My HP EliteBook 840 G5 suddenly stopped charging overnight. It worked only when connected to the AC adapter, while the battery remained stuck at 1%. Eventually it stopped turning on reliably, and the charging LED began blinking orange about every half-second when a battery was installed. It sometimes does the same thing with the battery removed, although it occasionally starts normally on AC power.
I replaced the original battery with a compatible third-party battery. It worked and charged normally for the first day, but after I discharged it for calibration, it became stuck at 1% too. After roughly 30 minutes of charging, the reported charge level had not changed, and the laptop began showing the same blinking-light behavior as before. Connecting the AC adapter while the laptop is running also makes it shut down immediately.
The laptop is an HP EliteBook 840 G5 with an i5-8350U and 8 GB of RAM. It uses a non-original HP-compatible adapter rated around 100 W, although the laptop is normally specified for a 65 W adapter, and both batteries are third-party compatible models. The charging light stays orange, and Windows shows the battery as charging with the lightning-bolt icon. Could the adapter, charging circuitry, or battery connector be faulty, or is the laptop damaging the batteries?
1 Answer
The orange light and lightning-bolt icon only indicate that the laptop detects a battery and an AC connection; they do not confirm that the battery is actually receiving current. Since two batteries show the same 1% behavior, the fault may be with the charger, DC-in jack, battery connector, or the motherboard’s charging circuit rather than both batteries. Run the battery and system component tests from HP PC Hardware Diagnostics, preferably with the adapter connected. Also verify that the adapter is the correct voltage and has the proper HP identification pin, because a generic high-wattage adapter may still be incompatible.
The charging LED remains orange instead of turning white, and Windows continues to show the charging icon. I’ll run the HP hardware diagnostics and check whether the adapter is properly recognized.