chevenee, unplug the power cord, remove the battery then hold power button down for 10 seconds. Put battery back in and plug power back in. See what happens. Also, you do want to measure the Voltage on the barrel connector and see what your voltage is. As for" push the charger in harder to make it work my laptop shuts off." it does sound like a bad DC jack. you may have to disassemble your Acer and see if the board is cracked on the DC jack or if it is the solder that has cracked. Hope this helps, good luck.