We talk about being mobile, part of a wireless¹ world, untethered (OK, it's just me who says 'untethered'). But if, midflight and midsentence, you've ever cursed your laptop battery for giving out, or developed the habit, when you walk into Starbucks, of immediately peering under chairs and through people's legs for a power outlet², you'll know that the reality doesn't quite match the talk. Our laptops might be more portable than before, our connections might be faster and involve less cabling, but we know our batteries will let us down. We still need juice.

我们对无拘无束的移动办公环境无不心向往之。但如果你有过在飞行途中或一句话写到一半时笔记本电脑的电池突然“罢工”的经历，或是每当步入星巴克 (Starbucks)咖啡店时都会习惯成自然地往椅子腿下瞄，透过人们的腿丛去寻找电源插座，你就知道理想和现实并不是那么匹配了。我们的笔记本电脑可能比以往更轻便了，我们的上网速度或许也更快了，能够无线上网的地方也更多了，但电池却拖了我们的后腿。我们依然离不开电源插座。

Of course, there are some people who never seem to need an outlet. At one conference, I offered a slot in a power strip I had managed to purloin³ to a fellow journalist, only for him to turn it down, snootily proclaiming he was using a Mac and therefore didn't need power (personally, I don't agree with his view that Macs have longer-lasting batteries; I suspect he just had a newer battery than mine). And some people, who always seem to be ridiculously good-looking, sit in Starbucks all day in front of laptops without any visible wires (I suspect their laptops are turned off). But what can the rest of us do to make the most of our batteries?

当然，有些人似乎从来不需要这玩艺。在一次会议上，我曾好心让一位记者同行使用我的接线板，但人家却不领情，还煞有介事地说他用的是Mac电脑，不需要外接电源。（要我说，他所谓Macs电脑的电池待机时间长之说不能成立；我怀疑他笔记本电脑的电池不过是比我的要新些罢了。）还有些人假模假式地抱着台笔记本电脑整天泡在星巴克，可却不见他们的电脑有任何接出来的长尾巴。（我怀疑他们的电脑根本就没开机。）但对我们这些凡夫俗子来说，如何能使自己的电池发挥最大效能呢？

The truth is: not an awful lot. 'I watch the consumer becoming more and more agitated,' says Christina Lampe-Onnerud, founder⁴ and chief executive of U.S. battery-technology company Boston-Power Inc. 'My message is very simple: There's very little you can do.' Of course, Ms. Lampe-Onnerud has an ax to grind: Her company is working with heavyweights like Hewlett-Packard Co. to launch a new kind of battery called Sonata⁵, which she says will have a lifespan as long as that of your laptop and give you at least four hours of power between charges, compared with two to three hours with existing batteries. (She declined to say when they'd be available and how much they'd cost.)

实情就是：没有太多办法。美国电池技术公司Boston-Power Inc.的创办人兼首席执行长克里斯蒂娜•兰柏-欧纳鲁德(Christina Lampe-Onnerud)说，她发现消费者对电池问题越来越感焦虑。她说得倒也简单：这不是你们操心的事。当然，这是兰柏-欧纳鲁德的用武之地。她的公司正与惠普(Hewlett-Packard Co.)等龙头企业合作，准备推出一款名为Sonata的新型电池，她说这种电池的寿命能和笔记本电脑一样长，待机时间至少能达到4小时，而现有电池的待机时间只有2到3小时。（她拒绝透露这款电池何时能够面市以及售价将是多少。）

Truth is, there's a lot of smoke and mirrors about batteries. Computer companies offer plenty of advice about how to get the most from yours, but it's probably wise to keep your expectations low. Battery technology still relies on chemical reactions taking place inside those innocent-looking slabs⁶ of plastic, and improvements happen, according to Isidor Buchmann, founder and chief executive of Canadian battery-charger maker⁷ Cadex Electronics Inc., far more slowly than improvements in, for example, chip speed.

