Microsoft Says Battery Woes Not Caused By Windows 7

Battery problems on Windows 7 machines are not caused by the operating system. That’s the position of Stephen Sinofsky, head of the Windows division, in a long posting Monday on the Windows engineering blog.

“At this time,” he wrote, “we have no reason to believe there is any issue related to Windows 7 in this context.” He acknowledged reports in the press and in forums about faulty battery warnings and batteries failing. “In every case we have been able to identify,” Sinofsky added, “the battery being reported on was in fact in need of recommended replacement.”

‘Accurately Detected a Failing Battery’

Sinofsky said that the company has been contacting customers who report issues in forums, monitoring customer-service communications, keeping in touch with PC makers, and utilizing opt-in, anonymous “telemetry in Windows 7″ to keep track of the situation. In all cases investigated, he wrote, “Windows 7 has simply accurately detected a failing battery.”

One factor Sinofsky emphasized is that there is a new battery notification in Windows 7 not available in Vista or Windows XP. The notification, with a battery meter icon and the message “Consider replacing your battery,” appears when the battery is performing at 40 percent of its designated capacity. He noted that some customers upgrading a PC to Windows 7 did not know the battery was degrading until 7 offered this new level of notification.

He pointed out that PC batteries, through the hardware and the BIOS firmware, offer several read-only fields of information about the battery, including manufacturer, serial number, design capacity, and last full charge capacity. Sinofsky added that this information “is read-only and there is no way for Windows 7 or any other OS to write, set or configure battery status information.”

‘The Answer Is RIGHT THERE!’

But user complaints continue to populate the Microsoft support forum, where the issue has…

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