does the MBA really not need a battery calibration like the Apple site says?

My battery on my MBA 11 is reporting 93% after 87 cycles, not too bad, i think they will go lower and higher over time, don't worry about it, can always get the battery replaced under warranty if it continues to dive.

Calibrate your battery at least once a month, that should be enough.
The battery's reported health does change continuously, don't worry about it.

Bottomsup said:

what's the warrenty policy on battery replacement? does it need to meet some lower limit to require or can you just walk in and say. "not good enough..please replace"

thanks

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I think its around 80% or less, i can't remember to be honest.

LostSoul80 said:

Calibrate your battery at least once a month, that should be enough.
The battery's reported health does change continuously, don't worry about it.

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I don't think any calbration is necessary - certainly not once a month.

Had my MBA for well over a year, never calibrated the battery and it reports 100%.

Battery calibration is nonsense and the effect it gives the owner is placebo, nothing more.

Bottomsup said:

this raises the question....why is yours at 100 and mine in the 80s? how many cycles do you have?

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No idea, perhaps the battery is faulty? Mine reads the following...

Health Information:
Cycle Count: 173
Condition: Normal

Bottomsup said:

ok that makes sense. mine is normal too, however i'm checking health via iStat. You are using only 'system info'. Install iStat into the dashboard and let me know what you get.

thx

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Ahh...now you see I thought you were talking about battery charge, as that is why a lot of people calibrate their battery when it will no longer report 100% from a full charge.

Anyway, interesting comparison, downloaded it, it's quite a nice little app, I might actually pay for the full version.

In the battery drop down menu it's showing me
Cycles: 173
Health: 94%

Does that help?

You are using a 3rd party app to interpret battery health? Is it accurate?

BTW - I like iStat as well.

GGJ Studios Were are you...

Bottomsup said:

this raises the question....why is yours at 100 and mine in the 80s? how many cycles do you have?

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Battery calibration does not affect how much charge the battery holds. It affects whether the Mac knows correctly what the charge is. So if you go for a long time without calibration, the number displayed is not the truth anymore. After calibration, the display should be correct again.

I don't really think the calibration matters anymore.

I bought this Air on July 21st 2011. I'm on the battery almost everyday and this is what mine looks like.



It goes down to 92% then climbs back up to 96%.

It's not uncommon for me to run it down to almost nothing nearly everyday. I make the battery work.

Bottomsup said:

only reason i ask is that i use my MBA every day...all day...love it, however my battery is reporting 88% health :-(

cycles == 94

I bought it the day the 2011 model came out.

Is it worth running from full charge down to absolute zero until it dies despite what this site says?

Thx

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1490

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Weird, I have iStat installed and I have 201 cycles with 91% Health. I think I have only calibrated it once since I got the laptop when it first came out. I would have to agree with the general consensus here that it's not that big of a deal to calibrate it unless you are having problems with the time/percentage being reported incorrectly. It definitely won't improve the battery's overall health.

From what I have read and info gained from GGJ, I run my battery down to 50% every three days or so ( however, I am not strict on this, I am in and out of Uni all the time so it varies), and completely discharge the battery on the first day of every month.

LostSoul80 said:

Calibrate your battery at least once a month, that should be enough.

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The built-in batteries in the newer Mac unibody notebooks come pre-calibrated and do not require regular calibration like the removable batteries.

Bottomsup said:

Is it worth running from full charge down to absolute zero until it dies despite what this site says?

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No, it's not.

Bottomsup said:

what's the warrenty policy on battery replacement?

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Bottomsup said:

this raises the question....why is yours at 100 and mine in the 80s? how many cycles do you have?

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This should answer most, if not all, of your battery questions:

boy-better-know said:

From what I have read and info gained from GGJ, I run my battery down to 50% every three days or so ( however, I am not strict on this, I am in and out of Uni all the time so it varies), and completely discharge the battery on the first day of every month.

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You never have to completely discharge the battery. You only need to put cycles on it.

Finally - we've been waiting for you...

TheRealDamager said:

Finally - we've been waiting for you...

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LOL! With the Battery FAQ appearing in over 1,000 threads on this forum, you'd think there would be less misinformation and confusion about batteries being posted by now. I'm surprised that more people aren't posting the link to it as their first response.