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Laptops with long battery life 2012

As we review laptops throughout 2012, we'll add their battery life stats here. If battery's the most important thing to you, this is the place to look.

Craig Simms Special to CNET News
Craig was sucked into the endless vortex of tech at an early age, only to be spat back out babbling things like "phase-locked-loop crystal oscillators!". Mostly this receives a pat on the head from the listener, followed closely by a question about what laptop they should buy.
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Craig Simms
5 min read

As we review laptops throughout 2012, we'll add their battery life stats here. If battery's the most important thing to you, this is the place to look.

Current king of the hill, Dell's XPS 14. (Credit: HP)

We run two separate battery tests when we test laptops at CNET Australia — a heavy test, which turns up screen brightness and volume to full and plays back a 720p H.264 video; and a light test, which sets screen brightness to 40 per cent and visits three different websites every 20 seconds until battery exhaustion.

We've separated the below into screen sizes, so you can identify first what size laptop you want, then find how it rates in our tests.

< 13-inch

Battery life (time)

  • Heavy battery test
  • Light battery test

(Longer bars indicate better performance)

13- to 14.4-inch

Battery life (time)

  • Heavy battery test
  • Light battery test

(Longer bars indicate better performance)

15- to 19-inch

Battery life (time)

  • Heavy battery test
  • Light battery test

(Longer bars indicate better performance)

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