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Laptops with the Longest Battery Life?
Yi Ding asks: "Recently, I have been investigating laptops for clients, and the majority of the complaints about current laptops is battery life. Most laptops just don't have enough juice to even finish a single DVD or write an article for 4-5 hours in an internet cafe. Of course, one can lug around extra battery packs, but it's a pain and often defeats the purpose of having a laptop in the first place, portability. What have your experiences with battery life been and where can I find the longest lasting, reasonably robust, laptop?"
Beautiful OS, beautiful construction, loooooong battery life, light-weight... what else can one ask for?
dell laptops have a battery life of about 2 hours new. They of course always last a little bit less time than they say they do, and as the batteries get old they run for shorter and shorter durations. If you want to play a DVD on a Dell, cross your fingers because it will be a close one.
iBook G4's have a very long battery life. I have one, and it lasts a lot longer than any PC laptop I've encountered.
My G4-800 iBook has lasted at least six hours, perhaps longer.
I'm a Linux user but Mac laptops are lovely, with excellent battery life. Too bad Airport Express (and power management?) isn't supported on Linux PPC.
I've got to say, my new 12" 1.33Ghz G4 PowerBook really has some great battery life. Well over 3.5 hours with "normal" usage, even with the screen brightness cranked up. I haven't done any DVD playback testing though. You can probably get improved battery life for DVD playback by ripping the DVD to your hard drive, so you're not spinning the optical drive that whole time...
When in danger or in doubt, run in circles, scream and shout. --Robert A. Heinlein
Werent they the ones that touted the longest battery life? Of course, they specialize in Tablet PC's (which are pimp - get a motion m1400VA... so nice) Back to topic... yeah I think electrovaya had the longest claims (9 hours), and the longest life (7-8 hours that people have been getting) - Awperator
Not to sound like an Intel commercial, but that's largely what Intel's Centrino platform is all about. It's designed as a mix of processor and chipset that allows the system to maximize battery life.
I have a Fujitsu Lifebook 5010 that reliably gets me just under 5 hours battery life, maybe more like 4 hours if I have wireless enabled (and there's a hardware switch on the case). Something like playing a DVD is going to suck even more battery, because of the need to spin the drive motor, but I'd wager I have enough juice for that most times.
Centrino isn't a blindingly huge advantage, though. Fujitsu makes a non-Centrino version of the same laptop that comes with 802.11g, and I understand it only gets marginally shorter battery life, and that's all from anecdotal accounts. Centrino does a good job, but a big reason this model's battery lasts so long is because it's 900MHz (so doesn't run as hot, so doesn't need as much energy to run the fan) and it only has a 10 inch screen.
Breakfast served all day!
Centrino-based ThinkPads have great battery lives... six hours and upwards, depending on usage patterns. The Centrino chipset makes a big difference in power consumption!
How appropriate. You fight like a cow.
My 15" iBook G4 regularly gets 7 hours+ worth of battery life if I'm not playing any DVDs (backlight dim, and in auto-power conservation mode). If I'm playing a DVDs or doing heavy disk I/O then I usualy get 5 hours. Maybe 6.
Look for a laptop with Centrino processor/mobo/wifi. The processor is either an older Banias (still good) or a great Dothan core. These are Intel processors designed for laptops, so they put power consumption at a minimum. You can also choose a slower spinning hard drive for longer battery life, and the cost of some performance.
Other than that things like forcing the laptop to stay in ultra-conservative power miser mode, or getting a laptop based on a low power processor (Pentium M, Transmeta Crusoe, etc) can help. Also, if you are willing to pay for it, see if there is an extra battery for the laptop you are buying that has a higher capacity than the one that ships standard. Replace the stock with the high capacity, and you've got more battery life.
Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
I have one of these for work.
I can watch TWO DVD movies on a plane with it on a single charge.
When I bring it home and work on it in the evening, it can sit on until I go to bed with its WiFi card on full power and not run out.
I typically get 5h+
but my laptop seriously rocks.
