Laptops: Make the most of your battery life

Sooner or later, whoever uses a laptop also asks: how long will the battery still live? Unfortunately, for most people the answer is: battery life is often not enough. However, there are many tips for you to make the most of, to the last seconds of the battery.

Using power management mode: Using the laptop's power management software, you can save a considerable amount of time for the machine. If the laptop has an applet for you to create separate power profiles compared to the OS, use it to adjust the settings until you achieve the optimal balance between functions and battery life. If not, use the relatively good Power Options utility in Windows in the Control Panel (Power Management in Windows 98).

Reduce screen brightness: An energy-consuming place for laptops is an LCD screen.Reducing the screen brightness will extend battery life.For example, when working in a low-light environment, you can increase your computer's 45 minutes by reducing screen brightness.Most laptops have a key combination, a function key (Fn), or a software utility to adjust this brightness.

For low screen brightness is great for battery life but the screen turns off when not in use.The Power Options / Power Management utility allows you to tell the notebook how long to wait before turning off the screen.In Windows XP and 2000, open Control Panel, select Performance and Maintenance, and click on Power Options.In Windows 98, open Control Panel and double-click Power Mangement.In the Power Schemes section, select Portable / Laptop in the "Power schemes" drop-down menu.In the menu next to "Turn off monitor", you select the amount of time the screen remains in the waiting state before turning off (see Figure 1).The shorter this time, the more power saving.However, the shortest option "After 1 min" may not be very practical.

Power Options and Power Management programs each have their own settings for other components in the laptop, namely the hard drive. Again, you will have to find a power saving setting for yourself. You need to remember to minimize the frequency of automatic backups in applications such as word processing and other software, otherwise your hard disk "sleeping" will be "woken up".

No power plugging: Remove PC Cards and USB devices when not needed.
Mimic a bear: Most PCs have a Hibernate or Suspend mode, and you can easily use the keyboard to activate these modes. Review the laptop's documentation for how to install it. Suspend mode (also called Stand By mode) will keep running information in RAM with a minimum power capacity, so the system will work quickly again. The Hibernate mode writes everything to disk and closes, so it saves electricity better than Suspend mode, but it also lasts longer for PC to wake up. However, it is much faster to wake up a system that is Hibernate than to start a machine that is turned off.

Increase the time a bit: To prevent the laptop's CPU from running unnecessary tasks, you turn off any unused hardware or software. Check the icons in the system tray (at the bottom right corner near the clock); For those applications that do not need, you can close them, although they are likely to run again when restarted. You can refer to the "Customizing Open and Open Windows at Your Own" article (June 4, 2004, page 113).

To monitor CPU resources when running many different programs, in Windows 2000 and XP, press - to open Task Manager.Select the Performance tab to see a graph showing the CPU usage (see Figure 2).In Windows 98 and Me, this information is in System Monitor: press Start, Programs, Accessories, System Tools, System Monitor to open it.

Disabling unnecessary devices, you can save even more small battery life.For example, if you're on an airplane, chances are you won't use a modem, network card, parallel and serial ports, and possibly a DVD or CD-ROM drive.You can easily disable all these devices in Device Manager.To open Device Manager in Windows 98 and Me, right-click My Computer and select Properties.Device Manager.In Windows 2000 and XP, right-click My Computer and select Properties, Hardware.Device Manager.To remove a device, right-click its list under the corresponding category and select Disable (see Figure 3).

If you have to disable devices often, you can save time by creating a hardware profile in Windows. Refer to "Potential" (June 2004, page 9), to learn how to create a hardware profile in all versions of Windows.

Boost memory: Adding more memory to your laptop will save power because Windows will rely less on exchanging files in virtual memory on your hard drive.

Battery care: Clean the metal contacts of the battery every two months with an alcohol-soaked cloth.

Bring a backup kit: Buy an extra battery pack if you have the ability. Perhaps it takes from 85 USD to 235 USD.

Charge regularly: Bring the battery charger kit with you during the trip, and plug in the power to recharge the battery whenever convenient.If the adapter included with the laptop is too bulky, look for a versatile adapter (you can adjust the output voltages).In addition, there is another type of adapter for laptops that uses 12V power often found in cars.Instead of the 12V adapter, you can use a DC-AC adapter, like Belkin's $ 30 AC Anywhere to plug the AC adapter directly into a 12V socket.AC Anywhere can run any AC device with a power consumption of less than 140W.

Discharge: If an old laptop uses a nickel-metal hydride battery, release all the electricity and recharge it again, once a month, to maximize its charged capacity. Most new laptops use lithium ion batteries without needing to discharge to maximize their charging capacity.

If you are looking to buy a laptop, you should equip yourself with the best battery life from systems based on Intel's Centrino base. However, just like any other technology, please refer to the product review articles from reliable sources before purchasing. Graphics chips, peripheral connectors and many other factors can affect laptop battery life. Actual results may not be the same as the quality of the advertisers.

Power supply malfunction

I read the article "Choosing the right hard drive" (June 2004, page 114) and was a bit shocked at some of the details the author presented. First, the author requires power to have a SATA connector. This SATA power connector is not the same as the standard Molex connector used in standard IDE drives. An adapter to convert standard cable to SATA costs about 2 USD. In addition, I think that IDE flat cable takes up a lot of space. In my PC, I use the "curled" IDE cable. They don't take more space than SATA cables.

Both have advantages. Power sources using SATA compatible connectors were very rare, but it is increasingly easy to find and have many SATA adapters on the market. If you buy a new power supply with a SATA connector, or a new PC with a new power supply, look for a type that supports 12V, 5V, and 3.3V. Many systems only support 12V and 5V, they are suitable for current SATA hard drives but may not support future drive types.

If you are assembling a PC or if the case you are using is too hot, the curled IDE cable is better suited. They sell a lot at computer stores.

Xuan Cuong
PC World USA April 10