laptop battery

[Fergie]

Hi all.
hey, i got me a second hand laptop (12mnths old) a few months ago, the battery that came with it used to hold its charge for 2-3hrs as i should. On a full charge i could pull out the power cable and it woul dbe at 98% etc.
BUt over the last 2 weeks, it has dropped to 6%.
So it would charge over night, i would take it away from the power, and it would be 60%, then a few days later (after a full charge) it would only be 40%, until today where its only at 7%.

Now i no batteries die over time, but isnt this a gradual process - this has went from 98% to 6% is about 2-3 weeks.

I charge it over night, and whenever its at my desk (about 2/3 of usage) its charging.

One then i will mention though, is i use the hibernate function alot - sometimes only resetting the laptop once a week. So could it be this? I have started to use 'shut down' every day since the battery has been failing, but it hasn't made a difference.

Is there something i can do to fix it (software error maybe?) or is it screwed?
CCheers

[godfather]

If the cells "age" normally, it would be gradual.
If one cell fails totally (short-circuits) then it would be a sudden event.

You note that it shows 6%, but does it run out of power very quickly as well when running on battery?

If it does, it sounds like a cell failure (=new battery), if it still runs for 2-3 hours, its just the "calibration" and running it flat and recharging would fix it.

It's just that you don't say how long it now runs on the battery. If a short time, its a new battery needed in my view.