CAA: Christian Anime Alliance

I've got me a laptop here (Compaq Presario) - it's about a year and a half old, and for some reason the battery is going kaput. When I first got it, it could last a good hour and a half. Now? I've had it on for a little less than a half an hour, and it's gone from fully charged to 6% of its juice left.

I know there's a myriad of reasons a battery would do this - my question is is there a way for me to help the battery hold in there for a while longer? I take notes in class with my laptop, and having it cut out halfway through a lecture is...really not fun.

Right now buying a new battery isn't fully within my means. And a new laptop is right out, so if there's a more...economical way to fix this, help would be appreciated. :3 Thanks!

Your battery most likely ran short of charge cycles. D: Some laptops don't have the best batteries, and after a year or two of constant usage, their batteries will short out really quickly.

To maximize battery usage, make sure you're only running necessary programs and try to dim your laptop's screen brightness a bit.

MSP is essentially correct. Look into turning down the brightness. Don't use the CD or play MP3s - that takes constant CPU cycles! If you can reduce the number of times the system connects to the hard drive (defrag it while plugged in, and make sure you don't have any kind of disk analyzer running in the background).

Unfortunately, though, you're going to have to buy a new battery or lug the power cord around with you. If you can't sit in a seat that has an outlet near it, maybe put your computer to sleep in between "important notes" until you have a battery.

Sorry the outlook is so glum!

I had a feeling the outlook was dim, since I usually only run Notepad and Firefox and have the screen brightness turned all the way down.

In the event that I get another battery somewhere down the road, are there measures I can take to make sure I don't run it down like I did this one? I'm guessing it mostly depends on the battery make itself, but no harm in trying?

You might try these tips for PC World:

http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,117424-page,1/article.html

The first half is about keeping your machine running, but the second half seems be about maximizing overall life.

Having lugged laptops around for years, the best advice I can give anyone is...
budget about $100/year for laptop batteries.

Suggestion #2, however, will increase your initial cost and decrease your overall cost. Buy two batteries so you can risk running them all the way down. Never short-cycle a battery (i.e., run it partially down then charge back up, or only partially charge it before going off wall-plug). This will as much as double the total life you get out of it. However, you need to really use the computer a lot for this to be worthwhile. Think about it: if you're going to get 2-3 years out of both batteries (because you doubled their lives) you're looking at 4-6 years total for the pair. If you aren't going to upgrade in that time, you just saved the cost of two batteries, but if a computer is only going to stay with you 2-3 years before you upgrade, there may be no point to the hassle.

Based on the age you've given for your laptop, I'm going to assume you are using lithium ion batteries. These batteries don't really have a memory effect, so it's find to charge them up from halfway. Lithium ion batteries have lives measured in total charge-discharge cycles, so don't bother trying to fully discharge them - you'll only be shortening the battery life.

Depending on use, a laptop battery usually needs to be replaced every two or three years, with moderate battery use. If you are a heavy battery user, a year and a half is not unreasonable, particularly if you run it on battery for classes. Lithium ion batteries will deteriorate with age, so it's best not to buy two from the start - wait until you need another to buy it, because aging starts as soon as it's manufactured.

Mr. SmartyPants (post: 1197404) wrote:Some laptops don't have the best batteries, and after a year or two of constant usage, their batteries will short out really quickly.

Batteries shorting our really quickly? I'd hope not!

Kaligraphic (post: 1197648) wrote:Based on the age you've given for your laptop, I'm going to assume you are using lithium ion batteries. These batteries don't really have a memory effect, so it's find to charge them up from halfway. Lithium ion batteries have lives measured in total charge-discharge cycles, so don't bother trying to fully discharge them - you'll only be shortening the battery life.

Depending on use, a laptop battery usually needs to be replaced every two or three years, with moderate battery use. If you are a heavy battery user, a year and a half is not unreasonable, particularly if you run it on battery for classes. Lithium ion batteries will deteriorate with age, so it's best not to buy two from the start - wait until you need another to buy it, because aging starts as soon as it's manufactured.

