Please Educate Me On The Battery Calibration

I use A/C power 95% of the time in my auto. With that being said, I dont use my battery very much. Am I going to shorten the life span doing this? Or will the battery calibrator help with this, or any suggestions of what to do?

Thanks Guys...Patiently waiting for all the brain work to come out!

 

Well... I have seen thousands of batteries destroyed in my experiance when the customer (including my ex-girlfriends battery on her toshiba) would leave the laptop plugged in 95% of the time on the 110v ac plug... I would recommend that you remove the battery so you don't destroy it. Now if you are using it in your auto striaght from the cigarette lighter into the laptop (in otherwords, no auto - 110v inverter, then that would be even worse as that power IS NOT regulated.

As far as re-calibrating the battery is concerned, you would want to do it once a year (or more if you frequently drain 50 - 90% of the battery at a time)... re-calibrating it won't bring it back to life it has been destroyed due to it being plugged in all the time, it will simply make sure that the percentages are correct and that windows is reading the charge correctly so that the laptop doesn't shut off at lets say 22%.

Good luck!

 

Thank you for your help. I do run it off my inverter in the car. I don't want to take the battery out because sometimes I will take it out of my vehicle dock and take it in the house while it is still running. Maybe I just need to turn the inverter power off every once in a while?

 

yea you could do that, but then you are using the battery anyways... i would just simply pop the battery out and leave it inside the laptop sticking out a little bit then simply push it in all the way and close the battery door and wait a few seconds for it to catch up and then unplug it...

 

Rob,
A little clarification. My Lind DC/DC adapters which I use to power my Toughbooks in the car or on the boat have very sophisticated regulators to protect the battery. I suspect they are a lot better designed and made than the OEM AC chargers which come from Panasonic. I have a couple from eBay which bear a NASA tag, "Certified for Flight Operations". I fail to see how using one of these adapters will "kill" my battery. I believe that if you look inside a LEDco or G-J vehicle mount you will usually find a Lind adapter inside supplying the power to the laptop. The thing to avoid with these batteries is too many charging cycles, the battery becomes chemically depleted. Once the battery is fully charged the AC or DC power supply is just trickle charging the battery and I don't believe this damages the battery.
Cap

 

It's less an issue of the quality of of the input power, but rather that you're slowly 'cooking' the battery from the charging circuitry continuously putting a maintenance charge to top it up.

I did a long-term experiment with my work using Anton Bauer Dionic 90 (14.4v, 90Wh : http://www.antonbauer.com/dionic.htm#Digital_DIONIC_90) batteries and their Titan Twin charger ( http://www.antonbauer.com/titan_twin_70.htm). These are the top-of-the-line batteries and chargers as far as broadcast video cameras are concerned. Each battery is serialized and have a custom discharge chart printed out at the factory.

I left one battery on the charger near-continuously, using it as a last-resort only if my other two ran out. Guess what... the two batteries that I used on a normal daily, rotation basis, which would reflect normal usage (only a few times a month run down to EOD (end of discharge))... the one battery left on the charger died faster than the ones I actually used everyday!

Lithium batteries don't like full discharges. They liked to be topped up. But they have a definite life as well. They will die a slower death if not used, but their life still depreciates, much like a lead-acid/gel battery sitting idle.

There's a battery handbook here... good toilet reading.
http://www.antonbauer.com/downloads/2008Handbook.pdf

 

I was under the impression that the dc adapters couldn't trickle charge either, only full blast quick charge. didn't know that about the lind (obvioulsy), otherwise I woulda recognized that

 

Rob,
The Lind chargers even monitor the state of the vehicle battery to prevent draining them and leaving you with a dead car battery. If the vehicle battery drops below a certain voltage the adapter turns itself off. Remember, at some point the computer drops the almost 16v from the adapter to 11.1v in my CF-30 and 7.x volts in my CF-07. Same OEM charger, very different battery voltage.
Cap

 

Well, Now I am getting both sides of whats best!

