Do you keep always the battery on the laptop

[Rwy in Sight]

even if the computer is connected on the mains?

I am fond of keeping the equipment I buy as long as possible. Hence I remove the fully charged battery from the laptop when I am at home. Once a week, I use and recharge the battery hoping it would remain in good shape.

What would you recommend to keep the battery in a better shape?

As usual thank you for your input.

Rwy in Sight

[Keef]

I'd never run a laptop without the battery connected. I've repaired one laptop for a neighbour who regularly ran it without the battery. She doesn't, any more.

Depending on the design of the power system in the computer, it may rely on the battery to stabilise the voltage on the power bus. If it's a 12 volt battery, the charger may deliver anything up to 18 volts off-load. Without the battery, components expecting 12 volts will get 18 volts and the magic smoke starts to leak out...

That's unlikely to affect the CPU or the memory, because they run from a stabilised supply far lower than the battery voltage, but in my neighbour's case it killed the hard drive which wanted 12 volts and didn't like the amount it got.

Simply put: overvoltage hits devices with the square of the overvoltage percentage. 20 percent too many volts, with no regulation, means 20 percent too much current, which means 44% too much power. Heat and smoke escape follow.

[SpringHeeledJack]

Having been in the perhaps bad habit of keeping the power cord in once the battery was charged and seeing how after a year the 'health' deteriorated, I saw the light and fully charge and discharge the battery and have lost negligible 'health' after 400 cycles. It is my understanding that whilst it's possible to run a laptop as a quasi-desktop without battery and just power cord (albeit a bit sluggish on my steed) the fact that the battery is very slowly discharging and then gets a strong 'bump' of charging power when reinserted, it is frowned upon. Some say whole cycles are best, others part cycles, who knows…



SHJ

[Keef]

Many laptops have two "CPU power" levels - full speed, when the mains lead is connected, and "economy" when it's not. If you don't notice any difference, then worry not. My laptop runs at 1600 meg on mains, and about 600 meg (varying with demand) on battery.

Most modern(ish) computer batteries have a finite lifespan, based more on when they were made than how much use they've had. It was different in the olden days of NiCd batteries, which needed to be fully discharged before recharging. Modern ones aren't so fussy.

I've had to buy a new battery for most of my portable stuff around 4 -5 years old. How much use and how many charge cycles didn't make a lot of difference (some but not enough to notice). The laptop battery goes down slowly till it reaches 39%, then falls off a cliff to zero in about ten minutes.

Buying a replacement can be interesting - you don't want one that's been on a shelf for three years. Mine have a "manufactured date" on them.

[mixture]

Do you keep always the battery on the laptop

Well, I tend to keep my batteries in the laptop, rather than on . Most batteries are not exactly works of art. :cool:


Back to the question, and with a big fat DISCLAIMER that I am NOT a battery expert, I would say the following :

(1) Modern batteries are designed to work on a top-up charge basis. The old days of it being a good idea to run your battery flat before recharging in order to "condition" it are long gone.

(2) Laptops have fancy PMU (Power Management Unit) circuits inside them that take care of the health of the battery and when it needs charging. When you plug your power cable into the laptop it doesn't feed straight into the battery, it all goes via the PMU.

(3) I suppose leaving the battery out could also affect the thermal design of the laptop and so put thermal stresses on other parts of the laptop internals that would not normally be subjected to them if the battery was in place.

[henry_crun]

What mixture said, plus having the battery in provides you with a UPS so if the mains flickers you don't suffer data loss.

I charge my chromebook (laptop) in the evening and switch the mains off when the charge light shows blue. Then during the day I remove the charger plug and use it unfettered by mains lead. Seven to eight hours available, I've never got near that yet.

[cattletruck]

Well, those that pay attention would know that I recently I blew up my battery controllers of 2 old laptops in an attempt to refresh the batteries in the battery pack.

I've been running both laptops without a battery pack and haven't had any issues so far.

Now what to do with 6 x $20 of LiIon batteries... a good plan poorly executed.

[The Flying Pram]

I always leave the battery in - as pointed out by henry_crun it provides a UPS function. As for potential lifetime - I read an interesting post by a guy who repairs small powertools and batteries. He's uncovered a sneaky practice by Makita (but who knows what other firms might be doing the same). Apparently the power management software built into the battery has a fixed number of charge/discharge cycles programmed, and once this is reached it will no longer accept a charge...

[mixture]

plus having the battery in provides you with a UPS so if the mains flickers you don't suffer data loss.

Excellent point Henry, forgot that one !