How to Check Sony XG 500 Battery

Front top view of the Sony SRS XG500 speaker.

Covers how to check the battery inside the Sony boombox speaker model XG 500 for correct operation, and also, how to know if the battery charge holding capacity is falling over time, and thus, when to replace the battery.

How to Check Sony XG 500 Battery, Current Charge

1. First, Turn ON the XG 500

You won’t be able to read battery charge status unless the speaker is ON.

The -Power- button on the Sony XG 500.

To turn on the speaker, press and release the Power button, pointed at by the green arrow in the last picture.

The Power lamp on the top of the unit should then light up green, as we see next, and the speaker may make a two-beep sound and a voice announcement if it pairs to a nearby device. If it does not boot, then the battery could be completely dead.

The -Power- lamp.

But as long as there’s some energy in the battery, the speaker should power up. When it does, move on to the next step.

2. Have the Speaker Tell You the Percent of Battery Power Remaining

When the speaker is running, you can press the Battery button on the back button panel, and the 500 then announces the percentage of battery charge left.

The Battery button on the Sony XG 500 boombox speaker.

Doing this, makes the speaker announce the following in a female voice depending on just how full the battery is…

- 91% – 100%: “Battery Fully Charged”
- 81% – 90%: “Battery about 90%”
- 81% – 90% (Battery Care mode): “Battery Care Mode, Fully Charged, Battery about 90%”
- 71% – 80%: “Battery about 80%”
- 61% – 70%: “Battery about 70%”
- 51% – 60%: “Battery about 60%”
- 41% – 50%: “Battery about 50%”
- 31% – 40%: “Battery about 40%”
- 21% – 30%: “Battery about 30%”
- 11% – 20%: “Battery about 20%”
- 1% – 10%: “Please Charge”

3. Look at the CHARGE Lamp

Or, if you don’t want to fumble around with opening the back panel door, or you do not need to know exact percentages, you can tell at a glance if the battery is on the verge of completely running out of power by way of the CHARGE lamp. When the battery is not critically low, this lamp is dark. But when the speaker has very little charge left, the CHARGE lamp flashes orange.

E,g, The next picture shows the lamp location. It’s the closest light to the left edge of the top buttons panel.

The glowing orange -CHARGE- light on the top of the speaker.

How to Check Sony XG 500 Battery, Overall Battery Condition

When the speaker is new, and using the included 20 volt charger, the battery charge time is about three (3.0) hours to reach a full charge. And, the full battery should last for around thirty (30) hours of play time (when not using Battery Care mode) before going dead. You get this time when playing the speaker at low to medium volume levels and with surrounding temperatures in the 70s or 80s.

But a sign of a bad battery, is that it goes dead too fast, or takes too little or too much time to fully charge. So if you fully charge your speaker, but it only plays for under twenty hours before dying, its battery may be bad, and unable to hold a full charge anymore. Or if the CHARGE light goes out in under two hours after you start charging from completely dead state, then the battery may also be on the verge of failing.

Also, if the XG 500 battery takes longer than four hours to completely recharge, this could also mean a failing battery and time to replace it.

It might mean too, that the charger you’re using is not robust enough to recharge the speaker in the specified charge time. So be sure to use the (20 volts, 4 amps, 80 watts) AC adapter that comes with this speaker (or equivalent) for fastest results.