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Question on a just arrive MBA
- Thread starter psli09
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It doesn't matter. Run on battery whenever you need to and plug it in whenever you can. You can plug or unplug any time you need to, regardless of the charged percentage, and you never need to completely drain your battery.
The link below should answer most, if not all, of your battery/charging questions, including tips for maximizing battery performance. If you havent already done so, I highly recommend you take the time to read it. 
Yup. No point in putting extra cycles on your battery if you don't have to.
I can't count the number of people I've seen using their phone or laptops on battery power when they're sitting RIGHT NEXT TO THEIR CHARGERS. I say hey, why don't you plug in your device? And their answer is, oh, no, it's okay, my battery still has some charge. I don't get it...
My cousin never uses it with the charger on, she thinks it's going to kill her battery. She will not even do updates or anything with it plugged in, it drives me crazy! Last week she did an internet recovery over a bad wifi connection. After 4 hours of downloading the battery died and called me to ask why!
I think my MBAir had like 90% battery and I used it a couple of days before I charged it.
I got it with about 90% battery as well. Surprisingly, the MBA came with Mavericks. So, I had to do an upgrade to Yosemite myself. Of course, plus the other native apps. I ended up plugged it in just in case during the upgrade to Yosemite.
Doing the first charge now. I downloaded Battery Health, and it indicates this is the 4th cycle of the battery.
I'm guilty of that too. MBA is always close to my heart when I'm using it. I'm in a recliner now with the MBA on my lap. I love this notebook!
I have it on charger for updates, Time Machine or anything that may not tolerate a power interruption.
I know the way I use it may result in needing to have the battery replace sooner but I enjoy it so much this way. It's worth it to me.
The built-in batteries in the newer Mac unibody notebooks come pre-calibrated and do not require regular calibration like the removable batteries in older Apple notebooks.
Ideally you'd use the charger whenever you can but SusanK makes a good point, if you don't like to have the charger plugged in then it's your laptop and you can do whatever you want.
Important is to know that it isn't bad for the computer to have the charger plugged in as much as possible, and it's better for the battery. As long as you know that then do whatever.