Gateway CX2620 Battery is Now Charging

My trusty CX2620 has been serving the family well for almost 3 years now, but for about the last year the battery hasn’t held a charge that would last more than 5 minutes.  I had attributed this to a bad battery, and with replacements going for around $150, I wasn’t going to sink that much money into an obviously aging laptop. 

A combination of events recently lined up to get my laptop battery back in action.  Our original power adapter’s cord had broken through the insulation around the place where the DC cord enters the adapter brick, so we ordered an el-cheapo replacement from Ebay.  This new adapter had the same specs as the original, and we managed to continue along, still not able to hold a charge, but functional while plugged in.

This new adapter only lasted a couple of weeks before giving out entirely right before we were going on a trip.  We decided against getting another cheap adapter, and put in a order for the original OEM spec adapter, to be shipped to one of the destinations on our trip.  When it wasn’t there when we arrived I checked the order status to find that it was backordered for another 4 weeks.  Since we were suffering from laptop withdrawal, we ended up running out to Circuit City and picking up a Kensington Universal Notebook Power Adapter (K33404US).

Well, the new adapter is a 90 watt adapter, vs. the original 60 watt.  Low and behold, the battery will now hold a charge almost as good as when it was new!