13' touch bar: 6 hours battery life...

[iasix]

I don't get all these 'it's indexing' comments.

The non-TB MBP is indexing too and this one doesn't die at 6.5 hours.

I ordered the TB MBP and after all the reviews, I considered switching to the non-TB version.
When I saw the TB version today at the Apple Store I knew it for sure: not worth trading all that battery life for.

Got the non-TB version and I hope the TB technology will develop itself within the next 2 years so it'll actually make sense to use it without too many tradeoffs.

 

[yillbs]

I don't get all these 'it's indexing' comments.

The non-TB MBP is indexing too and this one doesn't die at 6.5 hours.

I ordered the TB MBP and after all the reviews, I considered switching to the non-TB version.
When I saw the TB version today at the Apple Store I knew it for sure: not worth trading all that battery life for.

Got the non-TB version and I hope the TB technology will develop itself within the next 2 years so it'll actually make sense to use it without too many tradeoffs.

You're giving up more than just battery life . The non tb doesn't have faster ram, or as fast or a CPU, you also loose l3 cache and bus speed , not to mention ports.

 

[Chad Brostorm]

SG 13" 3.3/16/512 here. I'm still on my first charge after taking it to 100%. I'd say that I have about 3.5-4 hours of typical usage (for me) thus far, and it's saying I have 6:22 left. I rebooted so my "Time on battery" was wiped.

Typical usage for me entails:
- One Citrix session w/ a dedicated space
- 3-4 Safari Tabs
- Messages
- Final Draft (screenwriting program)
- Scrivener (another writing program)

I usually don't have backlighting enabled. I'm at about 65% brightness.

 

[iasix]

You're giving up more than just battery life . The non tb doesn't have faster ram, or as fast or a CPU, you also loose l3 cache and bus speed , not to mention ports.

I know mate.

I'm coming from a rMBP 2012 and the 2015 non-TB is still faster. The faster RAM isn't something I'd notice in practice, like most users, and if my MacBook had 1 port instead of 2 I'd be cool with it too.

6.5 hours of battery life on a newly design MB though? In 2016? No.

 

[badlydrawnboy]

I know mate.

I'm coming from a rMBP 2012 and the 2015 non-TB is still faster. The faster RAM isn't something I'd notice in practice, like most users, and if my MacBook had 1 port instead of 2 I'd be cool with it too.

6.5 hours of battery life on a newly design MB though? In 2016? No.

I feel the same way. According to the reviews the performance differences between the tMBP 13" and MBP 13" are negligible for most users. I have a 2013 MBA and the MBP 13" w/o TB will still blow it away. The MBA also has only two ports, which is fine with me.

Now, if this were my main work computer, I'd go with a maxed out 15". But it's primarily for travel and use away from my office, so portability and battery life are important.

I just recharged, this is now my 3rd battery cycle. Interestingly enough, it is showing 10:46 remaining. That is the longest it has shown yet. I'm going to work outside of the house for about 3.5 hours, we'll see how it holds up.

 

[yillbs]

I feel the same way. According to the reviews the performance differences between the tMBP 13" and MBP 13" are negligible for most users. I have a 2013 MBA and the MBP 13" w/o TB will still blow it away. The MBA also has only two ports, which is fine with me.

Now, if this were my main work computer, I'd go with a maxed out 15". But it's primarily for travel and use away from my office, so portability and battery life are important.

I just recharged, this is now my 3rd battery cycle. Interestingly enough, it is showing 10:46 remaining. That is the longest it has shown yet. I'm going to work outside of the house for about 3.5 hours, we'll see how it holds up.

Mine just randomly starting showing high numbers like that too , update when you get back !

 

[johngwheeler]

If anyone is curious, I started work this morning with a 13 inch touch bar model. brightness is at about 65%, and I started at 9AM, it's now 2:19, and I have 40% battery, and the estimated time till being empty is 2:45

If that happens. I'll be extremely happy

But that would still only be about 8 hours and I presume you had a few breaks during this period. That's not a full day's use, which is the "gold standard" for a work laptop in my opinion. Basically, can I go from say 8am-8pm without a power supply?

