If your laptop is running Linux you might not be happy with the battery life you are getting. There are numerous reasons for the possible extra drain on your battery.

Four years ago I purchased my first Eee PC, an Eee PC 1000HD. This model Eee PC had a battery life rating of just 3 hours in Windows XP and it would only last 1 hour on battery using my distribution of choice at the time, Ubuntu.

Last week when traveling to Europe for FOSDEM and other business meetings, I had picked up a new 9-cell battery for a Lenovo ThinkPad T60. While an additional three battery cells will noticeably extend your battery life, you can also extend your battery life by taking a few simple steps to optimize your Linux desktop that will also reduce your power consumption and heat output.

For frequent travelers who just can’t live without having a computer with them, the netbook has become an essential device as it is extremely portable. However, its portability has sacrificed a few important features. --One of which is battery life.Netbooks are usually sold with 3-Cell Li-Ion battery that when fully charged can last up to 3 hours on normal usage.

ZaReason is shipping a Linux-ready, 10-inch netbook that uses the Intel Atom N450 processor and is claimed to offer eight hours of battery life.

The Ramlog project lets you keep your system logs in RAM while your machine is running and copies them to disk when you shut down. If you are running a laptop or mobile device with syslog enabled, Ramlog might help you increase your battery life or the life of the flash drive on your mobile device.

One of the most touted advantage of Windows 7 over Windows XP and Linux is improved battery life. This may be trues for newer netbooks that would be optimized for Microsoft new operating system, but don't expect any gain from installing Microsoft's latest release on you current netbook! Many people have actually reported reduced battery life on their netbooks after an upgrade to Windows 7.

Battery Status is a project for GNOME, that shows information about laptop battery state. It comes with a lot of additional features, so usual icon of GNOME Power Manager can be removed from Notification/Indicator Area.

CherryPal announced an Atom-based "Bing" netbook that runs Linux or Windows XP, and offers a claimed five hours of battery life. The company also announced an upgraded version of its Linux-based nettop, the CherryPal C114, and launched a "Green Maraschino" open-source Linux distribution supporting the Bing.