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Do you calibrate your battery the first use?

K

kbt1020

macrumors regular
Original poster
Feb 15, 2010
138
1
Apple site recommends calibrating the first time usage. Do you guys do that for your laptop? Sorry first Mac, just wanna get it right :)

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1490

"You should perform this procedure when you first use your computer and then every few months after that."
 
Too many over-think their mac experience. (ie. Don't listen to folks who say you should repair permissions before every software update, that's a bunch of voodoo and only used for troubleshooting). Throw away all of those ideas of "upkeep" or "maintainence" that you previously had to think about on a windows machine.

kbt1020 said:
Sorry first Mac, just wanna get it right :)
Click to expand...

It's okay and yes you should do this, but please, just enjoy using your new laptop.
 
kbt1020 said:
Apple site recommends calibrating the first time usage. Do you guys do that for your laptop? Sorry first Mac, just wanna get it right :)

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1490

"You should perform this procedure when you first use your computer and then every few months after that."
Click to expand...

i've had a few mbp batteries for my 07 SR mbp. My first battery i didn't do this , and the life was never as good. My second and third batteries. i did this from the start and then every 3 weeks or so after that. They lasted much longer.
 
Matthew Yohe said:
Too many over-think their mac experience. (ie. Don't listen to folks who say you should repair permissions before every software update, that's a bunch of voodoo and only used for troubleshooting). Throw away all of those ideas of "upkeep" or "maintainence" that you previously had to think about on a windows machine.



It's okay and yes you should do this, but please, just enjoy using your new laptop.
Click to expand...

Thank you for the replies. I shall.:D
 
I never calibrated mine and have had no problems with partial charges (like being stuck at 98%), always gets to 100%. I'm only at 16 cycles.

As for repairing permissions. When I have a problem such as crashing, using Disk Utility to repair permissions seemed to solve the problem. Doesn't hurt to check it a couple times a month.

Find a utility to help with uninstalling apps (they tend to have left-overs). There are a lot of free ones out there. If an application has an uninstall, use it. Doesn't hurt to have a utility that also clears all of the system caches, and definitely get a utility to remove .lso's. (flash cookies)
 
I didn't calibrate my first one at all, and I regretted it. I calibrated my second when I first got it, but never really bothered to recalibrate every three months. I regretted that too. Third one should be here next week :p

The computer is 3.5 years old now so I'm getting a little less than 2 years out of each one without calibrating properly.
 
I only fully charge the first time to make sure; apart from that, I use my battery like crazy; often 2 full cycles a day, so I don't have time to calibrate.
 
tkingart said:
I never calibrated mine and have had no problems with partial charges (like being stuck at 98%), always gets to 100%. I'm only at 16 cycles.
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The point of calibration is to make sure your battery readings are accurate. If you never calibrate, you don't know if you're really at 100% because the reporting is inaccurate.
 
tkingart said:
As for repairing permissions. When I have a problem such as crashing, using Disk Utility to repair permissions seemed to solve the problem. Doesn't hurt to check it a couple times a month.
Click to expand...

Also no reason to get in this habit either.

tkingart said:
Find a utility to help with uninstalling apps (they tend to have left-overs). There are a lot of free ones out there. If an application has an uninstall, use it. Doesn't hurt to have a utility that also clears all of the system caches, and definitely get a utility to remove .lso's. (flash cookies)
Click to expand...

No, there is no reason to give these a second look. Again, further maintenance that does not need to be done.

All of this stuff just wastes time in what I'm sure adds up well beyond simply either restoring from a Time Machine backup, or restoring files after a fresh install which will both be better than running a program that "cleans" anything.

Voodoo, all of it.
 
I would personally recommend against calibrating the battery, based only on my own experience. From three somewhat recent systems:

  1. MacBook CoreDuo. This machine has been used plugged into the wall 95% of the time. It's about 3.5 years old now and for the last year or so, it has basically held no charge. I don't know the cycle count for it, but I would be surprised if it's at 300 and the battery drains in about 20 minutes.
  2. 15" MacBook Pro Core2Duo. (pre-unibody) This laptop had ok battery life to begin with, but had two batteries fail prematurely (less than 50% capacity below 100 cycles) and was used maybe 80/20 plugged in/on the battery. After the second replacement, I asked Apple to take a look at the notebook itself and they replaced the logic board because it apparently wasn't charging the batteries correctly. With the third battery, it was used maybe 60/40 plugged in/on the battery.

