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Why Is Linux Notebook Battery Life Still Poor?
Ganty writes "I recently purchased a Lenovo W500 notebook, and after 'downgrading' to XP and creating a dual partition, I found that I had a battery life of nearly three hours using the long-life battery, at this point I was a happy camper because it means that I can watch a DVD during a flight. I then tried various Linux distributions and found the battery life under FOS to be very disappointing, with an average of 45 minutes before a warning message. After settling on Ubuntu I then spent three days trying various hardware tweaks but I only managed to increase the battery life to one and a half hours. Unwanted services have been disabled, laptop mode has been enabled, the dual core CPU reduces speed when idle and the hard drive spins down when not needed. Obviously Apple with their X86 hardware and BSD based OS have got it right because the MacBooks last for hours, and a stock install of MS Windows XP gives me three hours of life. Why is battery life on notebooks so poor when using Linux? Some have suggested disabling various hardware items such as bluetooth and running the screen at half brightness but XP doesn't require me to do this and still gives a reasonable battery life."
Because linux is fucking terrible for desktop use.
Now ditch XP and put Windows 7 on that bitch!
If you're using Linsux on your notebook, make sure to pay your $699 license fee, you cock-smoking teabagger.
And get a real operating system.
Added bonus: People will stop thinking you're a faggot.
anyone who doesn't run powertop is just blindly ignorant, basically. Those are the people who post questions like in the summary.
Really, powertop let me get over 2 hours out of an Asus c90. Those things usually die in under an hour without it.
To start with, I'd guess the problem is DFO related. Dumb Fucking Operator. To be cute, he used the word 'downgraded', which is a gentle way of saying he was too ignorant to know that Visa works just fine. Ever influenced by the popular opinion of the uninformed, he installs Windows XP because he's not going to be fooled like the rest of those 'idiots'. Oh the irony.
Was that post intentionally ironic? Concrete evidence as provided from the original manufacturer as opposed to a third party battery of actual tests that are designed to get real numbers and not numbers that make the mfg look more favorable? Really?
Try harder next time.
Take that a step further, and just wonder why he's even bothering with using Teh Lunix.
Last time I checked, the OS was supposed to have the features you want. Sounds like Teh Lunix is a square peg in a round hole.
And I thought all I needed was to email Svend in Sweden to update the power-manager.driver kernel code for me. He said he would get right to it but was a little busy at the moment with his high school math homework.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Quit wasting our time.
You guys just don't seem to get it. Yes that might be the smarter way to go, but that's not the point, he was able to do it under Windows XP. Why can't he do it under Ubuntu? Typical response: YouDontNeedThat(TM), YoureDoingItWrong(TM). Poster, just reinstall XP where ItJustWorks(TM) and get on with your life.
Buy a MacBook and stop wasting time. Your time. Our time.
.config or GTFO AC also ... you're probably using an ATI card (doesn't support power management) which means you're being and idiot. Stop being and idiot you idiot.
Why is Linux so rubbish.
Very subtle.
Yawn.
Why don't you ******* use Windows XP?