Long story short, my laptops DC input is no longer working. Yes, I’ve tested every aspect of the power supply. I even measured the motherboard input voltage, and it is being properly fed. I suspect a faulty DC-DC converter.
So, I had this idea of removing the battery permanently, and instead emulating it with a power supply with matching voltage. I don’t really need the battery anyway (I mostly use a laptop for the form factor).
In theory, the laptop will then think it’s running off of battery power. Permanently. Are there any consequences in terms of performance that could arise from this? Of course, the power settings will need to be adjusted, but beyond that I’m wondering if there’s a hardware aspect that I cannot control.
It won’t work, it will try, then inspect the battery for its voltage and other stats via i2c, decide the battery is unsafe, and shut itself off.
I might be wrong, but systems I’ve worked with do this because they want to make sure the battery won’t explode, they have a battery management chip, either on the motherboard or in the battery, and this tells it whether the battery is safe to use or you should shut down, and if it can’t communicate it will probably assume it should shut down.
Personally I’d solder a new barrel connector on, or figure out where the dc-dc converter is and either replace it or backfeed.
It may be possible to get past that, I’ve seen people disassembling the battery to get the BMC and connecting the DC power supply to that instead.
It sounds way more risky than OP’s initial idea. I wouldn’t recommend taking apart batteries.
I’ve taken apart laptop batteries. It isn’t that hard, but what op wants to make happen seems like a ton of sketch work.
If it’s from the last few years and the barrel input has an adjacent usb-c port it may accept usb power delivery
The port may not even be labeled for it
It just so happens that there’s a USB-C close to ir, but I think that’s just a coincidence as this laptop eats a lot more than even the beefier USB chargers. 20V, 14A. Some sort of square 4 pin connector I haven’t seen elsewhere.
You get to add “Electrician” to your CV. Its the law.
I think it would be fine. You’ll never try to charge it obviously.
Will the laptop be happy with that though? It might be expecting communication with the BMS. I’d just try it and see.
I’m fine with an “OmG Battaray err0r!!!1”-warning that I can send to /dev/null as long as it works. I’m more worried about performance, as this is a gaming laptop that is used as such.
you are probably better off taking it to a computer repair shop to have the issue fixed or replaced, for peace of mind and probably liability reasons
