Your recommendation in my situation...

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simms · #1 Post by **simms** » Tue Jan 17, 2006 8:56 pm

I use my T40 on a daily basis and do not bring the AC adapter with me to school. I plug my AC adapter in my dock, and recharge when I get home.

I have a 6-cell that I bought from eBay that only holds about 36.75Wh - I can just BARELY get through a school day if I have minimium screen brightness, disable wireless at every chance I get, and don't play any movies/videos. The battery ends up getting to about 10% or less on a daily basis so I may be overusing the life of the battery.

I could charge up at school during the midday to fuel up my T40, but that would require me to take off and plug in my AC everyday into my dock and bring it with me to school. And I don't really want to reach the back of my desk, plug it in, remove, etc.

OR, I could buy a new 6-cell from eBay that would probably just last me 4 hours, I would probably use the battery to about 25% by the end of the day..

OR, I could buy a 9-cell but I would rather not have the extra weight...and the extra 1-inch sticking out may make the laptop too big to fit in my backpack, or at least make it more difficult to put in/take out.

I can get another AC charger for around $30, a new 6-cell for $60, and a new 9-cell around $100 on eBay.

What would you do?

christopher_wolf · #2 Post by **christopher_wolf** » Tue Jan 17, 2006 9:20 pm

I was in much the same situation you are in right now when I got my new T43; the 6-Cell Battery did pretty good. Then I got the 9-Cell halfway through the semester; I was happy with on charge for the entire day (5+ hours uptime). You have a T40, though...So you will probably get a much larger increase in uptime by getting a fresh 6-cell or 9-cell as compared to my T43. HTH

simms · #3 Post by **simms** » Tue Jan 17, 2006 9:34 pm

christopher_wolf wrote:I was in much the same situation you are in right now when I got my new T43; the 6-Cell Battery did pretty good. Then I got the 9-Cell halfway through the semester; I was happy with on charge for the entire day (5+ hours uptime). You have a T40, though...So you will probably get a much larger increase in uptime by getting a fresh 6-cell or 9-cell as compared to my T43. HTH

Thing that I'm worried about is that if I get a 6-cell new that meets my needs, I might drain it to around 15-20% everyday. Continued draining like that can't be too good for battery right - that will lead to reduced performance and eventually I will be in the same predicament.

christopher_wolf · #4 Post by **christopher_wolf** » Tue Jan 17, 2006 10:02 pm

I actually did some, very informal, measurements of the wear at low battery levels for the Thinkpad LiIon batteries (this was done with a fresh, original 6-Cell) with both NHC and MoblieMeter; when run down to 10%-9%...I would get a wear reading of 3% wear; then I tried it going down to 5%, it then shot up to 8% wear. Not good.

simms · #5 Post by **simms** » Tue Jan 17, 2006 10:22 pm

christopher_wolf wrote:I actually did some, very informal, measurements of the wear at low battery levels for the Thinkpad LiIon batteries (this was done with a fresh, original 6-Cell) with both NHC and MoblieMeter; when run down to 10%-9%...I would get a wear reading of 3% wear; then I tried it going down to 5%, it then shot up to 8% wear. Not good.

Wow, you did that right now just for the purpose of this thread?

Where can I get Mobilemeter?

I guess that means 15% would still be pretty risky, right?

christopher_wolf · #6 Post by **christopher_wolf** » Tue Jan 17, 2006 10:49 pm

LOL; I actually did them awhile back when I was having one of my OCD-Worry-alot Fits and just had to spend time checking out everything...That is what I found for a 6-Cell, and the second test applied to another 6-Cell. Usually, I am not *too* worried about going to 10%, but I am very careful to not go below 5% as it seems that is when the majority of wear seems to occur. HTH

Here is the link to MobileMeter http://www.geocities.co.jp/SiliconValle ... mm0310.zip

I try to not worry about how much day-to-day wear I put on the battery as that ws the point of the battery to begin with.

I haven't seen any bad effects at all for going down to 15%

#7 Post by **JaneL** » Tue Jan 17, 2006 11:08 pm

Or you could get a battery for the Ultrabay.

simms · #8 Post by **simms** » Tue Jan 17, 2006 11:23 pm

christopher_wolf wrote:LOL; I actually did them awhile back when I was having one of my OCD-Worry-alot Fits and just had to spend time checking out everything...That is what I found for a 6-Cell, and the second test applied to another 6-Cell. Usually, I am not *too* worried about going to 10%, but I am very careful to not go below 5% as it seems that is when the majority of wear seems to occur. HTH

Here is the link to MobileMeter http://www.geocities.co.jp/SiliconValle ... mm0310.zip

I try to not worry about how much day-to-day wear I put on the battery as that ws the point of the battery to begin with.

