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?"

Comments

Trade off

[erick99]

Until a more advanced battery technology comes along , battery life is going to be a trade between how long you want the computer to run between recharging and how many features (DVD, etc) you want available. Eventually, some new technology such as fuel cell will enable us to have our cake (lotsa features) and eat it too (very long battery life).

Cheers!

Erick

Re:Trade off

[JWSmythe]

Well, from what I understand, they aren't simply pressurized hydrogen cans. They use methanol, but still, it's a potentially hazardous fuel.

But, security on aircraft are a joke anyways. You could carry bottles of almost anything on a plane. A friend of mine filled a Dr. Pepper bottle full of Captain Morgan's spiced rum, and carried it on with her. She was a bit of a drunk. (Ok, a regular alcoholic). They didn't even notice the color was wrong. Hell, Cap't Morgans looks more like gasoline than Dr. Pepper. They didn't question the fact that she was carrying it on. What if it was 151 in a sprite or water bottle? Or "white gasoline"?

But really, how many perfectly common items are dangerous?

Butane from a common disposable lighter can be used to fill a bag or balloon, and combust rapidly.

Me smacking someone in the head with a hardback copy of War and Peace would be deadlier than a pair of fingernail clippers.

Or as an old ex-military man I once knew said, he could kill a man with a rolled up newspaper. It's not the item, it's how it's used.

I'd be willing to bet most women's purses are the most dangerous things on an airplane. If you won't believe me, tell your wife/girlfriend that she's ugly so you're sleeping with the new 19 year old secretary at work, and then dare her to hit you with her purse. :)

I think it's stupid that I have to put my screwdriver in checked luggage. Hell, I might fix the tray table so it doesn't flop down by itself while we're flying. Forbid the thought.

I recently attached my little 802.11b antenna to the top of my laptop. I leave the wire coiled up. *EVERY* time I go through security now, they look at it like it's a bomb. I had one security guard who couldn't even recognize it's a laptop. He was like "What is that?" Ummm, a laptop dude. How the hell are they suppose to recognize a home made explosive device, if they can't even identify common electronics?? I could have told him it was a toaster, and he would have believed me.

Do your research

[winkydink]

On IBM's web site, for instance, they state what power-saving settings they use to get the battery life specs they claim (hint, if you need the screen more than 1/2 illuminated, you're screwed).

One man's long life is goign to be another man's power hog. It all depends on how you use the machine and how you set up the power saving features.

Re:dell laptops

[Anonymous Coward]

Parent is overly broad. Laptops with P4s may indeed have short battery lives, but I generally get 6-7 hours out of my Dell laptop with a Pentium-M (and its a widescreen laptop at that).

Dell 600m Centrino - 8 Hours

[Carbonate]

My Dell can get about 8 hours of battery life under minimal load. Of course it does have a spare battery in the media bay.

Really? Portability hampered by a battery?

[switcha]

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.

Oh, come off it. The handful of ounces a battery weighs pales in comparison to most of the other accouterments a mobile fellow or gals carries around.

Besides, for most laptops, two batteries worth will far outlast any "long-life" laptop's single charge life. I'm not saying it's the ultimate in convenience, but if long life is really, really important to you, get the machine you really want and will be productive on, and then cough up for another battery.

Dual Batteries

[Quad_Junkie]

Hello All

My 0.02, try and find a laptop that can take dual battery packs. That should allow plenty of time to do just about anything :)

You could go with an external battery pack but all of the ones I've seen are pretty pricey and add to the overall bulk of a laptop.

Good Luck

Re:dell laptops

[dchamp]

My Dell i8500 will run for about 4 hours under "normal" desktop use running Linux, with an Orinico wireless card in it.
As to the original post... you know they usually have AC power available at net cafe's, right?

Re:-1: Offtopic, +503: Service Unavailable

[kzinti]

Funny thing is... Slashdot was more reliable back in the days when they were handing out those 4-digit IDs. I don't think I've ever seen it is flaky as it's been the past couple of weeks... with the possible exception of the times they were hit by DoS attacks. I'd assume that this was another attack, except for that recent upgrade. New servers? New version of Slash? Sounds like good old-fashioned upgraditis to me.

Use a laptop with Pentium M CPU

[Mike Rotch]

For the x86 side, use laptops with Pentium M cpus for the battery/perf. The whole Centrino marketing thing is based on using this cpu with other intel hardware to maximize battery life. I have a x1000 compaq with 15.4" screen and it has lasted a little over 4 hours. I think it could have gone a bit more if I employed more power saving features. I even watched FOTR on battery. I had the dvd ripped to the HD so the dvd drive was not it use. I am not sure if it would have lasted with constantly spinning the disc. But basically if you really wants lots of battery life, use laptops with smaller screens (10" or 12") and keep 'em dimmed. Also minimize the use of the HD.

I also have iBook 12" and I have used it for over 5 hours on battery. I stopped using it after 5 hours so I am not sure how much more it would have gone for.

Re:15" iBook

[Anonymous Coward]

First of all there is no such thing as a 15" iBook. It's either a 14" iBook or a 15" Powerbook.

I also strongly doubt 7+ hours unless that includes the laptop going to sleep when you're not using it. That is worth counting in when you're e.g. at school and it can go to sleep and wake up in less than a second if you need to take some notes. But still.

Active use will get you up to ~6 hours. With everything blazing we're talking more like 4-5 hours for a 14" iBook.

Re:Apple iBook G4

[YetAnotherName]

Yeah, but MacOS X is Unix anyway; I've been able to do a lot of my Linux application development on MacOS X with few problems.

Besides,

autoconf

is a wonderful tool.

Re:The most beautiful 12" Powerbook is the BEST

[drsmithy]

Beautiful OS, beautiful construction, loooooong battery life, light-weight... what else can one ask for?

A backlit keyboard, better video card and higher screen resolution ?

The 12" PB has the potential to be a great machine, it's just a pity it's such a poor cousin to the other PBs. 9/10 times buyers would be just as well served with a 12" iBook.

Re:Nota Bene

[abb3w]

Most "features" of a laptop don't really consume extra power if not utilized.

Note that wireless cards consume a decent chunk of power even if you aren't actively doing things with TCP/IP. Removing PCMCIA or USB adapters, or (for those that support such) switching off an internal wireless adapter when not in use will increase battery life by a decent fraction.

Re:IBM X31 -- 4 n change hours

[eric2hill]

Win-R = Run Prompt (95% of my needs for that key)
Win-D = Show the desktop (4% of my needs)
Win-E = Explore (1% of my needs)
Win-Break (hah!) = Device Manager (once or twice a year)