Power-down or sleep mode?

[BillW50]

In choro typed on Thu, 06 Jan 2011 07:13:33 +0000:

... I use mine just connected to the mains
and let it hibernate. BUT once every couple of months or so I insert
the battery in and give a good charge only to take it out again after
the charge.

But if you keep the battery in all the time, it would be interesting
to know how it has fared?

I have zillions of laptops and batteries. I used to leave them in, but
the heat of the laptop and the charging circuits always tapping them off
to full charge shortened the life of them down to two or three years.
For some people this is acceptable.

But I have left mine out for 10 years now. And charge them once or twice
per year. And I am getting about 10 years per battery now. And I have
found out if your laptop heats the battery up to 110°F or more, the
battery life will be shortened. The heat isn't necessarily from charging
and discharging of the battery, but from the computer itself.

I also learned that the Palm IIIc (from '99) uses a lithium battery
which one has to disassemble to get to it. So removing of the battery is
not practical, except for replacement. But they only charge the battery
4.10v per cell, and not to 4.20v like most laptop manufactures do. And
the Palm lithium battery lasts about 5 years under these conditions. And
two things helps to get them to last this far.

1) No heat from the Palm to speak off.

2) Stop charging them when they reach 4.10v per cell helps a great deal.

So why do laptop manufactures push the extra 0.1v on them? Simple, as
they can claim more battery capacity at the cost of shorter battery
life. They don't push more because lithium can't take it and will
explode.

Some laptops one can set where it will stop charging. I never owned one,
but that is a good thing IMHO. But removing the battery is also a good
option.

Some argues that leaving the battery in acts like a UPS that if the
power line drops power, their laptop is still running on batteries. This
is true of course. But with a real UPS you can power far more than a
laptop. Like cordless phones, clocks, small lamps, etc. And that is what
I do.

Of course, sometimes laptops are used as a portable device. Yes that is
what I am doing right now in fact. So I am running on battery and that
is the way it is. But 99.9% of the time I am not. And when I go
portable, I generally grab one of my netbooks because they are smaller
and lighter anyway. ;-)

 

[BillW50]

In Roy Smith typed on Mon, 03 Jan 2011 17:06:31 -0600:

Shoot what are you worried about? I used to drive trucks over the
road and would be away from home for 3-4 weeks at a time. In my
truck I had a laptop stand and my laptop would be running a logbook
program and Microsoft Streets & Trips and never had any problems. If
you think that an 18-wheeler has a smooth ride, then you are sorely
mistaken.

I too used to drive 18 wheelers and I wouldn't ever think about having a
hard drive running inside of the truck. The company had their own
computer that communicated by satellite. And I had my own. Both used
solid state drives. There is no way I would run a hard drive in a semi
truck.

They do make hard drives that offers antishock protection. I don't know
how well they would work in a truck. Maybe ok. But I suspect you had
one, or the hard drive would go to sleep in a minute or two. And thus
you don't have to worry about it once it does. As the heads are parked
and protected.

I knew somebody who serviced laptops installed in police cars. And he
told me that business was great because a hard drive generally only last
2 months in a squad car. Nowadays I bet they use solid state drives.

NASA turns off all hard drives just before launch. Although the systems
that needs to be on, are running on solid state drives. Once they are in
outer space, they can run hard drives once again.

Heck the docking station for this laptop is a big jolt to lock and
unlock. I used it a few times with a hard drive I didn't care much
about. And sure enough, bad sectors started to show up right away. The
hard drive is still usable, but I will use standby or hibernate before
locking or unlocking now. The docs say you don't have to do this. But I
see what happens if you don't.

I also hear from other people who uses their laptops as a portable
device and blops them down on tables and carries them while they are
running. A lot of them tell me their hard drives only lasts about a
year. And that sounds about right to me. And if you are careful with
them, they can last 30+ years instead. ;-)

 

[choro]

In choro typed on Thu, 06 Jan 2011 07:13:33 +0000:

I have zillions of laptops and batteries. I used to leave them in, but
the heat of the laptop and the charging circuits always tapping them off
to full charge shortened the life of them down to two or three years.
For some people this is acceptable.

But I have left mine out for 10 years now. And charge them once or twice
per year. And I am getting about 10 years per battery now. And I have
found out if your laptop heats the battery up to 110°F or more, the
battery life will be shortened. The heat isn't necessarily from charging
and discharging of the battery, but from the computer itself.

