Laptop Batteries

[ChAoTiCpInOy]

I have been reading that laptop batteries should not be continuously charged because they lose life. By that I mean, you should charge it fully, then unplug it and use it until the battery dies, then charge it fully again, and keep doing that. Or is it ok if you keep it plugged in the whole time? Which is the best way to keep your battery life longer?

 

[TheStu]

There are moany schools of thought on this one. The more you charge modern Li-Ion batteries, the faster they lose their life. Most laptops and their batteries have chips in them to make sure that you do not either A: overcharge them B: keep sending power to them after they are fully charged. On my machine for example, after it reaches 100%, it stops charging, and it will not recharge until it falls below 95% or so.

 

[ChAoTiCpInOy]

So Macbooks and Macbook Pros bascially do not have this issue because it does not keep charging the battery even after it is fully charged?

 

[TheStu]

I was ust using my machine as an example, I know that Dell does the same thing, I just am unsure about the specifics of it. I certainly know that it stops charging once it reaches 100%, at that point all the power gets diverted to the system. Furthermore, some laptops actually will downclock themselves (even shut down a core if they are dual core) if they see that tehy are plugged into mains, but there is no battery present.

 

[ChAoTiCpInOy]

So plugging them in seems to be ok to the life of the battery and standard to the operation of the laptop?

 

[Throckmorton]

You can keep it plugged in, but when you unplug it, like when you're moving it, you should let it discharge some. Plugging it in when it's already at 100% will degrade it faster.