I work as a developer and requested an IBM R50p with 1Gb RAM, which is plenty to handle Tomcat + IntelliJ + Firefox + Outlook + other crud.
On the occasions where I have to go to meetings all day, I've got 8+ hours out of the battery (taking notes, wireless network etc). Admittedly, this is the extended battery (hangs a little out of the back), but with a DVD writer, 60Gb and IBM sturdiness, its definitely the best laptop I've used.
Mine regularly lasts close to 6 hours on the battery, at least while doing non-intensive tasks and keeping the brightness at a reasonable level. Not to mention it never heats up to an unbearable level, even on a summer day; I've heard its fan come on maybe 5 or 6 times since I've owned it, and its usually been when I had it on a heat conductive surface (like a blanket or thick carpet).
Nothing beats Apple laptops in my opinion, especially in the low-end. Something comparable to a 12" iBook in size, weight, and battery life, ends up costing $1500 in the PC world (at least when I checked out the Thinkpads).
Yes, Intel Centrino is more then just marketing hype, all Centrino laptops have longer battery life then typical laptops.
linkage
The catch however, is Centrino laptops are also underperformers compared to regular laptops.
My Fujitsu Lifebook P-5020 claims to have 11 hours of battery life, but I've never gotten more than 8. Of course, this is with the built in wireless on, so I'm sure if I turned off the wireless and dimmed the screen I'd get more.
It's a small laptop with a slower chip (~1Ghz), which is exactly what I was looking for. The laptop almost fits in a 1-gallon freezer bag, but remains fully useful. I carry it around in the front pocket of my backpack or a thin leather valise. It plays DVDs just fine, burns CDs just quickly enough, has excellent wireless antennae, and the long battery life and portable size make it fit my needs for a non-desktop-replacement portable computing machine. Apparently you can get it to dual boot your favorite distro, but I haven't had the motivation to tackle that yet.
Incidentally, I bought the machine from Portable One in San Jose, and I recommend them- good customer service and good selection, with reasonable prices.
(Celui que tient la peur de devinir nuage)
My old Titanium powerbook stood up to the DVD test. Right before the second Matrix movie came out I sat down and tested the length of the battery. I put the powerbook in "DVD Playback" mode in the Energy Saving system panel - which means "NO ENERGY SAVING" (brightness all the way up, no spinning down of hard drives). Anyways, the Titanium 15" powerbook was able to display the whole movie beginning to end. Which was great for waiting in line.
;)
My newer Aluminum 15" (firewire 800) Powerbook can NOT do this. I can NOT play an entire DVD from start to finish with sound and everything running at full tilt. It's possible with some fudging of settings I could get a whole movie to work -but I haven't tried.
I imagine the two biggest consumers of power during DVD playback are
1) DVD drive spinning
- this could probably be mitigated by ripping the movie into quicktime and playing off your hard drive (which I believe consumes less power than the DVD drive)
2)Powering the speakers.
- Someone clue me in here, but I imagine you'd save power if you plugged your headphones in rather than powering the onboard speaker. And you'd get a better experience plugging the sound output into an entertainment center too.
Joseph Elwell.
Fine...I'll bring this back on topic. With effective use of Suspend, dimming the LCD, having enough RAM (to keep hdd access down) and the like, you can get a much better battery life out of a system with already respectable battery life.
Now...admittedly, there are systems that will play a full DVD on a single charge, but if this is a priority for you, then you should own two batteries anyway.
In other words though...while the system certainly matters, how you use it can matter more. (Of course, nothing will save you if you get one of those portable systems that are all Desktop hardware shoe-horned into a portable chassis).
I can get about 5+ hours of battery with my Acer, good enough for 2 dvds
-Mike
I'm sort of toying with selling my Dell "desktop replacement" laptop, as that didn't work out (I wound up getting a desktop anyway) and instead going for a lightweight. The Sony Picturebooks with 600-800 MHz transmeta processors are commonly available on eBay for $1000. you only need 700 MHz to play DVDs smoothly, and a friend has one of these with a little add-on battery pack that snaps onto the bottom and gives him 6+ hours. It raises the keyboard into a nice typing angle and the whole thing is still well under 2 KG.
