Anyone with the Minidrive or other full time SD card solution having battery problems? Like the battery draining overnight even though you closed the lid?
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Battery problems with Minidrive or other permanent SD card
- Thread starter ZBoater
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
Not sure. My MBA lost 6% overnight which I thought was steep. I ejected the SD card (but left it installed) and closed the lid last night at 82%. Today when I opened it, it was completely drained (would not turn on). I need to do some more testing before I know for sure.
6%? That's quite normal. I don't have link with me right now, but there's a guide for Apple Batteries that states that loosing 1% every hour during sleep mode is regular behaviour.
Ummmmm, no.
"Put MacBook Air to sleep for more than 3 hours, and it enters standby mode to conserve battery life for up to 30 days." (from the Apple website).
30x24 = 720. So unless I get 720% battery, there is something wrong with either the math or my MBA.
It's the i7
Bwhahahaha. I love it.
I may have done this to myself. I disabled hibernation so that 8GB sleepimage file doesn't get created. That's probably needed for the 30 day sleep (doh!). So is 6% overnight decent? I wonder why ejecting the SD card but leaving it in the slot made it loose 82% overnight? I need to test that again.
Bwhahahaha. I love it.
I may have done this to myself. I disabled hibernation so that 8GB sleepimage file doesn't get created. That's probably needed for the 30 day sleep (doh!). So is 6% overnight decent? I wonder why ejecting the SD card but leaving it in the slot made it loose 82% overnight? I need to test that again.
Check this out. If you have a SD card inserted it will prevent standby mode (deep sleep) and battery life will suffer.
Thanks for sharing that. I had seen it, which is why I tried ejecting the card but not removing it. I tried it again last night, ejecting the card but leaving it inserted, and I lost 90% battery over an 8 hour period. I will try again tonight leaving the card inserted and active to see how much battery I will loose.
Okay, last night I lost 2% over 9 hours. Now that I recall, my previous 6% loss was over 24 hours. So having the card inserted and active doesnt seem to be causing a big drain, although there is no way I am getting 30 days out of this which I guess is due to not being able to go into deep sleep. And ejecting it in the system but leaving it inserted in the slot is bad ju ju.
I guess the price of having the card all the time is to actually turn off the laptop overnight...
I guess the price of having the card all the time is to actually turn off the laptop overnight...
The majority of that drain could be happening during the 3 hours before it enters standby mode.
Use sleep mode with SD card inserted
I found this article about the topic:
http://www.atpeaz.com/index.php/201...external-disks-on-sleep-reconnect-after-os-x/
It is a little time-consuming, but at least it works.
I found this article about the topic:
http://www.atpeaz.com/index.php/201...external-disks-on-sleep-reconnect-after-os-x/
It is a little time-consuming, but at least it works.
Yes, the "deep sleep" you're referring to is actually the laptop saving the contents of RAM to disk and then turning itself off completely. So that uses less power obviously than having to keep the RAM turned on (refreshed) so it doesn't lose its data.
I don't know what might have happened with the card half-inserted but maybe you were tripping some mechanism where the OS was waiting for the card to be fully inserted and the computer prevented itself from going to sleep at all.
One question is, why not just leave the computer plugged into the wall overnight?