Originally Posted by
msrohud
I did a search and couldn't really find an answer to this.
Someone told me that to preserve the overall lifetime of my battery that I should occassionally (once a week) disconnect it from the electric and let it run all the way down to about 5%. They said that this would help to keep the cells in the battery from one by one "dying" completely.
I figured someone here would be able to tell me if this is true and why. Is it like muscles? Use 'em or lose 'em?!
Thanks
Here is a quote from a manual:
What is battery conditioning or exercising?
When you intentionally discharge a battery down to a certain minimum voltage and then recharge it this is known as battery conditioning or reconditioning . It is also sometimes referred to as battery exercise. This is particularly important to reduce what some call the memory effect experienced using NiCD batteries if you habitually do not fully discharge them each time you use them. For NiCD batteries this must be done periodically, approximately every 10 charge/discharge cycles or so, or the batteries will begin to lose capacity. For NiMH batteries conditioning is not really needed to reduce any memory effect because that is negligent in this type of battery. However, reconditioning is very convenient for both NiMH and NiCD batteries because brand new batteries are not charged when you receive them and they must be charged and discharged three to five times before they reach their full capacity. In addition, occasionally conditioning rechargeable batteries helps to ensure that they give you years or service and save you as much money as possible, before you recycle them and get new ones.