10.4.6 and better battery life?

[frenetic]

Hi all,

I was just wondering whether I was the only one who is experiencing better battery life with 10.4.6. My powerbook is two years old and had a battery life of about 2 hours on a full charge. Now with 10.4.6 it estimates 2 hours 45 minutes. I am letting it run down now at the moment but the estimate seems to be exact... If this is true this is a great present from apple!

 

[Vinnie_vw]

That would definitely be very cool, and I'll be checking for it on my iBook, but in my experience software does not have such a drastic effect on hardware, unless it's something that benefits from optimising... and the powerPC-architecture must have been optimised to their limits by now. But again, it would be cool if you're right.

 

[Togglehead]

software might just be better are decyphering the hardware's signals....

 

[frenetic]

Well, my pb went to sleep and it was indeed 2 hours 40 minutes ... I don't understand this where this comes from, especially since nobody else seems to have similar experiences.

 

[rye9]

Hi all,

I was just wondering whether I was the only one who is experiencing better battery life with 10.4.6. My powerbook is two years old and had a battery life of about 2 hours on a full charge. Now with 10.4.6 it estimates 2 hours 45 minutes. I am letting it run down now at the moment but the estimate seems to be exact... If this is true this is a great present from apple!

It's defnitely possible... some updates have increased my battery's capacity buy about 20%.

 

[yankeefan24]

I have also noticed a small gain in battery life and battery charging power. about 2 h 40 mins is what i remember my pb telling me last night. before it was 2h 25.

 

[frenetic]

OK guys and gals, just to reconfirm that indeed my powerbook has extra battery life. Today I let it my battery go down twice and it was more or less 2h40 every time... not bad for a two year old powerbook I say. Still it is bizarre that nobody else is reporting this.

 

[dr_lha]

Hi all,

I was just wondering whether I was the only one who is experiencing better battery life with 10.4.6. My powerbook is two years old and had a battery life of about 2 hours on a full charge. Now with 10.4.6 it estimates 2 hours 45 minutes. I am letting it run down now at the moment but the estimate seems to be exact... If this is true this is a great present from apple!

You know, last night I noticed that my PB got about 4 1/2 hours instead of the usual 4, so maybe you're on to something.

 

[dmw007]

I have not used my iBook G4 very much since I updated to 10.4.6, but better battery life would be great (not that I can complain, I get ~5 hours of usage as it is already).

 

[SC68Cal]

Could be a firmware tweak

EDIT: Or, it could actually be improved device communication. I know for instance the temperature monitors that I had on my G4 system would read under 10.2.8, but as soon as I upgraded to Tiger the OS stopped taking their input. I read a tech article that said that because they were so inaccurate, the OS just started ignoring them (in non-technical jargon) So, they might have refined the battery meter or something.