I haven't seen any bad effects at all for going down to 15%

I guess the best option is opting for a 6-cell...
What is your time for medium brightness doing word processing on a 6-cell? How about playing movies?

The link doesn't seem to be working - is there a mirror?

#9 Post by **BillMorrow** » Tue Jan 17, 2006 11:33 pm

nonny wrote:Or you could get a battery for the Ultrabay.

excellent thought..

with an addemdum:
be VERY careful getting that or ANY battery from ebay without some sort of guarantee..

christopher_wolf · #10 Post by **christopher_wolf** » Tue Jan 17, 2006 11:34 pm

Medium Brightness + Word Processing? Haven't measured that; only the extremes...Around 4:30 Hours most days

Here is the link to the home page

http://www.geocities.co.jp/SiliconValley-Oakland/8259/

See if that works

Nonny has a good suggestion with the Ultrabay idea; I have one and I have combined it with both the 9-Cell and 6-Cell to get some pretty long uptimes, only when needed though.

simms · #11 Post by **simms** » Tue Jan 17, 2006 11:53 pm

Ok, to recap: The 9-cell gives you 5+ hours with usage.
The 6-cell with medium brightness gives you 4:30? hmm...

Shouldn't the 6-cell give you less than 4:30 if the 9-cell gives you 5?

Thanks for the link.

Lastly, the Ultrabay is a good idea, but I'd probably be using the DVD/CDRW drive at least sometime. Plus with the mess that the Ultrabay discharging first can't be too good for the overall life if it always discharges fully

christopher_wolf · #12 Post by **christopher_wolf** » Tue Jan 17, 2006 11:55 pm

No, with the 9-Cell I *average* around 4:30 hours of uptime with medium-low brightness and clocked down to 800MHz or set to adaptive with a light load. The 6-Cell would give me around 3:30 hours with all settings minimal.

Aroc · #13 Post by **Aroc** » Wed Jan 18, 2006 12:08 am

I vote power supply. Get like four of the suckers. But I'm biased since 99.9% of the time I working from the same few places near a power outlet. I hardly ever need to run from battery. YMMV.

(if I was a student, I'd buy stock in batteries)

simms · #14 Post by **simms** » Wed Jan 18, 2006 12:38 am

Aroc wrote:I vote power supply. Get like four of the suckers. But I'm biased since 99.9% of the time I working from the same few places near a power outlet. I hardly ever need to run from battery. YMMV.

(if I was a student, I'd buy stock in batteries)

Buy stock in batteries? How come?

I'll probably get an AC adapter. Cheap and probably the best choice. Thing is I've heard one model is defective. Looking at these two:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... %3AIT&rd=1
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... %3AIT&rd=1

I think the first one is newer, but IIRC that one is also defective. Is the first one lighter? What's the benefit of the first over the second?

dr_st · #15 Post by **dr_st** » Wed Jan 18, 2006 4:27 am

Yep, another AC adapter, or just carry the one you have with you. Geez.

AndyL · #16 Post by **AndyL** » Wed Jan 18, 2006 5:59 am

What about getting another 6-cell battery, and taking both batteries with you? When the first battery gets low, just hibernate and switch batteries. If your current 6-cell battery is almost giving you enough lifetime now, maybe you'd only need to recharge the reserve battery once a week or so.

Aroc · #17 Post by **Aroc** » Wed Jan 18, 2006 7:56 am

(all things being equal) students will likely use the battery more than I do. If I were a student I'd be using my notebook at the library, in class, in the cafeteria, etc. All running on battery power. I see a lot of student on these forums shooting for 5+ hour run times on batteries. Granted a lot of professionals do that too. SO I can't make blanket statements.

My initial statemate was a stab of humor. It seems to have missed its mark. That's what I get for not being a better wordsmith.

christopher_wolf · #18 Post by **christopher_wolf** » Wed Jan 18, 2006 6:36 pm

Right now, I like my extended battery; the majority of Thinkpads I see in the Labs or Class have the extended battery or are plugged in. I used to take my AC Power Adapter with me as well...Not so much any more, though.

StarTraveller · #19 Post by **StarTraveller** » Wed Jan 18, 2006 7:36 pm

My experience is that if a notebook is hard to fit in the bag then it quickly becomes a really big annoyance.

I think that if I was in the original poster's shoes then I would opt for a new 6 cell battery and an UltraBay battery. That would keep things compact like they are now.

simms · #20 Post by **simms** » Wed Jan 18, 2006 10:06 pm

I just bought a spare AC adapter for $10 + local pickup fees on eBay. Really can't beat $10!

Surprisingly the 6-cells new are more expensive than I thought. They look to be around $70-80 even, and with a 9-cell at $90, really now..

Your recommendation in my situation...

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