Randomly started doing it today while I was at work today (my brother text me to tell me). The battery hasn't been holding charge for a while but since it's always plugged into the mains it isn't a problem. I have a feeling it's telling me the battery has definately died but I don't want to fork out for a new battery if I can help it. Wierdly it's running fine in the mains as usual. I'm writing this on it.

Any ideas?

If it flashed with the battery in and power out then the battery is dead.

Does it work with the battery in and the mains? There is usually a health status in the BIOS screen (press F2 on startup).

It's flashing now with the power in. Does it if it's on or off.

Hold on will whip battery out of mine and check...

Just took the battery out of mine (Dell XPS) and the power light oddly doesn't come on at all and just states no battery in the notification area in Win7. I only have one power/charge light though - i think you may have a battery light and a power light?

Does the battery hold any charge? and what does the BIOS say?

Hang on let me check. The power light is solid blue and the battery is flashing orange in pulses of 4 then goes to blue then repeats

Battery is dead then:

http://en.community.dell.com/support-forums/laptop/f/3518/p/19250481/19469467.aspx

BIOS still thinks it's fine but the battery discharges in less than a minute but it's done that for the last year or so. Can I run the laptop off the mains without the battery connected?

Edit: Yes I can. Learn something new everyday

Yep - actually it is reccommended if you don't use the battery often

I had an Inspiron that started doing that, flashing amber power light means the battery is knackered, been working fine on mains for the last 18 months with the fault light blinking away.

Edited 7 May, 201115 yr by DaveI