New Aspire One Owner

How long do i have to charge the battery the first time to get the max use of the battery life? Someone suggest charge it 24 hours before first time turning it on. How did u guys charge urs? I will have the 6 cell battery. thanks

 

Mine came almost fully charged. You only have to charge it until the LED changes from amber to green. Any more than that and you are just trickle charging it which isnt really neccessary.

 

My understanding is that with Li-Ion, the best approach is to fully charge it overnight, then let it drain completely down until it shuts off. Repeat three times. After that, charge or discharge at your leisure as they have no "memory" after the initial conditioning......Jake

Great resource: www.batteryuniversity.com

 

Thanks for this question - I've just got mine and wanted to know, since the batteries are a weak spot for all the netbooks. That Battery University is a great site. Here's what the guy says:

"A lithium-ion battery provides 300-500 discharge/charge cycles. The battery prefers a partial rather than a full discharge. Frequent full discharges should be avoided when possible. Instead, charge the battery more often or use a larger battery. There is no concern of memory when applying unscheduled charges.

"Although lithium-ion is memory-free in terms of performance deterioration, batteries with fuel gauges exhibit what engineers refer to as "digital memory". Here is the reason: Short discharges with subsequent recharges do not provide the periodic calibration needed to synchronize the fuel gauge with the battery's state-of-charge. A deliberate full discharge and recharge every 30 charges corrects this problem. Letting the battery run down to the cut-off point in the equipment will do this. If ignored, the fuel gauge will become increasingly less accurate."

So it's interesting that there's no reason to fully discharge for battery performance itself, but doing it every so often keeps the gauge more accurate.

 

Is the battery LED supposed to flash amber when charging or steady amber? Mine is flashing and won't power up unless the AC power is connected.

 

Flashing amber means the battery is almost empty. It is solid amber when charging and green when charged.

 

So, if the machine is turned off, with AC connected, it should be steady amber (ie charging)? In that case, my battery/machine is f**ked and I've only had it for a day!!