Miscellaneous laptop discussions : Extending the life of my laptop's battery
- 3/20/09 3:10 PM
New Battery on the Way after significant Loss of Capacity
by MOSFET2288a - 3/23/09 7:27 AM In reply to: HP Laptop's battery life by Grga48I just wanted to point out that my laptop is one year and two months old but that, commencing with February of 2009, I have noticed a marked drop in capacity. I would fully charge my laptop each day or at least until such point as it reaches maximum capacity each day. When I am home, sometimes I would leave the laptop on all night, even if it is "asleep" or "hybernating". It seems to me that from all the research I have conducted here and on Wikipedia, the problem with Lithium Ion Batteries is that eventually there is a noted drop-off in capacity arising from continually charging and recharging.
It seems to me obvious that one step in extending the life of the Lithium Ion Battery would be, whenever possible, when you have access to A-C power, to disconnect the Lithium Ion Battery and rely upon that. Maybe you won't be able to utilize the Lithium Ion Battery indefinitely, but I would think this would be a sure-shot for extending the life of the Lithium Ion Battery as long as you can.
I purchased a replacement battery (boosting the available capacity from the original eight-hour model (How did they manage to arrive at that figure?) to eleven hours (Which remains to be seen!). I will seek to utilize A-C power whenever possible, and when I do, I will have removed the Lithium Ion Battery to minimize power and capacity losses as the result of heat generated by my H-P laptop. Apparently, while the laptop is "on", it generates heat, and that heat, over a period of time, eventually "cooks" the Lithium Ion Battery.
Extending battery life...
by Bryan King - 3/17/09 3:04 AM In reply to: Extending the life of my laptop's battery by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
Hi Raji,
I also have an HP laptop and encountered the same problem. Despite many saying that Li-Ion does not suffer memory effect, my experience tells me different. What I have found to be effective is to use the laptop on battery power till you get a low battery warning, then plug it in and continue to work while it is charging. After a couple of hours remove the plug to check if it is fully charged, and repeat the cycle. The only down side on the HP is the screen backlight is dimmer while on battery power.
Hope this helps,
Bryan K
Extending laptop battery life
by sakiwi - 3/17/09 4:15 AM In reply to: Extending the life of my laptop's battery by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
Hi Raji the best method I have discovered of extending battery life is to buy a notepad cooler. I have a dell inspiron 6000 which I purchased in 2004 and the battery is still the same as the day I bought it. The notepad cooler is powered by your laptop via usb while it is on and keeps your equipment cool and thus extends its life. Far less expensive than purchasing a battery every year.
HP 1.5 years
by martinbus1962 - 3/17/09 5:37 AM In reply to: Extending the life of my laptop's battery by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
I would get onto HP as it only being a year and half normal a battery should last at less a good 3 years.
Battery Lifetime Expectancy
by Deschron - 3/17/09 7:17 AM In reply to: Extending the life of my laptop's battery by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
To Raji K.
In response to your question as how to get "More Lifetime Out Of
A Battery"!!My experience has shown me that the best way to get a better and longer "Life Span" out of a battery,is to leave it plugged in at all times.
Your battery is there for times when you are not near a Power Outlet,and you have to have certain things done on your Laptop,but,
when you are done,plug it back into a Power Outlet.
What I do is my way of extending Battery Life.You don't have to do it my way,I am sure that there will be a lot more ideas from other
members,that may work better for you.Like I said,that is my two cents worth..Have a great day and good lucl. Ron
charge and discharge
by brushmaster - 3/17/09 8:10 AM In reply to: Extending the life of my laptop's battery by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
Hi Raji:
Your battery must be a Lithium ion, which means that you must try to never let it go under the 35% of charge if you want to make it last. You also have to check if the battery and/or laptop has a charge sensor that suspends the current supply when its totally charged, because if you have a full charged battery and let it plugged, it will also make it last less. If you have been aware of the heat that your laptop generates, and if it`s uncomfortable or worst to work with it in your laps, then try to get a laptop cooler, the heat is the worst enemy of the battery cells, and is even dangerous. Of course you must read the manufacturer`s manual to check if there are other measures you must have to take proper care of your laptop.
Battery Life
by jpridie - 3/17/09 9:27 AM In reply to: Extending the life of my laptop's battery by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
Charge your new battery up fully and run it right down a few times to condition it. Then don't leave the battery in the computer for hours when you are working with the external power source. If you store the battery half discharge it and then use and charge it at least once every 2 months. If you are using the lap top frequently if you deep cycle the battery that is use more than 15% of the charge you will only get about 300 cycles from the battery and then you will need a new one. Apple laptops have better battery management so you don't have to worry about being plugged in for days on end. PCs on the other hand mostly overcharge the batteries which is not good for them. Finally if you use the laptop on battery a lot buy a spare and cycle the batteries and they will outlast the laptop which will probably be outdated in three years anyway.
