Squeeze Every Second Out of Your Laptop or Notebook Computer Battery

It isn't too tough to increase the time your laptop will run on its battery power. By employing as many of the following ideas as possible will result in your laptop operating for a longer time from its battery power.

The greatest energy saving will be quickly made by going to Windows Power Options usually found in the Control Panel. Set it to maximum energy saving. This is simple to do and should save loads of power.

Just lowering the brightness of the laptop computer screen will save a lot of battery power. So using the laptop computer in a darkened room at minimal brightness is sure to save extra power.

Often users have many unnecessary, maybe ineffective applications running in the background. These will waste power and slow down the laptop. It's typically difficult to identify and remove them so a cleaner program could also be required for this.

Use hibernate when turning off the laptop computer because it uses nearly no energy on this mode and will quickly power up when required. Standby and shutdown needs to be avoided as each will use extra energy from the battery when off or entering Windows.

The hard drive is slow and makes use of more energy, the RAM could be very quick and doesn't use so much power, so adding additional RAM should speed up all operations of the laptop and reduce energy drain from the battery.

Turn off any unnecessary hardware components. The WI-FI card makes use of battery power when turned on even if not connected to the network. It can often be turned off through a switch or keyboard functions.

CD and DVD drives use a substantial amount of energy when running, so don't install programs or access data from these but from the hard drive. Typically, it is possible to instruct a piece of software to install completely from CD or DVD to the hard drive in order that it does not have to run from the power hungry CD or DVD drive.

Do not play music whilst working the laptop as the combination of the CD or DVD drive and sound from the speakers will quickly drain the battery. If possible turn down or mute the sound to save much more battery energy and prolong the use of the laptop.

If you hear the fan working frequently or all of the time then battery energy is being wasted trying to chill an overheating laptop. The vent could also be blocked or if you are utilizing it on your knees you may be stopping air flow. In either case additional battery power will be wasted and the laptop might eventually be damaged by the excess heat.

Unfortunately, each battery will hold less and less charge the more times it's used and charged and discharged. Care should be taken to try to extend the battery life as long as is possible. Do not let the battery become hot as this may shorten its life. Do not leave on charge for lengthy periods as soon as fully charged. Try to almost fully discharge the battery before recharging.

There are many other elements that affects the power drain out of your laptop computer's battery, however the major causes of depletion have been considered. A battery won't ever be as good as the mains supply in operating your laptop however there's no other alternative if you are on the road.