MacBook : Long time powered on

Hi, if I know im going to leave it on for a while (downloading during the night, long instalations, video conversions, etc ), should I take the battery of and leave directly with the power line (dont know if it's possible anyway didn't try it) or just leave the battery in? Thanks

 

It's better to take out the battery if it's fully charged
Here's the battery guide, gives better reasoning than I can

 

i find it more useful to leave it in. in the event that your power goes out, your computer stays running, and you don't loose whatever it was doing.

thats happened to me several times, power goes out briefly, but the battery takes over and i continue with what i was doing.

 

If you leave you notebook always on most of the time, and you never really travel much, then go ahead and remove the battery.

Otherwise, don't worry about it.

 

I agree with Radcom...personally, I don't see much substance in the arguments that "overcharging" your battery is possible and also harmful. Plus, should something happen, you have at least an hour of backup power via the battery.

 

Remove it if your laptop gets hot from doing CPU intensive tasks. Heat and batteries don't mix.

 

The lifespan for Lithium Ion batteries is dependent on temperature and charge... keeping it constantly at 100% at high temperature can kill a battery dead in a matter of months.

This article has more details.

 

personally, i don't care for those battery articles too much, i always have my ibook battery in, i never take it out, and it still has ~90% of its charge after 1 1/2 years and nearly 200 cycles

granted, if i take it out, my notebook is unblanced as one of the feet is on the battery.

 

You obviously didn't read the article then. While the reported capacity may still be 80-90%, you may not be able to use it due to an increase in the battery's internal resistance. That's not even taking into account any mis-calibration in the battery level.

For a real test, you have to check your iBook's runtime under battery power and compare it to how it was 18 months ago. I guarantee it won't be 90% of what it was then.

 

i still get nearly five hours out of it. i would say that is close to 90%