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Re: Rechargeable Batteries

Tina Fanetti wrote:

PS the laptop battery is a Li-Ion battery.

That's a super-important "PS".
Thanks for including it.

They say that you are supposed to run down the battery every so often
to help clear its "memory" and make it last longer.

Not for Li-ion. Back in the pleistocene, people
used NiCd batteries that did have a memory effect,
but it is almost impossible to buy those anymore.

> I say that it is shortens the life span. I am not 100% sure, but I
> think it has something to do with chemical make up.
It does somewhat shorten the Li-ion life span, but
probably not tragically. Supposedly
-- Li-ion: thousands of cycles
-- NiMH: hundreds of cycles
-- car battery: one deep cycle if you're lucky
(although you can by deep-cycle lead-acid batteries)

This all started because my laptop battery goes dead in 5 minutes. I
very rarely run it off the battery because of this. I say they should
buy me a new one and the IT people say I have to teach the
battery....

So train the battery for one cycle. When it
doesn't make any difference, they'll have to
buy you a new one.

http://www.manufacturing.net/pur/index.asp?layout=articleWebzine&articleid=CA195266
http://www.google.com/search?q=li-ion+memory-effect
http://mailgate1.nau.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0301&L=phys-l&F=&S=&P=44592