Make computer shutdown if battery < 50%

Question

My original Dell battery died after one year, and I made the mistake of buying a new one from eBay.

The new battery starts from 100% charged and after 5 minutes drops abruptly from 95% to ~9-10%. Sometimes the computer doesn't even have the time to shutdown safely because it remains without enough power (and because of this I recently had to repair my Windows setup)...

So until I get a new battery, how can I force Windows to shut down automatically if battery reports less than 50% charge?

Solution 1

Control Panel > Power Options > Change plan settings > Change advanced power settings

Then expand the Battery > Low Battery options

Solution 2

You can set that in Control Panel.

1. Open Control Panel.

2. Go to -> Power Options -> Under the current selected Power Plan (e.g. Balanced), select Change Power Settings.

3. Click Change advanced power settings.

4. Under Battery, expand Low Battery level. In On battery, set the value to 50%.

5. Under Battery, expand Critical Battery action, In On battery, verify it is set to Hibernate your PC. Else set it to Shutdown if you like.

Comments

[HikeMike]

Since the battery can only handle a few minutes, wouldn't it be safer to just keep the machine plugged in all the time?

[Alex]

Yes I'm doing this whenever I can (I can't even do anything on battery because it lasts only for a few minutes). But sometimes there are power outages in my area, and if I'm not around to turn it off, the computer switches to battery...