Can you condition a laptop battery to get more life out of it?
 

I have a Sony Vaio. The battery will only last about 15 minutes on a full charge. Also, after about 15 minutes of normal use on battery power, the battery will show about 80% remaining, then all of the sudden the computer will shut off because the battery is dead. It's like XP doesn't know how much juice it really has. It's a Li-Ion battery and I know those don't have a memory like the old Ni-cad batteries, but is there any way to recondition the battery to get some more life out of it? I'm sure with the wealth of knowledge here, someone is probably a battery expert.

A new one is a minimum of $150! OUCH! Don't want to have to pay that much just for a battery on a 2 year old laptop that I just use to surf the internet.

I guess if there is no way to fix the existing battery I'll just have to cut my trips with the laptop to the bathroom to under 15 minutes.

No. Lithium ion batteries are excellent from a storage perspective, but they have a short life span. Less than 400 charge/drain cycles would not suprise me. There is no way to recondition them.

You might want to shop around for the battery, although Sony tends to make everything proprietary so you might be stuck. Post the model #.

That's what I thought. It's a Vaio R505DL. Most places I've seen seem to be around $150. I don't need one that bad.

Brand new on Ebay for $85.

http://cgi.ebay.com/NEW-Battery-For-Sony-Vaio-PCG-R505DL-Series_W0QQitemZ6733215828QQcategoryZ31518QQssPage NameZWD1VQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

Something is definitely wrong with your battery or your power management system. Call Sony tech support.

Likely your battery is past it's useful life. I believe the parameter for laptops when I supported them (dell) was about 400 charge/discharge cycles. If you used your battery and drained it mostly, then charged it every day, that would be something like 14 months. If your battery is significantly older than that, it's probably pretty useless. And if you want more life, you'll have to replace it.