LET'S TALK ABOUT TIPS FOR LONGER LAPTOP BATTERY LIFE
1. ACTIVATE YOUR
LAPTOP'S BATTERY SAVER OR ECO MODE
Designed with
these sorts of circumstances in mind, most Battery Saver or Eco modes will
engage a number of automatic changes to lengthen usable battery life—many of
the same changes we'll be making here. This saved profile will adjust your
laptop's settings and shift components into low-power states to help you ration
your remaining juice a bit longer.
Once you've
turned on the automatic battery-saver tool, there are still plenty of steps to
take to eke out even better efficiency. This is done by turning off unnecessary
devices, adjusting settings to reduce power consumption, shutting down unwanted
apps and processes, and adjusting your activities to use less power.
2. DISABLE UNUSED
DEVICES AND PORTS
The easiest way
to reduce power consumption is to simply turn stuff off. Every component in
your laptop needs power to function, but that doesn't mean you need to power
all of those components all of the time. Start by disconnecting any unneeded
peripherals (like a USB mouse or external drive) and turning off the biggest
power hogs, like Wi-Fi and Bluetooth radios, graphics processors, and unused
optical drives.
WARNING: Before
disabling any component or device, make sure that the device is not in use, and
that it is not essential to continuing operation of the laptop. For example,
you do not want to disable the hard drive that houses the operating system, or
the processor the runs the entire laptop. Only disable those devices you are
comfortable turning off.
To disable unused
devices on a Windows system, open up your system's Control Panel and find the
Device Manager. In the Device Manager, individual components are grouped by
category. For example, Network Adapters will often include both the LAN
adapter, which provides Ethernet connectivity, and Wi-Fi, for wireless
networking.
The four standard
candidates for saving power are the graphics card (found under Display
Adapters), the optical drive (found under DVD/CD-ROM Drives), and the Ethernet
and Wi-Fi adapters (under Network Adapters). Find the device you want to shut
down within the relevant category. Right click on the device name, and select
"Disable" from the drop down menu.
While you're in
the Device Manager, you can also turn off any unused ports. Just like an
extension cord left plugged into an outlet, these unused plugs still have power
going through them, and losing some in the process. The actual impact on
battery life will be minimal, but if you're desperate for another minute or two
of life, this will help. Take a quick glance at your ports, and turn off
anything that's not being used, like USB ports with nothing connected to them.
3. ADJUST YOUR
SETTINGS
While you'll
still have to use the display and the keyboard, you can adjust the settings for
each to reduce power consumption. One often overlooked power drain is keyboard
backlighting. Unless you're in the dark and need the backlight just to make out
each key, turn off the backlight entirely. You can typically assign a hotkey
for this function.
The next power
drain is your screen. While you obviously need to keep it up and running to use
the laptop, you don't necessarily need it running at maximum brightness or
resolution. Many laptops will have hotkeys for increasing and decreasing the
screen brightness, but if not, it can be adjusted in the control panel.
Reducing the display to 50 percent when you're running on battery power can add
a significant amount of time.
Additionally, if
you're simply typing up a document, you don't need all of the detail offered by
a 1080p or higher display. Dialing down the screen resolution to a basic
1,366-by-768 resolution or lower reduces
the amount of power used in graphics processing without negatively
impacting your ability to work, letting your laptop hang on a bit longer.
Finally, turn off
or turn down the sound. If you need to hear, drop the sound down as low as you
can, and consider switching from the laptop's larger speakers to a set of tiny
earbuds to get the audio piped right to your ears. Whenever possible, just mute
the laptop altogether. That way, the speakers won't be getting any power, and
you'll buy yourself some more precious time. (This is a quite difficult considering
if you have to call to your house or even work)
4. TURN OFF APPS
AND PROCESSES
It's not just the
hardware that's stealing your battery juice. Multiple apps and processes
running on your system will also chew through battery life more quickly. As
with the hardware, start by turning off anything that isn't being used.
In Windows, start
by taking a look in your system tray, the collection of icons in the
lower-right corner of the desktop, next to the clock. On the left end of the
System Tray, select the icon to display hidden icons. Take note of which apps
are running in the background.
Open up the Task
Manager by pressing Ctrl+Shift+Esc, or use Ctrl+Alt+Del and select Task Manager
from the menu. Once in the Task Manager, look at the open apps—you may find
that a program or two have been left running simply because you forgot to close
a window instead of minimizing it.
Next, go to the
Processes tab. This shows you what processes are currently running on your
machine. While some of these are needed, some, like those associated with music
and video players or cloud storage services (like Dropbox or Google Drive) can
be disabled without causing any problems.
You can also
stretch your battery life by simplifying your own activities. Multitasking is
nice when you have full power, but running several programs at once puts a
greater load on the processor and draws more power. Adjust your computer use by
sticking to one application at a time and avoiding resource-intensive programs.
Start by
single-tasking—if you need to type up a document, close any additional
programs. You'll get longer battery life by not running Spotify in the
background. If you need to keep some tunes going, switch from streaming media
to locally stored songs—you'll still be using some extra power to play them,
but streaming media over Wi-Fi also uses the laptop's wireless radio.
