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| posts about #laptopbatteries more → |
Unplug Your Laptop to Keep Your Li-Ion Battery Healthy |
Batteries on a Plane: 339 Burning Batteries Since 2003 |
Original material is licensed under a Creative Commons License permitting non-commercial sharing with attribution.
Gizmodo 
09/22/09
"For proper maintenance of a lithium-based battery, it’s important to keep the electrons in it moving occasionally. Apple does not recommend leaving your portable plugged in all the time. An ideal use would be a commuter who uses her MacBook Pro on the train, then plugs it in at the office to charge. This keeps the battery juices flowing. If on the other hand, you use a desktop computer at work, and save a notebook for infrequent travel, Apple recommends charging and discharging its battery at least once per month."
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How does a li ion battery lose capacity? 1) constant loss as soon as it's made, 2) discharge/charge cycles, 3) the heat from the device itself - regardless of whether it's plugged in. Source.
Worse yet, Apple recommends completely discharging the battery every month. This is completely wrong. Source.
I don't know if the Apple techs are 1) stupid or 2) lying, but if you follow their advice, you will actually hurt your battery and you'll be forced to replace it sooner. Gee willickers, that would mean you'd have to pay Apple more money. Gosh, that couldn't possibly be their motive, could it?
09/22/09
People are still seeming to confuse Li-ion and the old NiMH batteries.
Yes, charge and discharge your drill's battery (unless you've got one of the fancy ones). Don't worry about your laptop.
The battery is going to degrade over time. Unless time machine does more than I thought it did, there is nothing you can do about your battery degrading.
09/22/09
I've had very good luck with my batteries. I routinely charge up Lithiums overnight and then use them down to around 40-60%. Running them down all the way can actually harm them and doesn't help avoid "memory" effect as there is none, but running it right down once in a while and leaving it there for a few hours can recalibrate the sensors that tell what the charge level is.
I had a Dell Inspiron with a CD-ROM bay battery that died after being left alone at full charge for months. Now it can't take a charge and causes the charge light to flash when I plug it in - but the main battery that came with the computer something like 6 years ago will still hold a good 4-5 hr charge!
Other than that, a battery in my Sony Clie PEG-SJ33 PDA, and my original PSP-1000 both gradually wore down to impractical levels over several years, which is quite reasonable.
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I did the full discharge to full charge cycle once to condition the battery, but I will not be doing that on a regular basis. Rechargeable batteries generally undergo the most chemical stress within approximately 20% of the final charge and discharge, so I generally try to avoid going under 30% of battery capacity if I can.
09/22/09
Why would you need to discharge from 100% to 0% when lithiums don't have a memory problem?
And naturally lithium starts losing 20% of its charge after the 3rd year being used or not used... they just age quicker than NIMH batteries.
09/22/09
The only reason to discharge a battery pack nowadays is to calibrate the battery controller. LiIon packs often have a built in controller chip that keeps track of the current as the battery is charged and discharged to best report the battery capacity. But the controller can only know this if it's seen the battery at its low and high charge points. If your battery meter on your phone or laptop seems off, a discharge cycle to the point of low battery warning will often fix it.
09/22/09
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Over the long term LiIon cells degrade faster if they're stored at full capacity, even if that storage happens inside your plugged-in laptop. You probably won't notice the difference if you're on a 3-4 year upgrade cycle.
09/22/09
The only thing I haven't had problems with is my DS. I leave it on the charger overnight constantly, sometimes for days at a time. It's been over 3 years now and the battery lasts forever.
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It usually runs more off the battery any given day than it does plugged in. Myth confirmed.
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Rule No. 2: See rule No. 1
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