[Probably Physical] Only HPs Affected? Battery Abruptly Unavailable.

[DB [NOT Cooper]]

Hi, all.

I was able to run on battery power within the last month or so, but now am not, despite charging overnight. Currently stepping back thru updates via TimeShift until my battery (hopefully) works again. If someone has already dealt with this, or has some insight on HP problems, I'd appreciate hearing it. I'll probably have to update when Girl Genius: Adventures in Castle Heterodyne is released.

This is a presently unassigned, known issue for Ubuntu 18.04:
Missing battery status information on HP Pavilion Notebook 15 bc5xxx
Bug #1900741 reported by Marco Trevisan (Treviño) on 2020-10-20

Extract of inxi -FxxxZ Report [20210417]

System:
Kernel: 4.15.0-140-generic (rolled back 1 update so far) x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc
v: 7.5.0 Desktop: MATE 1.20.1 info: mate-panel wm: marco 1.20.1
dm: LightDM 1.26.0 Distro: Linux Mint 19.1 Tessa base: Ubuntu 18.04 bionic

Machine:
Type: Laptop System: Hewlett-Packard
product: HP Pavilion 10 TS Notebook PC (This "vintage" box was designed for Win 8, & Mint provided a nice life extension starting with Qiana. I'd be trying to run my old Amstrad if my folks hadn't cleaned out the basement, lol.)

[JoeFootball]

Extract of inxi -FxxxZ

Can you provide the Battery section of the output as well?

[DB [NOT Cooper]]

Oops. I miiight've been a little too focused on having that Ubuntu bug report, after reporting mine here the first time. It looks like I also missed a really basic now-and-then comparison check:

Battery: (20210417)
ID-1: BAT0 charge: 17.4 Wh condition: 17.4/17.4 Wh (100%) volts: 8.3/11.1
model: Hewlett-Packard Primary type: Li-ion serial: status: Full
cycles: 156

Battery: (2020810)
ID-1: BAT0 charge: 17.0 Wh condition: 20.6/20.6 Wh (100%) volts: 11.5/11.1
model: Hewlett-Packard Primary type: Li-ion serial: status: Discharging
cycles: 185

Voltage has dropped to 8.2V since the earlier text dump, so there's a good chance it's not just the bug, if the bug plays a part.

Shucks & other comments....

[mikeflan]

Battery: (20210417) looks bad to me:

volts: 8.3/11.1

Battery: (2020810) looks good to me.
Now why do you have 2 batteries - I don't know.

My battery report on an entirely different computer:

Code: Select all

Battery:
          ID-1: BAT0 charge: 41.7 Wh condition: 60.6/88.8 Wh (68%) volts: 15.2/14.8 
          model: Hewlett-Packard Primary type: Li-ion serial: <filter> 
          status: Discharging 

[JoeFootball]

Now why do you have 2 batteries - I don't know.

Same battery, but two outputs from two different dates.

[mikeflan]

Hmmm. More full cycles back in August than it has now. That seems unlikely.

If someone has already dealt with this, or has some insight on HP problems, I'd appreciate hearing it.

I just did some research on this and remember other HP laptops having this problem. The charger will drive the laptop, but not charge the battery. Happens on windows too. If you go over to HP and search their knowledge base, you can probably find it. I can't remember what the solution is, but as I remember it may not be an easy fix.

[DB [NOT Cooper]]

Thanks, Mike. I'll check their knowledge base. "Driving but not charging" is a good summary.

I can't flag it SOLVED, but maybe [Probably Physical] would downgrade it suitably.

[mikeflan]

I found the forum post that started my research:
viewtopic.php?f=49&t=346168
but I went through my history and I can't find the HP Knowledge Base item.