battery maintenance: optimize for battery lifespan

[classybum]

i've read a lot of posts so far about setting charge thresholds and which is the best to minimize max capacity loss, etc.

however, i've yet to see anyone address the setting under charge thresholds to "optimize for battery lifespan (automatically change for me)". when i first messed with my maintenance settings, that is what i selected, assuming that it would set whatever charge thresholds for maximizing battery life. unfortunately (?), it has not changed any thresholds, and it appears as if my battery gets charged to 100% every time.

the current specs of my battery are: 30 cycles, capacity 55.07 Wh from designed 56.16 Wh, manuf by panasonic, first used in january.

so already i've lost about 2% of my design capacity. it says my battery is in good condition. i've also got the checkbox selected to be notified when it changes my thresholds, but i have not yet been notified of any changes.

is my battery performance/life lost on par with those of you who manually set your charge thresholds? anyone else using the "optimize for battery lifespan" option?

[jdhurst]

I think this has become somewhat of a pointless activity (at least from my point of view). First, the battery is a chemical thing and start inexorably losing capacity from the time it is made (or at least its first use). Second, as antiquated as batteries still are, Lithium Ion batteries do remarkably well.

On my T41 (which is 28 months old, on its original battery), I plug it in at will, unplug it at will, and generally use it without a care. After 28 months, it is good for an hour or so and needs replacing. But I am willing to speculate (given the chemistry) that onerous special care would not have extended the life by any measurable amount.

Use it and enjoy! ... JD Hurst

[classybum]

hm, very interesting comments. i'm curious to see how my battery will be performing at 28 months.

i suppose i may still possess the OCD fear that was required to take care of NiCd batteries...

[amitra]

Design Capacity: 37.44WH
Cycle count: 35
Full Charge Capacity: 36.97WH
First Date used: 2006-01


I have set battery trheshold to start at 45% and stop at 50%.
capacity loss = 1.2% in 3 months
is this good or bad?

[cj3209]

Design Capacity: 37.44WH
Cycle count: 35
Full Charge Capacity: 36.97WH
First Date used: 2006-01


I have set battery trheshold to start at 45% and stop at 50%.
capacity loss = 1.2% in 3 months
is this good or bad?

Why are you stopping the charge at 50%? This means that you've got a 5% range for the battery to start charging again which causes it to increase it's cycle count. Although, I'm not sure if the cycle count affects battery life.

I set my Thinkpads at start charging @ 25% and end at 95%.

[amitra]

I read in the literature that lithium ion battery will decay slower if charged at only 40 - 50%

[classybum]

Design Capacity: 37.44WH
Cycle count: 35
Full Charge Capacity: 36.97WH
First Date used: 2006-01


I have set battery trheshold to start at 45% and stop at 50%.
capacity loss = 1.2% in 3 months
is this good or bad?

well, here's an update on mine, and i'm just about to hit three months of use:

design cap: 56.16 Wh
full charge cap: 54.78 Wh
cycles: 43
first use date 2006-01

so that gives me a loss of about 2.47% of design capacity, and extra half percent since my last post, at 30 cycles. i should make an excel sheet to track this. or i could not really care.

and like i said up above, i have it set to "optimize for battery lifespan". i think i'm going to consider setting some thresholds, as the optimization doesnt seem to be faring so well. actually, a difference of 2% isn't so much, so i'll probably leave it.

blah.

[Shahafg]

hi there

i think that this %50 thing isnt really good for you, those new li cells are not like the old ones, basiclyy if you care for them once a month they will be strong and happy

all i do with mine is charge to full then let it discharge till it turns off for 3 times in the begining and then once a month repeat the full charge discharge. other than this just use it normally and charge whenever you feel like....

my batt is actually above what it should be, i even "gain" a few.

http://www.ecommercegenerals.com/temp/z60m_stat.jpg

this 6 hours is with dim screen and wireless\infra\bluetooth off nothing is running in the background cpu @ %1.

Note: Please, post either a warning or a URL link only for images over 50KB; Thanks -Wolf

[erasmus99]

Try undervolting to increase battery life too. I added about an hour of time on my z60t with the screen at full brightness.

Question, though: I got an extra battery for free from Lenovo. I am planning on using it for the first time during school in September. I want it to retain its maximum charge for when I start using it then.

Is there anything I should do to maintain it? I haven't discharged it/used it at all yet. Should I just leave it?

[Shahafg]

how did you undervolt??

you should keep the battery as it is, dont charge it oranything untill you need it, and then just charge discharge couple of times like i show before.

[erasmus99]

Download NHC, notebook hardware control utility. Its freeware. Here is a guide.

Basically my settings, that were stable, on a Pentium M 1.73 GHz is

6x 0.748v
10x. 1.004
13x 1.32

You can set the 13x one lower if you want. I've had it working fine lower than 1.1v. I just didn't see the point for me. If I was going to extend battery life, I just don't need to let the processor run at its full speed. Thus, the 6x voltage is a bit more aggressive.

Basically, turning the voltage to .7v shuts off my computer. .724 seems to work...but I'd rather leave myself some room for error. Thus, I arrived at the voltage I did for battery (6x).

The best part of undervolting are the results: less heat, less fanage, and best of all, more battery life.

As I said earlier, I was able to squeeze almost an hour more battery life with my screen brightness on relatively high (highest setting or one down from the highest). From circa 3 hours to around 4 just by changing this alone. Not bad, I say!

Try it.

