Battery Size

Battery Size
Better battery life is always something nice to have, but spending the extra $50-$100 on an extended life battery is not something that most people want to spend, except the road warriors of course. Now there are some machines that come with both, such as the Sony X series, so that you can exchange them out depending on if you want something more compact or longer battery life. The extended battery is substantially bigger, probably 3-4 times the size of the standard battery. While having a small battery thats flush against the laptop is nice for looks and sliding into a bag, there are some positives to having a battery stick out the bottom, besides extended battery life.
In terms of size, there are three types of batteries: flush ones(the norm, you can’t see it from the outside), sticking out the bottom, and sticking out the back. I typically prefer the flush ones because I enjoy a uniform, and I don’t see any chance of Apple introducing a Mac with anything external. Lenovo has a few machines such as the T410 that has an extended 9 cell battery that sticks out the back. Battery life is great, don’t get me wrong, but having that black battery sticking out the back is annoying when it comes to finding a bag that fits cozily. The positives of having this type of extended battery is that the laptop rests flat on any surface.

Having an external battery that sticks out the bottom actually has some nice advantages to both the external back battery and the flush battery. The first positive I noticed immediately after using both the Sony W netbook and the Toshiba M645 is that the battery puts the keyboard on a nice slant that makes typing a little easier than if the keyboard is flat. Not only that, but having the bottom part of the laptop raised and exposed is better for circulating air around the laptop it will get less hot, and the onboard fans won’t have to work as hard keeping the laptop noise lower.

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