by Lizette Greco

Top 10 Laptop Battery Basics

Take care of your laptop battery and ensure that it will be ready to work properly when you need it most. Some general tips for laptop care include: avoid extreme temperatures, don’t leave a laptop outside in cold weather or leave it in a hot car. Cold batteries can’t create very much power and hot batteries will discharge very quickly. Use electrical power when available to keep battery charged. Don’t let your laptop go for long periods of time without using the battery.

1. Smaller Is Better

Consider an ultraportable or thin-and-light rather than a desktop replacement laptop. Smaller displays use less power. Going with a hard drive that runs at 4200rpm uses less power than a hard drive running at 5400rpm.

2. Power Control

Use as little power as possible by adjusting laptop settings. Use the Power Options to set to the laptop to go inactive after a set amount of time. Set adjustments so that the display goes off first, then hard the hard drive stay active a bit longer and store the system content’s to the RAM.

3. Turn Down the Lights

Adjust the display brightness to a lower setting, make sure you can view the screen without squinting. You can also adjust the brightness of the display to suit the conditions you are working in.

4. Watch Your Battery Use

Keep an eye on your battery consumption and know how much power you have remaining. Use the battery power icon on the system tray or you can purchase batteries which have LED gauges on the outside of the battery itself. Whenever you have access to a power source, charge the battery. Before you leave on any trips, fully charge the batteries, especially if you don’t know where or when you might have access to any electrical outlets.

6. Get Another Battery

Some laptops are capable of running with two batteries. If you cannot run two batteries, check with the manufacturer to see if there are high capacity batteries available. External batteries can also be used to extend operating time.

7. Drain the Battery

The first time you use your laptop with battery power, allow the laptop battery to completely discharge. Do this at least twice and don’t try to charge the battery when it is half discharged.

8. Clean Batteries

Keep the battery and its connections clean and free of debris. Clean your battery terminals on a regular basis using a cotton swab with rubbing alcohol on the tip.

9. CMOS Battery Check-Up

The backup battery is a CMOS battery which is a secondary battery to power the clock and can drain a main battery if it is dead. Check with your User Manual or manufacturer’s web site for the location of the CMOS battery and where to get a replacement.

10. Turning It Off

Don’t run programs or devices that you aren’t using. Remove PC cards and turn off Wi-Fi software. Using your laptop to watch movies or play games will drain the battery quickly as well.