MacBook Pro(Late2008-Early2009) Battery Life with Lion

[dixonraj]

My batteries health is at 84% with 367 cycles. I only average around two hours on my battery. I have tried conditioning the battery but just can't get anymore out of it. Does anyone know of a good replacement battery that can get me better battery life? I thought about biting the bullet and paying the $130 for a new one from Apple but did not know if the battery life would really improve enough to justify the price.

Thanks

 

[GGJstudios]

My batteries health is at 84% with 367 cycles. I only average around two hours on my battery. I have tried conditioning the battery but just can't get anymore out of it. Does anyone know of a good replacement battery that can get me better battery life? I thought about biting the bullet and paying the $130 for a new one from Apple but did not know if the battery life would really improve enough to justify the price.

Thanks

I wouldn't trust or recommend any non-Apple battery, due to the number of problems reported with "knockoff" batteries. Also, there is no assurance that knockoff batteries have the same charging technology that Apple uses, involving the battery, the MagSafe adapter and the Mac's logic board.

There are many factors that impact your battery life. See the BATTERY LIFE FROM A CHARGE section of the following link for details.

This should answer most, if not all, of your battery questions:

Apple Notebook Battery FAQ​

 

[sweetbrat]

I can't say how much the battery life will improve, but I personally wouldn't purchase a replacement battery from anyone except Apple. There's been too many problems with defective/bulging batteries. Saving a few bucks isn't worth the risk of ruining your computer or possibly getting injured. Just my 2¢.

 

[thundersteele]

@OP

84% is 84%. While these readings tend to fluctuate slightly, there's nothing you can do to actually increase the battery life.
A replacement battery should have 100% health... from 84% thats not a big improvement - at most 30 more minutes.

The best you can do is to try to minimize your power consumption:
- reduce screen brightness
- turn of bluetooth, keyboard backlight (and wireless if you don't use it)
- reduce CPU usage (e.g. use Safari instead of Chrome, no flash videos)

You could in principle downgrade to snow leopard, which might give a better battery life on these old machines.

 

[dixonraj]

Thanks for everyone's feedback! I am going to see if there there is anything I can shut off or processes to stop. Hopefully that will help. Thanks again!