I have been looking at the Lind chargers. The G/J Mag Dock I have does not come with it's own power supply. They swore up and down that my facory supply would not work. I finally had to physically show them it would work. Why would they make a product for a specific product and not make it to where the specifics products charger would work? Tounge twister! The reason was they kept trying to sale me a Lind. Well, now I am beginning to think maybe a Lind is worth it.

 

I think the "Important Tips" PDF file that should have been located on your desktop when you first purchased the CF-30 states that you should recalibrate your battery once every 3 months... If I recall correctly.

 

Toyo,
I think they are telling you that your factory adapter won't work because there is no 110/220V ac available in most vehicles. The Lind is the only product I use which is tougher and better made than a Toughbook. They are really a "nice piece of kit" as an Englishman on the forum put it when I hooked him up with a 24v Lind for his CF-29.
Cap

 

Yeah, whomever told you that car laptop DC/DC converters aren't regulated didn't know what they were talking about. It is inherent in the nature of the device that they have to provide a fixed, regulated voltage; it's part of how they work. :GEEK:

The power adapter for a laptop, whether it be AC powered or DC powered, simply provides DC power at the voltage and current capacity specified by the laptop manufacturer. The laptop's power supply section integrates a charging circuit designed in collaboration with the manufacturer of the battery pack used in the laptop (Sometimes the laptop MFR is that company; many times it is not). That circuitry provides the current regulation and battery monitoring functions; it works in conjunction with a smart board built into the pack which together charge the battery to its peak and prevent overcharging or overcurrent conditions. :twitcy:

The main problem is this; many laptop users really don't NEED a laptop; all they need is a computing device that is convenient to carry. They almost NEVER use their laptop without plugging it in, so they really don't even NEED a battery. This seems like a good deal; the battery is there to act like a built in UPS, right? Well, no.

The WORST THING you can do with ANY rechargeable battery is to not use it; no matter WHAT its chemistry. Constantly being float charged causes plate sulfation (or whatever metal salt is appropriate to your battery chemistry) because it is part of the charge/discharge cycle. A battery being used generates a small layer as part of the charge cycle; this layer becomes part of the transitive or "sacrificial" material which fuels the discharge cycle. If the battery is never discharged to its recommended minimum voltage, then that layer simply continues to build until it interferes with the cell's ability to generate current flow; eventually increasing its internal resistance to the point where it cannot pass enough current in the discharge cycle to remove the sulfation layer completely, or eventually, at all.

The OTHER issue you run into with modern laptops is with Windoze itself; in their infinite wisdom, Micro$uck set the defaults for power management to force a laptop into standby mode once it perceives, whether correctly or not, that the battery has reached critical discharge. (3% remaining, IIRC) This is fine on a battery which is used properly; Winblows APM (Win2K & newer) does constantly monitor the discharge curve of the battery and adjusts its life estimation accordingly. When the battery never gets discharged, Wi'nards learns a "flat" discharge curve which is not representative of the laptop's actual capacity. It then shuts off the laptop prematurely, and is never able to relearn the curve. With many laptops you can force a "relearn" by disabling all power management (Set all alarm actions to DO NOTHING when on battery) and run it a few cycles of "Charge fully then discharge until it simply shuts off" because of actually reaching such a state of discharge that the battery voltage is low enough to trigger the battery pack's minimum voltage safeguard. You can see this manifest as a laptop which reaches critical discharge quickly, but then continues to run at "0%" for some time after that point; I've been very lucky in a few cases and had batteries that actually ran a couple hours... this operating time will eventually be added to your estimated runtime.

The "Battery refresh" or "Battery recalibration" routine does this for you without having to resort to the above workaround; furthermore, since the utility is usually designed specifically for the battery in your laptop it works in a hardware specific mode rather than a generic APM profile mode generated by Wibbledows. This usually means that it clears the old profile to begin with, then starts a "relearn" cycle as if it were the first time the pack had been used. This is usually a much more accurate reflection of the battery pack's actual capacity.

