If you’re like me, one of the most annoying things that can happen when you’re on the go is having your laptop battery die. Most of the time, a notebook battery will only last about an hour and a half. With these 5 easy steps you can improve your battery life by nearly half an hour and get the most out of your laptop.

1. Watch You’re WiFi:

The wireless card in you’re laptop is a huge energy hog. If you’re not using the Internet you may want to switch the WiFi off. Most laptops have a small On/Off switch on the outside so that you can turn it off when you’re not using it, and quickly switch it back on if you need it.

2. Stay Away from CD’s and DVD’s:

Running the optical drive also uses a lot of power. It needs energy to spin the disc and power the optical laser. A normal optical drive will reduce the battery life by over half.

3. Watch for Background Programs and Processes:

Few people know that some programs will also suck up battery energy. Things like Virus scans, Games, Photoshop/Final Cut Pro, and iTunes should be closed unless you are using them.

4. Utilize you’re laptop’s Energy Management Program:

Many OS’s on laptops will come with Power Management options to help with energy consumption. You can customize these programs to lower you’re Screen Brightness, CPU Activity (So that the computer wont need to cool itself as much), and will turn your screen off after a certain period of inactivity.

5. Remove USB Devices:

They key thing to remember about USB devices is that they draw their power directly from the battery. Things like Flash Drives, Mice, and Keyboards will shorten your battery time. If you can, save things to your hard drive and detach all Flash Drives. Also, Use you’re laptop’s Keyboard and Mousepad, instead of external devices.

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 1st, 2008 at 1:57 pm and is filed under Other, Technology.You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.