VPC S Series Battery Life - How can I get the claimed duration?

[Odyssey1]

I have recently purchased an S series Vaio for my new business venture and one of teh primary reasons for choosing the Sony was the battery life of quoted 6 - 7 hours. However, now I have the machone and am using it I have encountered a few problems that people may be able to help with.

1) I seem unable to charge the battery fully, it seems to only get to around 80% despite leaving it on charge for the alloted time.

2) At the 80% charge the system is telling me that the battery will only last ~3 hours, which is way short of that quoted in the spec; and I am running it in stamina mode under a power saving plan!

Overall I need to get much better battery life out of the machine as I am likely to be in clients offices and mobile a lot. If I had known that the actual battery life was ~ 3 -4 hours then there were other machines that may have been a better choice, that I ruled out at the time because their battery life was 3 - 4 hours.

I have raised the query with Sony and am awaiting a response, but I thought I would check with the community to see if anyone has had the same problem and what the solution was.

Worst case I amy be asking the supplier for a full refund as the goods are not as described, i.e. the battery life is not marginally different from the manufacturers (and what was quoted on theirs and Sony's website) but around half the claimed.

Regards

Gary

[nikkilim]

Hi. Try to update the drivers and see if it would help. 3-4H is way off I think.

Turn off unneeded services too that drains the battery like blue and if not used, turn off wifi.

[rich912]

Hi Gary,

To increase the battery charge percentage alter the setting in 'Battery Care' – Vaio Control Center > Power Management > Battery Charge Functions > Advanced. Either turn off the care function or edit the parameters.

To explore increasing battery life have a look at the following link.

http://genesis.sony-europe.com/instranet/ccil_sony/selfservice/searcher.jsp?DocId=56572&l=en_GB&m=VP...

Rich

[Odyssey1]

Hi Rich

I have followed the suggestions and am operating in stamina mode on the power saver plan with DVD drive off etc. The main issue is that when left on charge the amber light is on and goes out after a while (presumably once fully charged). But when I fire up the notebook and check the battery life the charge is only 80% (no idea whay) and the claimed life is ~4 hours.

I have tried contacting Sony Support but the Case ID provided is only 6 digits long an dtheir telephone support system requires a 7 digit code. Doe steh left hand know what the right hand is doing.

I have to admit that I am getting a little frustrated that what was to be a great new notebook for my new business is turning out to be a real headache.

All I want is the battery to charge fully and last around 6 hours......all of whcjh should be a given based upon the spec!!!

Regards

Gary

[rich912]

Hi Gary,

Have you followed my suggestion to alter the settings for Battery Care? If so I assume that it now charges to 100% but drops off when shutdown?

If you let me have the case ID (via PM – please do not post this on the open forum) I will escalate this in the hope that given your user name they will be able to cross reference. Please ensure that your contact details are correct and up to date.

Rich