Laptop Battery?

[luckyeight]

Is it good to leave the adapter in the mains plugged into the laptop constantly? Does it harm the battery or is it a good thing? Is it advisable to power up the battery then run it down, or maybe it makes no difference in terms of the battery's life how you power it? Any info gratefully received.

[fo3nix]

The battery will only last a certain number of cycles before it starts not working properly. So if you leave it plugged into the mains it should bypass the battery once fully charged, this meaning that the battery won't be losing any cycles as you're using it. So that should be good.

However, it's always good to use the battery occasionally. Perhaps use it on the battery once a week or so, just to keep it in use.

[jenky]

I would have thought fo3nix was correct, but at a local store called 'the laptop shop', they remove the batteries from all laptops that are permanently attached to the mains. I thought it was to stop them being nicked, but they told me it was to stop them heating up too much and that this can cause a drop-off in performance.

[fo3nix]

In a shop that's maybe different, yea. They'll be on all the time, and always plugged in, so no need for batteries. Maybe some laptops do route some current through the battery too? Not sure, but most I know of isolate the battery once fully charged.

[Catso]

The newer battery technologies claim that it doesn't matter if you leave them on charge all the time.

However, older sorts were seriously degraded by not being run through a charge-recharge cycle regularly.

My own opinion is that it does the battery good to be 'exercised', and I run mine down at least a couple of times a week.

Interesting comments about the heat problem.