LiIon battery care
by device_node - 3/17/09 9:48 AM In reply to: Extending the life of my laptop's battery by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
The best way to keep a LiIon (or LiPoly) battery is to store it at half-charge in a cool place (not cold). LiIon batteries hate heat and I don't think they like to sit on the charger all the time.
If you use your battery regularly, then when you're using it at a desk and have it on the A/C Adapter, just remove the battery until you're ready to leave. This keeps it off the charger (this may be my superstition) but most importantly keeps it away from heat sources involved in charging, charger, CPU and video chip (scientific fact).
If you DON'T run on battery-power regularly, then discharge it about halfway and toss it in a drawer. When you know you're going cordless for a while, insert the battery a couple of hours ahead of time to get a full charge. Or if you just don't want to shut down going from home to work, just put in the half-charged battery, suspend the PC, unsuspend it when you get to work and have it on the A/C adapter, and then remove the battery. Suspend will gradually run down the battery so when you see the battery meter inching down to 1/4 charge, then leave the batter on the A/C adapter until it gets back to 1/2 charge. Then take it out.
Deep discharging does NOTHING for LiIon batteries.
I'll tell you one downside about high-capacity batteries: In my experience, they fail much sooner (with average use) as compared to low-capacity batteries. Here's why.
I spent a lot of time taking apart laptop batteries and testing cells and trying to reassemble a working pack. What I found was that all laptop batteries use a parallel/series combination of cells. Usually two or more cells in parallel (yup, just strapped together!) and then usually three of these packs in series. When you get a 12-cell battery, you're getting three sets of four parallel cells. A 6-cell battery has three sets of two parallel cells.
Why does this matter? Well, in order to just strap cells in parallel, their terminal voltages and charge capacities have to be precisely matched. Otherwise, the stronger cell will just discharge directly into the weaker cell(s) and drain that section of the battery (remember, there were three parallel sections in series). The battery-management chips don't like imbalances, because that can lead to battery over-charging or over-discharging and the fear of overheating and burning. So the battery-management chips shut down the whole battery if they see one of the three sections getting out of balance with the others.
The significance of all this is that with average use (keeping the battery in the laptop even when on the A/C adapter), I found empirically that the high-capacity (12-cell) batteries failed earlier (6-9 months) than the 6-cell batteries (12-15 months). I attribute this to the higher probability of cell instability in the parallel pack as the cells age; when you have more cells in parallel, you have higher probability that a cell will go out of balance sooner.
I always go with normal (standard-capacity) batteries and just get several. However, if you store it in a drawer at half-charge, a high-capacity battery will stand by nicely for a trip where you want extended battery power without changing batteries. Just don't put it through a lot of charge-discharge cycles when you really don't need the extended run time on one battery.
- John
Extending the life of a laptop battery and other help
by itcruiser - 3/17/09 10:30 AM In reply to: Extending the life of my laptop's battery by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
First of all this is of course just my opinion as someone who has worked both in IT and the cell phone industry for a living and dealt with rechargeable batteries a lot.
HP makes excellent products, their laptops being no exception. They provide excellent support and my first assumption with your replacing the battery is that since you had the laptop and original battery for over a year and a half, the battery wasn't under warranty anymore?
I hope that when you purchased a new one, that you bought an HP approved battery, as some of the 3rd party ones, while cheaper, can damage a laptop or whatever you are using it in.
Plus the warranty would be void on your laptop if there is any left when using a "non-HP" battery on your HP laptop. At least that is usually the case with most manufacturers.
It is hard to say what kind of testing and quality control went into making the 3rd party or "knock off" brand of your laptop's battery. You can save a lot of money with non-HP or other major brand's batteries, but sometimes you get what you pay for, and a laptop that cost over a thousand dollars(?) probably isn't something you want to test out an unknown manufacturer's battery on.
Depending on your operating system, (Microsoft or otherwise),they each have ways to hibernate or set up different profiles for how you use your laptop.
Sleep mode, lower energy consumption profiles, etc., are good ways to extend the current charge on a batteries life. I have always been taught to let a rechargeable battery that has any charge in it to be used until it doesn't have any charge left in it.
