R40 Max Battery life, control charging

[unperson]

On my t43 I was able to tell the computer not to charge the battery until it dropped below my defined level.

I installed the same software on my R40 and wasn't able to find this feature.

I wonder if it is available 3rd party or if it is a bios / hardware feature.

It is not bad for your battery to charge it say at 50 percent but you will get much better life if you only use the whole charge and only charge full once. Most laptops will start charging your battery at levels below 100% reducing lifetime charge cycles.

They say Lion batteries aren't like other batteries with 'charge memory' but it sure seems like they perform better when you apply the same rules.

Let me know if any body finds the ability to set the 'begin charge' level on an R40 battery.

Thanks.

[sarbin]

the t43 can use power manager:
http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... MIGR-61583
which includes charging threshholds. the web site doesn't list the r40 on the supported system list.

[unperson]

okay..

http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... MIGR-62935

I'm going to try 1.17 and see if that is an update to the original listed driver but still supports the R40 with the charge threshold feature.

If this doesn't work I'm likely to think that it needs some sort of hardware support.....

Question: Is the charging of the battery determined at the software level or bios? because you can plug in and charge the battery while the computer is dead off. This feature might require some hard ware support yet to be determined capable in the R40..

Thanks for the link.

[sarbin]

your welcome.

i don't know if any version of power manager supports the r40, but it'll be interesting to hear your results.

[unperson]

I have installed and uninstalled several versions of power management.


NO LUCK.

R40 does NOT seem to support charge threshold though its listed as included by multiple software versions of power manager with charge threshold functionality.

I suppose I'll just waste charge cycles on a mostly full battery like most.

Any body heard of 3rd party apps here?? Bios setting? Bios update?

I'll keep my results posted but really shouldn't waste anymore time on this.

[sarbin]

i don't think any version of power manager supports the r40.
i wish it supported some of the older machines. i've gone through several a31 batteries that i know would have lasted longer by being able to set charge thresholds.

[unperson]

I can use almost every other feature of all the power manager versions I tried.

Just not the charge battery threshold.

I am also convinced this would be a great way to prolong a battery.

I'm going to look for a dead one on ebay that lasts long enough to be a power back up and move from room to room. I'll fry that one and save my brand new one as needed.