A 700 MHz or so machine with a nice screen, that was very small, would be nice. I've got a Dell monster now and I never take it anywhere because it's too damn heavy.
Yeah, batteries do that. Over the course of two years of heavy daily use, my Powerbook's useful life went from 5 hours to about 45 minutes. I bought a new battery and it's back up to 5 hours again.
The next Cmdr Taco duplicate will be ready soon, but subscribers can beat the rush and see it early!
A lot of sub notebooks, which are designed for travel (i.e. Sony VAIOs, ASUS M5000 and S5000, some Fujitsus) have reasonable battery life, but also have the option of using higher capacity batteries without increasing the overall weight or size beyond an ordinary (usually they remain much less). These larger batteries boost the life of the laptop into the 8-12 hour range (or even more if you look at those powered by Crusoe or other exotic power savers).
lifebooks especially the P-Series have great battery life. I was able to watch a DVD and a half on a single charge, and with the Bay battery and the extended battery you've got at least 12 hours.
I write code.
Got a Thinkpad R40 for about a year now, Pentium-M 1.3Ghz, 512MB RAM. Battery life is about 5-6 hours with battery saving options (screen blanker, turning off hard drive etc). ;)
If I let it go into standby mode when not in use I never need the AC adapter the whole day. Just wonderful to go into a meeting and watch everyone else with their P4-2.6Ghz laptops (more like "portables") scramble for the one power socket in the room while I just sit back and smile
I sometimes watch DVDs on battery power while relaxing on my bed, doesn't really drain the battery as well. Imho there is no way around a Pentium-M if you want serious processing power combined with extended battery life.
The thinkpad 600 series, most definitely. Those damn things seem to have a design defect or something, causing a fresh battery (2,5 hours, tops) to wane down to 10 minutes and then to "this battery is fucked" in the space of less than three months. No way are you going to use a thinkpad 600-whatever without being very very aware where your next wall socket is going to be.
In comparison, my brother's old TP 560Z's battery has lasted him for close to two years and he still gets a tad less than two hours' worth of mobile time out of it, with an ethernet card plugged in no less.
(The docking station is pleasantly sturdy however, though it is heavy, as you could expect.)
There are several things you can do to get more out of your battery.
If you have a variable speed CPU like the AMD Ahtlon XP-M then you can use SpeedSwitchXP (or similar) to force it to run at the slowest speed. For the tasks you mention 500 MHz is plenty of power.
Rip your DVD to the HDD and play it from there.
Disable WiFi and Bluetooth even if they aren't actually connected. They will continously ping looking for other devices, which does hurt battery life. Most notebooks have a keyboard shortcut to disable it.
One of the most useful utils is MobileMeter. This app will show the amount of current your notebook is currently consuming, so you can play with various settings (like backlight intensity) and see the exact affect it has on power consumption.
Finally, what's wrong with using a spare battery? Modern notebooks can hibernate and resume in less than a minute, which is trivial downtime to swap batteries.
Dan East
Better known as 318230.
The complaints you cite are slightly behind the curve. Brand new Pentium-M based laptops claim to, and really do, have amazing battery life times. My friend has a Compaq based P-M laptop with a 15" widescreen and his battery lasts 6 hours. One with a smaller screen should run even longer. Beware Pentium-4 mobiles which do suck down battery power; get the 'M' series.
Most "features" of a laptop don't really consume extra power if not utilized. For instance the DVD drive only consumes power if it's actually spinning (and mencoder can can take care of that).
To reduce the power consumption of the cpu simply put it to the lowest frequency (speedstep). 600MHz is generally enough to play a movie (DVD or .avi). As far as the LCD screen is concerned - simply reduce its brightness.
I'd personally recommend the Centrino processor line - good perfomance at reasonable power levels (as opposed to Pentium 4 Mobile).
The Raven
When new, easily 8+ hours at work (networking, email, docs and code) with a battery in both bays. Until one battery recently failed (6+ years old!) it still regularly gave 6 - 7 hours of effort. This is by far the best I've ever seen from a laptop.
