MacBook Pro Battery Life Sucks!

[chosenwolf]

I'm getting about 2 hours on a full charge with the brightness at max and 3 hours with the display dimmed a bit. Isn't the battery supposed to be rated for 4 hours on a full charge? I've got better battery life selected also.

Any MacBook Pro owners have similar experiences? I've got the 2.0 dual core system.

 

[thegreatluke]

I'm getting about 2 hours on a full charge with the brightness at max and 3 hours with the display dimmed a bit. Isn't the battery supposed to be rated for 4 hours on a full charge? I've got better battery life selected also.

Any MacBook Pro owners have similar experiences? I've got the 2.0 dual core system.

Do you have the 7200 RPM HD maybe?

Try dimming the display to at most 4/16 bars (I use it at 1 bar when not plugged in), muting the sound, turning off Bluetooth and Wi-Fi if you're not using them, and taking out all peripherals. Also, selecting some of the energy saver preferences (like sleeping the hard disks, big one) might help too.

During light work, you should get 3.5 hours.

I have a stock 1.83 MBP, and I get 4+ hours doing light work with these options.

Edit: Rosalindavenue is right. I can practically see my battery going down when I have it on max brightness. Never use max brightness when unplugged.

 

[rosalindavenue]

You can't expect much with the screen brightness on max. My G4 ibook would probably not go much longer than 2 hours with that brightness (and its nowhere near as bright as the Macbook).

 

[maestro55]

Do you have the 7200 RPM HD maybe?

Try dimming the display to at most 4/16 bars (I use it at 1 bar when not plugged in), muting the sound, turning off Bluetooth and Wi-Fi if you're not using them, and taking out all peripherals. Also, selecting some of the energy saver preferences (like sleeping the hard disks, big one) might help too.

During light work, you should get 3.5 hours.

I have a stock 1.83 MBP, and I get 4+ hours doing light work with these options.

Edit: Rosalindavenue is right. I can practically see my battery going down when I have it on max brightness. Never use max brightness when unplugged.

That just seems to bother me, I mean that is like saying, you get 4 hours of battery life if you choose to not use the many different features that you machine offers you. Now I am not one who is going to fret about battery life, and 2 hours isn't bad, IMHO. However, how many of us want the MacBook Pro for watching videos, listening to music, working with pictures, and doing some pretty heavy tasks on the go. While I don't think 2 hours is bad, I think that much improvement could be made, I would much rather have a system that I could use for 4 hours and do everything that I want.

 

[QuarterSwede]

That just seems to bother me, I mean that is like saying, you get 4 hours of battery life if you choose to not use the many different features that you machine offers you. Now I am not one who is going to fret about battery life, and 2 hours isn't bad, IMHO. However, how many of us want the MacBook Pro for watching videos, listening to music, working with pictures, and doing some pretty heavy tasks on the go. While I don't think 2 hours is bad, I think that much improvement could be made, I would much rather have a system that I could use for 4 hours and do everything that I want.

The Dual Core processor and display is what is sucking the battery life down the tube. Also, you have to remember that battery technology has been one of the slowest moving technologies. No notebook that has really great features lasts more than a couple of hours. It's just a limitation of the current technology.

 

[technicolor]

Did you calibrate your battery?

 

[yellow]

Sounds just like my PowerBook, which was supposed to have a 5 hour battery life. Uh-huh.. 5 hours. Riiiiiight.

 

[maestro55]

The Dual Core processor and display is what is sucking the battery life down the tube. Also, you have to remember that battery technology has been one of the slowest moving technologies. No notebook that has really great features lasts more than a couple of hours. It's just a limitation of the current technology.

That is certainly true, but that is no excuse. Apple needs to push to have better battery life in the Rev. B MBPs, a true 4 hours would certainly be nice on a new battery.

 

[sel1965]

I can get about 3.5 hours of battery life with my stock 2.0!

 

[Mord]

, make yourself a clear lid for your macbook buy a thin solar panel hook it up to your macbook under the lid and go out into the sun, then maybe you'll get a battery life near as good as mine.

 

[mark!]

I get 3:45 with full brightness & airport on, battery has been calibrated twice..whats up with you?

 

[blueflame]

I get 3:45 with full brightness & airport on, battery has been calibrated twice..whats up with you?

please prove that with some system profiler shots while unplugged. i definitly do not belive that, i get about 2:30 on full everything, light tasks. i get about 3 with screen 1 bar, bluetooth and wifi on, 3hr 15 min with 1 processor off.
andreas

 

[mmmcheese]

The Dual Core processor and display is what is sucking the battery life down the tube. Also, you have to remember that battery technology has been one of the slowest moving technologies. No notebook that has really great features lasts more than a couple of hours. It's just a limitation of the current technology.

