Computer battery help. - Page 2 - UK Vintage Radio Repair and Restoration Discussion Forum

SiriusHardware · 28th Aug 2013, 5:50 pm

For what it's worth, the battery in my 2008 Dell 6400 / 1505E laptop worked at full strength for about 2 years, then the built in system battery utility started to report that the battery was nearing the 'end of its life'.

As it was still lasting for about 2.5 - 3 hours at that point I simply didn't believe it and eventually turned off the nagging message.

Shortly after that, the battery life nosedived, and I have basically been using it as a compact desktop machine since then.

By contrast, the battery in my Dell Mini 10V (netbook, bought at the beginning of 2009) is still lasting about 2.5 hours (when new it was only 3 hours anyway) and I'm now some way into the fifth year of ownership. There was a brief period when I thought the battery was dying on me but that actually turned out to be a problem with the DC power cable on the PSU, a story told elsewhere.

AC/HL · 28th Aug 2013, 5:54 pm

Please keep on topic (batteries)

GJR 11L · 30th Aug 2013, 8:46 am

I've an older Dell Latitude from about 2005 that I was given for parts in case any of it had been useful when I was restoring my CR-48. As the Dell didn't contain anything of use for the Mario, I decided to try to get [the Dell] grafting, so bought a battery from China and a few other bits so that I was able to boot it from a CD.
Upon successfully installing Lubuntu 11.04 on the machine, I left the (original) battery in place and charged both since thae Latitudes can use two batteries as its drive bay can take an additional battery in place of a CD or floppy drive.

Eventually (fear not, I'm getting to it

), after establishing that the old Latitude was in fact a good, useable machine, I decided to install XP to it as I needed Windows as a native O/S for making recovery drives for the Mario Fish whose buyer wished it to be supplied with its original Chrome "OS" so, as I was using only USB pen drives, I left both batteries in place and ran the Dell like that for around a week. At the end of that week, I noticed that the original battery had by now regained some 87% of its capacity - more than enough to provide two solid hours of varied use.

The Chinese replica battery died after a further month but the original battery is still fine now, taking 100% charge at that 87% of capacity, a year on. So if ever there were a case where conventional wisdom, logic or reason had no place, here it is!

By far the best performing laptop batteries I've ever encountered must be those supplied by Google originally with the CR-48s. I use one of these daily, have a spare and have refurbished and sold on a further two to people who like the idea of the discrete, rubbery black Macbook lookie-likey with its 8 hour+ battery life. In every case, their batteries show 100% of their factory capacity and I tend to run the daily machine at around 80% of its full charge - more than practical with this device as that charge provides a solid 6 or 7 hours of use and that in spite of my having installed a user-accessible bios, Ubuntu 12.04 in 64 bit flavour and a Betacom Crystal HD video card where the 3G device used to sit.

My other laptop - and the one that has effectively taken on the rôle previously occupied by a desktop machine - is a Dell Vostro 1015 that I bought new in 2011. I haven't been especially kind to its battery yet it still displays the same capacity (91.4%) that it had when I first took it out of its packaging.

My belief is that a large quantity of luck is required where batteries are concerned.

28th Aug 2013, 5:50 pm	#21
SiriusHardware Dekatron Join Date: Aug 2011 Location: Newcastle, Tyne and Wear, UK. Posts: 11,560	Re: Computer battery help. For what it's worth, the battery in my 2008 Dell 6400 / 1505E laptop worked at full strength for about 2 years, then the built in system battery utility started to report that the battery was nearing the 'end of its life'. As it was still lasting for about 2.5 - 3 hours at that point I simply didn't believe it and eventually turned off the nagging message. Shortly after that, the battery life nosedived, and I have basically been using it as a compact desktop machine since then. By contrast, the battery in my Dell Mini 10V (netbook, bought at the beginning of 2009) is still lasting about 2.5 hours (when new it was only 3 hours anyway) and I'm now some way into the fifth year of ownership. There was a brief period when I thought the battery was dying on me but that actually turned out to be a problem with the DC power cable on the PSU, a story told elsewhere.

28th Aug 2013, 5:54 pm	#22
AC/HL Dekatron Join Date: Nov 2003 Location: Heckmondwike, West Yorkshire, UK. Posts: 9,642	Re: Computer battery help. Please keep on topic (batteries)

30th Aug 2013, 8:46 am	#23
GJR 11L Heptode Join Date: May 2004 Location: Ellington, Northumberland, UK. Posts: 815	Re: Computer battery help. I've an older Dell Latitude from about 2005 that I was given for parts in case any of it had been useful when I was restoring my CR-48. As the Dell didn't contain anything of use for the Mario, I decided to try to get [the Dell] grafting, so bought a battery from China and a few other bits so that I was able to boot it from a CD. Upon successfully installing Lubuntu 11.04 on the machine, I left the (original) battery in place and charged both since thae Latitudes can use two batteries as its drive bay can take an additional battery in place of a CD or floppy drive. Eventually (fear not, I'm getting to it), after establishing that the old Latitude was in fact a good, useable machine, I decided to install XP to it as I needed Windows as a native O/S for making recovery drives for the Mario Fish whose buyer wished it to be supplied with its original Chrome "OS" so, as I was using only USB pen drives, I left both batteries in place and ran the Dell like that for around a week. At the end of that week, I noticed that the original battery had by now regained some 87% of its capacity - more than enough to provide two solid hours of varied use. The Chinese replica battery died after a further month but the original battery is still fine now, taking 100% charge at that 87% of capacity, a year on. So if ever there were a case where conventional wisdom, logic or reason had no place, here it is! By far the best performing laptop batteries I've ever encountered must be those supplied by Google originally with the CR-48s. I use one of these daily, have a spare and have refurbished and sold on a further two to people who like the idea of the discrete, rubbery black Macbook lookie-likey with its 8 hour+ battery life. In every case, their batteries show 100% of their factory capacity and I tend to run the daily machine at around 80% of its full charge - more than practical with this device as that charge provides a solid 6 or 7 hours of use and that in spite of my having installed a user-accessible bios, Ubuntu 12.04 in 64 bit flavour and a Betacom Crystal HD video card where the 3G device used to sit. My other laptop - and the one that has effectively taken on the rôle previously occupied by a desktop machine - is a Dell Vostro 1015 that I bought new in 2011. I haven't been especially kind to its battery yet it still displays the same capacity (91.4%) that it had when I first took it out of its packaging. My belief is that a large quantity of luck is required where batteries are concerned. __________________ John.