Starting with a fresh battery

[edwardaux]

Well, I bit the bullet and bought a new 9 cell battery for my T42. However, it was delivered (by IBM Parts) in a plain cardboard box with no instructions, no invoice, nothing! Hmmm, anyway... not wanting to be bitten by doing the wrong thing, I begun searching the web to see what the general concensus was w.r.t charging the first time. I found this page:

http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... NQJN#Battc

Lovely! However, this is a battery for my T42, which is Lithium Ion... as a parenthetical aside, the same article says *not* to do deep discharges for Li-ion batteries. So, this leaves me with no clue as to what I am supposed to do.

Any suggestions on whether I need to do the three cycles that the article suggests, or can I just charge it up and away I go.

Also, from this point on, I am still unclear whether I am supported to run it down to x% (where x is some magical number), or doesn't it matter for Li-ion batteries these days?

Many thanks.
edwardaux

[underclocker]

I'd say just pop it in the laptop and do what you'd normally do, run it unplugged until it dies or plug it in. The difference can't be significant as there are no instructions on what to do. If it were important, there would be HUGE LETTERING on what to do.

Plus, you always have the 1 year warranty. Enjoy the extended run time.

[Hanson]

I would charge it to 100% the first time (so as to activate all battery cells), and use it like you usually do. When it says not to deep discharge the battery, I would say that means to avoid going below 10% battery life. I would also customize the battery setting to not charge until below 70%. This would avoid unnecessary recharging (i.e. cycling) which can reduce the battery's capacity.

Taking those steps into account, your battery will maintain its capacity longer and deteriorate at a slower rate without causing any major inconvenience to you. Once the capacity decreases to an unacceptable level, which should be at least a year later since first use, you can recalibrate the battery by resetting it to potentially regain some capacity.

[edwardaux]

> When it says not to deep discharge the battery, I would say
> that means to avoid going below 10% battery life.

OK... I am happy to go with that number. I will just set it to hibernate when it gets to 10%.

> I would also customize the battery setting to not charge
> until below 70%

I didn't know you could do this. Is this a setting in the battery's firmware, or an operating system thing? I just found that setting in the IBM Improve Battery Health dialog under Windows - do you happen to know if that is something I can set up in Ubuntu?

Anyway, thanks for the advice. Much appreciated.

--
edwardaux

[Hanson]

I use the ThinkVantage Power Manager software to control my battery.

Go to Power Manager, click the Battery Information tab, click the Battery Maintenance button, choose the custom option and input the percentage values there.

I don't have Ubuntu so I can't help you out with that.

[pianowizard]

For my X60s, I am using the "Optimize for battery lifespan" option instead of specifying the percentages.

[dsigma6]

I am using the "Optimize for battery lifespan" option instead of specifying the percentages.

Moi aussi!

I didn't like having to pick a value, for the semi-naive point of saving a battery that's going to die anyway.

What if you have the threshold down low, at about 70%, but suddenly need to do some work off battery for a while? Screwed!

[Hanson]

What if you have the threshold down low, at about 70%, but suddenly need to do some work off battery for a while? Screwed!

True, that's why I sometimes use the "Optimize for battery lifespan" when I know I'll be on my 6-cell battery for longer periods.

Everyone uses the battery differently. For a University student living in the middle of campus like me (5 minute walk from residence to any of my classes), I don't normally use more than 2 hours on battery for each lecture, and because my lectures are relatively spread out, I have time to leave my laptop in my room to charge back upto 90%.

I avoid using the "Optimize for battery lifespan" option because it generates more recharges to reach a capacity that I do not need. By setting specific percentages to optimize the battery for my needs, I have avoided unnecessary recharging of the battery at high levels of charge remaining. If the following may serve as any statistical evidence to you, I used to use the "Optimize for battery lifespan" option between late November 2005 and the end of August 2006, I lost 5.9wH in 20 cycles probably because I was on AC most of the time and the charge was at 100%. Between September 2006 and now with my customized settings, I have lost only 0.1wH in an additional 40 cycles and my charge rate is typically between 75-89%. So obviously I would stick to my current settings since it is keeping my battery life long and stable for many months.

[dsigma6]

I'll see if the threshold proves the same for me. I did one discharge the other day and went from 49.80Wh to 49.70. Not a big deal, but maybe I can slow the loss down.