Today's Sesame Street was brought to you by the number e.
My IBM X40 (it's a Pentium M, 1GHz) runs 7 hours on a charge of the 8-cell battery.
:)
Total weight is only 1.6kg with the battery, and the laptop is great for everything except graphics-intensive games. The downside is that there is no DVD drive except with a docking station, and it has only a 10.4" screen running 1024x768.
It suits me perfectly for a transatlantic flight though and plays DivX very well for several hours
-- As long as the answer is right, who cares if the question is wrong?
I use an IBM Thinkpad R40 1.3 GHz Pentium M with a 15" screen and I usually get 4-5 hours of use with near full screen brightness. If I use even lower battery settings, I can sqeeze 6 hours or more out of it with the wifi on. When watching DVDs with a screen brightness high enough for outdoor use, I can get through one 2hr movie and have a little time to spare. It is a little heavier at 5.6 pounds, but it has been a great little notebook.
My Apple iBook G4 gets 4-5 hours on full backlight, and close to 8 on dim.
I recently had to purchase a lightweight laptop for my boss. His requirements? That it be lightweight, long battery life, and have a few bells and whistles (DVD playback, wireless, etc.)
d se riesbean.do?series=P7
Well, we ended up getting this one:
http://webshop.fujitsupc.com/fpc/Ecommerce/buil
The Fujitsu 7000 series has a hell of a lot of bang for the buck and if you are interested in long battery life - it's hard to beat this. Fujitsu claims that the 7000 series can run for up to 11 HOURS on battery power. This is, of course, using the modular bay for a battery.
Nonetheless, it seems he's able to get over 5 hours on just the single stock battery for non-DVD use. Centrino-based laptops are very well designed and when used with the ultra-low voltage processors are unbeatable, IMHO.
Finding a dealer though... That's the REAL challenge...
"...Well, there's egg and bacon; egg sausage and bacon; egg and spam; egg bacon and spam; egg bacon sausage and spam..."
The very best solution I've ever had for writing up all kinds of documents, taking meeting notes, and doing other basic things such as PIM, yet maintaining long battery life and low weight, is an HP Jornada 820 (WinCE). A real 8-10 hours on a full charge, a real, touch-typable keyboard (the only bug was a misplaced caps-lock key thanks to MS's strong-arming the initial H/PC keyboard layout), and a screen more than sufficient for writing draft and some final documents (640x480). Also meeting-friendly (no fan, true instant on, one click to turn off all sound, no scrounging for an outlet, no panic when the meeting takes longer than my battery). Anything smaller is not touch-typable and anything bigger might as well be a laptop. It can sync with a fully loaded laptop that stays at my office or hotel room, where I'd be more likely to watch a DVD anyway. Unfortunately, this form factor has not succeeded for a variety of reasons, an important one being that one must give up something significant to get really good battery life. Today, I'd probably pick a very small form factor notebook to retain a touch-type capability, and cut its other features to the bone (slow processor, minimal disk, RAM; no integral CD/DVD). Leave all the power in the desktop-replacement laptop that lives a less mobile life.
My T41p (T42 is out already) lasts 4-4.5 hours going full speed with the larger (9 cell) battery. With power management on (lower backlight, CPU throttling etc), it last cca 6 hours without problem. Should be more than enough for your needs. Another plus - the HW is completely Linux friendly, everything is supported and works.
I had the same problem. The capacity is still in the battery but the smart controller in the battery gradually loses track of the zero level and reports less and less charge.
:-(
To fix it you need to run the battery _completely_ dry. Run it for as long as you can until it enters sleep because of perceived 0% charge. Then let it sleep (of course without a charger attached) until the battery is exhausted.
The problem is that since there really is plenty of charge in the battery it can sustain sleep for many days
Since the machine will turn off when the battery is exhausted be sure to close all running applications before setting it to sleep.
Once the machine turns off you can recharge the battery again and take advantage of the full capacity.
