Battery life after 2 years of use

[ze2000100]

More of a heads up than anything. Been using the laptop now for 2 years. Extra-super-special care with the battery, following all tips. Battery lasted about 7 hours at the beginning, after 2 yeards it hardly lasts 4. I know that batteries are not forever but this seems excessive degradation. And no, the battery is not a RECALL.

Not sure how it will be for someone that gives it a REAL "portable computer" use.

Good luck with yours.

NOTE FOR MODERATORS, HP WORKERS ETC: Please don't tell me "I have forwarded your concern blablabla", you guys are awful as a company and already treated me like crap too many times. My laptop is still in warranty and I wouldn't dare let your technicians touch it again after the last mess they did.

[banhien]

Hi,

After 2 years and getting 4hrs is above standard actually but please try the following check to see how good, bad and ugly now.

    http://support.hp.com/au-en/document/c04700771

This may also do a recalibrate for battery and give some more breath.

For NORMAL batteries, over 400 charging cycles can reduce a lot of power that why vendors only guarantee batteries for one year EXCEPT some workstation and business classe models.

Regards.

[ze2000100]

About 50% doesn´t really seem acceptable. Laptops are meant to last a few years. Technically we are implying it´s not for it´s purpose in it´s conception. Nevertheless I will test your suggestion tomorrow. Thanks.

[Huffer]

OK well the problem is Lithium Ion chemistry. I suggest you drill down a bit and do some research and you will see that 2 years, 400 cycles on a Lithium Ion battery is going to degrade the run time of the cells substantially. HP cannot change the fundamental laws of the universe, and you will not find another laptop brand where the result would be any different. There are not really "HP" batteries and "Lenovo" batteries all come from the same few factories using the same cells. But we are happy you came in here and set us all straight and you had the chance to vent a bit. Thanks.  

[ze2000100]

Thanks for the sarcasm Huffer. If you put the same effort in solving all the issues maybe this forum woulnd´t be so full of people "settting anybody straight" or "venting a bit".

I took your suggestion on board and have done some research. The cycles are not 400 but 300. Meaning that if you use a laptop every day for a year your battery won´t even last the first year in full health (80%). As I said before I give is a lot of extra care, if I used the laptop for its real purpose it would be obviously a lot less.

But again, because of new designs (not only HP) batteries cannot be replaced without opening the laptop. HP won´t let you open the lapop in warranty, you are forced to pay the fee and risk the laptop to be badly treated like it happened to mine.

Probably 9 out of 50 of customers don´t even know what a cycle is. Why not put it clearly at the time of purchase?

"Your battery will die before the end of warranty. Changing the battery cannot be made during warranty without paying us to do it for you".

Sorry now it was me being sarcastic. I know most of the brands have poor ethics, not only HP.

[banhien]

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@ze2000100 wrote:

About 50% doesn´t really seem acceptable. Laptops are meant to last a few years.  ...

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Hi,

Are you talking about BATTERY or LAPTOP here ? Have you tried to use CONTINUOUSLY any rechargeable batteries ?

Regards.

[Huffer]

You confuse ethics with physics. The best minds in the world are trying to squeeze more life out of Lithium ion batteries....think electric cars. Laptops have kind of hit a plateau. Battery life has not really improved much in 5 years or so. What has improved is the power consumption of the processors and components but even that can only go so low. Yes if you use your laptop every day for a year on battery charging it to 100% and running it down to 20% every day your run time at the end of the year will be quite a bit less than it was new. 

Having a removeable battery requires structures and components that make a laptop thicker. Consumers want thin laptops. Anything else will not sell in sufficient quantities to make the end price affordable. Sorry for the sarcasm but I have been here a long time and just have to call out the folks who come in here and present a problem as the result of some sort of nefarious corporate dishonesty. I guess they get that from the media. Trust me, I have called out HP on a lot of things over the years, but you cannot legitimately blame the company for battery run time or service life. As I said it is the physics and chemistry of the product and consumer preference. If they could make batteries run 10 hours and last 10 years they would. 

When you buy a laptop you have to figure you are going to have to spend 50 bucks for a new battery in 2 or 3 years, and also pay for labor if it is one of the internal batteries. That should be obvious. If the battery dies in the first year warranty will pay parts and service labor. So you do get one year where the battery is guaranteed and nobody promises or implies any more than that.