Power Manager on non-Thinkpads? similar tool on other brands?

I love the Power Manager app on my T61p. Based on http://lenovoblogs.com/insidethebox/?p=52, It's probably why my battery (which doesn't get used much, machine mostly on AC) is still totally fine after ~2.5 years, unlike my old Dell Inspiron 4000 series after not too long.

Do non-Thinkpad Lenovos have the Power Manager app? http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site.wss/document.do?sitestyle=lenovo&lndocid=MIGR-70601 seems to only list Thinkpads.

I'm in the market for a cheapo laptop only to occasionally VPN into work but no netbooks or AMD for me. It doesn't need to be fast nor very good but must be able to run Win7 Enterprise. I've been tempted by bargains on G series and Ideapads thinking that they'd have it but it looks like they don't.

Any other vendors ship with a similar tool that lets you change the thresholds for when to start charging and to stop at a certain %? (I'd rather pay more for a laptop w/this feature than to have shell out ~$100 for a battery after 1-2 years.)

 

don't think they do, these features are for Thinkpads only. The SL thinkpads had missed many features like setting the threshold, etc.

 

And apparently the new T series had that missing before the latest update. I am not aware of any similar (read as configurable) power management features from other manufactures that is tied to the hardware level.

 

Huh? I think ever since I bought my T61p around late 8/07, early 9/07, I'd always had the ability to specify don't charge until battery drops to x % and only charge up to y %. Yeah, the UI has changed over the years, but that choice has always been there.

Is there some place that I can see what Power Manager UI on the SL looks like? If it doesn't let me set the above, then I should probably rule it out.

 

On my new T410, Power Manager 3.12 did not allow me to set custom thresholds - that shocked me!!

However the option came back in 3.20, and all was fine with the world once again...!!

 

@cwerdna you don't have a new T series...

 

So, for the SL series, did it get added back (or ever added) with 3.20 and above?

 

i wouldn't know, i don't have a SL series.

 

I've seen just Fujitsu notebooks that let you set the threshold somewhat. You either get to pick full charge or 80% charge...

HP has a couple of notebooks that can use their new "long-life" battery which is supposed to last 3 years. However, the initial capacity is somewhat lower than the regular battery.

 

HP Elitebooks have a similar power manager that can even tell you how much it costs to run your laptop for a year based on its power usage. Dell has ControllPoint, which probably isn't as good as the Thinkpad Power Manager. I think it's probably easier and better to just use Windows 7's power manager on any brand besides Thinkpads and Elitebooks. I like my Thinkpad Power Manager so I use that, but Windows 7 has a great built-in power manager.

 

Ok, does Windows 7's power manager let you specify charge thresholds? I'm looking for don't charge until battery drops to x % and only charge up to y %. If not, can you just tell it to not charge?

I have Win 7 installed on some machines but none are laptops so I can't check.

 

No, that is just in power manager.

 

No it doesn't.