If you are electrically inclined I guess you could place a 1K resistor between + and - on the battery to drain it more quickly.
I own the Fujitsu P2110 - 866mhz Transmeta Crusoe + 512Mb ram, and 60Gb drive (updated).
I have the extended + modular batteries, each give over 7 battery life, and I managed to squeeze over 18 hours from light to average usage (with pcmcia powered down, battery management set to performance and screen brightness on just under medium).
The laptop itself is a little slow, but seems to be perfect for reading books, watching movies/dvds and programming (with distcc). High bitrate divx play perfect, and even certain games like warcraft3 can be made playable under wine. (ATI Rage Mobility 8mb, with accelerated gatos drivers).
Also great linux support, and works pretty much out of box with everything. Sound card has hardware mixing (amazing that nforce2 and many via chips dont). There is also an optical out to plug to your hifi at no loss of quality!
Overall, highly recommended laptop that I had for around 2 years now that can be gotten dirt cheap. Slight show of tear like headphone jack has bad contact now (only if you touch the plug though, so not dramatic). Cant see me replacing it anytime soon though.
There are newer transmeta based laptops as well, and if battery and portability is your goal, they beat centrinos in every possible way (centrino requiring 2-3 times more power, bigger heavier batteries to provide similar battery life at the gain of performance).
Anyway, just my opinion, yours might differ, but over 15 hour battery life impressive by any standard.
With the transmeta long-run utility set to max savings, low display brightnes and no wireless I was reading an e-book during a transatlantic flight and it still had a significant amount of spare juice in the battery at the end of the flight (well, it wasn't exactly the entire flight, I did power it down during takeoff and landing ':)
This machine doesn't have a dvd-drive so I can't comment on that (I guess I could get a decrypter and copy a movie to the hard disk but I haven't tried that)
They're very lightweight and you can find them on ebay at reasonable prices
Application startup performance is quite bad though :(
If you want to watch a whole dvd, has anyone tried programs like dvd idle? It claims to optimize caching to minimize the many spin up/shut down cycles. It won't help with burning but for watching a movie, it looks like a no-brainer.
Just an opinion.
Battery life and system performence were my main criteria when searching (yeah, I know they can be in conflict!), and I am extremely happy with the ThinkPad. Even after a year, it continues to amaze me just how well IBM designed (and built) this machine.
Dude, I think I can see my house from here.
I'm now on my 3rd PB 15" (still have 2nd) and I've always been amazed at the batteries. I even was able to get a higher capacity battery from Apple since they jacked up their battery to support a CPU speed bump. I've routinely been able to watch full length movies on DVD when flying cross country and squeeze in a bunch of work with maximum power saving practices (dim screen, etc). Another nice touch is the ability to check the battery strength while the computer is hibernating or off (button and LEDs on battery).
Recently I've also become a big fan of the Kensignton Universal Car/Air Adapter. You can also get a version that works for AC wall power too so you can leave the stock brick at home. The Car/Air one is super light and works with both Empower and cigarette lighter style jacks. I cannot tell you how valuable unlimited DVDs and games are when you need to pacify a kid who can no longer be amused by more preferable diversions. And of course it's always fun when 4 hours into your flight all the other laptop users are looking longingly at your super bright screen while theirs are pitch black.
I call bullshit.
You neglect to state which model you have so I can't be certain of the degree you are full of shit.
I regularly use a 1ghz/14"/OSX 10.3.n config at work and get, maybe, 3.5 hours full brightness and around 4 hours dimmed down almost all the way.
Are you using linux and command line only (i.e.; no gui at all)? did you get your hands on a prototype iBook fuel cell? Are you using a new battery type made by space aliens?
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety" - BF
I call bullshit on your bullshit.
My 500mhz Powerbook G4 got 5 hours dim, minimal disk access, reduced processor speed when battery was new. Replaced battery recently, it got ~7, but only for a few weeks; it now gets 6ish. This is very much in power-conservation mode (screen actually off at times), but it's doable and the GUI is still there.