I also learned that the Palm IIIc (from '99) uses a lithium battery
which one has to disassemble to get to it. So removing of the battery is
not practical, except for replacement. But they only charge the battery
4.10v per cell, and not to 4.20v like most laptop manufactures do. And
the Palm lithium battery lasts about 5 years under these conditions. And
two things helps to get them to last this far.

1) No heat from the Palm to speak off.

2) Stop charging them when they reach 4.10v per cell helps a great deal.

So why do laptop manufactures push the extra 0.1v on them? Simple, as
they can claim more battery capacity at the cost of shorter battery
life. They don't push more because lithium can't take it and will
explode.

Some laptops one can set where it will stop charging. I never owned one,
but that is a good thing IMHO. But removing the battery is also a good
option.

Some argues that leaving the battery in acts like a UPS that if the
power line drops power, their laptop is still running on batteries. This
is true of course. But with a real UPS you can power far more than a
laptop. Like cordless phones, clocks, small lamps, etc. And that is what
I do.

Of course, sometimes laptops are used as a portable device. Yes that is
what I am doing right now in fact. So I am running on battery and that
is the way it is. But 99.9% of the time I am not. And when I go
portable, I generally grab one of my netbooks because they are smaller
and lighter anyway. ;-)

Thanks for the info. As you can expect I was thinking along the same
lines as you but was not fully aware of the side effects of charging
batteries to the hilt.

But as a matter of fact, I use AA (HR6) batteries for some of my cameras
and I have found out that the older more modest NiMH batteries (1700 mAh
Kodaks) far outlast the new 2500 mAh batteries branded Energiser and
various other brands. I also believe in slow-charging as this does not
heat up the batteries during the charging process like fast chargers do.

But, I must say, your info was most informative and illuminating.

 

[choro]

In Roy Smith typed on Mon, 03 Jan 2011 17:06:31 -0600:

I too used to drive 18 wheelers and I wouldn't ever think about having a
hard drive running inside of the truck. The company had their own
computer that communicated by satellite. And I had my own. Both used
solid state drives. There is no way I would run a hard drive in a semi
truck.

They do make hard drives that offers antishock protection. I don't know
how well they would work in a truck. Maybe ok. But I suspect you had
one, or the hard drive would go to sleep in a minute or two. And thus
you don't have to worry about it once it does. As the heads are parked
and protected.

I knew somebody who serviced laptops installed in police cars. And he
told me that business was great because a hard drive generally only last
2 months in a squad car. Nowadays I bet they use solid state drives.

NASA turns off all hard drives just before launch. Although the systems
that needs to be on, are running on solid state drives. Once they are in
outer space, they can run hard drives once again.

Heck the docking station for this laptop is a big jolt to lock and
unlock. I used it a few times with a hard drive I didn't care much
about. And sure enough, bad sectors started to show up right away. The
hard drive is still usable, but I will use standby or hibernate before
locking or unlocking now. The docs say you don't have to do this. But I
see what happens if you don't.

I also hear from other people who uses their laptops as a portable
device and blops them down on tables and carries them while they are
running. A lot of them tell me their hard drives only lasts about a
year. And that sounds about right to me. And if you are careful with
them, they can last 30+ years instead. ;-)

Sounds like sound advice to me!

FYI: My "Toshiba or Not Toshiba" Tecra locks the HD upon sensing movement.

 

[BillW50]

In Alex Clayton typed on Sun, 2 Jan 2011 09:36:36 -0800:

Then the people who make them are lying to all of us.
Now the first one I bought in 2000 did warn that it should not be left
plugged in with the battery in, but that was very old tech. The ones
I have now you can pop the battery in and out while running and
nothing happens, the machine is running off the AC power as the
makers claim. Other than that first one I bought then I have never
had one that I needed to buy another battery for after years of use
like this. I normally use one for a couple years and buy a new one
and pass off the old. A few of those old ones are still in use, 2 of
them are XP so that shows how long they have been in use. Batteries
still work fine according to the users. Of course they do not get the
kind of time on battery that the newer ones do, but those machines
never did. Back when they were new you could expect about an hour or
so on battery and that is still what they get all these years later.
But if it makes you "feel" better by all means leave the battery out
of it.

I have done it both ways. As I have left them in and on AC and they last
two to three years. Although taking them out, they are lasting 10 years.
And during the zillions of experiments, I have found these two truths.

1) Laptops generally tap off the battery to 4.20v per cell. This
shortens the life of lithium by almost half life. Manufactures do this
because the extra capacity is a great selling point. Not all do this,
but most of them do.

2) Lithiums sitting in a hot laptop is bad for its chemistry. It doesn't
matter if the battery is charging or just sitting there doing nothing.
Keeping a lithium in an environment of 110°F+ also shortens its life as
well. And a lot of laptops do warm up the battery. The hotter they do,
the shorter the life.

For those of you getting longer life than three years having it plugged
in the AC all of the time... well you must not use the laptop very much.
As if you did, the heat from the laptop would shorten the life by a lot.

My Palm IIIc is 11 years old now and it is on its second lithium
battery. You have to disassemble it to remove the battery. So it isn't
practical to do so. Plus I leave it on the AC most of the time. If you
don't, it doesn't really turn off, but lives in standby. And it will
last two weeks on standby before the battery is dead. That is why I
leave it on the charger.

And this is why it is only lasting 5 years per battery and not 10 like
the ones that I keep mostly out. But since it charges it only up to 4.1v
per cell and there is virtually no heat from a Palm IIIc, that is why I
am getting 5 years out of them living mostly on the charger.

 

[Fred]

You mean in hibernation mode, I guess.


Tell me, do you keep the battery in or do you use it just plugged into
the mains?

I don't ever turn my laptop off unless I'm taking it somewhere, although
sometimes I close the lid which is set to only turn off the monitor. No
problems in ten years of heavy use (one keyboard replaced) I always leave
the battery in.. I'm on my second one now -first lasted 6 years. Various
experts have told me all sorts of different things, but I'll stick to what
I'm doing now. I reckon consistent temperature is best- for laptop
componemts and battery, so rather than on-off and battery in-out, I just
leave it.
..

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

You mean in hibernation mode, I guess.

I think he means sleep mode.

Hibernation suspends to the hard drive and powers down.

 

[Roland Mösl]

You mean in hibernation mode, I guess.

Hibernate ist suspend to disk
Suspend to RAM is faster, most times referred as "sleep",
but requires power for the refresh of the RAM

Tell me, do you keep the battery in or do you use it just plugged into
the mains?

I have a notebook also for data security.
I would never take the battery out.

I suspect this is what you do. I use mine just connected to the mains
and let it hibernate. BUT once every couple of months or so I insert the
battery in and give a good charge only to take it out again after the
charge.

Why this ceremony?

I always have my notebook with me

But if you keep the battery in all the time, it would be interesting to
know how it has fared?

Differs from notebook to notebook.

My new notebook has still 12 hours run time.

 

[Roland Mösl]

In choro typed on Thu, 06 Jan 2011 07:13:33 +0000:

I have zillions of laptops and batteries. I used to leave them in, but
the heat of the laptop and the charging circuits always tapping them off
to full charge shortened the life of them down to two or three years.
For some people this is acceptable.

But I have left mine out for 10 years now. And charge them once or twice
per year. And I am getting about 10 years per battery now. And I have
found out if your laptop heats the battery up to 110°F or more

So hot are only very bad notebooks.

I have an ASUS UL30, this means Ultra Low Volt CPU

 

[BillW50]

In choro typed on Thu, 06 Jan 2011 17:24:41 +0000:

Thanks for the info. As you can expect I was thinking along the same
lines as you but was not fully aware of the side effects of charging
batteries to the hilt.

But as a matter of fact, I use AA (HR6) batteries for some of my
cameras and I have found out that the older more modest NiMH
batteries (1700 mAh Kodaks) far outlast the new 2500 mAh batteries
branded Energiser and various other brands. I also believe in
slow-charging as this does not heat up the batteries during the
charging process like fast chargers do.
But, I must say, your info was most informative and illuminating.

Well thanks! Although I must thank most of the experience from others
who has had greater success than I did myself. While I got my electronic
engineering (EE) degree back in the 70's, one would think that means
something. But no, we only spent a few hours on batteries and it means
little to nothing in this regard.