实情就是：我们得到的建议大多华而不实。虽然电脑公司给我们提供了许多使电池发挥最大效能的建议，不过最好还是别对这些建议抱太高期望。电池技术的进步依然有赖于电池内部化学反应方式的改进，而据加拿大充电器生产商Cadex Electronics Inc.的创办人兼首席执行长伊西多尔•布彻曼(Isidor Buchmann)说，这一改进速度比芯片运行速度等方面的进展要慢得多。

So assume your battery is a dying beast as soon as you buy it. It only has a few hundred cycles -- from charged to empty -- before it starts to resemble a very expensive doorstop. The trick is to slow the dying process. To do this, it's best to think of your battery as separate from your laptop. Yes, it fits snugly⁸ underneath⁹ it, but that doesn't mean it should live there.

所以不妨将电池想像为从你买来那天起就一步步走向死亡的家伙。电池一般只能反复充电几百次，过了这个极限它就会像旧门簧一样无法工作了。关键是要减缓这一死亡进程。要做到这一点，最好不要将电池与笔记本电脑混为一谈。诚然，电池与电脑搭配得严丝合缝，但这并不意味着电池就应该是总傍在电脑身边。

When you buy a new laptop or a new battery, go through at least one cycle of charging it fully¹⁰ and then discharging it, and do the same again every few months. This will reset¹¹ the digital circuit that estimates the battery's charging status, so it doesn't stop charging prematurely¹². Resetting¹³ the gauge¹⁴, says Atsushi Kumaki, director of ThinkVantage Technologies at Lenovo-Group Ltd.-owned Yamato Labs in Tokyo, 'will gain you a few percent' of charge each time.

当你新买了一台笔记本电脑或一块新电池，至少要将电池充满一次电然后再放掉，此后每隔几个月就这样重复一次。此举意在重置评估电池充电状态的数字电路，以便它不会在电池未充满时就下令停止充电。联想集团(Lenovo-Group Ltd.)旗下ThinkVantage Technologies的负责人Atsushi Kumaki说，每重置一次这一电路，电池的充电容量就能提高几个百分点。

Then plan your day. If you know you're going to use the battery, charge it fully beforehand. If you're not going to need it, let the battery run down until it's just under half full and remove it from your laptop. (Of course, this means you no longer have a battery backup if power fails, so if you're vulnerable to power outages or colleagues yanking out the power cord with their legs, you might not want to do this.) Laptop batteries should be stored at about 40% full; fully charged, they're a fire hazard, but if you store them entirely¹⁵ discharged, they might not charge again.

然后是安排好你的日程。如果你今天会用到电池，那就事先将它充满。如果你暂时用不到它，那就在电量消耗掉一半以上后将电池从笔记本电脑上卸下。（当然，这意味着如果突然断电你就无法通过电池供电来应急了。因此，如果你在使用电脑时绝对不能断电，或者你同事们不安分的小腿时时有将你电源线断开的危险，你或许对这种做法不感兴趣。）笔记本电脑的电池在存而不用时应保持约40%的电量；如果充满电，则起火的危险会大增，但如果把电池中的电完全放掉，下次可能就充不进电了

The reason for storing your battery outside your laptop is simple: Laptops get hot. If a battery is too hot, it starts to discharge itself and this, over time, reduces how long each charge lasts. Tests conducted by Cadex indicate laptop batteries under such conditions will last only 12 to 18 months, something I'm unhappily able to confirm.

将电池与电脑分开来存放的原因很简单：电脑会发热。如果电池温度升得太高，它就会自动放电，长此以往，电池的待机时间就会下降。Cadex所作的试验显示，这种情况下笔记本电脑的电池使用寿命只有12至18个月，不幸的是我的亲身经历正好印证了这一说法。

So the battery is best kept somewhere else, preferably at room temperature. Some people recommend keeping it in the fridge (though not in the freezer), but I don't think you need to go that far -- just don't store it in your car in hot weather.

所以电池最好单独存放，在室温状态下存放尤佳。有人建议将电池存放在冰箱里（虽然不是放进冰箱冷冻室），但我认为没必要如此极端，只要别大热天把电池放在汽车里就行。

When it comes to using your laptop, there are ways to conserve¹⁶ the battery:

如果你要靠电池给笔记本电脑供电，这里也有几个保存电量的方法：

-- Your laptop shouldn't be working if you aren't. Windows computers have 'suspend' (or 'standby') and 'hibernate¹⁷' modes. Suspend, says Howard Locker¹⁸, director of new technologies at Lenovo, 'can extend the life of a fully charged battery to 50-plus hours.' Suspend turns the display and hard drive off, and all open files and programs are saved into memory. This allows a quick return to what you were doing, and is good for moving between offices or rooms. Hibernating¹⁹ freezes the computer, turns it off and then, when you switch it back on, returns to where you were; in this mode, a battery will last about six months before fully discharging, Mr. Locker says.