You might also
benefit from switching to simpler tools for the same tasks, like typing in a
basic text editor rather than using Microsoft Word. It may have fewer features
and none of Word's automatic actions (like Spell Check and Autosave), but you
can do all the writing you need without using quite so much power. Some
applications you'll want to avoid entirely, like photo and video editing tools,
which place a significant load on the processor and graphics card, and are real
power hogs.
6. CARE AND
FEEDING OF BATTERIES
It starts with
taking care of the battery itself. If your system has a removable battery, take
care not to damage the battery contacts. They connect the laptop to the
battery, and if the contacts get dirty or damaged, it can reduce and disrupt the
flow of power. You can clean the contacts with a cotton swab and rubbing
alcohol, but damaged contacts might need to be professionally repaired. This
doesn't apply to laptops that seal the battery into the chassis.
You may have
heard old tips about charging your battery to only 80 percent, and not leaving
it on the charger all the time, but most of that advice is outdated, and
applies to older nickel metal hydride batteries but not the lithium ion and
lithium-polymer batteries used today. While modern laptop batteries don't
require you to be as conscientious about how and when you charge your battery,
you should occasionally take the opportunity to let the battery drain
completely through normal use.
Finally, keep
things cool. Heat will shorten the long-term life of the battery, so take steps
to provide optimal airflow and cooling. The biggest problems come from physical
obstruction of the ventilation ports. Dust buildup is one problem, which you
can take care of by cleaning the laptop's vents and fan. A can of compressed
air can be used to blow out some of the dust. The more frequent issue that
crops up is using the laptop on a pillow or blanket, which can both obstruct
the ventilation fan and retain the heat coming off of the system. This can be
avoided by only using your laptop on surfaces like a table or desk, and a
lapdesk will make a big difference when using a laptop in bed.
7. TUNE-UP
The next step is
keep your laptop tuned up for more efficient use of power. A few simple
maintenance tasks and upgrades will not only help your battery last longer, but
they will also result in a faster system overall.
For starters,
regularly defragment your hard drive to make data retrieval more efficient. An
active drive uses more energy that an idle one, and defragmenting your hard
drive reduces the amount of active drive time needed to access data. Over time,
as you add and remove files from your system, data is haphazardly recorded to
the hard drive, scattered in different portions of the drive. This disorderly
(or fragmented) data, requires additional time and energy to access that
information in the course of regular use. Defragmenting your drive is the
digital equivalent of organizing your cupboards, making everything a bit tidier
and easier to find. Windows has an automatic tool that defragments your drive
on a regular schedule, but you should at least check to be sure that this is
enabled and running properly. In Windows 10, search for "Defragment and
Optimize Drive" to find it. Note: Do not defragment a solid-state drive (SSD), as it will reduce
the drive's usable life.
Decluttering your
drive will also make it more efficient. Practice good computer hygiene and
regularly remove unwanted programs, clean out cobwebbed files, and ditch any
excess bloatware that came with your system. Your cleanup should also include
cleaning out the cache on your Web browser and deleting all of the old files
from your downloads folder. Windows also has built-in tools for this (search
for "Disk Cleanup"), or there are a number of free and paid system
tune-up utilities with even richer capabilities.
8. UPGRADE
COMPONENTS
Another option is
to ditch the hard drive entirely, and upgrade to an SSD. These use flash memory
to store data instead of a spinning disk, so there are no moving parts; this
automatically makes them more energy efficient. In addition to improving your
laptop's battery life, SSDs also deliver faster performance and boot times than
their traditional counterparts, and remove the problems associated with
fragmentation.
Finally, add some
more RAM to your system. RAM stores data for short-term use in flash modules,
much like an SSD. The more data that can be put into RAM, the less reliant the
system will be on pulling that data afresh from the hard drive. Again, reducing
hard drive activity reduces the power consumption, but like an SSD upgrade,
adding RAM also has performance benefits that you will notice immediately.
9. BATTERY BACKUP
Finally, the
easiest way to ensure that you always have enough battery power is to bring
along an extra; either a spare battery or an external battery pack. For laptops
with a removable battery, the simplest option is a second battery. These can
either be ordered directly from the manufacturer, or purchased from a
third-party company, usually for less than $100. Simply swap the old battery
for the new once in a while when charging, and bring along the charged-up spare
whenever you expect to be away from a power outlet.
Another, similar
option is to buy an external power pack. While it is also technically a
battery, these external power sources plug in to your laptop the same way your
charger does. They generally cost between $100 and $200, but come with adapters
for use with many different laptop models, and can be reused on more than one
system, and even for other devices, like your phone or tablet.
Although these
strategies will help you make the most of the battery you have, if you're in
the market for a new laptop anyway, check out our roundup of recent models with
the best battery life. And if your problem is that your computer is plugged in
but not charging, we have more advice for both Windows and Mac laptops.
SOME OTHER TECHNICAL RECOMMENDATIONS:
1- Never use a software to manage and administer your battery laptop, do it using the OS tools (Windows & Mac)
2- Remove all necesary software and programs running background to avoid updates (only the unnecesary)
3- If you have to travel for long time and gonna be out, you can have options like a charger for vehicles that can convert power from 12v to 110/120v. WORKS!
4- Never, ever try to update and install software without power and running on battery, only if is necessary.
Comments
Post a Comment