m1530 owners with 9-cell batteries check in please

So I haven't even had my laptop for a year yet (will be a year at the end of May). I bought a separate 9-cell somewhere in late June or early July.

I've noticed as of late, that my battery life is nowhere near as long as it used to be. With all my tweaks and once it was sitting at the desktop idle, Rightmark would regularly say I have almost 6 hours of charge left. As of today, I don't even see 4.5 hours, sometimes barely 4 hours.

I checked the battery by holding down the button at back; the lights go away instantly and then 3 of them light back up.

I definitely didn't buy this thing with the expectation that it would lose over 30% of its capacity in barely 10 months of use, especially considering a new battery costs between 100-150 bucks.

Is the 9-cell's life span really this sh!tty?

 

The battery probably has a 12 month warranty, so trade it in quick.

Battery life usually becomes reduced when the battery is mis-used. If you often discharge only partially then recharge, this is hurting the battery. Also, leaving the laptop plugged in with the battery inserted for long periods is also bad. Do you do either of these things?

 

I do the opposite actually. If I unplug it and run it off the battery, I don't plug it back in until I get down to 5-10% remaining. Likewise, if it's charging, I never unplug it until it gets back up to at least 95%.

As to the second point, is that when the laptop is on or off? Because if my laptop is shut off, I always unplug it (unless of course it's charging as described above, in which case I'll unplug it once the battery light on the front of it is no longer lit).

 

Then it sounds like you take excellent care of your battery.
See if you have any warranty options.

 

Purchased my 1530 in 1/08 along with my 6 cell and my 9 cell.

In 1/09, my 9 cell on my 1530 wouldn't even hold steady on 2 bars...
Then, it failed to even hold a charge.

The 1 year warranty ended mid January. I contacted XPS Support, and even though I was out of warranty nearly 11 days, they did a *one time courtesy* for me and sent me a *brand new* 9 cell battery.

This I thought was very nice of them....I was able to convince them that for a 9 cell, the battery should have not have *died* that quickly even at the 1 year mark.

So, here I am checking in!

My new battery works flawlessly, BTW!


Cin

 

technically, 3 lights = 60% dead

might be a manufacturing error, or something that u did reduced the life so badly

 

thats funny, i was just getting ready to test my 9cell's battery time, since i bought it in june and ive used it A LOT since then ( only battery i have... )

might also call dell and hope they understand my battery no longer gives more than 1 hour of charge, when it gave 3 when i bought it

best of luck to you man!

 

Thanks for the the insight guys, never thought to just call up XPS support and tell them. But it's good to see I'm not crazy in thinking that a battery should last at least a year before beginning to lose capacity.

 

Contact them and have them send you a new one. You should have a battery running at a much better capacity, then what you have now!

Cin

 

Wow thats really nice of them its great sometimes when you get a good representative.

 

This is OT, but on the topic of getting stuff replaced past warranty, eVGA is awesome about it. I've RMAd two cards that were both 1-2 months out of warranty. The first was a 7600GS, I got a 7600GS back. The second was a 7600GT, I got an 8800GS back!
When I called in the first one, the phone rep approved my RMA while I was on the phone with him, it was great.

 

There's your problem.

Charge cycles are the main killer of a li-ion battery, and what you've just done there (allow it to discharge all the way to 5-10% before plugging it in) is a full cycle. An average laptop battery only has 300-500 cycles in it before it is noticeably degraded.

Run it off the battery when you need to for sure (ie when you're away from a socket), of course, thats what batteries are for!........ but don't discharge it on purpose needlessly, that will just degrade the battery sooner.

 

Yes, it is...that is a case of great Dell Support...XPS Support has always been great

The 9 Cell's should last well more than a year!

Cin

 

Really? I understood it as the opposite. That running the laptop off the battery for 30 mins then plugging it back in for 15 mins then unplugging and running for an hour off battery etc etc etc was worse for the battery.

 

Little update. I called up Dell about the battery.

Boy did I get a lot of grief for what I thought would be a simple replacement that would take up all of 5 minutes of my time. Ending up being on the phone for over an hour and it's still not resolved, because they can't find my information in their system about the battery. So I'm waiting for a call back from some "resolution specialist" which that only happened after basically I chewed him out and said that I want to speak to his supervisor/manager.

Before that, he offered to replace the original 6-cell battery that came with my laptop. Uhh, how the hell is that supposed to be a solution when the problem lies with the 9-cell battery that I bought, and not the 6-cell. He even went so far as to say that "oh, that sounds normal." REALLY?!? Going from over 5.5 hours of runtime to barely 4 in less than 10 months is normal? Hmm, I think not.

 

No, not with Li-Ion batteries, they don't have any memory effect. It's all about cycles.

If you use it until it hits 50% and then recharge it, that's basically 'half a cycle'.

If you use it until it is all the way empty, and then recharge it, that is a 'full cycle'

A full cycle is basically twice as bad as a half cycle. It is probably not that accurate, but that's the rough idea. So only discharge it when you actually need to use it, don't discharge it needlessly in the belief that it will prolong battery life, because it will do the opposite.

 

Ummm... You purchased that 9 cell in late June/July right? And, it was a separate purchase...Therefore, that 9 cell, is still covered under the 1 year warranty. It has nothing to do with the 6 cell battery whatsover.

They should be able to pull the information on the battery via the serial number.

You need to complete the Unresolved Issues form. You are being fed some BS, I'm sorry. Ack..that's not good CS at all. I detest seeing this type of service, and coming from a so called *Resolutions Specialist*....

Here: https://support.dell.com/support/to...outstanding_issues?c=us&l=en&s=gen&redirect=1

Also, if you go to your online Dell account, you can pull up your purchases that you have made up until the past 2 years, I believe...and you should be able to pull the order number for the purchase of that 9 cell battery

Do not let them ship you anything less that what you paid for...The 9 cell battery.

Cin

 

I have generally let it run down to about 30-50%, then have it recharge. My original 9-cell battery lasted only 13 months. (I fought with Dell CS for two hours and they finally agreed to send a replacement, since the battery only held a 1.5 hr charge at that point)

So, would just running it plugged in to the charger most of the time increase battery life? Any down side to that?

El

 

Wait... 4-6 hours of battery life on a 9-Cell??????!!!!!! I must be retarded or something, but mine has NEVER been that high. Right now, my laptop is completely charged and RightMark is telling me 3:10 battery time left. Should I call for a new battery? My laptop is not even half a year old, and I always only had about 2 hours of battery life even after all the tweaking. I just passed it off as normal, as it is a laptop, and I would carry my charger to class.