Laptop Battery 0% - Charging - 0 minutes until fully charged

[systemBuilder]

I have an T430s from my employer, and its starting to have troubles. For example, the trackpoint SNAPPED off by itself. Literally. I have never in my lifetime used it and one day I open up the laptop and the red nub is gone, along with about 1/4" of square white plastic tunnel that the nub is supposed to rest on. Not impressive.

I am writing because of another problem, my series-43 battery is no longer recognized by the T430s, but it can be inserted into a T60p and charged to 100%. When I insert the fully charged T60p battery into the T430s, Ubuntu 14.04 says, "Laptop Battery 0%" Charging - 0 minutes until fully charged". I am wondering what is going on - is it possible the ultrabay charging circuit has fried itself? This laptop has never had anything but a battery, although it did have a series-42 battery inserted for a while, by mistake.

I can boot the device with a charged-up series-42 battery, and the laptop says, "This battery cannot be charged by this laptop", and of course the series-42 battery powers the laptop, but the message and policy is Lenovo's cute little way of flipping the bird to its loyal customers.

The T430s has many downsides (burns my thighs, lasts 3 hours on a charge, crappy viewing angles) but I am reluctant to switch over to something newer, and likely worse, from them.