    Battery life was still going down noticeably, and so I started to calibrate it every 4-6 weeks. Each time I did this calibration, following Apple's instructions to the letter, the battery life dropped even more. (so I stopped doing it) I don't mean that it was now reporting more accurately, I mean I actually got less time out of using it, and later, it started cutting out when it said there was estimating 20 minutes of time left.
  3. Another white MacBook, Core2Duo this time. This is almost 2.5 years old and is my parents' laptop. It is using the original battery which has never been calibrated per Apple's instructions.

    It is only ever used on the battery, and is plugged in to charge after that. It's probably never run down more than 30-40% most of the time. Well I was using it myself the other day to see if I could get by on a 13" machine instead of a 15" due to the underwhelming MBP refresh (can't do it, too low resolution) and to install the latest updates. I actually ran it all the way down and got about 5 hours out of it - pretty much what it was getting on day one. I was curious about the state of the battery considering its age and ran coconut battery on it today:
    batteryz.png

    Considering that the battery was run right down other day (through normal use, not intentionally) and it's still getting 5 hours I have no reason to believe that Coconut battery's results are wrong, even though it's past its 300-cycle life expectancy.


So my take on all of this, is that if you have a laptop you should only ever use it on the battery if you want to get good battery life out of it. And it's best not to run it all the way down all the time.

I would only ever use it plugged into the wall when it's charging. If it isn't charging, unplug it.

Don't go out of your way to 'calibrate' the battery. From my experience with more than one battery, it has only ever lowered battery life. It is only supposed to be done when the battery is very rarely used.

If you are only using it on the battery, as I would now recommend (and plan to do) it should not need calibrated.
 
Just for info sake.. Is the battery covered by Apple Care or not ?Like will they replace it if its under warranty...

Got my 1st mac.. 15" base model.. njoying it.. although need some time for transition from PC.
 
And when using the computer, is it advisable to only connect it to the power outlet to recharge the battery? I would prefer being able to plug it in constantly. However, if it hurts the battery I would think twice.
 
swapna81 said:
Just for info sake.. Is the battery covered by Apple Care or not ?Like will they replace it if its under warranty...

Got my 1st mac.. 15" base model.. njoying it.. although need some time for transition from PC.
Click to expand...
If it is failing prematurely (low cycle count and low capacity) they will replace it, but not if it is performing as specified and has simply run out. (it's not like batteries last forever)

Bob1039 said:
And when using the computer, is it advisable to only connect it to the power outlet to recharge the battery? I would prefer being able to plug it in constantly. However, if it hurts the battery I would think twice.
Click to expand...
Well out of those three machines, the only one with good battery life is the one that has more-or-less only ever been used on the battery. And the machine that was plugged in 99% of the time gets less than 20 minutes.

After almost four years of MacBooks and seeing how the batteries perform under different conditions, I would only ever plug it in to charge.

Use it while it's charging by all means, but once it has a full charge, I would then unplug it if I plan to keep on using it. (it's fine to leave it sleeping when plugged in)

You want to keep the battery active rather than letting it sit there with a full charge.
 
andrewfee said:
You want to keep the battery active rather than letting it sit there with a full charge.
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for long periods of time (ie >6months) - you are correct. but for a week, or month even. you are incorrect. you are more worthwhile leaving your battery fully charged and plugged in then you are to discharge it everyday for a week. that gives you less cycles to use it for!
 
I just wanted to post here about something I noticed…

My battery came new at 2 cycles and only 98% health; I did the "first time" calibration by charging it full and letting it deplete to 0% and hibernating for a a few hours. Then I charged it to full again and it appears I have over 100% health now.

I'll update if I experience this on other computers as well.
 
alphaod said:
I just wanted to post here about something I noticed…

My battery came new at 2 cycles and only 98% health; I did the "first time" calibration by charging it full and letting it deplete to 0% and hibernating for a a few hours. Then I charged it to full again and it appears I have over 100% health now.

I'll update if I experience this on other computers as well.
Click to expand...

thats how it goes generally. but it wont work every time.
 
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