What does your mobile work do for you if the laptop has run out of battery after a very short time? The sense of wireless work is completely lost with a weak battery and the frustration is high. Often you notice a few weeks after the purchase that the battery capacity is diminishing. Why is that and what can everyone doing to extend the battery life?
Expert opinion has summarized 5 tips for you to keep the power in your device stable for as long as possible. It is important that these points are taken into account from the start on a new notebook.
Optimal charging behavior
The advantage of lithium-ion batteries is that they have no memory effect. You do not have to completely discharge the battery before recharging. This type of battery is the standard in today’s notebooks. In general, these batteries are expensive and are more sensitive to incorrect handling. Even the best battery is of no use to you if you do not properly maintain the energy cells. The following applies: Avoid permanent reloading when there is little discharge.
The manufacturer usually guarantees you between 500 and 1000 charge and discharge cycles for lithium-ion batteries. Every charging process counts, no matter how much energy you have supplied to the device.
With current notebooks, continuous charge monitoring ensures that the charging curtain ends automatically when a full charge is reached. It is optimal to fully charge the laptop, then disconnect it from the power and use it until the device asks for power. Then fully charge the battery without interrupting the charging process.
Avoid extreme battery usage
In general, lithium-ion batteries suffer from extremes, i.e. frequent overcharging or extreme deep discharge (below 10%) weakens the battery performance. No damage is noticeable the first few times, but in the long run this shortens the life of the battery. Most new laptops are now designed to automatically shut down before the battery is completely empty. So you yourself do not get into the critical area of the discharge with your device.
Protect your laptop from excessive heat
The overall lifespan of the battery is reduced at high temperatures. A battery ages faster if it has to deal with extreme heat. When using the device, always make sure that the ventilation slots on the device are free and that the cooling of the device is secured.
When working on soft surfaces such as cushions or a blanket, you should also plan a small increase so that the air flow is guaranteed. Cleaning the ventilation can be an additional help. Simply clean them off with the help of a compressed air bottle. Computer shops sell compressed air bottles for little money. Please follow the instructions on the packaging.
Treat your battery to a refreshment cure
Unfortunately, you cannot rejuvenate old batteries. Aged lithium simply cannot store as many electrons as a new laptop battery. However, there is a kind of fresh cell cure that is suitable for laptops that discharge relatively quickly and have problems with correctly indicating the remaining power of their battery.
Your battery should be calibrated when the battery is fully charged, but the charge level drops rapidly after a short time. The goal of calibration is to redefine a 100% charged battery. The battery performance is improved and the maximum achievable charge level is saved again. We recommend performing 3 to 4 times a year.
Most of all notebooks have a diagnostic program such as “battery test” and a “refreshing tool” in the BIOS, which gets the exhausted battery going again. To get into the BIOS, you have to press the “Delete” or “F2 key” shortly after starting the notebook. Some of these buttons may not work. If this is the case, you have to check this function in the manual of the device. The exact name of this “refreshing tool” and where it is located in the BIOS unfortunately differs from each manufacturer, but after a short search everyone should find what they are looking for. The function ensures that the battery is really completely discharged and recharged.
Optimize your daily routine
Each manufacturer offers you an energy-saving mode. If you use this function, your battery will last much longer. You can find the settings for this under Control Panel. Dim the screen, mute the laptop, and turn off Bluetooth and Wi-Fi when you don’t need it. With newer models, similar to the cell phones, there is also a flight mode. External devices that are connected to your laptop via USB connection should also be removed when saving energy if you do not need them at the moment. All of this contributes to energy-saving use and makes your battery last longer.
It also helps to close applications that you are not currently using. Programs running in the background are absolute power guzzlers.
Defragmenting data carriers can also contribute to a longer battery life. The process ensures order on the hard drives and avoids wasting large amounts of electricity when searching.
Wayne Probert is a senior reporter at Zobuz, covering state and national politics, and he is a grantee with the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting. Before joining Zobuz, he worked as a freelance journalist in Kentucky, having been published by dozens of outlets including NPR, the Center for Media.
