cycles'. Dell even goes further to define that term as... "Maximum Recharge Cycle is the maximum number of times the battery can be charged in order for a device to work." hmmmmmmmmm. Impossible ? I think not (well unless Dell has the magic ability to know indefinately the internal state of your battery cells at 500 charges).

The point is that this battery does indeed come with internal circuitry complete with a not-so-fancy EEPROM mounted on one of the circuit boards (seen it personally when I opened my battery casing). This circuitry does count the number of charge cycles the battery is exposed to. Over the 11 month life of my battery, I am able to approximate the number of times my laptop was plugged in (once at office and once at home every business day). Coincidentally, the count is almost right on at 500. PROOF provided. Oh ya, I failed to mention that the last battery was a replacement for that of a very similar period of use.

Now, I must add that with all of the hype about laptops igniting into balls of fire, I do not blame Dell for attempting to mitigate the liability. We all know that as a rechargable battery goes bad, it draws more current and thus gets hotter. My issue is that at the moment my last battery DECIDED to die, it still had 3.5 hours of its original 4.5 hours of battery life. First, I received a warning that the battery was about to die and that I should purchase a new one. Second, it be dead and wont charge. SCAM !

Oh ya... Simply unplugging your laptop to move from the desk to the couch (2 minutes) counts as a charge REGARDLESS IF YOUR MACHINE IS RUNNING.

This issue would not be so bad if Dell didn't charge $155 for the replacement. Crooks and I repeat... SCAM.

Sorry for the truth. Buyers beware ! Mine is the Dell Inspiron series.

You could buy a logic probe, software etc and reverse engineer the program in the chip. So you can program your own eprom?

No matter what the discussion is, looks like no one has the solution sorry to say.

Maybe ask here?

http://www.badcaps.net/forum/index.php

Ohh there are many battery stores on the internet and physical sotes in cities. Might ask around there what the deal is. They refurbish lots of laptop battery packs..............

Hello ,
I am new here and I have got good news !!!!
There is very easy solution for "How to reset the EEPROM"
You don't have to reset the EEPROM and there is no need to buy new Dell battery neither.
Maybe that's why no one has came up with it
Any one interested let me know and lets cut the Dell charge/discharge cycles crap !!!

Just to let you know I have check it on my laptop and it WORKS , battery holds over 2hrs !!!!

Please stop posting the same thing multiple times in a row in incredibly hard to read colors and simply post the fix, if there is one.

tymber said:

Hello ,
I am new here and I have got good news !!!!
There is very easy solution for "How to reset the EEPROM"
You don't have to reset the EEPROM and there is no need to buy new Dell battery neither.
Maybe that's why no one has came up with it
Any one interested let me know and lets cut the Dell charge/discharge cycles crap !!!

Just to let you know I have check it on my laptop and it WORKS , battery holds over 2hrs !!!!

Click to expand...

Tymber
What is your fix for this???

Tymber, I am interested.

Any one interested let me know and lets cut the Dell charge/discharge cycles crap !!!

Click to expand...

I recently worked on a newer Dell Inspiron laptop for a customer. It wasn't charging even though you could take out the battery altogether and run the thing off the OEM charging brick without a problem.

My initial conclusion was that the battery had gone bad so I ordered him a supposedly compatible third party battery off of Amazon. That did not fix the issue.

My universal charging brick kit did not have a tip that fit the charging port so I ordered a Dell brand charger off of Amazon that was compatible with that model laptop. That fixed the issue.

Then out of curiosity I tried the third party battery again before returning it and the system would not recognize it for charging purposes. Got a post error saying something like, "This is not a certified Dell battery. It may not charge."

Not sure if this would be the case with all third party batteries but my suspicion is that Dell has instituted technology into their newer laptops that prevents using third party batteries and maybe even chargers, though I cannot confirm the charger suspicion yet. I did purchase a $12 third party charging brick for that laptop model after I returned the unit to the customer but have not yet tried the third party charger.

Now, with all the scary stories in the media about mobile device batteries catching fire this may be motivated by liability issues but it frosts me that these technology companies take measures to prevent customers from using reasonably priced third party accessories and then charge them 2-3x the money for essentially the same thing OEM. If you want to make it so only OEM stuff will work with it, that's okay but charge a reasonable price.

Found this: https://nctritech.wordpress.com/201...-ac-adapterschargers-hardware-vendor-lock-in/


Edit: The third party charger did work on the Dell laptop mentioned above in this post. I got a chance to go by the customer's workplace and plug it into this computer. Now whether every third party charging brick will work on those newer Dell's I cannot say.

EEPROM reset

tymber said:

Hello ,
I am new here and I have got good news !!!!
There is very easy solution for "How to reset the EEPROM"
You don't have to reset the EEPROM and there is no need to buy new Dell battery neither.
Maybe that's why no one has came up with it
Any one interested let me know and lets cut the Dell charge/discharge cycles crap !!!

Just to let you know I have check it on my laptop and it WORKS , battery holds over 2hrs !!!!

Click to expand...

What is your solution to this problem?

I have 2 battery packs and 2 "external" battery packs for a Lenovo ThinkPad that all exhibit the problem. The external battery packs are OEM packs that snaps onto the bottom of the laptop plugging into the expansion connector and is recognized as a 2nd battery. I have opened one of the external packs which contains 4 Panasonic lithium batteries and circuit board. The batteries were in a very discharged state but I have charged the batteries to a combined charge of 15.82V. A lithium charge of 3.9 would equal 15.6. This is considered a low charging state. A charge of 16.8 would be the high charge of 4.2V each.

I am very interested getting these to work again. The std battery packs would just be fun to get working again.

SOLUTION: i had the same problem and found the fix to be a really easy one and the battery now works 100%.
This is the youtube video for the fix:

I think tymber is wanting to sell something.

Yes, I think the laptop manufacturers are very concerned about law suits from battery explosions and fires and are therefore being very cautious and conservative about battery life. Plus, it helps them make more money cause they sell more replacement batteries, the expensive OEM variety in particular so that manufacturing variables are kept within specs.

Found this also. It's a few years old. Not sure if it works:

SSGG said:

SOLUTION: i had the same problem and found the fix to be a really easy one and the battery now works 100%.
This is the youtube video for the fix:

Click to expand...

Thanks for sharing that video. Terrific information on how to bypass the kill circuit. My battery is now able to power the laptop (I manually charged each pair of cells in the pack because one had drained to 0v). However the Precision M2800 refuses to charge the battery when on AC power. The BIOS says that the battery needs to be replaced. Windows reports an incorrect % and says not charging.
Any tips to override and enable the charging circuit?

Help with reset video.

SSGG said:

SOLUTION: i had the same problem and found the fix to be a really easy one and the battery now works 100%.
This is the youtube video for the fix:

Click to expand...

Hello, I know I`m reviving a "dead" subject but I really could use your help.
I have a problem with my Alienware battery (re-celled it recently and the Alienware system says that the battery needs to be replaced even though the battery is not dead) and it seems that I need to reset the chip, but the info I need I believe it could be found inside the YouTube link you talked about in your quote. But when I try to watch the video I get this response from the system: “Unavailable video. This video is confidential”. Is there any chance you have another link or maybe you could give me some tips about the procedure?
Thank you very much in advance!

Yes, that's the problem with Youtube. What's available today may not be a year from now.

Since I`m an electronics technician do you actually remember any clue from the procedure under question?

Sorry, no I don't.

That`s ok thank you anyway