Laptop's battery life

AnanthaP · 02-06-2011, 04:55 AM

Noticed it too. My UBUNTU tells me the status. At present it's a dire warning that the life left is only 39%. Its little more than three and a half years old. I took it to the dealer. He said that its normal. He suggested keeping the monitor at low or medium brightness to prolong the battery life.

Latios · 02-06-2011, 09:34 AM

I have a Dell Inspiron 1300 made in 2005 and bought in 2006. When was new it did 2.5 - 3 hours on battery. Now it does 2 hours
For 3 years it was used by mom, and was rarely powered from battery
After that for 2 years it is mine, i use the battery but treat it well and dont abuse it

It depends on the use and battery quality. It may be normal for abused battery, but not for normqal use

The brightness of the monitor does not affect the battery when its plugged in

Aquarius_Girl · 02-06-2011, 09:53 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Latios

If you want to use the computer plugged in for a long time, discharge the battery a bit and take it out of the computer

Taking it out of the computer would prove to be a risk of data loss
if the light goes off suddenly!
So is it better to keep the AC plugged on and when the battery gets
to 100%, plug out till the it reaches to 30% and plug back AC in and
thus keep repeating the same process?

Latios · 02-06-2011, 10:54 AM

That probably wears the battery more than being charged full all the time. I would prefer to leave it plugged in

Linux filesystems have journal, which means that the risk of data loss is minimal except for data that was open at the time in an application and not saved. Save often (or set up your apps to auto save often) and you'll be fine without battery

Many desktop computers work without UPS and its not like theyre in huge risk

lupusarcanus · 02-06-2011, 06:17 PM

http://bpr.hpordercenter.com/hbpr/

Did you take a look at that? I had the same problem with my HP Pavilion zv6000, but HP refused to fix it.

Aquarius_Girl · 02-06-2011, 10:00 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by leopard

http://bpr.hpordercenter.com/hbpr/Did you take a look at that?

Thanks for the informative link, I'll check my battery number today.

Quote:

Originally Posted by leopard

I had the same problem with my HP Pavilion zv6000, but HP refused to fix it.

Your battery number was listed there? What reasons did HP give?

Aquarius_Girl · 02-06-2011, 10:25 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Latios

That probably wears the battery more than being charged full all the time.

Then what to do if I want to keep the battery too and use AC too at the same time?

lupusarcanus · 02-06-2011, 10:34 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Anisha Kaul

Thanks for the informative link, I'll check my battery number today.

Your battery number was listed there? What reasons did HP give?

No, mine wasn't listed. Mine was zv6000, not 5000. HP said mine was out of warranty and listed an obscene price to fix it, more than the PC itself was actually worth.

Aquarius_Girl · 02-06-2011, 10:44 PM

I don't know if they'll check for warranty even if the battery number IS listed there?

smeezekitty · 02-06-2011, 11:10 PM

Seems to be a known problem see:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&c...t+PC+battery+n
and
http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport...reg_R1002_USEN

Latios · 02-06-2011, 11:42 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Anisha Kaul

Then what to do if I want to keep the battery too and use AC too at the same time?

Leave it in at full charge

There is no reason to do that. If the power fails, at most you can lose the changes to unsaved file that was open in an application. Set it to auto save all the time, problem solved. (Thats as long as your partition is not ext2 or fat32)

A second hand small UPS (normally anything as tiny as 200 VA will do) is a lot cheaper than replacement battery, and will protect the computer

smeezekitty · 02-06-2011, 11:51 PM

FWIW I keep my laptop plugged in all the time and have for years and the battery still holds reasonable capacity.
Has anyone proven that having it plugged in with the battery in is harmful?

Aquarius_Girl · 02-06-2011, 11:55 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by smeezekitty

You can test a operating system i am writing (Home page)

Firefox can't find the server at smeeze.homelinux.com.

smeezekitty · 02-07-2011, 12:10 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Anisha Kaul

Firefox can't find the server at smeeze.homelinux.com.

hmmm...Not sure why that is.
Apache is working but I cannot access it even from IP.
Guess I have to look into it.

Aquarius_Girl · 02-07-2011, 12:29 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Latios

Leave it in at full charge
There is no reason to do that. If the power fails, at most you can lose the changes to unsaved file that was open in an application. Set it to auto save all the time, problem solved. (Thats as long as your partition is not ext2 or fat32)

So the crux of this post is that it is NOT a good idea to plug in AC ALL the time when battery is present in the lappy? I shall confirm this from the HP vendor.