Librem 14 Not Charging, Stuck at 0% Battery

Hardware Librem 14
1

I didn’t do anything different this morning. I unplugged the Librem 14 from its USB-C hub,l plugged in my work laptop, and came back to the Librem 14 after the workday. To my surprise, it said it was out of power. It lasts about 10 seconds after being unplugged before shutting down. I hadn’t updated any binaries recently.

I had my Librem Control set to hold the charge between 80-85% when plugged in. I tried clicking “Start charge now!” without success. I have also tried using the original charger. The green charging light illuminates on the top for both DC Barrel & USB-C power sources. Unfortunately the one on the side does not work since getting the laptop back from Purism after they repaired the charging barrel & keyboard not working. The lightning icon appears beside the battery in the top right. Charge time is stuck at “Estimating…”

Any suggestions? If there’s any Bios/EC updates, I don’t know if it’s smart to do so while it can’t hold charge above 20%.

Software/Firmware
OS: PureOS 10 (Byzantium), with latest apt update && upgrade
Bios: 4.21-Purism-3
EC: 1.13_2023-03-22

Hardware (Laptop Battery)
State: Charging
Energy: 0.0 Wh
Energy when empty: 0.0 Wh
Energy when full: 39.6 Wh (2.5 years old)
Energy (design) 52.8 Wh (4-cell battery)
Capacity: 75%
Rate: 0 W
Voltage: 7.6 V
Time to full: 0 seconds
Time to empty: 0 seconds
Percentage: 0.0%

image

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Update: after leaving it plugged in to both connectors for over an hour, it has began charging, and estimates it will take 14 hours to get to 100%, where I have the maximum now set. Still charging at only 7.7V for some reason, rather than anywhere near the full 19 V the power supply offers. At least it charges, but it shouldn’t be this slow. Hopefully that fixes itself.

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I suspect the battery calibration is off and it being discharged allowed it to reset. There is a similar issue with the Librem 5: https://forums.puri.sm/t/battery-dropping-from-40-to-0-in-a-few-minutes/19240.

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I’m glad your battery is charging again @magician, I didn’t catch this in time on Friday but that behavior can be normal if the battery is very deeply discharged, it will initially charge at a very low rate.

The UI doesn’t know that Librem EC ramps the charge current to maximize the life of the battery. Librem EC starts and ends at a low charge rate, with higher rates in the middle. The UI is estimating 14 hours thinking that it will be at the low initial rate the entire time.

It should take about 9 hours to charge up to 100%, though again this can vary when the battery was very deeply discharged.

That’s the correct behavior. The 4-cell battery is nominally 7.6 V, so it will charge at voltages around there. You would never want to apply 19 V directly to the battery :wink:

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