Quoted for truth.

Also, an excellently thorough guide to laptop batteries (beyond the usual manufacturer advice):
http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=91846

Fair warning. The link in the last post, while it does treat certain myths, has several pieces of misinformation. This is probably due to the misimpression that Li-Ion batteries are one kind of battery. There is actually lots of different chemistries out there, and the technology has evolved dramatically in the last ten years. Often, something is true for one kind, and gets into the public knowledge base as if it were true for all kinds.

My credentials are having worked in the past with the battery management / power management chip design group in my company. I'm out of date since I have worked in more recent time with other sectors, so I can't reliably quote numbers, but I do have enough knowledge to make the above statement.

First of all, please note that there is no such thing as a memoryless dry rechargeable. The myth that Li-Ion batteries are memoryless probably comes from the fact that NiCads are extremely sensitive to short cycles, and in comparison, Li-Ions seem 'memoryless'. You are still best off with a fairly deep cycle in the long run. However, as I tried to point out, there isn't enough benefit versus the hassle, because they are very good at short cycles too.

The idea that Li-ion batteries deterioriate regardless of use is not precisely true. Li-ion batteries in regular use deteriorate due to oxidation in 2-3 years. They last longer on the shelf, and less use will cause less oxidation. (But shelf storage doesn't prevent oxidation, just slows it down. So the statement isn't entirely wrong, either. Just a half-truth.)

If one did purposefully keep one's laptop on when you aren't using it, in order to discharge the batteries, yes, that would shorten the life, so don't do that.

Full discharge of Li-ion batteries causes damage to the cell, and for this reason, people will tell you that you are better off not letting your laptop run all the way down at all. What you need to understand is that your laptop has a management circuit that is actually cutting you off and refusing to run before your battery gets down this far. "Out of battery" on a laptop isn't really "empty", but simply below the spec. That's why most laptops can power up, tell you you're out of battery, then shut off again, if you attempt to turn them back on in this state.

You actually NEED to let your computer get down to this point once in a while, though. I think most manufacturers put the number at every thirty cycles. This is not for the battery but for the 'gas gauge', the chip that is monitoring your level of charge. It needs to recalibrate, or it literally loses track of your battery's real status. If it doesn't, then it will begin mis-managing your battery, which also leads to shortened life-time.

This is because Li-Ion batteries are much more erratic than NiMH batteries. It's for this reason that Prius Hybrids don't use Li-Ion batteries. NiMH batteries can go through many more short-cycles (as they tend to in a hybrid) and not develop this problem. However, even they have memory, and eventually must be replaced, and even they are better off with deeper cycles.

Huh... Imagine that. That was a very informative little post you've got there, ETF!

-.- 'ziz is not looking good. I have a laptop supplied by my school. I use it at least 5 days a week. The battery life is maxmium 3 hours if you have your screen turned down low. If not then 2 or so hours. Unfortunately, the wiring was kind of tapered with when I got it caught in my big comfy chair.

Explanation: I will sit in my chair (it's kind of like a lazy boy model with a footrest) and I had it plugged into the wall behind me. The phone rang. I get up quickly, set my laptop on the chair and ...er.. the cord wiring was caught in the metal footrest bars *the footrest swung down really fast* and we had to electric tape it. After that luckily no problems.

Now the battery is making a beeping noise every time I plug it in and my laptop is sitting hibernating on my kitchen table. I checked the wires and that doesn't seem to be the problem. The beeping noise is coming from the battery itself and I don't quite know what to do. I had my laptop charging just 3 hours before and when I went to plug it in again it went beep.and won't charge my laptop at all...so any ideas what could be the problem?
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WHAHAHA I got my laptop to work... so therefore everything else about this is nix. XD I just had to play with the wires... and almost get shocked...O_o ... oh well I got it working now so I'm happy.

You might have tore something up inside your computer...