Laptop battery dies when running Unigine Heaven

[TechPioneer]

Hello! I bought a Lenovo Y700 15ACZ yesterday and brought it home to test, but today, when I launched Furmark and Unigine Heaven 4.0 at 39% battery, in 15 seconds it shut down entirely and when I connected it to the charger, it indicated 0% chagre. I tried benchmarking while plugged in and it works good. I also tried charging it to 100% and playing youtube videos for about an hour and a half and the battery held up pretty well, but I can't figure out why it doesn't run for more than 15sec while unplugged.

While the laptop is tilted or upside down, there seems to be a rattling sound, as if something is in the cooling fan, so now I'm wondering if I should just return it.

Do you guys know what causes this kind of behavior? 

[porina]

Battery charge state is not an exact science. A simple method is to look at voltage changes but the 0 and 100% points will not remain constant due to multiple reasons. More advanced methods will try to measure or calculate the usage rate, but even they are not exact and should still be considered relative measurement.

 

Under a high load, it is normal for the voltage to drop, and that might be enough to push the indicated level down by a large amount. Since it is not a good thing to have a battery totally flat, the protection will kick in and shut down at some low end threshold. 

 

Out of interest, if the battery was charged to 100% and you repeat the Heaven test, how long does it last? 

 

Basically, for any high load use case, you'd probably want to run it connected to power. Running on battery is only really suitable for light loads. 

[TechPioneer]

@porina I tried running it at 40% and it lasted about 10-15sec tops, then I tried it at full charge and the result was same. After the laptop shuts down, it won't turn back on again. In theory this makes no sense. Let me explain:

The battery is rated at 60Wh and the charger (original) it came with is rated at about 135W max; let's say under full load, the laptop needs the maximum amount of power the charger can deliver (135W), so it means that the battery should last about 26 minutes, but it doesn't even last for 15 seconds. I know that it may need more current than the battery can deliver, but I am confused why it goes flat. While drawing too much current from the batteries, they seem to output less voltage, but when disconnecting it from the load and attaching a low power load, the voltage returns to "about" the same voltage it used to be. 

I am really upset, because if I can't fix this, I will have to return it and find another one and finding deals as good as this is a pain.

Thanks for reading my topic and trying to help.

[porina]

1 minute ago, TechPioneer said:

I tried it at full charge and the result was same.

That shouldn't happen. Could be a bad battery. Is the laptop "new"? It looks like the model was released 4 years ago.

[TechPioneer]

@porina The laptop is used. My first thought was to blame the battery, but it held up pretty well, when playing videos. I might charge it to 100% and count how much time it takes to drain it while playing a movie or something like that. I can't think of anything else this moment and would appreciate any suggestions.

[TotallyNotGigabit]

Check the battery health with HWInfo, or BatteryBar to confirm, as it could definitely be a sign of a bad battery.

[TechPioneer]

@TotallyNotGigabit @porina I just checked using BatteryBar. See the results yourselves:

 

I really am pissed. I was expecting the battery to had lost some of it's original capacity, but 53.2 goddamn percent????

 

I'll go return this laptop. I can't thank you guys enough for helping me out. You are awesome!

[porina]

Just now, TechPioneer said:

I really am pissed. I was expecting the battery to had lost some of it's original capacity, but 53.2 goddamn percent????

 

I'll go return this laptop. I can't thank you guys enough for helping me out. You are awesome!

Not totally unexpected unfortunately. A typical battery spec is you go down to 80% of original capacity after 2 years or the rated cycle life. Given this laptop model was released in 2016, it could be 4 years old now.

[TechPioneer]

@porina @TotallyNotGigabit Sorry guys for taking so much of your time, but I wondering if this software is accurate.

After the first photo I took, the laptop, after some time, got up to 100% and the wear decreased to about 22%. I restarted it and now it's at 18.7%.

 

edit: I installed FurMark and now it has been running for about 9 minutes 40 seconds and the battery is at 58%. I don't know what's going on at this point.

[porina]

As mentioned earlier, battery level (and also wear) are not exact measurements. The software reads whatever is reported, so it is more about getting a sensible number out of the battery reporting itself.

 

Thinking more, one trick to help the battery calibrate itself is to try the following:

1, charge it to 100%

2, under light load, drain the battery until the device turns itself off. This should be done slowly, so no heavy loading. Maybe run some YouTube for example.

More than one cycle of the above might be needed.

 

That way the battery management knows the where the two reference points are currently, and might give a better reading.