~J
I've found that getting a fresh battery makes a huge difference. I've had a Compaq Evo Centrino notebook for about a year. When the notebook was new, the battery was good for about 5 hours. After a few months it was down to 3.5. After 6 monthes, 2 hours. Finally when I couldn't squeeze even an hour out of it, I replaced the battery. This leads me to believe that I would need to purchase 3 or 4 batteries a year to maintain maximum battery life.
Also, I see people saying "a Dell gets 2 hours" or an "IBM gets X hours". This is silly, each notebook brand has many different models. I would bet a cross section of similar Centrino notebooks from different manufacturers would have very similar battery performance.
I wouldn't call this complete BS.
My iBook G4 800 12" gets about 4-5h with full brightness, and around 5-6h dimmed.
This, of course, with processor scaling set to low in the Energy settings.
-- michell
-mz
I have a new 1.5 GHz 15" PowerBook. It gets a consistent 4+ hours of life in "regular" use - that doesn't mean watching a DVD, but it does mean writing documents, surfing the net, checking my e-mail, and so on. It also gets that kind of life with both Bluetooth and AirPort Extreme live and kicking.
For power conservation, I let the processor cycle down as needed, and I spin down the HD after 5 minutes. I also have the brightness dialed back to about 70% when on battery - that's usually good enough for me. But that's all the steps i need to get over 4 hours. If I were a little more aggressive, I might be able to break 5.
Part of the difference I think is the newer PPC 7457 processors - I believe they're pretty light on the power consumption (I don't have the actual specs handy).
-- Josh Turiel
"2. Do not eat iPod Shuffle."
I use the thing every day on my commute to work.
This is on a factory model, no aftermarket batteries, no special hacks.
"Learning is not compulsory... neither is survival."
--Dr.W.Edwards Deming
I'll second the bullshit to your bullshit. I have a 1ghz/12"/OS X 10.3. If i knock the brightness down all the way I'll get 6.5-7hrs out of it, 3-4 hours at full brightness or heavy load. Maybe you need a new battery. Or turn off "Best Performance" under power management. Automatic works well, "Longest Battery Life" is a dream for word processing / casual web browsing. No noticable slowdown but the underclocked processor will coast for 1-1.5hrs more.
I make it through 6 hour flights while watching movies constantly and still have enough left over to check my email when I get off the plane.
I use a Dell C600 (PIII-1000-Speedstep)
First I pack the ROM drive away and replace it with the second battery. I also carry a 3rd batt just in case. Second I also RIP my DVD's (DVDDecrypter) to the hard drive - spinning the harddrive takes far less juice than spinning a DVD. Lastly I use a hardware & user profile that has any extraneous devices, apps, utilities disabled.
Dell CPx, PIII, 500Mhz, 1024x768.
Two brand new 4460 mAh batteries, which are ~20 bigger than what the laptop shipped with years ago, yields over 11 hours of phun.
And for that, I can live with the low rez.
Toss in Gentoo, gcc 3.4.1, and compile everything with -O3, and you've got a snappy little machine, mang!
> on Linux there's no practical way to get the OS
/proc/sys/vm/bdflush and with hdparm you set the drive to spin down every 20 seconds or so and you are ready to go! /dev/null before playing oggs, helps a LOT!
> not to access the drive at least a few times per
> minute. It would be nice if there were.
Of course there is a way. It's called laptop_mode kernel patch and 2.6 kernel has it (also, the 2.4 kernel from fedora 1, has it). If you have that, then you mess a little with
I have an IBM T41 which runs for about 3 hours normally and for almost 4 hours if I spin the drive down with this way.
Also, cat *ogg >
My Dell Inspiron 8600 (with the centrino 1.7, 1920x1200 wuxga display, 80gb hdd) gets a good 7 hours of usage for things like surfing the internet/typing with the second battery installed in the modular bay and the display contrast all the way down.. not bad for such a monster of a laptop, considering its faster than most desktops.. with the dvd drive installed in place of the secondary battery, it'll play through a full movie and still have about an hour left..
"Make it idiot proof, and someone will make a better idiot."