Does the rMBP exaggerate battery life

[neurodave]

I have been noting as of the past few days that my rMBP (while it does have great battery life) is not very consistent with it's battery life expectancies.

Here are two pictures to share what I mean. The above is from OS X itself, and below it is iStat Menus.

&

So which one do I believe?

 

[zombiedave]

Keep it running and see who wins!

 

[sofianito]

Maybe a bug in OS X. It should have been 6:09 instead of 9:06?

 

[bill-p]

You can get 9 hours at lower screen brightness (50% or less) and very light workload (documents, PDF or something similar). I know because I've been getting that for a while now.

One thing people keep forgetting is that the rMBP does have a battery that has higher capacity than the cMBP, which means it should be able to last longer than the cMBP given the same power consumption.

It's just that the screen sucks so much power that battery life seems to equal the cMBP. But at lower screen brightness, the benefits of the larger battery capacity does shine through.

Though with all that said, I think your battery is still calibrating, so estimates are all over the place. Once it has settled down (as in it has gotten used to your typical usage), you'll see much more consistent results.

Like me, I see 5-6 hours consistently with my usage, which is a mix of web browsing + XCode + Photoshop + etc...

 

[falconeight]

I always get 9 hours doing web surfing.

 

[576316]

I have a question about the battery in the rMBP but I don't think it's worth starting a new thread. If you use your MacBook Pro whilst it's plugged in and NOT fully charged, is the power being used to run your MacBook coming from the battery or directly from the power outlet? I guess what I'm saying is, does the power coming from the wall socket go two ways - one into your battery to charge it and one to purely run the MacBook? Or does the power still come from the battery WHILST it's charging?

Does that make sense?

I'm sat here using it whilst plugged in and I can see that the battery is charging, does that mean the battery isn't being used at all in the slightest, it's just charging?

 

[snaky69]

I have a question about the battery in the rMBP but I don't think it's worth starting a new thread. If you use your MacBook Pro whilst it's plugged in and NOT fully charged, is the power being used to run your MacBook coming from the battery or directly from the power outlet? I guess what I'm saying is, does the power coming from the wall socket go two ways - one into your battery to charge it and one to purely run the MacBook? Or does the power still come from the battery WHILST it's charging?

Does that make sense?

You can use it while charging, it'll simply charge slower so I'm guessing it's 50/50.

 

[neurodave]

You can get 9 hours at lower screen brightness (50% or less) and very light workload (documents, PDF or something similar). I know because I've been getting that for a while now.

One thing people keep forgetting is that the rMBP does have a battery that has higher capacity than the cMBP, which means it should be able to last longer than the cMBP given the same power consumption.

It's just that the screen sucks so much power that battery life seems to equal the cMBP. But at lower screen brightness, the benefits of the larger battery capacity does shine through.

Though with all that said, I think your battery is still calibrating, so estimates are all over the place. Once it has settled down (as in it has gotten used to your typical usage), you'll see much more consistent results.

Like me, I see 5-6 hours consistently with my usage, which is a mix of web browsing + XCode + Photoshop + etc...

I get anywhere between 7-9 hours on a regular basis. All I do is some light web browsing, WordPress writing, some Office, and lots of iMessage. I've owned my rMBP for about a month now, so I'd assume it's far beyond that calibration point. I guess the sensors are being read differently on both ends. I'll have to keep an eye on usage today to see which one wins.