Need help please: How will I know if my Asus k42jv is fully charged? :(

Hi, guys. I am new to this Asus forum since I just got a new Asus notebook last week. It's a K42j i5-450M (as you can see in my signature below). I first used it and drained the battery to the brim prior to charging it. I read in NBR that it's good to recalibrate the battery once in 3 months to extend batt life So, this is what I did considering my batt is new. I slept and left my my laptop turned off while it's charging. When I woke up (after 8 hours), I saw that the battery usage indicator light was already yellow. It was orange when I left. I read the e-manual that came pre-installed and the Asus user's manual. It says that the yellow light would disappear if the Asus battery is completely or fully-charged. I was wondering if my battery is still not fully charged when i left it for 8 hours. I tried turning on my Asus K42j running it's batt. It indicated 97% of charging. So I guess my battery is not yet full even after leaving it for 8hours. How then will I know if my battery is already at it's 100% state of being fully-charged? Does charging Asus batt really take this long? Thank you very much

 

Also, is it fine to use my laptop for a long time like 5 hours while the battery is attached? Or should I detached it? Actually, in my old laptops before, I used to detach the batt and run on AC at home. However, there have been short electric shortages which cut the electric supply. I fear that these electric supply fluctuations could ruin my laptop. What's your stand on this? I really want to prolong the battery life of my new Asus while taking good care of its internal parts as well, like its internal hdd, and other parts. Thanks a lot

 

Ei, guys, need a hand on this...

 

Alright, for the charging problem, it's normal if your laptop says 97%. Asus laptops have a great feature to extend battery life by not allowing the battery to charge if it is over 90% charged. Try using the battery till 80% and then plug your AC adapter back in. Hopefully it will reach a 100%.

Because of the great feature you DO NOT need to unplug your battery.

If you are getting power surges, get a surge protector, and don't be too cheap, get ones cost around 20$ and you'll have you're laptop running no matter how many power surges you get.

Best of luck, I like the AUG.

 

-Thanks a lot, now I am enlightened Btw, what do you by AUG?

 

I'm glad you are!
is that YOUR AUG? I'm talking about the gun in the picture

 

In the BIOS there is a battery function that will allow you to see the charge of the battery and if you feel its not giving its life, to recalibrate it.. be careful on that one, it will tell you to unplug your laptop so it can drain the battery. As far as electrical surge, get a good power strip that is rated well to help catch those surges and nulify them to not hurt your computer.

 

-Oh, yeah, sorry hehe Yeap, that's my AUG w/ phantom kit. I'm into airsoft, are you too?

 

-How can I access the BIOS? This is the one upon boot-up, right? Thanks, btw

 

I am not detaching my battery anymore whenever I use A/C power. Before using the A/C power, I saw that my battery level was 97.8% because I used the battery a bit. I turned off my notebook and slept. When I woke up, I turned it on again using A/C power, I saw that my battery level went down by 0.1%. from 97.8 to 97.7%. Is this normal? I mean even though I have been using the A/C power, my battery is draining by 0.1%...

 

That sounds like a glitch or did you completely shut down or did you Hibernate/sleep the machine. Also, sometimes computers can get stuck in shut down mode and not actually shut down when you unplug it from AC power during shut down and just get stuck there. When you restarted, did it ask you if you wanted to start in safe mode or anything?

 

ALso, another thing I forgot, laptops have a built in system that even though its on AC power, it will still use a little of the battery so it doesnt just sit there and rot. This helps keep the battery in good standing and just sit there and be a lame duck.

 

I don't understand comrade_commissar7,
did you mean that with the laptop plugged in to A/C power it still lost .1?
if so I wouldn't be worried, why? because reading battery levels is never perfect and will always have a margin of error.

And if the laptop was NOT plugged in, as l3g4cy99 said, laptops keep a power circulation even when they are off. My Asus, when fully shut down, still loses battery over time. When this happens, you can remove the battery.

 

-so you suggest i detach the battery and use A/C instead? I lost another 1% of my batt while plugged it, now it's 95%... Btw, I am using the Osiris batterybar free edition...

 

-yes, it asked for that when I first calibrated my battery, like used it down to the drain until it shut down. Before charging, I turned it my notebook once again until after logging in to the desktop, it shut down completely. That time, I recharged my battery. After 8 hours of charging. I booted my notebook and asked for safe mode or start windows normally options. Then, in the desktop, I saw that my batt was just charged 97% although I left it for 8 hours...