Getting the Most out of Your Laptop Battery
If you’re wondering why your laptop battery doesn’t seem to last as long as was advertised, don’t complain to the manufacturer just yet. It could be some of your habits that could be draining the battery. Here are some troubleshooting tips if you seem to be always looking for a power outlet to recharge your laptop.
Screen Brightness
One of the biggest drain on many laptops is the backlight on the screen. If you have the screen brightness turned all the way up, that’s going to deplete the battery than it would with a dimmer brightness setting.
Fortunately this is easy to adjust. Some laptops have an ambient light sensor that adjusts the screen brightness to a level appropriate for your lighting conditions. If your model doesn’t have the feature, simply turn down the screen brightness to a level you find comfortable.
Internet and Media Activity
Another source of battery usage if what you actually do with your laptop when it’s unplugged. Streaming media, gaming, and internet usage will all use up the battery life on your machine.
The obvious thing to do would be to save battery-intensive applications for use when you’re plugged into a power outlet.
Your Mileage May Vary
Laptop manufacturers will advertise battery life under ideal conditions, such as not using demanding applications. So like in car commercials, that “your actual mileage may vary.”
Discharging your laptop fully and then recharging it will shorten the battery life. While modern lithium-ion batteries don’t have a “memory”, they can only handle about 300-500 charge cycles before performance starts to degrade.
This means that if you’re fully discharging your battery every day, it will only last up to a few years. You should plug your laptop in when the battery gets to around 20% capacity.
Conclusion
If you take these tips in mind, you can get the maximum performance out of your laptop battery. If you need service with your battery or any other component in your laptop, please feel free to contact us.