As I recall, I have already written an article related to this subject, but now I want to emphasize some aspects which I did not mention in the past, many of them received thanks to you, in our comments box.
First of all, those who use laptops in their daily life must know that a battery will eventually run out of energy. I heard about people that took the battery from the computer and put it into the freezer for about 12 hours, took it from the freezer, let it to reach the room’s temperature again and then placed in the battery bay in the computer, where it belongs. And they say that this method really works.
I prefer to buy a new battery when the old one remains out of power, because I am sure that this method can’t provide me energy for one year or for two years. The energy that can be provided could be for a few days, time in which you must keep your computer very close to an outlet, in case you experience some shortcomings with the battery that shows a certain remaining time, in hours, and which stops after a few minutes.
This is my case also. For example, now I have a laptop that shows me that if I disconnect the computer from the power source, it will last and run the operating system, with me listening to music from the MP3 player for 45 minutes. Remember that I don’t use Wireless, nor run demanding applications, that stress the processor and the computer’s memory. No, I simply listen to music and the screen is not even lit. by telling you these, I just said what to do in order to preserve the battery’s life for a longer period.
Try to disconnect also the peripherals that are normally connected to your computer. If you just transferred some files from your smartphone to your computer or vice-versa or if you synchronized the agenda from one part to another, make sure to disconnect the devices. Don’t keep the printer or the scanner connected to the computer, nor use other devices that can eat the resources from your battery, which can be already tired from functioning a year or perhaps two years.
The trick is to charge and discharge the battery once in while for no reason at all. The battery will accomplish its mission if it is allowed to run. You know that an organ that doesn’t accomplish its own task, in time, it will forget how to do that. This can be said also when talking about computer batteries, not in the same way, because the batteries do not actually have a memory (neither our organs have).
All the USB devices that are connected in a way to your computer, when this is running on batteries must be disconnected to preserve the energy in it for a longer period of time.
A battery represents a source of power. When you don’t run the computer using the electric power from an wall outlet, then you definitely use it running on batteries. If you are a person that is always on the run, then a laptop suits you good, if not, a desktop solves the problem. But there is another problem that might occur. A desktop in some cases consume more energy than a laptop computer, mainly because the desktop computer uses a larger monitor, the central unit is larger and consumes a lot of resources and the graphical unit interface is generally better than the one coming from a laptop computer.
This doesn’t mean that you can’t play various games while you are running the laptop. But the image will be smaller (the laptops usually have a screen of 15 or 17 inches) and probably have a weaker resolution.
Those who have a laptop, it is better to buy a port replicator or a docking station and when they are in a room where they can’t just plug the computer to a wall outlet, at least to be able to connect the docking station to one. The cables used by a docking station are definitely longer than the cables of a laptop. For more safety, a person that knows his computer to run a short period of time on batteries should buy a spare battery, that should be used only when necessary.
This is like the fifth wheel that is in your car. Just like it is supposed to take care of that wheel, also it is supposed to take care of the spare battery. Don’t keep that battery 100% charged, but 50%. In time, if you don’t use it, it will lose energy anyway. It is best to remove the main battery from the battery bay and replace it with this spare battery, just to start using it as a main battery. Eventually that battery is going to fail and you will have to buy a new one. Why don’t you use in this case the battery that always helped you when you needed? The battery of which you took good care in order to make it a battery that is worth to be inside your laptop.
When you replace the outdated battery with a new one, you must perform a charging cycle to make sure that your computer benefits of energy at its full.
The charging and discharging cycles must not be performed when you remember to do them, but on regular intervals. Not too often though. It depends on what computer you have and how do you use the computer. for more information, ask the one from where you bought the computer. if you bought a refurbished computer, at least remove the battery from it and buy a new one. Don’t buy refurbished batteries. In my opinion, it is best to buy new things, new car, new house. I know that all of these are expensive, but let’s be honest, when you buy an old computer, an old car, an old everything, you might have surprises that will make you say: “Why in the world I bought this crap?”. You will see very often the repair center in order to repair a component, a pipe or anything else.
You will do that even with your new things (computers, MP3 players, radios, phones), but what about the old and outdated products? You will go to the doctor with them more often than you go to a doctor for your own medical problems.
Don’t go away! I will write something about batteries soon, cause I have to say in addition that a new battery must comply to certain rules before the user transforms himself into an actual buyer.
