Weird Battery Problem.

[eRondeau]

My 14" iBook G4 is 32-months old and has always worked perfectly. About two months ago I replaced the battery with a brand-new original-equipment Apple battery as the original battery's capacity had slowly dwindled down. The new battery worked great, lasted hours and hours, only about 60 charge/discharge cycles. Then on Tuesday I was running the computer off the battery when all of a sudden it just died. Bam, just like that, no warning or anything, and the battery icon wasn't even red yet. I plugged it in and rebooted and it worked fine, only now the battery gauge won't charge above 51%. At 51% the power plug turns green and it stops charging. Coconut Battery says I'm still capable of a nearly 4000mAH charge but all I'm getting is half that! I've rebooted several times, reset PRAM/NVRAM for the first time ever, unplugged the charger -- all to no avail. And now when the battery runs down to 0% it just shuts down without warning; no more sleep!

So whaddya think? Bad battery? Faulty computer? HELP!!!!!

 

[DannySmurf]

Try calibrating the battery (following the directions in the manual that came with the computer). Charge it as much as it can, rest it for 5 hours, discharge the battery completely (until the computer shuts down by itself), rest 5 hours, then charge it again.