Is an average 4hrs battery life normal on rMBP15?

[Raima]

Hey everyone,

I've had this problem ever since Mountain Lion was released. It didn't bother me too much in the past as I've always had a power adapter close by.

But now that I'm flying overseas, I need the battery life more than ever.

I'm just curious, on your rMBP15, what's your average battery life after it's been fully charged?

 

[fatlardo]

Can you give us a little more info on what you use the comp for?

 

[Raima]

Can you give us a little more info on what you use the comp for?

That's just basically using OS X with normal applications with web browsing, word processing sitting on the wifi network.

Not playing videos, music or anything.

if I play a game on bootcamp, I think I'd be lucky to get 2.5hrs off it with no wifi or anything like that. This is with the screen set at a lower res of something like 1200 x 800, lowest graphics settings in game, turbo boost taken off, running up to a maximum of 80% cpu and power managment set on power saver.

 

[AllAmerican]

With the screen brightness about halfway up and the keyboard lights off I'd say I get close to 7 while having firefox and word running

 

[B...]

If your screen brightness is set to close to 100%, that could be normal. If it is more like 40-60%, that is not very normal, although it still could be.

I would talk to an Apple rep to ask how they can check and what they could do about it, as it is still in warantee.

 

[ColdCase]

I usually down to 20% after 4-5 hours with heavily wifi use and with bright screen, i.e not trying to conserve. Several apps running.

 

[Asuriyan]

I run 6-8 hours on a normal day. Any use of the GeForce chip doubles power usage. You might want to install gfxCardStatus and see if it's kicking in for any reason, though it's not as useful as it used to be since most apps that use the dedicated GPU will force it to remain on.

 

[Ledgem]

I run 6-8 hours on a normal day. Any use of the GeForce chip doubles power usage. You might want to install gfxCardStatus and see if it's kicking in for any reason, though it's not as useful as it used to be since most apps that use the dedicated GPU will force it to remain on.

gfxcardstatus allows you to see if the discrete GPU is being activated, and it also allows you to disable it. Just as an example, I find that Microsoft PowerPoint occasionally switches on the discrete GPU on my system (although a few presentations don't switch it on). Don't set it to "integrated only" while the program that uses the discrete GPU is running, though; in my experience, the program is very likely to crash in that case. Instead, close the program (and any other programs that might use the discrete card), then switch over to "integrated only." You can then reopen the programs and they'll function properly and in a stable manner.

Note also that your setting for "integrated only" may not stick after a system is suspended. I don't know if this has changed with the rMBPs, but with others you can't run an external monitor or output to a projector if you're set to "integrated only" - due to chipset design, the discrete graphics card is required for that.