Battery life on ibook?

[twoodcc]

AFAIK, only the ram is powered during sleep.

what does AFAIK mean?

so if the ram is powered during sleep, then you can't leave it asleep for that long then, right? like i could let it sleep between classes, but i'd have to shut down after my last class? i have a break between some classes (like one class ends at 11:50, and the next one begins at 1:30), so i'd either have to plug it up, or shutdown between those?

 

[nikeballa09]

im not worried about wifi signal strength, cause every classroom on campus has a wireless router so at least with my toshiba i always have excelent reception (full bars). i dont want the 14 inch i book cause i have a 15 inch pc laptop right now and its a bit too big, the desks in college are small so i need the small size of the 12 inch so i want to know if the battery on the 12 inch will last. thanks again

 

[deebster]

AFAIK = as far as I know

Sleep mode doesn't use much battery power at all. If you need 4 hours of use from your iBook throughout the day, then you should have no problem with the same amount of sleep time in addition. It might use perhaps 3% of your battery charge in those 4 sleeping hours, probably less.

Basically don't worry about it.

I have a 3 year old G3 (600) iBook and today was using Safari to read an html-formatted book on battery power. It was a large file, but with brightness on the 3rd notch up, Airport and BT off (well, I don't *have* them ) and reduced processor power my battery was still showing 4 hours remaining.

 

[CubaTBird]

i get 5 hours.. max bright.. auto proc perform.. and its almost a year old

 

[twoodcc]

AFAIK = as far as I know

Sleep mode doesn't use much battery power at all. If you need 4 hours of use from your iBook throughout the day, then you should have no problem with the same amount of sleep time in addition. It might use perhaps 3% of your battery charge in those 4 sleeping hours, probably less.

Basically don't worry about it.

I have a 3 year old G3 (600) iBook and today was using Safari to read an html-formatted book on battery power. It was a large file, but with brightness on the 3rd notch up, Airport and BT off (well, I don't *have* them ) and reduced processor power my battery was still showing 4 hours remaining.

thanks, that helps alot. next thing to do is decide on which to get

 

[mkrishnan]

so if the ram is powered during sleep, then you can't leave it asleep for that long then, right? like i could let it sleep between classes, but i'd have to shut down after my last class?

The numbers I posted above -- 2-3% of total battery life for every ten hours spent sleeping -- are with 640 MB of RAM. So I don't really think this is that big of an issue....

 

[twoodcc]

The numbers I posted above -- 2-3% of total battery life for every ten hours spent sleeping -- are with 640 MB of RAM. So I don't really think this is that big of an issue....

yeah, i don't think it's a big deal either. and when i get back to my dorm, i can just plug it up until the next class. just sometimes with my pc laptop now, i forget, and then i'm screwed

 

[nikeballa09]

would it be worth it for me to invest in a 12inch ibook, or should i just stick with my toshiba. if it is worth it, what are the main reasons. thanks

 

[twoodcc]

would it be worth it for me to invest in a 12inch ibook, or should i just stick with my toshiba. if it is worth it, what are the main reasons. thanks

i'm in the same boat as you. i bought an HP dv1048us laptop about 6 months ago. i love it, it's a great laptop and all, but no OSX. that's the main reason i want an apple laptop.

 

[0098386]

I have never had a Centrino laptop, but my experience is the same, vis-à-vis some other classmates' PC laptops. FWIW, several people have said the PB is slightly worse than the iBook, because of its metal casing.

yea I have a PowerBook (802.11g) and a Gericom laptop (802.11b), the windows machine does get a better signal, but the wifi card is a PCMCIA card so it pokes out and isnt surrounded by aliminium. still i'm very happy with signal i get. i live in a big house, the wireless router has to pass through 6 walls/20 metres to hit me but i get a good signal (about 50%) still.

 

[Mechcozmo]

Word is very good, in fact i find it better then the microsoft version. It has notebook layout which is good for notes. Here's the screen shot.

Microsoft makes Word. You mean the Windows version, right? I agree there-- Microsoft Word for the Mac is better than Microsoft Word for Windows.

so if the ram is powered during sleep, then you can't leave it asleep for that long then, right? like i could let it sleep between classes, but i'd have to shut down after my last class? i have a break between some classes (like one class ends at 11:50, and the next one begins at 1:30), so i'd either have to plug it up, or shutdown between those?

You can leave your computer asleep for as long as you have battery power for. You could easily let your computer sleep between classes, and then after your last class let it sleep on the way home. My PowerBook averages a few days uptime-- some people here have laptops with 60 days uptime, just letting it sleep and charging it inbetween.

Essentially, the RAM contents are preserved in sleep mode. Everything else is off. Hard drive is spun down, display cards are off, and network cards too unless you check the option to keep them awake for Ethernet administrator wake-on-LAN stuffs. That can eat into sleep mode's longevity as it has to keep your network card alive and monitor it, too. Airport and Bluetooth are off, BTW. (Wake-over-LAN doesn't work with WiFi)

 

[18thTomorrow]

I can get about that much with a 14" ibook, more if i'm conservative.

 

[twoodcc]

well after trying out MS word for mac, i feel like MS Onenote for pc is better for note-taking than word for mac. (i only got to use it one time, so that's all i can base my decision on). so my question is, are there any other note-taking software for mac?

 

[XIII]

On the plane from LAX to LHR I used my 14" iBook for about 4 hours typing, 3 or so sleeping, and one iPhotoing . Then, when I turned it on at home, I still had one and a half hours left.

Note, I had my screen on pretty much the lowest brightness to conserve battery life on the plane while I was typing (MS Word) as I didn't need any higher ( it was black outside, and everyone else was sleeping, I can't sleep on planes I just can't. ). The rest of the time it was on full brightness. Airport was obviously off all the time as I don't need it in the sky.

 

[nikeballa09]

will the 12 inch ibook get comparable battery life as the 14 inch. i hear the 14 gets better battery life, is that true, and if so how much more?