10.12.2 fixed battery life on my 13" MBPr TB

[Satti]

I definitely noticed a difference, I unfortunately didn't capture much information before the update, but I did check the watts being used and with no apps open I was sitting at ~20-25. After updating I've currently got safari, mail, and messages open and I'm at 8.9 watts.

But, did you capture the backup time

 

[edenorchestra]

Apple told us repeatedly and emphatically that it had taken no specific steps to improve MacBook Pro battery life in this update. According to Apple’s data, the company said the batteries appeared to be performing as intended.
http://arstechnica.com/apple/2016/12/explaining-the-battery-life-problems-with-the-new-macbook-pros/

So I really think indexing could have been a big culprit. And in all honesty a bit of placebo effect. I want to see this all be good as I am ordering a fully loaded 2.9/460/2TB as soon as I get the guts to push the "purchase button" And just to show you how much of a fanboy I am. I have a MacPro, 2012MBP, and a 2014 MBP . . which I will be selling the MBP's on eBay.

 

[CBlakeston]

Just wanted to add 10.12.2 has fixed my battery issues completely. But not at first. I was getting 4hrs surfing in safari and watching movies in iTunes. Battery Health 2 said I was discharging at 20w.

I booted into recovery mode and reinstalled Sierra having read this would replace all the system files, leaving my apps and data intact. It did exactly that and now with the same usage I discharge at 5.5w and get 11-12 hours real world usage.

 

[Leaf.]

Just wanted to add 10.12.2 has fixed my battery issues completely. But not at first. I was getting 4hrs surfing in safari and watching movies in iTunes. Battery Health 2 said I was discharging at 20w.

I booted into recovery mode and reinstalled Sierra having read this would replace all the system files, leaving my apps and data intact. It did exactly that and now with the same usage I discharge at 5.5w and get 11-12 hours real world usage.

Wth mines discharging at 9-10 watts giving me like 5 hours (just with youtube vids running) and brightness less than 50%

 

[CBlakeston]

Wth mines discharging at 9-10 watts giving me like 5 hours (just with youtube vids running) and brightness less than 50%

Try what I did originally. Install Sierra 10.12.2 on USB stick or external drive and boot from there. Try watching YouTube videos and see if your battery discharge is smaller. If so, my fix may work for you also? (Mines the 15" by the way)

 

[Apple_Robert]

Apple told us repeatedly and emphatically that it had taken no specific steps to improve MacBook Pro battery life in this update. According to Apple’s data, the company said the batteries appeared to be performing as intended.
http://arstechnica.com/apple/2016/12/explaining-the-battery-life-problems-with-the-new-macbook-pros/

So I really think indexing could have been a big culprit. And in all honesty a bit of placebo effect. I want to see this all be good as I am ordering a fully loaded 2.9/460/2TB as soon as I get the guts to push the "purchase button" And just to show you how much of a fanboy I am. I have a MacPro, 2012MBP, and a 2014 MBP . . which I will be selling the MBP's on eBay.

Mac computers aren't going to index for days and weeks, especially with the new SSD in the late 2016 models.

Just because Apple didn't specifically address battery problems, that doesn't necessarily mean, that the new update did not (indirectly) fix some problems some people were having with the battery.

 

[Mercman1]

Working today with iTunes streaming, some excel spreadsheet building, and lots of web browsing. OneDrive sync is on as is Time Machine backups. Now at 86% remaining...and will get more than 10 hours quite easily. Running 10.12.2

 

[edenorchestra]

Mac computers aren't going to index for days and weeks, especially with thew new SSD in the late 2016 models.

Yea actually that's a real good point. These things are supposed to have screaming SSD data throughput.

Just because Apple didn't specifically address battery problems, that doesn't necessarily mean, that the new update did not (indirectly) fix some problems some people were having with the battery.

Admittedly I concur with that possibility too.

 

[sziehr]

I think for the 15 there was a glitch where messages would get stuck using the Dgpu. I think that glitch is no more. If you did not notice it and were using messages you could be watching your battery just drain insanely.

So I would suspect some of the glitches are gone and thus people are seeing better battery as a knock on effect.

they also can not admit a single bit that they addressed battery issues cause then they have to admit there was an issue to start with.

Apple HQ has a strong history of not owning there mistakes. They just update the product with new guts quietly / or a new model year comes quicker than normal. I cite 2012 to 2013 MacBook pro's this was a fast back to back change to fix graphics issues of the 4000 series being under powered.

