Netbook Software Review: BatteryBar Monitors Your Netbook’s Battery

For us netbook users, managing our machine’s battery life is of utmost importance. While Windows’ XP’s power meter is a good application and comes default if your netbook is running on XP, it however can only tell you about the remaining battery that your netbook currently has. Don’t you just wish it could tell you something more such as historical data of you battery’s performance? Well, you might want to try out Osiris’ Battery Bar.

What is Battery Bar?

Battery Bar is a simple, straight-forward, battery meter that helps you monitor the status of your netbook’s battery. Similar with XP’s power meter it also display your battery’s status in the taskbar.  It constantly monitors the status of your battery as you use your netbook in battery mode.

Unlike XP’s power meter, Battery Bar provides historical data on  your battery and gives you accurate estimate of how much battery life your netbook currently has. Battery Bar is being offered by Osiris Development as a free download. A pro version is also available for a small fee of  $9.95.

Battery Bar Features

Like we said, Battery Bar’s key feature is the historical data of your battery’s performance.  The software uses this historical data to estimate the time remaining on your netbook’s battery life.

When you are using your netbook on battery mode, BatteryBar gives you a percentage bar of the remaining life of your netbook’s battery. You can display this by right clicking on the Windows taskbar and choosing BatteryBar. The percentage bar displays meter in green, yellow or red depending on how much time your battery still has. The remaining battery life is displayed in hours:minutes format.

When you are charging your netbooks, a blue indicator tells you that your netbook’s battery is charging. It also gives you the estimated time before full charge status is achieved. When fully charged, a black light is turned and displays “On A/C” to indicate the charging is full.

Other features of the BatteryBar include  same look and feel as the Vista taskbar buttons, statistical time predication, supports 13 languages, and detailed battery info including max capacity, current capacity, charge rate, discharge rate, and more. BatteryBar also provides you with automatic update features at your netbook’s startup time.

BatteryBar Pro Version

While the free BatteryBar version is already a good power management tool for your netbooks, its pro version offers something more.  BatteryBar’s Pro version features the following:

• Customizable themes to change the look and feel of BatteryBar
• Low battery and critical battery notifications and audio alerts
• Customize 20 settings, including changing the font, low battery warning levels, and more.
• Change the current Windows power scheme by right-clicking on BatteryBar
• New features in future versions that will only be available in the Pro version

How to install BatteryBar on your Netbooks

To install BatteryBar on your netbooks, simply download the file here. And run the setup. BatteryBar requires version 2.0 of the .Net framework. If your netbook doesn’t have that it will automatically ask you to download the said framework. After installation, you simply right click on your netbook’s Taskbar and select BatteryBar. If you don’t get the BatteryBar to appear on the Taskbar, you need to uninstall the software and repeat the process again. It took me several times to run it on my Eee PC 1000HE successfully.

Interested to have BatteryBar on your netbooks? Check out the product information and download site for more details.