Battery health drop

[Fayler]

I just noticed that my laptop battery health just dropped from 94% to 78% since yesterday. Should I be worried about anything? Should I call up Apple and talk to them (I have Applecare)? I'm rather new to laptops and so I'm not all familiar with what this really means.

 

[Eidorian]

That's definitely something to be concerned about.

 

[jaymeebuoy]

Call support, get a new battery ASAP

Hey;

I had the exact same problem starting two weeks back. I phoned Apple support last week, They ran me through a reset of the PRAM and junk, but the max charge was still less than half original after only 6 months (179 cycles) so they sent me a free new battery the next day.

I just put it in, and it doesn't look to promising for the new one either. Something has changed with my battery management at a hardware level and it's eating batteries all the sudden.

Kudos to Apple though, top notch customer support getting me a new one so fast with no argument. They may have won me over for life with that one.

 

[Eidorian]

That's a lot of cycles for 6 months.

I have 6 cycles after a month of usage.

 

[Fayler]

That is indeed a lot of cycles. I have had mine since the MBPs went to SR and I only have 19 cycles. Thank you, Jaymee, I'll phone up Apple once I get back to my dorm room.

Needless to say, battery life is incredibly important to me while on campus going from class to class, so thank you for your quick responses.

 

[jaymeebuoy]

Battery life in heavy times

You only unplugged your laptop 6 times? You should just take the battery out and use it when you need it once a week, it would probably last longer.

For someone like me who uses it on the go every day at work, home, and constantly running between my desk and the edit suite, I have to charge it pretty much every night. The depletion based on the cycles was still way out of whack according to the customer support rep.

 

[Eidorian]

You only unplugged your laptop 6 times? You should just take the battery out and use it when you need it once a week, it would probably last longer.

For someone like me who uses it on the go every day at work, home, and constantly running between my desk and the edit suite, I have to charge it pretty much every night. The depletion based on the cycles was still way out of whack according to the customer support rep.

I use my laptop everyday in class. I've unplugged it many more then 6 times.

coconutBattery, iStat Pro, and System Profiler still only report 6 cycles.

 

[theman]

uhh, that's kind of screwed up... it should definitely be more than 6.

i hardly ever use my battery (at least it seems that way) and I've gone through 20 cycles in 2 months.

my battery came with only 95% health, but luckily it's held steady. still gets over 5:20 max life.

 

[Draddy]

You only unplugged your laptop 6 times? You should just take the battery out and use it when you need it once a week, it would probably last longer.

For someone like me who uses it on the go every day at work, home, and constantly running between my desk and the edit suite, I have to charge it pretty much every night. The depletion based on the cycles was still way out of whack according to the customer support rep.

i've had my computer for a year and 5 months and it has 417 cycles.

also, I don't think it's counting how many times you've unplugged, it's counting how many times you've charged your battery 100% .... so 50% after 1 unplug and replug.... 40% the next, and then 10% would equal 1 cycle.. (I think)

 

[richard.mac]

after upgrading to leopard my battery health has gone from 90% to 40% and the battery life has halved. should i ring applecare to enquire about a replacement? im scared that leopard has boinked my power management and i if a get a replacement battery it will have the same symptoms.

 

[e12a]

for me the battery update screwed my battery life. From what was around 2 hours at 68 cycles with a year old battery, to barely over 50 minutes in a week. I could barely get through a class that I easily got through a week prior.

Took it to the apple store at my university where my friend works. He got me a replacement asap, and now i'm happy. Check out a local apple store and see what they say. If you know anyone that works there or at an authorized reseller check it out. I find it much easier to do AppleCare claims. I got a new magsafe adapter too! (the mini 85w one)