-- 你不应该在自己用完电脑后还让其出于工作状态。使用Windows操作系统的电脑有“待机”和“休眠”模式。联想集团新技术业务的负责人霍华德•洛克 (Howard Locker)说，电脑处于待机模式下电池的待机时间可达50个小时以上。电脑处于待机状态时其显示器和硬盘是关闭的，电脑中所有打开的文件和程序都被存储在内存中。这样一旦开机电脑就能迅速恢复原有工作状态，如果你从一个房间转到另一个房间去工作，在转移过程中最好使电脑处于待机模式。休眠模式会使电脑处于被冻结状态，当你重新打开电脑时，它会恢复到你关机前的工作状态；洛克说，电池在电脑休眠状态下的待机时间可以达到6个月左右。

-- Switch off those parts of the computer you don't need. WiFi, Bluetooth, the DVD drive, the hard drive -- all use power and are best disabled when you don't need them. Some recent laptops make this easy (Lenovo's new ThinkPads, for example, have built-in software that allows you to do so), but you can also do it yourself if you dig around your laptop's Control Panel; the Windows XP operating system, for example, has power options that let you turn off the monitor and hard disk after they haven't been used for a while and you don't need them.

-- 关掉电脑中你不用的功能。使用无线保真功能(WiFi)、蓝牙功能(Bluetooth)、DVD驱动器和硬盘都需要电，当你不用这些这些功能和装置时最好将其关闭。一些新面市的电脑可以使你轻松做到这一点。（以联想集团的新款ThinkPads电脑为例，它们便内置了帮助你完成这一任务的软件。）其实打开电脑的控制面板你也可以自己完成这步工作。以Windows XP操作系统为例，它就有电源选项，点击这一选项你就可以在暂时不用显示器和硬盘时将其关闭。

-- Reduce the screen brightness as much as you can. LCD screens are a power hog²⁰.

--尽可能降低电脑屏幕的亮度。液晶显示屏很耗电。

-- Don't squander²¹ resources on levity²². Don't use your laptop's battery power for graphics²³, music or watching DVDs.

--不要把电池里的电浪费到无关紧要的事情上。别在只能靠电池供电的情况下在电脑上画图、听音乐和看DVD。

Of course, it also makes sense to carry a power adaptor with you when you're on the move. You'd be surprised where you can plug it in, especially if it's a travel model that can also be connected to cars' built-in cigarette lighters²⁴ and the like. I was on a bus between Singapore and Kuala Lumpur the other day that had power outlets²⁵ all over the place.

当然，出门时随身携带一个电源适配器也是有用的。如果能在旅途中意外发现它的用武之地那感觉就更妙了，有些适配器能与车上内置的点烟器等装置相连接。有一次我在从新加坡到吉隆坡的大巴上发现，车上到处都是电源插座。

If your battery life still isn't enough and you don't mind carrying the extra weight, bite the bullet and buy a spare. The fact that buying a new laptop battery isn't easy or cheap -- and that most people don't buy a laptop thinking they're going to have replace the battery after a year or two -- is to me evidence that batteries are the laptop industry's dirty little secret that they don't want us to think about too much. (Just make sure you only buy them when you need them, and look carefully at the manufacturing date when you do. Don't buy old stock, and don't buy cheap brands.)

如果你电池的待机时间不够长，而你又不介意多增加点分量的话，那就咬咬牙再买一个备用的电池。笔记本电脑的电池价格可不便宜，而大多数人在买笔记本电脑时也没想到自己1到2年后就得更换电池。我从自己的亲身经历体会到，电池是笔记本电脑业不愿意暴露给人的一个软肋（千万只在需要时才买电池，购买时要看清生产日期，别买便宜货。）

Follow all this advice and you won't necessarily be untethered, but you might at least be able to grab a coffee without crawling around on all fours.

遵循以上建议虽然未必能使你翱翔在移动办公的自由王国里，但至少能让你安心喝上一杯咖啡，不必急着爬到桌子底下去接电源。