Be mindful that this process is not a magic bullet; it just helps you get the most out of your battery pack that it can give. If you have a pack with healthy cells that has just been ignored for a while & doesn't know how good it really is, you can get dramatic results. But MOST batteries will only give you a bit more (10%-30%) runtime before they tank out. Take this windfall for what it is; a momentary reprieve to ease the immediate pain of the battery replacement you know you need. :wink:

mnem
"And the award for most profligate geekage on a mainstream User Group goes to..."

 

mnem,
Thanks for that. I have been guilty of using my Dell plugged in 95% of the time for years. The battery is finally acting as you described after 3 years. No matter, it is now retired to a port replicator in the shop. The new, unanticipated issue I have is the amount of battery life in the new CF-30. I can't really call it a problem, the sucker runs so long with the media bay battery I don't need to plug it in at all during a 12 hour work day. I'm trying to do as Panasonic suggested and run the batteries down to about 20% before I plug it in, but that is going to require me to put a charger on the kitchen table and remember to charge it every night. It takes a very long time to charge it back up. Mrs. Dogfish gets crabby when I leave power supplies laying around on "her" table, and I have to go hunting for the adapter after she "cleans up". It has been on now since 6:30 last night, it's now 6:20AM, 2-3 hours working, the balance with the lid closed and it's showing 8.38 hours/81% remaining on the power meter. I wonder how much time I'm going to have to allow for a battery refresh!
One interesting factoid I learned from a tech at Lind. DC/DC adapters for Dells are Dell specific as they contain a chip which "handshakes" with the computer to turn on the charging circuit. Aftermarket adapters will run the computer, but they will not charge the battery.
The "Award" in my opinion goes to the Dwagon.
Cap

 

Capt mentioned, "Panasonic suggested and run the batteries down to about 20%" and you said, "Micro$uck set the defaults for power management to force a laptop into standby mode once it perceives, whether correctly or not, that the battery has reached critical discharge. (3% remaining, IIRC)".

Which lower discharge limit is 'better' for the batteries in the long run, min 20%, 3% or completely flat? Please elaborate on how a battery is used properly (or improperly). I believe this is something that most users are either ill-informed or takes it as is.

For older 27s and 34s, which doesn't have 'Refresh' option in the bios, what would you suggest? Thanks.
Ron in SG

 

Now this is a thread you gotta love. INFORMATION!

I just recieved my Lind power supply yesterday. I am going to do the wiring for it today.

I just unplugged my computer to run it on the battery. I will do this now and then like you guys described.

Here is another monkey in wrench........ Mine sits in a Gamber/Johnson Mag Dock. I wonder how much power the dock is taking from my battery to operate? It has lights, R/F pass thru I am using etc. I guess I could take my current battery specs, take it out of the dock and see what changes?

 

For what it's worth, here from the horses mouth;
View attachment Panasonic Battery.pdf
This comes from "Important Tips" which is on the desktop of new Toughbooks. Bear in mind that Panasonic is one of the largest battery manufacturers in the world.
Cap

 

Well Capt, It looks like my battery will last forever! Ha Ha , That is a very good piece of literature.

I unplugged my computer at 11:00 am yesterday. At 7:30 it still 30% remaining. I used it hard till about 3:00 and then it just stayed there with a couple of programs runnings.

 

The Manual for my cf-52 suggests switching the bios setting to high temp environment for prolonged plug ins where the laptop is rarely run on battery. The short reason it gives is that the battery is charged only to 80% "prolonging the life of the battery"

 

I realize the real world doesn't allow for you to fully discharge your battery EVERY TIME; my rule of thumb is to discharge the battery COMPLETELY at least once a week. This means turn off all alarm actions in power management & let it run until it shuts off due to battery depletion. The protection circuits in the laptop & battery will NOT allow you to over-discharge the battery. I'm nearing the 3 year mark with my HP laptop (which I use EVERYDAY) and still manage 90% of runtime it had when new; I think that's doing pretty good.

mnem
Double-charging a battery? That's RE-VOLTING!