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I recently installed Ubuntu 19.04 on an HP ProBook 430 G3 and discovered the following issues. The battery won't charge when AC pluged-in until the level drops below 15% or less, sometimes even then I have to pull the plug and insert it several times until it starts charging. Also, when on battery power the performance is bad, really bad. I think it has something to do with CPU scaling or something. First I figured there was something wrong with my installation, so I erased everything and installed Lubuntu 19.04, but the same issues appear.

I would like to disable CPU scaling when on battery power and make the battery charge all the time when on AC, not just when the level drops bellow a certain threshold.

Can you help me do that? Thanks!

UPDATE Battery discharged to 45% then plugged the cord in. After 1 hour the batter was down to 3%, to my surprise it didn't charge at all. I had to pull the plug and reinserted like 5 times to get it going. This is becoming very frustrating.

Vlad Balmos
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What you are describing sounds more like a hardware problem. i Googled your laptop model and apparently these are known for having charging issues. There should be a pin that you can straighten inside the charger end that you plug into the laptop. You obviously want to unplug the charger first though. Here's a thread on HP's website about other people with the same problem:

HP Forum on charging problems

and another:

Hp forum post on your model

Finally, try doing stuff like putting upward pressure on the charger while plugged into the laptop and see if it suddenly starts charging. There isnt a software setting that Im aware of in Ubuntu that would prevent a charger from working intermittently.

jwcooper
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  • I think you can tell an OS to only begin charging when battery drops below a threshold and tell it to stop charging before 100%. – WinEunuuchs2Unix Apr 24 '19 at 21:47
  • Lenovo has a little utility on Windows that does that so as to maintain the battery condition, but its a separate application. Ubuntu may have something similar available, but I dont know of anything out of the box that would restrict charging. I'm always learning though so if you know of anything definitely post it in the comments. – jwcooper Apr 24 '19 at 22:12
  • Sorry don't know know anything about HP's. Just IBM, Dell, Toshiba and Compaq in my Laptop history. – WinEunuuchs2Unix Apr 24 '19 at 23:14
  • Definitely a hardware problem. I reverted back to ubuntu 18.10 and the issues persist. Now the laptop won't even run on AC power. – Vlad Balmos Apr 26 '19 at 07:26
  • Charger issues arent too uncommon. The two most likely fixes are either: 1) Try a different AC charger and see if the error is there and if not 2) the error is in the part it plugs into. Its usually a little cube in the bottom of the laptop that plugs into the motherboard. If you google your EXACT laptop model and charging port, you should get a bunch of options on Amazon or Ebay that you can use to replace it. Its a very easy swap. Hope that helps. – jwcooper Apr 26 '19 at 19:25