 

[Satti]

Try what I did originally. Install Sierra 10.12.2 on USB stick or external drive and boot from there. Try watching YouTube videos and see if your battery discharge is smaller. If so, my fix may work for you also? (Mines the 15" by the way)

Yours is 13 with TB ?.. Did you try installing Sierra 10.12.2 again as suggested ? What happened after

 

[happyhippo1337]

I think for the 15 there was a glitch where messages would get stuck using the Dgpu. I think that glitch is no more. If you did not notice it and were using messages you could be watching your battery just drain insanely.

So I would suspect some of the glitches are gone and thus people are seeing better battery as a knock on effect.

This exakt issue is still present. Ran into it 2x today

 

[lobo1978]

Reporting after some days. Battery is improving even further... 11:29 - how sick is this !?

 

[NotVeryFriendly]

I think for the 15 there was a glitch where messages would get stuck using the Dgpu. I think that glitch is no more. If you did not notice it and were using messages you could be watching your battery just drain insanely.

So I would suspect some of the glitches are gone and thus people are seeing better battery as a knock on effect.

they also can not admit a single bit that they addressed battery issues cause then they have to admit there was an issue to start with.

Apple HQ has a strong history of not owning there mistakes. They just update the product with new guts quietly / or a new model year comes quicker than normal. I cite 2012 to 2013 MacBook pro's this was a fast back to back change to fix graphics issues of the 4000 series being under powered.

If there were to be any adjustments to the battery life they wouldn't frame it as 'fixing an issue with the battery life', they would advertise it as increasing the efficiency of the battery consumption or improving the battery life of the new MacBooks; they can address the battery without ever stating there is an issue (something which I am as of yet unconvinced). Why would they pass up the opportunity to advertise improved energy efficiency of some apps?

To provide a further comparison on before and after this update, here is my battery status as of now, with both Coconut Battery and the Activity Monitor (in my previous post, I only have the snippet of the time remaining segment), but it remains completely unchanged in both. I think I agree with thesaint024 here that all which is going on is the combination of software people are running, and people making reports based on estimated time remaining and not the actual time on battery statistic.

Before I was running with the same screen brightness as I currently am, but with a slightly different use of apps (had VLC and Quicktime running for a few hours which I haven't had today, but I've been playing a game on Steam today which I wasn't before).

 

[Westbrook0]

My biggest issue is Safari's average energy impact (not sure what the units are here) is 16.15, much more than my other processes. It would explain the significant drop in battery life, even when I just use it to browse.

 

[JohnnyGo]

Reporting back after 4 full cycles (100% to 0%). Battery continues to improve as @lobo1978 reported.

Right now past the 1h30 min mark with 90% battery remaining. Battery estimates by activity monitor points to a further 9h20min left (but we know these estimates are not reliable). Most importantly, battery health indicates I am using 300-450 mAh with Safari/Mail/Batter Health/Activity Monitor running. Brightness at 70%.

Hopefully I will be able to report that I past the 10 hour mark tomorrow. I will also measure sleep usage.

 

[Westbrook0]

Reporting back after 4 full cycles (100% to 0%). Battery continues to improve as @lobo1978 reported.

Right now past the 1h30 min mark with 90% battery remaining. Battery estimates by activity monitor points to a further 9h20min left (but we know these estimates are not reliable). Most importantly, battery health indicates I am using 300-450 mAh with Safari/Mail/Batter Health/Activity Monitor running. Brightness at 70%.

Hopefully I will be able to report that I past the 10 hour mark tomorrow. I will also measure sleep usage.

Hey! Did you do anything in particular to see such an improvement? I'm getting 6:30 to 7:30 even after the update. Any suggestions? Today, I'm at 78% after 1:20 of use, with another 5:30 or so remaining, with just Mail/Safari/Calendar open.

 

[sziehr]

I am not getting that level of battery life. I think I might get a solid 5 to 6 hours of battery. Then again my old laptop could only manage 3 hours. So I see this as a positive gain just not earth shattering.
[doublepost=1482177319][/doublepost]

Reporting after some days. Battery is improving even further... 11:29 - how sick is this !?
View attachment 678667

what is the application you are using to monitor your battery

 

[strangeguy]

what is the application you are using to monitor your battery

It's Battery Health 2 https://fiplab.com/apps/battery-health-for-mac

I am not getting that level of battery life. I think I might get a solid 5 to 6 hours of battery.