The second group (getting smarter as we go along) of people who I trust
are the ones who manufactures them. I have met a few and they know far
more than most people.

The third group (and I only met one) is those who designs and
manufactures stuff for outer space. As if they got it wrong it is very
costly. So they do a lot of experiments and testing before anything is
sent up into outer space.

The fourth group was a complete surprise to me. As they didn't have an
EE degree, didn't manufacture anything, didn't do anything in outer
space, and could be a dish washer for all we know. But what they did was
to fly radio control (RC) electronic aircraft as a hobby.

This fourth group I found to be some of the most knowledgeable I ever
found about Ni-Cads, Ni-MH, and lithiums. And I think the reason for
this is because they push them so hard. And this is where all of the
faults and weaknesses show up. Plus they want to recharge as fast as
they can to do it again. The new people to RC may not tell you much, but
the ones with lots of experience sure can. And many of them have learned
all of the wrong ways of doing this (at great expenses to themselves).

I say pushing it because scale stuff has to be as light as possible
(otherwise it is useless). Getting a laptop to run 2+ hours is one
thing. But a laptop sits on the ground. Getting something as small to
fly for 15 minutes is totally different.

Speaking about the 1700mAh AA NiMH batteries, I too have had the best
luck with them. Although I have a slight twist about charging them.
Everything I have read that turns out to be true is to charge them as
fast as you want, but no more than 10°F higher than room temperature.
Well not completely as fast as you want. As they often rate charging
NiHM and NiCads by C. And one C=mAh. So for 1700mAh means 1.7 amps.

And at first, 1C, 2C or sometimes even 3C doesn't seem to hurt NiMH. But
the most important thing is the heat. As once near being fully charge
and you push it more, they start to heat up a lot. And the restriction
of either cutting off the charge or cutting back if it hits 10°F more
than room temperature is really conservative IMHO. As I think you can
push them for a few minutes even at 40°F higher.

I first learned this with my first electric helicopter. It came with
NiMH and a dumb charger. And the instructions said something like don't
charge longer than an hour and 15 minutes. And once it couldn't lift off
of the ground, it was completely useless and time to recharge. And I
found it didn't get hot until close to an hour and 15 minutes. And even
pushing it an hour and 20 minutes was just fine. Any longer and the
battery temperature would start rises a lot. And the battery capacity
drops a lot. There was warnings about leaving it on charge too long
could start a fire. And trust me, I could see this as a problem.

Later I got fancy and I bought a battery charger that you could dial in
the amperage (0.1 amp per step), the amount of time it is charging for,
and the temperature of the battery (which cuts off if it hits this
temperature). Although it is your fault if you dialed in the wrong
values. This is a RC battery changer that works on NiCad, NiMH, lithium,
and lead acid btw. And I have found that you can pump upwards into NiMH
(up to 3C anyway) as long as the heat of the battery doesn't hit more
than 140°F or so. And that is pushing it and might limit the life to a
half to a third. Anything more and the battery capacity becomes pretty
much worthless if it isn't already. So do whatever you want to and if
you don't allow anything higher than 10°F above room temperature I think
you will be perfectly safe.

Most people reading this would probably want to know about lithium
batteries. Sorry I have almost zero experience with manually charging
lithium. And lithium batteries are very dangerous without safe guards.
As youtube has videos when lithium charging has gone wrong. Luckily most
devices are well designed. And if you want to experiment on your own, I
wouldn't bother without three to four feet away (the size of a laptop
battery anyway) from anything burnable.

 

[BillW50]

In Roland Mösl typed on Thu, 06 Jan 2011 20:46:39 +0100:

So hot are only very bad notebooks.

I have an ASUS UL30, this means Ultra Low Volt CPU

Well I have a Palm IIIc from 1999 that uses very little power, doesn't
get hot in any way, and only charges to 4.10v per cell (lithium) and it
can last 5 years plus living mostly on AC. So if your ASUS UL30 doesn't
heat up the battery and doesn't overcharge, I would think the very same
would happen.

I have a few Asus netbooks being 701 and 702 series running Windows XP
and Linux. None of them seem to heat the battery much at all. As they
are so far from any heat they don't seem to pickup any at all. Although
they do charge the lithium up to 4.2v which worries me. So I usually
remove them if I don't need them.

