Unsolved
This post is more than 5 years old
1 Message
0
74070
Latitude E4300 battery charge options
Hello everyone. I'm in the middle of the purchase of a new laptop and I'm still divided between the Lenovo X200 and the Latitude E4300. I'm already familiar with the Thinkvantage tools, but I never used Dell's Controlpoint software. I heard it's possible to disable battery charging (I use that feature in my Thinkpads to reduce battery wear. My X60 Tablet still uses the same battery that came with it when I purchased it 4 years ago and it still holds around 80% of the stock charge (roughly) mostly because I don't allow it to be charged if the battery is over a threshold. However, my question is: If I disable charging via the controlpoint software, will it keep the charging disabled when I turn off the computer, or it requires that the computer stay on so the battery charge policy is kept?
jrivam
1 Rookie
1 Rookie
•
15 Posts
0
June 21st, 2009 22:00
hi,
i have a dell e6400, and just found this feature just a few days ago by looking the buttons for curiosity, and wanted to know why is this feature included in a laptop. so, i google it just to be doubly sure if pulling off the battery after it is complete charged (or disabling it in this case) will prolong its life, as i heard.
in my dell (and i asume in all the e-series) the "disable battery charging" feature is reached by pressing Fn + F2 or using DCP software. in the DCP option says "Checking this box will stop your battery from charging until you DISCONNECT A/C AND SHUTDOWN or hibernate the computer. Your battery will still perform normally."
then, i test it, i disabled the charging battery, and shutdown the computer. after a 5 minutes, power on, and the battery charging LED is still off, and when windows completed start, the "battery charging disabled" icon is still there. ran a few more tests, and the battery charging LED can be enabled/disabled at any time when the computer is on (before windows starts, and even in the restore, without DCP, with the function key). the only time the "battery chargind LED" enabled itself was after shutdown the computer AND disconnected the AC. never tried hibernate.
so, i think this is more a hardware feature, like the WIFI switch, but without a switch, only a Fn key.
also, there a cool feature that the battery itself has, and is a led indicator (5 blue circles) that shows how much is the battery charged.
i wanted to ask you, wich was the threshold you use for the battery to stop charging?. and what other tips you have for preserve the battery life. thank you.
p.d. sorry about my english. im peruvian. my name is Jorge.