My laptop has arrived! It is shiny!! So I am going to be asking a lot of stupid questions this month because I've never owned a laptop before and I don't want to destroy the battery or whatever.

I know that I am supposed to fully charge the battery and then let it discharge completely to make sure it's calibrated. Can I use the computer when it is charging initially? Or am I supposed to let it charge without anything going on so it doesn't have anything draining it while it charges? Do I need to have it on so that I can remove the charger once it hits 100% or can I just plug it in right now while I'm at work and assume it will charge completely by the time I have to go home? And then I should use it for four or five hours until it's almost dead and shut it down at 1% or whatever before charging it fully again?

Apparently I'm not supposed to keep it plugged in all the time, though? How does that work when I want it to function like a desktop computer that is on all day all the time so I can just use it whenever? Maybe I want it to be downloading something while I'm asleep or while I'm at work.

You can use it all the way through the calibration, both during charging and discharging, as far as I know.

I keep mine plugged in pretty much all the time, and have never suffered any ill effects. As far as I know, there's no problem with doing that.

A lot of the battery "suggestions" around are essentially old wives tales, leftovers from the days of nickel/cadmium batteries, which were far more finicky than the Lithium batteries of today. Mostly, laptop batteries and their charging systems are designed to work just fine in the ways they are commonly used; plugged in a lot, with arbitrary amounts of charging and discharging. No battery lasts forever, of course, but you won't kill it in a year by leaving it plugged in.

After ten years, the Lithium batter in my old long-time dying laptop holds about a five minute charge.

I've got the battery for my new netbook not plugged in, but do have it plugged into a battery backup. I figure I can put the battery in the night before I travel. But if the stuff I hear is old wives tales,am I actually shortening battery life?

I just did some Googling, and, yeah, it appears that the lithium batteries work much better than the old ones and are generally designed to be fine. I know Lenovo has a good power managing software for its ThinkPads that allows you to set the battery to only charge if it drops below 95% or something so that it's not continuously charging while it's plugged in, but I don't know whether it comes with IdeaPads. The instruction manual does say that the battery is designed not to charge immediately after discharging, so that's good.

No battery lasts forever, of course, but you won't kill it in a year by leaving it plugged in.

Ha, the Office Depot guy was talking like it would be dead in a week if I did that. Which confused me because, you know, my WORK computer is plugged in all day and it seems to be juuuust fine.

But the calibration IS something I should do, though? I'm not sure I have enough time tonight to fully charge AND discharge it. So maybe I'll just let it discharge the rest of the way while I sleep and die, although I'd prefer to actually shut it down before it loses power completely.

The calibration should be done if you think it might be miscalibrated. It's not a necessity to do it right away, but I would do it sometime in the next week or so, just so you can get an idea of how long your battery lasts when calibrated correctly.

Typo Boy: I'm not sure what you mean by a battery backup. The computer is plugged into one, or the battery itself? If the battery is not plugged into anything, you're probably saving some battery life. If it's plugged into something that's keeping it at full charge, I'd think that it's the same thing as leaving it your plugged-in laptop. If you're looking to get 10 years of battery life, I'd think leaving the battery completely unplugged from everything except when used is your best bet. I've never been that dedicated: my longest-lasting laptop was 4 and a half years, and it's battery life was down to about 1.5 hours when I finished, which I could live with.

Yeah the computer itself is plugged into a battery backup to protect the power supply and hard disk. The battery is unplugged.

Then I think you're probably extending the life of the battery.

So maybe I'll just let it discharge the rest of the way while I sleep and die

I feel like you're missing some punctuation there, buddy.

PUNCTUATION SAVES LIVES

I have Googled madly for the solution to my issue, and I haven't been able to find a straightforward answer, so I think this may be more complicated than I would have hoped, BUT there must be a way to do it.

I used Outlook Express for ten years. I have ten years' worth of e-mails in .DBX files.

Windows 7 does not support Outlook Express. Instead, it has Windows Live Mail. I may use Windows Live Mail. I may use Thunderbird. People like Thunderbird, right? I may use Outlook, I don't know.

Nearly all import solutions I have seen involve having OE installed on the same computer. How can I import all my e-mails with just the files?

Okay, according to this page, Windows Live Mail should be able to import my files with no problem? I hope that's true. And, ah, then I can export to Outlook (when I tried to import to Outlook years ago, it reset the Received date and time to the time of the import, which was stupid, so I never used it, but now that I use Outlook at work, maybe I want to use it at home, I don't know?). If Windows Live Mail will take my damn e-mails with no problem, I may just use it. Anyone have an opinion on it? I like that it apparently has an optional conversation view. Thunderbird can do things as well and is more customizable, but after years of OE, I don't really ask for much from a mail program, you know? I don't know what I want/need. Windows Live Mail also has a calendar (as does Outlook), but can they sync with my Google Calendar? I don't need more calendars.