A SIDE NOTE: These Asus netbooks I have also use Celeron CPUs. And not
only these, but other laptops using Celerons (not all I would guess) has
a problem of never completely shutting down. Thus some of them still
draws small amount of power even when they are off.

An easy fix is to simply remove the battery. But I have found removing
the battery for a second or two also does the trick. But since I
generally remove the battery, it is out until the next time I use it. So
I don't have a lot of data to go on.

 

[choro]

In Roland Mösl typed on Thu, 06 Jan 2011 20:46:39 +0100:

Well I have a Palm IIIc from 1999 that uses very little power, doesn't
get hot in any way, and only charges to 4.10v per cell (lithium) and it
can last 5 years plus living mostly on AC. So if your ASUS UL30 doesn't
heat up the battery and doesn't overcharge, I would think the very same
would happen.

I have a few Asus netbooks being 701 and 702 series running Windows XP
and Linux. None of them seem to heat the battery much at all. As they
are so far from any heat they don't seem to pickup any at all. Although
they do charge the lithium up to 4.2v which worries me. So I usually
remove them if I don't need them.

A SIDE NOTE: These Asus netbooks I have also use Celeron CPUs. And not
only these, but other laptops using Celerons (not all I would guess) has
a problem of never completely shutting down. Thus some of them still
draws small amount of power even when they are off.

An easy fix is to simply remove the battery. But I have found removing
the battery for a second or two also does the trick. But since I
generally remove the battery, it is out until the next time I use it. So
I don't have a lot of data to go on.

One question, though, Bill. If you do NOT keep a laptop (with the
battery removed) connected to the mains, wouldn't this shorten the life
of the CMOS battery on the laptop's mobo which for most people would
necessitate taking the laptop in for a replacement battery?

This would in all probability negate the advantages of NOT removing the
battery UNLESS you have the laptop permanently connected to the mains?

 

[choro]

I don't ever turn my laptop off unless I'm taking it somewhere, although
sometimes I close the lid which is set to only turn off the monitor. No
problems in ten years of heavy use (one keyboard replaced) I always leave
the battery in..

I have my laptop configured to go into hibernation mode when I close the
lid. In sleep mode the fan keeps whirring and I don't like that idea one
bit whereas in the hibernation mode only the RAM remains on.

And of course you are right about the adverse effect of frequent on and
offs on any electrical equipment from the simple filament type light
bulbs (but in particular the fluorescent tubes) to TVs and computers.
The sudden change in temperature doesn't do the circuits any good.
--
choro
*****


I'm on my second one now -first lasted 6 years. Various

 

[choro]

I think he means sleep mode.

Hibernation suspends to the hard drive and powers down.

Trouble with sleep mode is that the fans keep whirring and they soon
wear out!

 

[choro]

Hibernate ist suspend to disk
Suspend to RAM is faster, most times referred as "sleep",
but requires power for the refresh of the RAM


I have a notebook also for data security.
I would never take the battery out.


Why this ceremony?

I always have my notebook with me


Differs from notebook to notebook.

My new notebook has still 12 hours run time.

My laptop is merely serves me as a spare computer. I hardly ever take it
out away from its desk where it sits demurely! Though I must admit I
bought it when I had a problem with my monitor and the manufacturers
took ages to replace it.

If as I expected it was going to be replaced under warranty/guarantee
there was no logical reason to buy another monitor in the meantime. So I
bought a laptop instead which actually came in extremely useful when
around a year later I had a row with my ISP and gave them the boot. With
my laptop I could nip across the road to the public library which had
wi-fi facility. The money I saved not having to pay my ISP over those
months and the more favorable terms plus the discounts I extracted from
them when I eventually signed up with them again several months later
more or less paid for the laptop. A nice Toshiba Tecra with a 1440x1050
screen! All this happened a few years ago, though!

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

Trouble with sleep mode is that the fans keep whirring and they soon
wear out!

If your computer ran the fans in sleep mode, you'd get very short
battery run time. And since in sleep mode, all that's really on is the
RAM, just enough to keep the contents intact, I have no idea why the
fans would run. To me, it sounds like a bug or a misunderstanding.

Note that if your battery runs down in sleep mode, you'd lose the
contents of RAM and hence the state of the computer.

I've never heard fans on in sleep mode, but since I only do it
occasionally and even then usually just for an experiment or test, I am
not all that knowledgeable...