I suspect that the LCD draws 3/4 of the power used by the machine when used for "light" work.

 

[ieani]

Its better than the Toshiba Qusmio or whatever that gets 45 minutes. Ugliest thing in the world and CNET praises it. Window$ loving bastards...

 

[SC68Cal]

I'm getting about 2 hours on a full charge with the brightness at max

There's your problem, noob. Displays eat battery life like Anna Nicole Smith after getting out of trimspa.

 

[MacsomJRR]

i just unplugged my mbp 2.0 5600HD and it sez 3:07 on a full charge. Screen on medium.

 

[mmmcheese]

i just unplugged my mbp 2.0 5600HD and it sez 3:07 on a full charge. Screen on medium.

I don't know about anyone else, but I've found that the battery estimate is about as accurate as Microsoft's progress bars...

 

[MacRumoron]

on a full charge my MBP says 2:57 screen brightness full

7200 rpm hard drive (if it matters)

 

[asherman13]

Apple has not, repeat has not rated the battery life of the MacBook Pro; the 3-to-3.5-hour battery life tests are user tests only. The Apple battery page has lots of information that will help.

Another way to save power is to manually turn off one of the processor cores. If you install the CHUD tools from XCode (on the Mac OS X Install Disc), you can add a menu option that lets you turn off one of the cores, which will save a good amount of battery power.

A note on calibration: the MacBook Pro, like the last two (or so) revs. of the PowerBook G4, requires that you fully charge it, use it/run down the battery until it sleeps, and then leave it unplugged for a few hours or whatnot (overnight when you won't need to take it with you the next day) and let the battery completely run out. Then, plug in your laptop, and let it charge (feel free to use it while doing so). Your laptop will then be fully calibrated according to Apple's standards of calibration.

 

[mmmcheese]

...
Another way to save power is to manually turn off one of the processor cores. If you install the CHUD tools from XCode (on the Mac OS X Install Disc), you can add a menu option that lets you turn off one of the cores, which will save a good amount of battery power.
...

Many users are reporting that deactivating a processor decreases battery life. This sort of makes sense since if you're doing a few small jobs, low frequency parallel processing will draw less power than one higher frequency processor (needed to handle the multiple jobs).

In any case, the processor isn't that big of a power draw compared to the screen.

 

[calebjohnston]

The battery life given to you in the specs is never what you get, we should all know that by now. To get the given lifetime, you need to have basically 1% brightness and then just stare at it.

 

[thegreatluke]

I'd like to add that unless you have bad vision and don't wear glasses, 1 bar out of 16 on the MBP is very readable and usable. It's not necessary to use 12, 8 or even 4 bars if you're doing Word/Safari etc.

Before I realized that 1 bar is usable, I used to use it on eight-ten bars, light work, no Rosetta or iSight, just Internet. I'd get around 3.5 hours.

Never listen to the estimate. They suck. When I got 3:30, it game me 3:00. They're always better than what it says, and they change all the time, depending on processor usage. (I just unplugged it curiously, with 1 bar and bluetooth on with only Safari open, and I got estimated 4:00.)

Guys, notebooks weren't meant for heavy things "on the go." When was the last time you did video editing as you're walking to your car? Heavy Photoshopping as you sat down on a bench? They're really made for heavy use while plugged in, and light use when not. Like internet when you sit down for a couple of minutes. When you do "heavy work," you're probably somewhere where you can plug it in anyway.

 

[BornAgainMac]

Isn't there a product such as a external battery that you can carry around and plug your laptop into to get additional battery power. I have seen something like that for the iPod. I wouldn't mind carry the extra battery if I could get 12 hours of battery life on average.

If the iBook replacement uses integrated graphics and a single core, and 4200 rpm drive and smaller screen then it may be the laptop people want if they consider the battery life the most important feature. Perhaps have a version using the iPod Nano drive but at 8 GBs and no DVD drive. The focus would be on a mobile laptop and not a gaming laptop.

 

[SC68Cal]

Buy a second battery, charge it, put it in your bag. Simple as that.

8 Gigs is not usable in a computer. At all. After you format it, that'd be around maybe 7 gigs, then how much of that is devoted to the OS? Doesn't leave you with enough room at all.

 

[LethalWolfe]

That is certainly true, but that is no excuse. Apple needs to push to have better battery life in the Rev. B MBPs, a true 4 hours would certainly be nice on a new battery.

That's pretty good advice. I mean, I'm sure Apple is currently telling it's battery supplier(s), "Hey, we want the shortest life battery ya'll got. Thanks."


Lethal