F8VA-B1 battery life

I have an F8VA-B1, and so far my only issue is the horrible battery life. I'm coming from a T60p w/ 9 cell battery, and the 2-2.5h that the F8VA lasts is killing me. I know that with tweaks you can squeeze another few minutes, but I'm looking for an extra 1.5-2h. Using a second battery would work, but it's a hassle to swap, and it's an extra thing to carry.

I need to know if it's at all possible to use an DVD bay battery with this machine. I am aware that the DVD drive is not swappable, that Asus does not offer a drive bay battery and that no aftermarket drive bay batteries are available for this model. What I need to know is if the motherboard has the circuitry to accept a charge coming from the drive bay.

My rationale is as follows: Other laptops are using the same DVD drive as my F8VA, and they may have an drive bay battery that would physically fit in the F8VA chassis. So as long as the F8VA motherboard supports power coming from the drive bay, I could theoretically get a battery from another manufacturer and stick it in.

Unfortunately I haven't been able to find out whether or not the F8VA motherboard can accept a charge from the DVD drive bay. And before I make sure it does, everything else is a moot point.

 

I think what you're asking is if the F8 series notebooks have a switching bridge in the motherboard that enables hot-swapping batteries. AFAIK, they don't and your only option to increase battery life is to use another primary battery.

 

I have never heard of "DVD bay secondary battery" option for the F8Va series. It is not as easy as to plug-in batteries that can fit into the DVD bay, of course. You need appropriate battery connections in the drive bay and the mechanisms to handle on-line switching of power.

Currently the best thing to do is to keep a spare main battery and when one of them is about to finish, you may hibernate/shut off the laptop and swap the batteries which will effectively double the battery life (upto 5-6 hours in total).


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I was afraid that Asus did not include the required circuitry on the motherboard. I guess the only real solution is getting the spare main battery.

Thanks for the replies, this forum is a great source of information.