In the above remarks, I am talking about battery only mode, since when
connected to the mains you wouldn't worry about battery drain (unless
you have a long AC power failure!).

 

[BillW50]

In choro typed on Fri, 07 Jan 2011 04:26:42 +0000:

One question, though, Bill. If you do NOT keep a laptop (with the
battery removed) connected to the mains, wouldn't this shorten the
life of the CMOS battery on the laptop's mobo which for most people
would necessitate taking the laptop in for a replacement battery?

This would in all probability negate the advantages of NOT removing
the battery UNLESS you have the laptop permanently connected to the
mains?

First of all, there is generally two types of CMOS batteries. And the
two most common are the rechargeable NiMH and the non-rechargeable
lithium. As for the latter, the drain on the battery is so low that it
lasts pretty much as long as it would be just sitting on the shelf.

As for the NiMH type which is often used in laptops. Doesn't even charge
unless the laptop is running. So even having the main battery installed
and/or connected to the AC doesn't charge it if it is off. For example,
I have two Toshiba 2595XDVD from '99 right here. The first 5 years they
were always connected to the AC and I used at least one of them daily.

The last 5 years, they both just sit on the shelf without AC. And I only
fire them up once a year just to check to see if they still work and
they still do. Although one in particular (the least used one btw), the
CMOS battery doesn't have enough charge left to run the clock or to hold
the CMOS settings for a whole year. No big deal though, just run it for
a few hours to charge it up and it works fine once again. If it was used
more often, you wouldn't even know anything was wrong.

And for our modern laptops, the term CMOS battery is a misnomer anyway.
As they don't use CMOS memory anymore, but rather flash memory instead.
Which the battery has nothing to do with. So basically it just runs the
clock and that is it. Which is kind of funny, since about 25 years ago
that is all that same battery was good for too. ;-)

 

[choro]

If your computer ran the fans in sleep mode, you'd get very short
battery run time. And since in sleep mode, all that's really on is the
RAM, just enough to keep the contents intact, I have no idea why the
fans would run. To me, it sounds like a bug or a misunderstanding.

Sleep mode to me means Stand-by. Hibernation is deep sleep; more or less
like powering off except that RAM is kept going and use of "juice" is
absolutely minimized. The battery for instance will last a lot longer in
Hibernation Mode rather than in Sleep/Stand-by mode. Anyway my laptop is
configured to go into Hibernation Mode when the lid is closed.

 

[choro]

In choro typed on Fri, 07 Jan 2011 04:26:42 +0000:

First of all, there is generally two types of CMOS batteries. And the
two most common are the rechargeable NiMH and the non-rechargeable
lithium. As for the latter, the drain on the battery is so low that it
lasts pretty much as long as it would be just sitting on the shelf.

As for the NiMH type which is often used in laptops. Doesn't even charge
unless the laptop is running. So even having the main battery installed
and/or connected to the AC doesn't charge it if it is off. For example,
I have two Toshiba 2595XDVD from '99 right here. The first 5 years they
were always connected to the AC and I used at least one of them daily.

The last 5 years, they both just sit on the shelf without AC. And I only
fire them up once a year just to check to see if they still work and
they still do. Although one in particular (the least used one btw), the
CMOS battery doesn't have enough charge left to run the clock or to hold
the CMOS settings for a whole year. No big deal though, just run it for
a few hours to charge it up and it works fine once again. If it was used
more often, you wouldn't even know anything was wrong.

And for our modern laptops, the term CMOS battery is a misnomer anyway.
As they don't use CMOS memory anymore, but rather flash memory instead.
Which the battery has nothing to do with. So basically it just runs the
clock and that is it. Which is kind of funny, since about 25 years ago
that is all that same battery was good for too. ;-)

Thanks for the info.

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

Sleep mode to me means Stand-by. Hibernation is deep sleep; more or less
like powering off except that RAM is kept going and use of "juice" is
absolutely minimized. The battery for instance will last a lot longer in
Hibernation Mode rather than in Sleep/Stand-by mode. Anyway my laptop is
configured to go into Hibernation Mode when the lid is closed.

OK, if you're going to use idiosyncratic definitions, I really can't be
of much help trying to figure your problems out, since I don't quite get
what you mean.