Did you actually measure your runtime or is it just a feeling? What were you doing with your mac while seeing this kind of battery life? As you know the battery life depends on many factors. If you only got six hours while browsing (with Safari, not Chrome) and using a word processor on somewhere around 75% brightness I would say your battery life is low. If you were processing photos in photoshop while watching a 5k video on an external screen and had the internal screen on 100% I would say your battery life is great

 

[dasagent]

I am experiencing very inadequate battery life when simply using the laptop to browse the web, listen to Spotify, and a bit of word processing. I am worried because very soon I will start using more intensive applications like Xcode and FCP and it may not last enough.

Here is an image of the battery life right now. Safari's energy consumption is 30+ on average, which I feel like may be causing some issues.

In the image, it is 11 watts of usage, but it tends to be leaning towards 15 on average. I am running the 10.12.2 update, so I am unsure how to resolve this issue.

 

[strangeguy]

I am experiencing very inadequate battery life when simply using the laptop to browse the web, listen to Spotify, and a bit of word processing.]

Do you have anything attached to your mac that could explain your diminished battery life (external monitor, external harddrive...)? Do you have your screen brightness over 75% (~12 clicks)? Did you only set up the mac recently and might it still be indexing or optimizing things?
If none of the above are true for you I would try to look for other explanations - but I think these are the most common causes of increased battery drain.

 

[JohnnyGo]

Hey! Did you do anything in particular to see such an improvement? I'm getting 6:30 to 7:30 even after the update. Any suggestions? Today, I'm at 78% after 1:20 of use, with another 5:30 or so remaining, with just Mail/Safari/Calendar open.

Auto-brightness OFF. Keyboard lighting OFF. Dropbox ON. Siri ON. Text/Typing suggestions ON.

I have done a clean re-install after purchasing it. And installed the latest Sierra (which would be a 2nd reinstall). I think I also used Terminal and a one line instruction to clear cache (in this thread). Also did a PRAM reset. That was it.
[doublepost=1482198344][/doublepost]

Do you have anything attached to your mac that could explain your diminished battery life (external monitor, external harddrive...)? Do you have your screen brightness over 75% (~12 clicks)? Did you only set up the mac recently and might it still be indexing or optimizing things?
If none of the above are true for you I would try to look for other explanations - but I think these are the most common causes of increased battery drain.

I agree. Having something connected to the USB is one of the battery drains. Even if it is a powered monitor.
[doublepost=1482198549][/doublepost]I am still seeing above normal/expected sleep power drain. After 6h, 3% drain is a lot.

My usage is pointing to a 9-10h of light use (Mail/Safari/Preview). I will test tomorrow the performance using Excel and Word.

It is an incredible performance given the size/brightness of the screen and all the power in this machine. An 11" MBA has a 5200mAh battery, i.e. 20% greater than this tbMBP. And I never got more than 5-6h out of it.

 

[Westbrook0]

Auto-brightness OFF. Keyboard lighting OFF. Dropbox ON. Siri ON. Text/Typing suggestions ON.

I have done a clean re-install after purchasing it. And installed the latest Sierra (which would be a 2nd reinstall). I think I also used Terminal and a one line instruction to clear cache (in this thread). Also did a PRAM reset. That was it.
[doublepost=1482198344][/doublepost]
I agree. Having something connected to the USB is one of the battery drains. Even if it is a powered monitor.
[doublepost=1482198549][/doublepost]I am still seeing above normal/expected sleep power drain. After 6h, 3% drain is a lot.

My usage is pointing to a 9-10h of light use (Mail/Safari/Preview). I will test tomorrow the performance using Excel and Word.

It is an incredible performance given the size/brightness of the screen and all the power in this machine. An 11" MBA has a 5200mAh battery, i.e. 20% greater than this tbMBP. And I never got more than 5-6h out of it.

So if I were to do a re-install, it would first be a Sierra install and then 10.12.2? And how would this be done? Through a USB?

 

[JohnnyGo]

So if I were to do a re-install, it would first be a Sierra install and then 10.12.2? And how would this be done? Through a USB?

Have you upgraded already to 10.12.2 ? Did you use migration assistant ?

 

[Westbrook0]

Have you upgraded already to 10.12.2 ? Did you use migration assistant ?

I installed the 10.12.2 update last week. And I didn't use migration assistant, since this is my first Mac and all my stuff is on the cloud anyway.

 

[JohnnyGo]

I installed the 10.12.2 update last week. And I didn't use migration assistant, since this is my first Mac and all my stuff is on the cloud anyway.

So no ned to reinstall. Have you done the SMC / PRAM resets ?