Is my battery faulty?

[gfroyle]

Hi, I have an 18-month old G4 Powerbook, for which the battery seems to be rapidly declining.

According to System Profiler, the battery has a Cycle Count of 294 and a Full Charge Capacity of 1396 mAh. The initial Full Charge Capacity was 4200 mAh and so my battery is now down to 33% of its initial capacity after just about 18 months. My friends and colleagues with iBooks of a similar age and Cycle Count are still reporting about 80% battery capacity...

Personally, I find this to be an unacceptably rapid decline, and was wondering if the battery is actually faulty. (Although there have been multiple battery recalls from G4 Powerbooks made both before and after mine, none of them apply to my battery).

What do you reckon? Is this just a fact of life, and I should just buy a new battery? Or is a drop to 1/3 of its original capacity in this time period an indication of a faulty battery?

Any advice welcome

Gordon

 

[Gokhan]

k

this area depend's on the battery's type of use e.g quick empty and recharge kills battery quicker than charging when bat has 50% to go although saying that i just had to buy a battey for my 18 month g4 aswell only got one hour after full charge !!!!

saying that had my ti for 4 years and the battery is excellent fluke i guess

so yeah ur battery's dying there is a program that lets u test ur battery life google search it i cant remember the name but thats what told me my bat was dead and to replace it !

hope this helps

 

[Heb1228]

Try an app called iBatt. The free version will work for 10 minutes at a time and it will evaluate your battery and grade it and let you know if you need a new one.

 

[Gokhan]

k

that the one

 

[dmw007]

Does not seem normal to me for your battery to have lost 1/3 of its capacity in just 18 months. I have had my HP Pavilion ZV500 notebook for almost 12 months and have not noticed any loss in battery capacity.

 

[taeclee99]

There could be a real problem with your battery. My battery that came with my powerbook g4 in 12/2002 still gets about 90 percent of original capacity.

 

[CiBoys]

It gave me a C i have the 1st generation 12" PB

 

[Heb1228]

I get a C- on mine now, but its not that bad cause the service plan I got through CompUSA gets me 1 new battery. I'm just waiting a little longer before i take it in and get my new one. But i check it with iBatt about every month. Even with a C- battery rating I still get about 2 hours out of it under average workload, almost 3 hours if I'm just typing, but its starting to get to the point where I can't watch longer movies all the way through on the battery.

 

[gfroyle]

... but what is "acceptable"

Thanks for the replies. I guess what I really want to know is what rate of decline is "acceptable" - or maybe just what is normal?

For an iPod battery, there is a statement on the Apple web site that says that a properly maintained battery should still retain 80% of its original capacity after 400 charge cycles. Of course, an iPod battery is quite different from a Powerbook battery, so I just don't know what is reasonable ...

If EVERYONE has 33% capacity after 300 charge cycles, then there is no point in me complaining and spending time and effort trying to get it "fixed". But if everyone else still has 80% capacity after 300 charge cycles, then I will argue that my battery is actually defective...

I'd just like to know where I stand because obviously my local dealer will try to avoid giving me a new battery by telling me "all batteries wear out", "your battery is completely normal" etc, but if I have evidence that mine is particularly bad, then I will be in a stronger position...

So maybe the simple question is: what percentage of the original capacity of a battery SHOULD it still retain after 300 charge cycles over an 18 month period?

 

[Gokhan]

k

it seems to me it depends who manufacture's ur battery some batteries manufactured by different compaines last longer than others in my view !

 

[AcousticDoc]

do you take the battery out when it's fuly charged and you're plugged in @home?

 

[gfroyle]

do you take the battery out when it's fuly charged and you're plugged in @home?

No, I don't - should I do that?

I don't think that my friends (still with 80%+ capacity) do that either...

Gordon