Dell Inspiron 5110 I7 Battery Life

http://www.dell.com/ae/p/inspiron-15r-n5110/pd
That would be my Laptop. Currently using Windows 7 Ultimate and I care more about performance then visualization. I am using Windows Classic theme and all the Aero and visualizations things are turned off. I need battery life, most of the time I am on “Power Saver” mode. My question is, if I use Windows XP, will I have more batter time or it doesn’t really matter? Does Windows 7 use the batter smarter maybe? Thank you
Edit: Maybe even some other OS, I don’t really care. All I do is surf the net and watch TV Shows/Movies. Like, UBuntu maybe?
Answer #1
Well, Each case is different so I can’t say for sure whether you’ll get longer battery life with XP.
But generally speaking, Different OS’s can make a difference with the battery life (You might be able to get an extra 20-40 mins out of it!) but it’s not that much of a difference if you ask me. The best way to increase the battery life is not to change the OS, But to change the battery itself with a longer-lasting one! The higher the mAh the better!
Answer #2
Well, I’d have said the more you try to do the quicker your battery will drain. Turning all the visualisations off, dimming the screen, and not having anything plugged in the USB ports will all help, but I don’t think using a new OS will make a significant difference. You could try if you want to and have nothing to loose though.
As Roberto says, the easiest way to increase your battery life is to get a higher capacity one. Not quite as cheap, but very effective, you could also invest in a solid state drive… They have multiple benefits including increased battery life and decreased boot time!