when my laptop battery is fully charged should i unplug charger and let the battery discharge?

Question

Possible Duplicate:
Is it better to use a laptop on battery or on AC power?

I was wondering if when a laptop battery is full charged if one should unplug it and let the battery discharge or it can be left plugged in. I want to know because I have heard that when the battery is full and the charger stays in it actually harms the battery by killing the cells etc.

Solution 1

Ideally your laptop would have a setting that would only charge to 60-80% of full charge. This lets you leave the charger plugged in all the time without causing serious degradation of the battery.

But not all laptops have this feature.

Solution 2

Lithium Ion batteries last longer the less they are used. You only need to drain it a tiny bit every now and then to keep electrons flowing

Comments

[DonP]

Adding to this, My laptop I currently own is almost 5 years old and can still give me over an hour on battery (dell XPS) simply because I do not use the battery.

[Daniel R Hicks]

Many laptops will not provide full performance when the battery is removed. The battery provides "surge" power over what the charger provides.

[Rain]

@DanH The second half of my answer addresses this...