|
|
|
|
A Website Dedicated to Computer Professional...and some not so Professional |
|
The simple fact is, batteries do lose their longevity
after time, (according to electronic super stores your battery will die
after a year if you don’t purchase an extended warranty) but I'd say that
after a year, your battery should be in pretty good shape. The first sign or complaint is that you can’t get
through a 2-hour DVD movie. Watching a movie is a big drain on your battery, but you
should be able to stretch your viewing time. Before your trip, be sure your
battery is fully charged. Rechargeable batteries will give you their longest charge
when you've fully discharged and recharged them several times in a row. It
may be a pain, but a day or so before your trip, let your laptop run until
the system shuts down. Then recharge it and, if you have time, discharge and
recharge it a second time, preferably overnight. This is easier to do at home before a trip, but remember
to do it at the hotel before your return flight as well. Once your battery is full, tweak your laptop's settings to
maximize battery life. Start with your monitor, which is the biggest battery hog.
Find the brightness adjustment for your screen and turn it down by at least
half. Dimming the screen could buy you almost an hour more power. The
battery life on my Apple laptop increased by 45 minutes when I turned my
brightness down. Windows XP and Macintosh OS X both have accurate
battery-monitoring software. Each operating system can display how many
minutes of remaining battery life you have. Do some experimenting with the
screen settings and watch how your battery life increases. Other tips to save power include turning off wireless
networking, removing PC cards and not using floppy or CD drives. The Energy Saver control panel on your Mac and the Power
control panel in Windows XP allow you to configure your system to power down
the screen and hard drive after a period of inactivity. If you fly frequently, you might find which planes have
power. Check with your airline's Web site for information on which of its
planes have power outlets and where they are located on board. You will need
a special power adapter for airplanes that is available at most computer
stores. Also, look for power outlets during airport layovers. In
the gate area of the airport, sit near walls and columns to take advantage
of plugs. That two-hour layover can be enough to recharge your battery. Finally, the best advice I can give is to buy a second
battery for your laptop. Paying $75 or $125 for another battery will
instantly double your movie enjoyment. source for this article came from desktop support manager Jim Rossman
|
|
As a Network Administrator of a large company I frequently
hear complaints from traveling sales people or company staff that have been
assigned a laptop that their battery doesn’t last as long as it use to.
Here are a few tips to help increase the battery life of a laptop battery. 
