Battery Life on Laptop Batteries using wi-fi?

[jbachandouris]

I just need one simple question answered. Unfortunately the USELESS HP email 'tech support' could not answer it. The question is: Is 1 hour battery life normal for a portable with wi-fi on?

The portable is a 3Ghz P4 with a 15.4" screen. I have the power settings to max battery life and brightness turned down. Simple web-surfing never yields more than 1 hour.

In response to my email, all I got from HP India is instructions on battery conditioning and a re-stating of the obvious: wi-fi consumes more power. NO KIDDING CHIMPS.

I really wish there was a laptop maker that had REAL tech support. When this laptop is replaced it will NOT be an HP unless they get their act together!

[Jason Dunn]

I have an hp laptop with a 3.2 Ghz CPU and 17" LCD, and with WiFi on and active surfing I can get perhaps 90 minutes - if your battery is smaller than mine, then yes, one hour sounds normal. Laptops with desktop CPUs are not designed in any way to be battery friendly. :-)

[jbachandouris]

My battery is a 9 cell, that's all I know. I'm happy to hear that I am not alone. I dont think I would have bought this if I had known of the battery life.

[Fishie]

I have an Acer Travelmate 4001WLMi, I get around 4 hours on max battery mode with WiFi.

Centrino´s kick ass.

[jbachandouris]

Too late now. I have only had this machine since August.

[Jason Dunn]

My battery is a 9 cell, that's all I know. I'm happy to hear that I am not alone. I dont think I would have bought this if I had known of the battery life.

Mine is 12 cell, but it's also got a bigger screen - so it probably balances out and you're getting a bit shorter battery life than normal. It's tough to say though, and even harder to prove that there's a problem unless you can get your hands on a compatible battery and run some tests.

[jbachandouris]

It is 14.8v, 6.0Ahr. how can I tell between 9 and 12 cell?

[jimski]

That's why I dumped my 3.0Ghz laptop for this Centrino 1.6Ghz with a 15.1" screen. The three fans on that thing never turned off.

I can have anything I want from my firm (company VP) so this is my choice. I usually replace my machine every 14-18 months (when the HD gets iffy) but I think I am just going to replace the HD in this machine and reconfigure. I run Outlook, AutoCAD, MS Access, Project, Publisher, Excel, etc. all day without any issues. I can honestly say that I have not noticed any performance hits between the two laptops (maybe the 3.0 was just not configured well).

I have been browsing on a hotel's wireless network tonight for more than an hour and my battery meter says 78% or 3.43 hours remaining. From history I know I can go at least 2 to 2.5 hours without even getting close to running out of juice.

And BTW, the next time you go shopping, you might want to consider an MPC (formerly known as Micron Computer). Solid, reliable machines and ALL U.S. support for all machines. I have used nothing else for work, home and family for more than 10 years and feel comfortable recommending to anyone.

[Jason Dunn]

I can honestly say that I have not noticed any performance hits between the two laptops (maybe the 3.0 was just not configured well).

That's because the Pentium M processor has 1 MB of L2 cache while the Pentium 4 has 512KB. The doubled cache provides a huge performance boost - the 1.6 Ghz Pentium M processor probably benchmarks at about the 2.6 Ghz Pentium 4 level, so it's almost as fast as what you had. The Pentium M is a seriously awesome CPU. :mrgreen:

[Jason Dunn]

It is 14.8v, 6.0Ahr. how can I tell between 9 and 12 cell?

I'm not sure - best to check the HP Web site and see what it says in the specs.

[Fishie]

Jason, urm actually its been 2mb for a while now.
I bought my Centrino in September and it had the 2mb cache processors already, improvement has increased even more with the new Sonoma Centrino´s.
I was positively surprised to find that at 1.5GHz my laptop outperforms my desktop which was clocked much higher.

[Jason Dunn]

Jason, urm actually its been 2mb for a while now.

Really? Hmm. I could have sworn that 1st gen Pentium M CPUs were 1 MB.

Intel's page says both 1MB and 2MB for the cache:

http://www.intel.com/products/processor/pentiumm/index.htm

It looks like the ULV Pentium M's had 1 MB of cache - that's the CPU my P5010D notebook has. I think it's only the new Sonoma chips that can have up to 2 MB of cache. This page is about the first gen, Banias CPUs, and it says 1 MB:

http://www.cpuid.com/PentiumM/index.php

[Fishie]

Banias has 1mb, Dothan(what I have) and Sonoma are 2mb cache.

[jbachandouris]

How can I tell what size L2 cache I have? Mine is a 3.4Ghz P4.

[Jason Dunn]

How can I tell what size L2 cache I have? Mine is a 3.4Ghz P4.

You'll have 512KB of cache because it's a desktop CPU.

[jbachandouris]

Yes, you are right. MOOX, who builds custom FF builds for specific processors, has a utility that tells you a lot about a PC's chip. Thanks for the info.

[Kowalski]

with a 3 cell(2200mAh) battery, i get 1.5 hours of surfing with a dim screen, wifi on
i also have a 6 cell battery doubling the runtime
thank god for centrino platform :D

[jbachandouris]

Mine is a 12-cell, but since it is not Centrino, I will have to settle for 1 hour. :cry: