Will Laptop Battery Life Die with Blu-ray?
It seems like only a few years ago the biggest improvement to a laptop’s entertainment value was the inclusion of DVD drives. With the advent of Blu-ray, it looks like DVD drives may be turning obsolete.
Now that the showdown between Sony’s Blu-ray and Toshiba’s HD DVD is over, laptop companies such as Dell are producing laptops equipped with Blu-ray devices. In recent news, Dell has even announced that it plans on distributing laptops with Blu-ray for under $1000.
However, even with Blue-ray becoming more affordable consumers may be skeptical about purchasing it. One of the biggest complaints that laptop users have is that their laptop battery doesn’t last long enough. For those users who, for the most part, keep their laptop stationary on a desk, plugging their laptop into an outlet for the duration of a movie is not an issue. For other users who travel and want to watch a movie while on a plane, train, or bus, saving power is extremely important.
The current issue with Blu-ray, as reported on sites like Wired.com is that the laser used in these devices as well as the amount of CPU it takes to decode data from a disc is extensive. Without a high powered laptop battery and high rated processor, consumers should expect to be close to a power outlet before playing a Blu-ray disc.
At their optimal performance value, the average laptop user can expect their laptop battery to last only a few hours. Current batteries could last as long as 4 hours if minimizing programs that require a lot of juice. Analysts have suggested that you can expect a Blu-ray device to suck up as much as half of your laptop battery life.
Currently, there are only a few laptops on the market that have the battery capacity as well as top processors to play Blu-ray discs for long periods of time. These laptops are expensive and only on higher end laptops. If Dell can truly come out with longer lasting laptop batteries and cheaper high-end processors to support Blu-ray, then it will revolutionize the Blu-ray market.
Until a change in Blu-ray or a change in the capabilities of a laptop happens expect Blu-ray to be more popular in other devices such as stand alone Blu-ray players or Blu-ray drives on desktops where portability is not an issue.
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