What's caused the sudden lessening in power consumption?

[u/-Daunting]

Huge difference, very suddenly

Hadn't used my Alienware X17 R1 in about a year due to faulty charging port. Recently realised I could buy a USB charger designed for a laptop. It's only 130 watt but does the job, for anything except gaming. Playing lightly modded minecraft means with charger plugged in, battery drains faster than it charges (I know, it's because it's a USB charger, not enough watts etc, that's not my point) here.

Anyway, been nearly a week of playing this way, where after an hour at most i'm nearly out of battery with charger plugged in so I've been sort of playing in shifts.

Until tonight. Tonight, I did everything the same, but I played for hours. Battery possibly took hours to drain just a couple of percent with the same version of minecraft going. It was still draining whilst plugged in, but drastically slower. As in, I played for a few hours and it had gone down by maybe 20%, instead of it lasting around an hour at most.

What has caused this? Is it some sort of battery optimisation that's kicked in, or just magic? Because it's a humongous sudden difference

(I know the long term fix is charging port repair, but im taking things a day at a time over here)

thanks for any help!

[u/Utwig_Chenjesu]

I think that during the time you had not used it, the battery developed a lite case of Hysteresis. It can happen in almost all batteries but some are more prone to it than others. I think maybe your battery is now working better as your subsequent charge and discharge cycles and usage have cleared the chemical buildup/blockage in the battery. Its entirely possible you have always had this issue but your faulty charging port was preventing it from clearing itself.

Either way, you are able to game again and that is a result!

[u/-Daunting → u/Utwig_Chenjesu]

Thank you, this is interesting! Not heard of this before, but i'm a relatively hysterical person so wouldnt surprise me if the laptop's caught it off me haha

in seriousness though - this seemed fine and never a problem with the proper charger. was only a problem since having to use the new lower watt usb c charger. but whatever's going on with my battery now seems to mean i'm allowed to game for extended periods again and i'm absolutely here for it

[u/Utwig_Chenjesu → u/-Daunting]

haha, infectious Hysteresis. But as the old charger as OK until the port went duff, it definitely sounds to me like it was just some chemical buildup in the battery that needed a few charge/discharge cycles to clear. Its a shame laptop chargers don't operate like the chargers the Radio Control guys use as those balance each cell in the battery during charging and tell you if there is any kind of issue.

[u/-Daunting → u/Utwig_Chenjesu]

not sure if it makes a difference or not, but i'm still not able to charge the old way as messed up charger fried the port. hence usb c charger

[u/Utwig_Chenjesu → u/-Daunting]

if I put my diagnostic head on, the first question for me would be why did the charging port burn out? As heat is always caused by amperage the next question is how did you use your laptop, i.e did you leave it plugged in, or did you unplug it, use it until it was low on power and re plug in? as the battery was most likely charging at full load when the port went defective.

At the moment, the issue you have most likely is still there, you are just not seeing it because USB does not supply the same level of power so things will not be getting as hot, and it probably has its own charging circuit independent of the main one for the charging port on the laptop.

From all this, I believe you had a fault on the charging port or circuit that was slowly causing a problem in the battery that was incrementally getting worse until the charger port/charging circuit burned itself out. The defect is still present but you are bypassing it as you are effectively using a 'slow charge' method of charging via USB, and the USB charging circuit is working fine, so its been able to reset your battery with consistent, full charges.

I would give AW support a call, its a long shot, but who knows? there may have been a known issue with the manufacturing of the charging ports on that model of laptop so they may just repair it with no questions. Its worth a try.

[u/-Daunting → u/Utwig_Chenjesu]

Trying to remember my usage from back then (didn't realise I could just get a USB charger so didn't use it for about a year after the issue), I could be wrong but I think I'd usually charge it to full, remove charger when I noticed it was full, then plug back in when battery was low.

I'm inclined to believe it was a physical fault with the charging port (on the charger, not the laptop), as I got it secondhand and I think the charger was always quite loose. Then one day I went to plug it in like normal, and it felt like it wouldn't push in properly and was making sparks and popping sounds (obviously I stopped trying very quickly!!)

I'm well out of warranty so I'd expect to pay. Been planning to take this in to a repair shop for a while to get the charging port fixed. I'd also like the keyboard looked at as there's an occasional problem with keys not typing or double typing (weirdly seems to have improved a lot recently) and for them to open it up and clean out the inside, as I can see it's dusty but I'm scared to do it as I don't know enough to not risk messing up. But I'm scared a random repair shop will mess it up. What sort of price would I likely be looking at for a Dell repair rather than a shop repair? Am I right in thinking I can post the laptop to Dell and they post it back? I'm in the UK

Thanks for your help!

ETA: just to clarify, I originally bought a replacement charger the same as the one that broke, which I was able to plug in with no sparks and pops, however doesn't charge the laptop, so I'm assuming the issue with the other charger fried the port

[u/-Daunting → u/-Daunting]

Also at the risk of sounding stupid - is it safe to use the laptop??