You can remove the battery, you know, and just use on AC power. Turn the computer off, unplug from the wall outlet, and take the battery out. Then you can just plug back into the outlet and turn it back on and use it that way. As to the computer being slow to boot, etc., this should have no relationship to the power source.

I agree take the battery out and only use the wall outlet. Your battery is probably pretty much shot. I'd purchase another battery so you have one if you need it.

"battery power is low, change to wall outlet to avoid losing what you are working on"

As far as I know you should only get that message / warning if your in fact running on battery power only. The computer senses the low battery and tells you to switch to wall out let, I wonder if you are running on battery power and don't realize it sometimes..

Sometimes the computer will turn off completely by itself when I leave it for some time

On that issue I would check your power options located in the control panel and see what there set for they may well be set to shut down or go to sleep or hibernate after a certain amount of time.

A slow boot up is indicative of to many start up programs starting up with windows.

Slow loading web pages could be a verity of items including internet connection, temp files etc. Running a tool called Ccleaner doing a Defrag maybe beneficial. If your connected wireless try a direct connection and see if that helps faster web page loading.

You didn't necessarily destroy your battery by keeping it plugged in. It used to be the case that a monthly discharge-charge cycle was recommended. However, lithium ion batteries have become more common in laptops in recent years, and these don't benefit from doing discharge-charge cycles. Batteries don't last indefinitely, and often start declining in about 18-24 months.

I had to learn about what to do with these type batteries when I got my netbook, the old way was to fully discharge then let it charge back up, that is not correct for these laptop batteries from all my reading the recommended process is to use the battery till it is at about 40% then remove it from the laptop, in fact some say to put it in a ziplock baggie well sealed and keep it in the freezer, that makes them last even longer. But at any rate drain it to around 40% remove it and then use the laptop plugged into wall outlet.
Your battery is pretty much done I suspect.
I had very good luck finding a very good battery exactly like my netbook battery on ebay, however there are some really junk ones out there too. I got a 10 hr one which is much bigger but last great. I am also guilty of forgetting to take my battery off when it is plugged in and I am not traveling with it. I need to get in the habit of removing it or I will be in the same situation.

Do the batteries decline even if they are not used? I'd guess this battery has in total for the 4.5 yrs I have it maybe 40 hours. Is that alot? For the rest of the time it has been plugged into the all. Any idea how much a battery would cost? Is there a way to recharge this type of battery? I got a recall notice from HP awhile back but after checking the number on the battery, I was told my battery was not included in the recall. I'm just wondering if there is something wrong with my battery anyway. Is it worth storing outside the computer?

Thanks for the info.

Zep 516 where do I find the tool Ccleaner to do a defrag. (sounds complicated to me).

It doesn't matter how much you have or have not used a battery. They just don't last forever, and 4 years is probably beyond normal life expectancy. When you have the computer plugged into AC, that is recharging the battery.

Defrag is listed in XP under All Programs>Accessories>System Tools. You might find it helpful to also run the disk cleanup tool, also listed under System Tools. If you have never done this in four years, it's not surprising that your computer is running slow. As Zep has mentioned, slow bootup may indicate too many things starting at bootup. Not every program you have needs to run when you boot up, but many of them want to do this. I think your computer is just in need of some good, routine maintenance.

from all my reading the recommended process is to use the battery till it is at about 40% then remove it from the laptop,

What is the object of that?
I always thought it best to take a fully charged battery out as it loses charge in time and has to be recharged to keep from going dead.

I am not the expert but in my research that was the advice given on the issue, that 40% was repeated over and over it seems to be the magic number. And again that is for the specific Laptop batteries not necessarily any battery.
this is a quote from a battery site

"If possible, store the battery in a cool place at about a 40% state-of-charge. Some reserve charge is needed to keep the battery and its protection circuit operational during prolonged storage. Avoid keeping the battery at full charge and high temperature. This is the case when placing a cell phone or spare battery in a hot car. Running a laptop computer on the mains has a similar temperature problem. While the battery is kept fully charged, the inside temperature during operation rises to 45C (113F).

Removing the battery from the laptop when running on fixed power protects the battery from heat. With the concern of the battery overheating and causing fire, a spokesperson for the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission advises to eject the battery of affected laptops and to run the machines on a power cord. It should be noted that on a power outage, unsaved works will be lost. The question is often asked, should the laptop be disconnected from the main when not in use? Under normal circumstances, it should not matter with lithium-ion. Once the battery is fully charged, no further charge is applied. However, there is always the concern is malfunction of the AC adapter, the laptop or the battery."
How to prolong lithium-based batteries

ravencajun-
I'm not an expert on batteries either, but I think that, unless you have a laptop with a known overheating problem, you just leave the battery in and do what you want. I'm simply not convinced -- especially with lithium ion batteries -- that fooling around with draining the battery down to a certain level and then pulling it is either a very practical procedure or lengthens battery life appreciably.

I have read all over. 40% is mentioned for storage, so is 40-60%, as is 80& or less. The reason for not keeping charged to max is inside the car or storage in high ambient temps and suddenly power them up.. battery is overheated to begin with probably then suddenly heats more.

Toshiba says.. leave it in place unless not using the laptop for an extended period. My laptop was 3yrs old couple weeks before xmas. Almost always on ac adapter.. I just unplugged it for the first time in way long time... says 99%, 2hr 43min remaining. Which seems longer than it should .. maybe see how much real life is left in a while.

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Have 4 PCV's 2 dt/2Lt's all are into wall outlets, have NP's battery charge light comes on as needed, get no messeges however? maybe it was out from Pc or not tightly fitted and so was on battery and you did not realize this??

I just check remaining battery life and it says I have 100%.and the current power source is AC. That is surprising and I can almost bet that if I ran the computer on battery power I'd only get about an hour to and hour and a half out of it. How long would you think a battery at full charge should last.

Kathie

That depends on the capacity of the battery itself. There are different batteries and some will give much longer life than others. Usually the ones that last longer are larger, though not always, but you can bet they are more expensive! If you take the battery out and look at it you will see a rating for amp hours; I forget the actual lettering used. The higher the rating, the longer the battery will last. Also, it depends on the type of use you are putting the battery to. If you're just surfing simple sites without lots of graphics, or reading e-mail, the battery will last longer than if you are doing intensive tasks that put a drain on it.

My battery life was slightly more than 2.5 hrs when new... now after three years of almost always on ac 24/7 it just ran 2hr 5min on battery before the 5 min warning.

Battery has always been in place in the laptop.. charge light is rarely seen to come on. Think it comes on when it drops below 95% charge.