Laptops have quickly entered our lives thanks to the advantages they provide: portability, convenience, continuous availability. However, it loses these qualities simultaneously with the failure of the battery, tying us to an electrical outlet. A battery is the most vulnerable part of a device that loses its characteristics over time. How to restore the properties of the battery, and what methods exist for this?
Content
When should you think about restoring a laptop battery?
Modern batteries are designed for continuous battery life from 2 to 8 hours. Manufacturers also claim that battery life is determined by the number of charge-discharge cycles. That is, the battery will work properly, according to experts, for 400-500 cycles. Depending on the intensity of operation of the device, this is approximately 3-4 years. However, problems often start earlier. How to determine that the battery is faulty?
In fact, the operating system notifies you of various problems that occur in electrical equipment. The message will display information about low battery capacity and the need to replace it. A user who spends a lot of time on a laptop will always notice changes: the battery’s exhausted battery life is indicated by a decrease in the computer’s battery life to one hour or even 10-20-30 minutes. However, not everything is so simple as to better understand the processes taking place in the equipment, we will deal with them one at a time.
The laptop battery is a circuit consisting of 4-6-8 cans, sometimes the amount reaches 12. The banks are charged and discharged under the control of a special board called the controller. In general, unsatisfactory operation of the power supply system can be caused by the following reasons:
- Battery cells have exhausted their life. Sometimes individual banks fail, then they can still be replaced. This process is called "repackaging", and they say about the battery that it "died".
- The battery cannot be restored after a deep discharge. As a rule, the elements are serviceable, but the controller blocks the charge due to low voltage. That is, it automatically turns them off, considering them malfunctioning. In such cases, they resort to balancing the cans by means of a charger or charging each element separately.
- The controller is out of order. It is impossible to fix such breakdowns on your own, usually a faulty board is replaced with a new one.
Capacity Recovery Methods
To date, specialists use the following effective troubleshooting methods.
Software Battery Calibration
Calibration is a method that improves controller performance if the power supplies are operational. In this case, the readings of the battery voltmeter are reset to zero by means of special software and utilities.
One-hundred percent charging indicates that the voltage in the cells is approximately 4.2 V. However, over time, the readings do not appear correctly and the full charge icon appears long before the battery cells are charged. That is, resetting the controller allows for the presentation of data, but does not improve battery functionality.
Method 1
Manual calibration is very simple: to do this, the battery is fully charged, discharged until it is turned off, and then again charged to 100%.
Important! When calibrating manually, you need to change the power plan: the ban on switching to sleep mode and the screen turns off automatically turns on. You can do this in the power section of the control panel.
Method 2
Significantly facilitate the work will help special programs to restore the battery. Thus, the program will perform all the actions on its own, freeing the person from routine actions. In the meantime, you can do other things. Users are offered free versions that can be found on the Internet. Among them are:
- UEFI Diagnostic System or Support Assistant. Specially designed for HP equipment owners.
- Lenovo Energy Management. Also developed by specialists for owners of such laptop computers.
- Battery Doubler. It is considered universal, users testify that with its help it is possible to reanimate the batteries of Asus, Acer, Dell models without any problems.
- Battery Care A free application to check battery performance, charge analysis, determine the temperature of the device.
- Smarter Battery. It has great functionality, but requires registration.
Method 3
This is one of the most effective and popular methods that can be applied regardless of the device model: Packard Bell, Xiaomi, MSI. Adherents of Samsung laptops are massively resorting to it. It consists in performing calibration through the BIOS as follows:
- We connect the laptop to the network.
- When rebooting, press the F2, F10, Del, or Esc key (depending on the model of laptop).
- In the Boot tab, select Smart Battery Calibration.
All methods are successfully used by users, so it’s better to get acquainted with all of them. However, if they all turned out to be useless, then we resort to a more serious event - the replacement of elements.
By replacing the batteries in the battery case
Before starting work, that is, before disassembling the battery, we prepare the following tools:
- multimeter;
- sharp object: knife, screwdriver, scalpel;
- soldering iron with solder and flux;
- charger with balancing function;
- new battery cells;
- glue, electrical tape for assembly parts.
Further, depending on the type of batteries, we carry out a certain sequence of actions.
Li-ion
In modern laptops used lithium ion batteries, bring it back to life is possible in the following way:
- Carefully cut the glued parts of the body. To do this, carefully heat them with a hairdryer. We direct the jet locally so as not to heat the battery, as it may explode.
- We sketch the connection diagram of the elements before disconnecting them. We mark the connection points of the positive and negative outputs. Designate the connection to the controller or soldered segments.
- Visually check the parts for defects: damage, burnt parts on the board and bulges, smudges on the banks. If at least one faulty element is detected, replace all the others.
- Check the voltage at the terminals. Even if the battery is deeply discharged, it must be present. Otherwise, the controller fails or the circuit is broken.
- In some cases, it is advisable to carry out balancing, which allows you to restore the battery to life. To do this, the elements are disconnected from the board and connected to the balancer. If this does not help, the elements are replaced with new ones.
- After repair, the output voltage should be close to the nominal battery value.
- Carefully assemble and glue all the components.
You need to purchase batteries the same as the previous ones. Their electrical characteristics and dimensions should correspond to the old ones. Notebook PCs use size batteries 18650 at 3.6 volts. Notebooks when running on battery power require a voltage of 10.8-11.1 volts, this voltage can give three series-connected batteries of 3.6-3.7v.
Ni-Mh or Ni-Cd
Older laptops used Ni-Mh (nickel metal hydride batteries) or Ni-Cd (nickel cadmium batteries) They have completely different properties and advantages of use. It should be noted that in all cases, charging and discharging must be carried out at normal ambient temperature. Heat or frost can cause the battery to malfunction. The whole sequence of actions is observed, as in the previous case: when performing work, we pay great attention to safety rules.
For Ni-Mh and Ni-Cd cells, the voltage will be 1.2v, which means you need 9 series-connected batteries to get the required 10.8 volts.
Important! If what is written above seems incomprehensible and complicated to you, then it is better to return the battery for repair or replace it with a new one.
What can not be done to restore the battery?
Some craftsmen conduct dangerous experiments with batteries. It should be noted that illogical actions are fraught with explosions, injuries and other unpleasant consequences. Despite the tips that you can find in various forums, in no case do you need to do the following things:
- Connect battery cells directly to the mains.
- Freeze the battery in the freezer, and then try to revive it. And also use the battery at ambient temperatures above 45 degrees and below zero.
- Close the contacts with a metal object.
- Put the battery in water or fire. Well, after that, many masters ask why the battery is dead? Really strange!
- Disassemble the battery yourself without special preparation, discharge by improvised means.
Simple tips and tricks will extend battery life and avoid unnecessary costs. Do not forget to follow the rules of operation of the device, then the computer will certainly serve us for many years!
