Battery Light stays orange for 3 seconds on startup - then goes out

[pkoryn]

My husband has a very old Toshiba Satellite laptop that continues to work well for him except for the latest issue with the battery light on start up. He always uses the laptop connected to power - never on the battery. When he plugs the adapter in and turns on the laptop, the orange indicator light for the battery lights up briefly (about 3 seconds) and then goes out. If he clicks on the battery symbol in lower right near clock, it says "battery remaining n/a". Not sure what that means and what should be done about it. We have replaced the power cord a couple of times over the course of his owning this laptop - most recently a few months ago. That seems to work fine - when we jiggle the connection point there is no blinking of lights so it seems like the connection is a good one. Since he never uses the laptop unplugged (running on the battery) this really isn't a critical issue - more of a confusing one. We thought maybe there was a setting that might have gotten changed somehow which is keeping the battery indicator from lighting up - and that we might be able to easily fix this. Because of the age of the laptop - there's no reason to purchase a new battery for it. I keep telling him it's time for a new laptop - maybe this will finally convince him! I'd appreciate any insights you might care to share with us. Thanks!

 

[hang-the-9]

Sounds like the battery is bad.