Solved how long should a charge last on a laptop battery?

I charge this one, and it says 100%. then 1.5 to 2 hours later it's 10%. Then I get home, plug it in, and in 5 minutes it's saying 44%. :huh: it's been plugged in 15 minutes or so, and it's 100% again? that don't seem possible.

something seems strange to me, not right. I've never owned a laptop before so is this normal? I do know this PC is 5 years old and was always plugged in. it's never been used unplugged before now.



I have a compaq C700 notebook.

thanks for any help.

I would drain the battery completely and then recharge it. The time between charges depends on the device and what you're doing. If you're doing stuff like video encoding or other cpu\gpu intensive things, the battery will get used up faster.

thanks for replying.

all I was doing was light web surfing. so I wonder if the battery is shot?

I'll try draining completely and see if that helps.

Hi,

The biggest issue here the "Run time" for the battery not the "Charge time".

If the battery is lasting 2 hours then that is normal to pretty good, especially as it only takes 20 minutes to charge back up.

Test it for a few days & if it maintains that kind of service I'd say your good.

I had originally considered suggesting that the battery may need to be replaced. However, I didn't do that because he said the it showed as 100%. It's possible that the battery is bad if it won't hold a charge with little or no activity.

I had also tried to find something on the web which discussed battery charge life for the C700 but was unsuccessful.

In general, i don't put much stock in battery charge life provided by the computer manufacturers.