I bought a PSP Go on launch. It has since become indispensable to me as I ride the bus for an hour to and from work every day. Last night, after charging, it wouldn't turn on. I plugged it in and it booted up, but after I left it charging over night, the battery was still dead. It seems the battery has totally died after only a little over two months. I've tried to find information on the PSP Go battery but nobody seems to know anything. I charged it almost every day and rarely (if ever) let it go dead. Am I doing it wrong? Am I just unlucky? Or is this about to be the next hardware-failure wave.
Overall I love the PSP Go, but I can't helped be a bit irked by the fact that a dead battery means a dead PSP. Luckily, I happen to live on the same block as the Sony Playstation Service center in Seoul, so it will just be a matter of walking there, waiting for 20-30 minutes while they repair it, and walking out.
My question is in regards to care for the battery. What is the best protocol for charging? Should I let it almost die first, or is it OK to charge it every day regardless?
For ANY rechargeable Lithium-Ion batteries, the best practice to adopt is to charge them to 100%, use them/drain them to around 40% or 30% charge and then repeat the cycle.
"Deep-Cycling" Li-Ion batteries, that is, fully depleting Li-Ion cells and then charging them back to 100% will shorten their lifetime significantly (as much as 30% in just 6 months).
Also important to note is, high temperatures degrade Li-Ion cells significantly too. So don't leave them in sunlight or near sources of heat.
If you plan on not using a Li-Ion battery for a significant period of time (a few months) but want to maintain it's peak capacity, the best thing to do is charge it to maximum capacity, remove it from any device, and store it someplace cold.
(Some battery enthusiasts recommend keeping them inside your fridge, as temperatures below 10C will retain maximum capacity for much longer).
Obviously, this is a moot point with the PSP Go.
One last thing; remember that in relative terms, Li-Ion batteries have generally poor life cycles, but very high energy density. On average, laptop, mobile phone, portable electronic Li-Ion batteries (3.6-12 Volt) that are at full charge every second day and operate in normal temperature ranges (20-30 Degrees Celsius) will lose around 20%-40% of their capacity per year in average usage situations.
you can't take the battery out of a psp go when not using it for a long period of time, its permanent isn't it? because of all the trouble sony had leaving a service battery in a returned/repaired psp and then someone finding out what exactly you can do with a pandora and telling the world.