 

[kevinkyoo]

You're giving up more than just battery life . The non tb doesn't have faster ram, or as fast or a CPU, you also loose l3 cache and bus speed , not to mention ports.

RAM speeds should not be considered significant factors of the battery life. People who keep saying this are delusional.

 

[FrozenDarkness]

RAM speeds should not be considered significant factors of the battery life. People who keep saying this are delusional.

i've been thinking about this recently. MacOS, more so than windows, spends a lot of time writing to RAM and taking things out of RAM. It was how they were able to get so much ram utilization out of smaller amounts of RAM. I wonder if that's a bigger battery hog than expected

 

[kevinkyoo]

i've been thinking about this recently. MacOS, more so than windows, spends a lot of time writing to RAM and taking things out of RAM. It was how they were able to get so much ram utilization out of smaller amounts of RAM. I wonder if that's a bigger battery hog than expected

If anything, macOS is much more efficient in using its RAM than Windows. There are videos out there with this exact comparison: 16GB vs 32GB, 2 sticks vs. 4 sticks, etc. There are no significant differences in Windows. So if macOS is more efficient, this difference is negligible.

 

[PaulWog]

I get 6.5 hours at 100% brightness on a 2015 Macbook Pro 13", using Word, and Google Chrome.

Would expect, ESPECIALLY for the price, that the Macbook Pro 2016 gets 6.5 hours at 90-100% brightness (accounting for increased screen brightness) doing the same things.... and 10 hours at 60% brightness.

 

[FrozenDarkness]

so to be sure, NOBODY has gotten 10 hours out of their macbooks? I've been thinking that 6 hrs isn't that bad for normal usage

 

[skids929]

I get 6.5 hours at 100% brightness on a 2015 Macbook Pro 13", using Word, and Google Chrome.

Would expect, ESPECIALLY for the price, that the Macbook Pro 2016 gets 6.5 hours at 90-100% brightness (accounting for increased screen brightness) doing the same things.... and 10 hours at 60% brightness.

Well this is interesting given the conversation with the 2016s, sets some perspective assuming thats the same for all 2015 MBP owners. I can't for the life of my understand why anyone would want to have their screen up at 100%, especially this new screen, it's so freaking bright.
[doublepost=1479426103][/doublepost]

so to be sure, NOBODY has gotten 10 hours out of their macbooks? I've been thinking that 6 hrs isn't that bad for normal usage

Im working on it with a 13 in right now..But I have a 15 sitting here too and didn't get close to 10. Maybe 8. 13 is trending the same at the moment. But I won't know for sure until I cycle a few times.

 

[ConnorMcJeebus]

I was working on my refurbished 2015 13" MBP last night...typing in Word and streaming a Flash-based video in Chrome (a.k.a. multi-tasking). About 75% brightness. I checked when the battery percentage was 90% and it showed 7 hours and 50 something minutes of battery life remaining. Not bad.

 

[Nitefly]

Is the processor making a difference (i7)?

 

[David58117]

Looking at the Apple site - it's up to 10 hours of itunes video playback and "web surfing." It also looks like they used an i5 for the 13". I'm just trying to figure out how they got their numbers:

"Testing conducted by Apple in October 2016 using preproduction 2.6GHz quad-core Intel Core i7-based 15-inch MacBook Pro systems with a 256GB SSD and 16GB of RAM; preproduction 2.9GHz dual-core Intel Core i5-based 13-inch MacBook Pro systems with a 512GB SSD and 8GB of RAM (wireless web test and iTunes movie playback test); preproduction 2.9GHz dual-core Intel Core i5-based 13-inch MacBook Pro systems with a 256GB SSD and 8GB of RAM (standby test); and preproduction 2.0GHz dual-core Intel Core i5-based 13-inch MacBook Pro systems with a 256GB SSD and 8GB of RAM. The wireless web test measures battery life by wirelessly browsing 25 popular websites with display brightness set to 12 clicks from bottom or 75%. The iTunes movie playback test measures battery life by playing back HD 1080p content with display brightness set to 12 clicks from bottom or 75%. The standby test measures battery life by allowing a system, connected to a wireless network and signed in to an iCloud account, to enter standby mode with Safari and Mail applications launched and all system settings left at default. Battery life varies by use and configuration. See www.apple.com/batteries for more information."

