battery life??

homealone_2

i have just noticed when i clicked on how much power was left an option appeard explaining the best ways to conserve energy and save your batter life. it says that power saver is the best option to select for prolonged battery life but it has a setting saying dell recommended that was selected, is it best to change it to power saver? or leave it on the recommendation set by dell?? there are also other recommendations about conserving by how bright the screen is? i dont know much about these things but need to have this computer around for as long as possible so could someone explain what is the best action to take please, if any??

guitarinacase

Don't know about the Dell settings but a couple of things I have found to help maintain the battery life of my Sony Vaio are:

- fully charge the battery then make sure you fully discharge it again before re-charging
- if using for long periods of time, remove the battery and run off mains
- reduce screen brightness

Hope this helps.

homealone_2

guitarinacase wrote: »

Don't know about the Dell settings but a couple of things I have found to help maintain the battery life of my Sony Vaio are:

- fully charge the battery then make sure you fully discharge it again before re-charging
- if using for long periods of time, remove the battery and run off mains
- reduce screen brightness

Hope this helps.

thanks, dont know what you mean though by remove battery and run on mains, wasnt aware i had mains only the battery charger but i am no expert

Jockthearab

I have a Vostro 1510 and have 'tweaked ' the recommended settings (click on Change power settings) by turning down screen brightness when running on battery as well as "turning off display" earlier than recommended.

When I'm plugged in & charging, once the battery gets to 100% charged I right click the battery/power option on the bottom of my screen/menu tray which gives me a Battery Meter screen. From here I select "Battery Life" & then click on "Disable battery charging". I believe that this saves me removing the battery as mentioned above, when running from mains power. Having personally experienced in the past how running a laptop 'plugged in' quickly kills a battery, I have been extremely satisfied that my 11 month old Dell still manages to hold just over 200 minutes of power when fully charged. When I first got it it managed just over 4 hours!

JtA

guitarinacase

If I managed to get just over 200mins of power I would be very happy, far better than what I get just now.