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Issues with internal battery

T25 Anniversary/Retro
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aaa
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Issues with internal battery

#1 Post by aaa » Sun Sep 21, 2025 11:27 am

I've tried to replace my internal 3-cell twice now, and both times it did not work. Wondering if I'm missing anything or if this is a motherboard failure.

Both batteries were off ebay, which may be the actual issue :lol:. I'm not sure where else to get them, I was prepared to shell out $100+ direct from Lenovo but they didn't have stock.

First battery, a 01AV421, would not be detected. I left it inside the laptop unplugged, and it recently started bloating up in spite of not being used after a couple years.

Second one was this https://www.ebay.com/itm/334622680394. The multiple pics should have tipped me off but the actual thing looks mostly like the top pic which looks oem. This one is detected, but says 0% waiting to charge. I poke around at /sys/class/power_supply/BAT0/charge_control_start_threshold and it seems stuck at 0.

Strangely enough it shows a serial number of 800 and a cycle_count of 104. My 2 year old external battery's serial is 9001 and has a cycle_count of 85. Kind of odd.

So basically I am wondering if I should request a refund from the seller, or spend more time testing (I have another old tp25 lying around). And also wondering where to get batteries, it sounds like the way to go is to play ebay roulette with the cheapest ones on there. Or just slap in some kind of filler and rely on the external 6-cell.

My bios version is N1QET87W (1.62) if that makes any difference.

dr_st
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Re: Issues with internal battery

#2 Post by dr_st » Sun Sep 21, 2025 4:25 pm

If you can test it with another laptop to prove that the battery is faulty - request a refund. Or just request it now.
The batteries of that generation are notoriously finicky. Here is my experience:
viewtopic.php?f=68&t=137471
Thinkpad 25 (20K7), T16 Gen 3 (21MQ), Yoga 14 (20FY), T430s (IPS FHD + Classic Keyboard), X220 4291-4BG
X61 7673-V2V, T60 2007-QPG, T42 2373-F7G, X32 (IPS Screen), A31p w/ Ultrabay Numpad

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