[Mikroft]

Here's my specs:

IBM R52
Sanyo First Used Date: 2005-12
Design Capacity: 51.84Wh
Full Charge Capacity: 50.89Wh
Cycle Count: 75

Battery degradation: 2%

Not bad at all for 7months of usage.

[jdhurst]

It's pretty good. Battery usage is not linear, however, and you can expect drop-off more rapidly with age. My T41 battery is 30 months old, battery information says it is 38% used, and simple-minded observation says it needs replacing. FWIW, I don't know whether the battery will expire before I decide to replace the machine.
... JD Hurst

[o1sowise]

I understand why I would want to lower the threshold for when recharging starts. Reading the posts here, I believe setting the start parameter to 40% seems reasonible.

Why would I not want to set the top (stop charging) setting to 100%? Isn't full good?

-John

[simms]

I use the default battery optimizer. For aroudn a year of charging and usage, design is around 47.11 Wh, and mine is at 48.xx. So it's acutally remained pretty charged up over time.

[o1sowise]

Can anyone tell me:

1. Why I would want to stop the re-charging before it hits 100%
2. Why the Power Manager does not retain my 40% settings after a reboot?
3. Any info about this would be very helpful

[mattbiernat]

Can anyone tell me:

1. Why I would want to stop the re-charging before it hits 100%
2. Why the Power Manager does not retain my 40% settings after a reboot?
3. Any info about this would be very helpful

i had the same question, here is what i found:
http://www.batteryuniversity.com/parttwo-34.htm
can anybody comment on this?

[o1sowise]

Can anyone tell me:

1. Why I would want to stop the re-charging before it hits 100%
2. Why the Power Manager does not retain my 40% settings after a reboot?
3. Any info about this would be very helpful

i had the same question, here is what i found:
http://www.batteryuniversity.com/parttwo-34.htm
can anybody comment on this?

I understand what they're saying, but what should I make my setting to conform to their principles? Right now I have it to charge when it drops to 40% and stop charging when it reaches 100%. Based on the article, this appears wrong, but I cannot figure out what they want me to do...

[Humpa]

i had the same question, here is what i found:
http://www.batteryuniversity.com/parttwo-34.htm
can anybody comment on this?

I understand what they're saying, but what should I make my setting to conform to their principles? Right now I have it to charge when it drops to 40% and stop charging when it reaches 100%. Based on the article, this appears wrong, but I cannot figure out what they want to be do...

I always link people to that battery university page - I like it.
But it really depends on personal preference, and how you use your laptop.

Batteries really aren't that expensive in the scheme of things, and I like jdhurst's philosophy. Just use or abuse the battery as suits you - it isn't going to make all that much difference anyway, so might as well reduce stress and not worry about your battery. Don't be a slave to the machine.

If you are going to be storing the battery long term, it is probably best to store it at 40% or below (like they mention on that batteryUniversity page) - but otherwise, just let it charge to 100%. That way you'll have a full battery when you need it.

Personally, I rarely use battery power - I might go months without using battery for more than a few minutes. So I'm trying to set my upper threshold to something much less than 100%. But so far my Z60m is not obeying the threshold limits. I started a thread askiing for advice/opinions/whatever, but so far no one has responded:
Z60m Power Manager Woes - custom Battery Threshold ignored

[mattbiernat]

im just wondering how credible batteryuniversity is... and yes i agree on jd's perspective as well but only if you use battery quite often. for me... i don't use it for 3 months at all and then use it for the next three months 3 times a week so keeping it alive for as long as i can makes more sense to me.

[P-Meyer]

FWIW

my batteries in my old A31p's were doing fine UNTIL I installed Power Manager. YUK!

Why? Because Power manager checks how many recharge cycles there have been and then "downgrades" the battery when certain thressholds have been exceeded. Just check the .ini file .

Built in obsolence and generating a cashflow for IBM / Lenovo? I do not know but I took out Power Manager el pronto when my Z61m arrived 4 weeks ago.

(The trouble I have with the approach is that the power manager does not know how deep the battery has been discharged and since these modern batteries have no memory effect the basic premise of downgrading based on charge cycles is imho wrong.)

Peter

[gearguy]

My old 760ED Bat still holds a good hour and a half of battery or so , if you take into account the age of such batteries then I guess that may seem a little odd.

[perry_78]

Well, my t60 came with a Sanyo nine cell. Over 3 weeks I lost 2% of my capacity, with only 14 cycles. Doesn't sound too good to me..

[krajicek]

I understand what they're saying, but what should I make my setting to conform to their principles? Right now I have it to charge when it drops to 40% and stop charging when it reaches 100%. Based on the article, this appears wrong, but I cannot figure out what they want to be do...

I always link people to that battery university page - I like it.
But it really depends on personal preference, and how you use your laptop.

Batteries really aren't that expensive in the scheme of things, and I like jdhurst's philosophy. Just use or abuse the battery as suits you - it isn't going to make all that much difference anyway, so might as well reduce stress and not worry about your battery. Don't be a slave to the machine.

If you are going to be storing the battery long term, it is probably best to store it at 40% or below (like they mention on that batteryUniversity page) - but otherwise, just let it charge to 100%. That way you'll have a full battery when you need it.

Personally, I rarely use battery power - I might go months without using battery for more than a few minutes. So I'm trying to set my upper threshold to something much less than 100%. But so far my Z60m is not obeying the threshold limits. I started a thread askiing for advice/opinions/whatever, but so far no one has responded:
Z60m Power Manager Woes - custom Battery Threshold ignored

just found solution for this - check the thread mentioned above. at least it works for me
kr.