 

[halfbad]

didn't read through all the comments, but as of last update, the photo recognition for Photos runs in the background. The first time this happens it takes a lot of power and a long time depending on the size of you library. Once it's all settled in after a week or so you should see more normalized durations.

 

[Impatientmac]

I swear I posted in this thread talking about my battery life, but I don't see my comment. I'm on 64% and it says I have 2:30 hr but it's been saying that since it was on 100% I guess I've been using it off power for about an hour. I think its going to take a few cycles to accurately test the battery. I'm going to wait until its about 20% to charge since I don't plan on going anywhere tonight. I've got a 13 in Macbook with touchbar

 

[skids929]

Looking at the Apple site - it's up to 10 hours of itunes video playback and "web surfing." It also looks like they used an i5 for the 13". I'm just trying to figure out how they got their numbers:

"Testing conducted by Apple in October 2016 using preproduction 2.6GHz quad-core Intel Core i7-based 15-inch MacBook Pro systems with a 256GB SSD and 16GB of RAM; preproduction 2.9GHz dual-core Intel Core i5-based 13-inch MacBook Pro systems with a 512GB SSD and 8GB of RAM (wireless web test and iTunes movie playback test); preproduction 2.9GHz dual-core Intel Core i5-based 13-inch MacBook Pro systems with a 256GB SSD and 8GB of RAM (standby test); and preproduction 2.0GHz dual-core Intel Core i5-based 13-inch MacBook Pro systems with a 256GB SSD and 8GB of RAM. The wireless web test measures battery life by wirelessly browsing 25 popular websites with display brightness set to 12 clicks from bottom or 75%. The iTunes movie playback test measures battery life by playing back HD 1080p content with display brightness set to 12 clicks from bottom or 75%. The standby test measures battery life by allowing a system, connected to a wireless network and signed in to an iCloud account, to enter standby mode with Safari and Mail applications launched and all system settings left at default. Battery life varies by use and configuration. See www.apple.com/batteries for more information."

So an I7 in a 13 is going to draw a lot more power? This is how I was going to order my 13 if I go with that, which it's looking like it will be. Cripes, how am I supposed to know if the i7 draws more if they didn't test it!

 

[motime]

Lol what a joke, and people are still rewarding Apple with their hard earned money.

 

[CreativeC]

Lol what a joke, and people are still rewarding Apple with their hard earned money.

There's a sucker born every minute

 

[jclardy]

I seem to be getting around 7 hours with my typical workflow (Xcode, iOS sim, a bunch of safari tabs, Messages, tweetbot, slack, Todoist), I won't really be able to test it until next week since I'm out of town and am charging whenever I can.

I will say, the auto brightness really wants to crank it up most of the time on this laptop, I'm wondering if this is contributing a bit to the reduced battery. On my old rMBP I was typically running at about 40-50% brightness. This one is usually 60-100% if I don't manually turn it down after opening the lid.

 

[archimon]

I seem to be getting around 7 hours with my typical workflow (Xcode, iOS sim, a bunch of safari tabs, Messages, tweetbot, slack, Todoist), I won't really be able to test it until next week since I'm out of town and am charging whenever I can.

I will say, the auto brightness really wants to crank it up most of the time on this laptop, I'm wondering if this is contributing a bit to the reduced battery. On my old rMBP I was typically running at about 40-50% brightness. This one is usually 60-100% if I don't manually turn it down after opening the lid.

For all of the talk of how bright these new displays are, unless I crank it up to around 70% they actually seem noticeably dim to me. My iPad Pro 9.7" seems to more or less match the max brightness of the display. Am I missing something?

 

[skids929]

Is the processor making a difference (i7)?

Thats my theory because the 13 inch i5 I have alongside this 15 i7 lasts easily 8-9 hours.

 

[lapacho]

6 hours are very poor, using my non tb mbp now for one week and I have an average battery-life of 9 hours by surfing the web und light usage.

Actually the battery information is not very accurate