Hi, Not sure if this goes here but I didn't see a specific forum about laptops. Apologies if there is one. Anyways, I bought a refurbished Dell laptop from newegg about 4 months ago. The laptop was great and it charged just fine. After a few months though I started to receive a message saying: "The AC power adapter type cannot be determined. Your system will operate slower and the battery will not charge. Please connect a Dell 65W AC adapter or higher for best system operation." Now this was fine as I assumed it was just a bad charger, so I kept using it how it was and I was just unable to unplug it. The issue I'm now having is that my girlfriend also has a Dell laptop and charger. I decided to plug her charger into my laptop and it was charging normally. After about 2 or 3 charges though her laptop is now getting the same message as me using her own charger. I've never heard of batteries of laptops affecting each other like this so I was curious what the issue was. If anyone has any insight into what could cause 2 chargers to basically become duds and what I should do I'd really appreciate it.
It looks like they are actually Dell chargers, they have the sticker that says Dell and information on it. In fact they are 65W just like the message says they should be. The thing that's puzzling though is the fact that just because I used my girlfriend's charger, it's affecting her laptop the same way as mine when it wasn't before. It's only doing it because I used it to charge mine.
Sounds like maybe the laptop messed up both your's and your girlfriend's charger some how charging up yours.It could be something is shorted out in your laptop causing them to go bad.
Hmm, how would I even find the problem though? I've never even heard of that happening honestly. Could it be the actual battery that came with it?
look inside the battery compartment to see if it shows what wattage & amperage is required & see if the adapters meet that requirement. ran into your problem with a customer's laptop who got it free from a friend minus the power adapter. had to replace the keyboard as a couple of the keys did not work as some type of liquid had been spilt on it. used a non-dell power adapter that had more then enough wattage & amperage but was getting that same error as you are getting. got a new dell adapter configured for that laptop off ebay & error message went away.
I looked inside the battery compartment and couldn't find and wattage or amperage requirements, I did however find that the laptop battery seems to be a "REV A01" while my charger/adapter is "REV A02," if that somehow makes a difference. The battery itself seems to also be a Dell-made battery and not something made by a 3rd party. Although I guess the sticker itself doesn't mean 100% proof.
9-cell "smart" lithium ion (85 WHr) 6-cell "smart" lithium ion (56 WHr) 4-cell "smart" lithium ion (35 WHr) 11.1 VDC (6 cell and 9 cell) 14.8 VDC (4 cell) Output current 4.34 A (maximum at 4-second pulse); 3.34 A (continuous) Output power 65 W or higher Rated output voltage 19.5 +/–1.0 VDC ftp://ftp.dell.com/Manuals/all-products/esuprt_laptop/esuprt_latitude_laptop/latitude-d630_user%27s%20guide%202_en-us.pdf
It seems to correspond correctly to the adapter; 65W-AC Adapter Input: AC 100-240V-1.5A(1.5A) 50-60Hz Output: DC 19.5V(19.5v) 3.34A(3.34A)
Try the new battery, that will be the Dell. However, I experianced the exact same issue with same message.
don't get the battery from dell as they don't make them as none of the pc makers do, get it off ebay as will be cheaper but still brand new with warranty.
