IBM T30: battery life under 5.0-current, ACPI/APM and sleep issues

[Tobias Roth]

On Sat, Apr 05, 2003 at 11:43:33AM -0800, Lee Damon wrote:
> I know
> that IBM has had problems with battery life in the past, so I
> may just be a victim of that. :/

very likely. apm works on 4.8 here, and I heard it is also working
on current for some people.

however, IBM still has problems with batteries, and they know about
it. the usual symptoms are as follows: the battery capacity reported
by apm decreases normally up to some point (60%, 70% or even only 95%),
and then suddenly drops to 5%. It's a problem with the capacity signal
the battery logic transmits to the bios, not with the actual battery
capacity. covering certain pins on the battery will disable that
signal, and the battery will run for the expected duration.

the same behaviour is present on windows as well. it definitely is
a problem ibm should fix soon. it can happen to brand new batteries.

greets, t.