Recently several Australia laptop users read that keeping laptop battery charged at 100% the whole time degrades battery life. Today AussieBatt notebook battery experts explain this myth.
Battery University says that “the worst situation is keeping a fully charged battery at elevated temperatures.” If your laptop produces a lot of heat, removing it might be a good idea. If you have a fairly cool laptop that you occasionally let discharge a reasonable amount, leaving it plugged in — even for days on end — shouldn’t be a problem. If your laptop gets extremely hot, you may want to remove the battery.
It’s fine to leave your Toshiba laptop plugged in at your desk when you’re using it, as the laptop won’t “overcharge” the battery — it will stop charging when it reaches capacity. However, just as you shouldn’t store your laptop’s battery at full capacity in a closet, you shouldn’t leave your laptop plugged in for months on end with the Toshiba pa3820u-1brs battery at full capacity. Allow your laptop’s battery to occasionally discharge somewhat before charging it back up — that will keep the electrons flowing and keep the battery from losing capacity. A battery will last longer if only charged to 60-80% of capacity. This has nothing to do with “memory”. This is why many manufacturers supply utilities that will limit charging to lower levels, if you do not need the long cordless runtime of a fully-charged battery.
The circuitry built into the battery will not allow the battery to be overcharged. However, storing the battery at 100% capacity for long periods of time is bad for it. Completely discharging and recharging Lithium Ion batteries is also not good for them. Discharging Lithium Ion batteries below a certain voltage will ruin them. The best way to store a Toshiba pa3821u-1brs laptop battery is to keep it between 40% and 60% charged. Some notebook PCs support the functionality of maintaining the battery charge at a certain level (say 60%), as an option to improve battery longevity.
Toshiba does not recommend leaving your portable plugged in all the time. An ideal use would be a commuter who uses her notebook on the train, then plugs it in at the office to charge. This keeps the battery juices flowing. If on the other hand, you use a desktop computer at work, and save a notebook for infrequent travel, Apple recommends charging and discharging its battery at least once per month.
