Thinkpads Forum

I was finaly charging and cycling my battery today when I noticed how extreamly loose the 8 cell pack feels when attached. I can't believe how much play there is with it.

is this normal or is my battery/Laptop defective. It really detracts from the sturdy feel, theres got to be about 4mm of play on each side. Is it same to use the battery with it wiggling around this much?

I've got an X60 with an 8-cell battery and I have zero play along the left-right axis, but about the thickness of a credit card along forward-backward axis. I can squeeze in a credit card underneath and it only falls off when I lift the computer if I pull the battery hard and away from the main body. There is a tiny tiny tiny bit of play in up-down axis.

I noticed when I got home the secondary latch was not in all the way. redit card wise though I can fit 2 credit cards in the space its still a bit loose but not as bad as I thought.

I have a lot of play in my 8-cell, but none in my slim 4-cell; I've heard a lot of similar complaints about the 8-cell before, so I'm assuming it's normal.

revertTS wrote:I have a lot of play in my 8-cell, but none in my slim 4-cell; I've heard a lot of similar complaints about the 8-cell before, so I'm assuming it's normal.

Same for me. No play in my slim 4 cell - lots in my 8-cell

Same with 4 cell enhanced on x61s. No play but plenty on the 8 cell. I use an index card folded twice to minimize the play.

Duct-Tape is a Lenovo-Tablet-Owner's best friend!

Funny you mentioned it, because I actually turned to duct tape last week for my 1.5 years old X60. It is the small and thin plastic bar/piece of the main body that separates the SD-card slot from the PC-card slot on the front-left side.

I think what happens is that I quite often lift the notebook with by left hand only holding it in that front-left region. After more than 18 months, the plastic probably gave up and broke. I still got the two pieces but they are too small to super-glue back.

Both slots work fine, but the cover for the PC card slot does no longer close because the tiny swing-back spring rests on the broken piece. Since I never use the PC card anyway, I decided to duct tape the entrance to prevent dust/dirt to get inside the X60.

Looking at the design, this is the first thing I would say could have been designed better/slightly more robust.

BTW, does anyone know of these kind breaks are covered by the basic warranty (got 3yrs depot til Sept 2009)? Don't think I'll be bothered, but good to know.

I guess it's quite normal. Even my T42 has the same loose battery problem. (4 years and not fixed, come on now Lenovo...)