From there, charge it all the way to fully charged (probably overnight while you are sleeping). Personally, since I normally do not use laptops as much as desktops, power management hasn't been an issue, but when I have had one, the advertised battery use time is usually 3 to 4 hours.
You do have to pay close attention to the fine details though, because there is a big difference in 3 to 4 hours of idle or minimal use time and time watching a movie or things that require more "juice" due to moving parts, more demand on the processor (like running programs), accessing the hard drive more often, etc.
I would also check for BIOS/Firmware/Driver Updates for your laptop on HP's website and see if there are any. If you don't fell comfortable doing a BIOS update as this can be very risky sometimes, have a PC Technician do it or someone very knowledgeable in PC repair.
Sometimes BIOS updates can do wonders for a computer. Just read the notes on what it is supposed to fix with your laptop and if it sounds like something you need, I would definitely update it.
I would also use a search engine and research software for helping with battery or energy management of your laptop as I'm sure there is a market for it.
Sorry for such a long answer or at least an attempt at one. I hope maybe I have helped you out a little bit at least.
Extending the life of my laptop's battery
by Aparicio Martínez - 3/17/09 4:43 PM In reply to: Extending the life of my laptop's battery by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
Dear Raji.
Battery is the dark side of the laptop
Wikipedia has very good and useful information
I suggest you this one:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium-ion_battery#Guidelines_for_prolonging_Li-ion_battery_life
Good luck.
Aparicio
Extending the life of my laptop's battery
by Loongk - 3/17/09 8:50 PM In reply to: Extending the life of my laptop's battery by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
I had a similar problem with my Toshiba Satellite laptop. Not sure if it will apply to you though.
When I checked my battery level, it never reached 100% and I had to have it on AC power all the time.
I removed the battery, cleaned the terminals with a dry cloth, put it back and it worked perfectly again.
You should really let the battery totally exhaust itself about once a month.
Extending the battery life on your computer
by brenq - 3/17/09 11:43 PM In reply to: Extending the life of my laptop's battery by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
I don't own a laptop myself but a lot of my friends do and from their experiences I have learned some ways to extend the life of your laptop battery. One good way to start off with the new battery is to completely drain the battery its first use and completely charge it as well. Repeat this for the first few charges so the battery has a stable memory. One other simple way is to run the power options tool in vista, and change the power levels to run more efficiently. Another good thing is to have your computer convert to sleep mode after a small amount of inactivity. Avoid leaving your laptop on overnight or for any other extended periods of time. Have as few services running as possible as long with hidden tasks. I can't really provide much information on software to help with your problem, but there's a few tips on how to extend the life of your battery.
'brenq'
About draining a LiIon battery...
by device_node - 3/18/09 2:16 PM In reply to: Extending the battery life on your computer by brenqDo NOT do this. Do NOT drain the battery fully several times. There is no such thing as "memory" in LiIon batteries and never has been. This will only stress your battery and decrease its lifetime incrementally.
This is a common superstition passed down from the early days of NiCd. There is no truth in it whatsoever with respect to LiIon.
The only useful purpose of fully draining a LiIon is to stress it to try to force it to fail while it is still under warranty, as a way of "screening" for a bad battery pack.
- John
P.S.: Realize that you will never "fully drain" a LiIon battery pack because of the balancing and protection circuitry. It doesn't allow the voltage across any of the cell groups to fall below the minimum stipulated cell voltage (usually 2.5-3.0V) across any parallel cell group. The protection circuit will electrically disconnect the battery from the appliance and wait for charging again. But even this functional "full discharge" will stress the battery and should not be done for fun or superstition; only when you really need to use the battery. It won't kill the battery to do it a small number of times over the battery's lifetime but if you do it regularly you will kill your battery 20-30% sooner than what it's lifetime could be.
Wikipedia says don't frequently fully discharge...
by device_node - 3/18/09 2:25 PM In reply to: Extending the battery life on your computer by brenqIf you don't believe me, believe Wikipedia.
Thank you, Aparicio, for the link (several posts back).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium-ion_battery#Guidelines_for_prolonging_Li-ion_battery_life
I also agree with what they say about doing a "full" discharge every month or so to recalibrate the laptop's battery meter as the cell ages.
- John
Presently want to replace battery for Sony laptop
by narasareddi - 3/18/09 5:55 PM In reply to: Extending the life of my laptop's battery by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
I want to replace the battery for my Sony laptop.It will cost around $120 to 150. Please suggest me what are the precautions to be taken to extend the life of battery.I will be more pleased to hear the suggestions. Thank you in-anticipation.
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