MacBook Pro Users Express Concerns About Limited Battery Life

[MrX8503]

Stop using chrome

 

[djgamble]

Wow, hold the front page! Laptop battery lasts less time when using power hungry apps!

To quote Apple. "UP TO 10 hours battery life".

3 hours is "up to" 10 hours.
Use better designed apps.

E.g. Don't use Chrome because it's poorly coded and does lots of stuff in the background without your permission.

 

[Corrode]

I love all the expert opinions from those "glad" they didn't spend thousands of dollars on the new machine. None were ever going to. But if bashing the new one makes you feel better about your outdated equipment, MR seems to be the place to do this. I have the new machine. I think it's the best damn thing Apple has produced in years. Mine is exceeding expectations, especially battery life and the speed at which it charges.

I think a lot of complaints from owners are legitimate but I agree that a lot of people never planned or can't afford to buy and make themselves feel better by bashing a computer they never owned. Technological insecurity.

 

[WarDialer]

I'd hate to see what a non-pro MacBook of similar specs would get for battery performance.

 

[coolbreeze]

Did not having deep integration into the Apple eco system bother you at all on the surface? I would miss the hell out of iMessage and iCloud Photo Library. Not to mention all my iCloud Keychain stuff

I'm curious enough to possibly try a surface pro at some point, I'm just a bit hesitant. The battery life compared to iPad, touchscreen apps. App selection. Windows updates stalling the machine.

Maybe I'll give it a try when pro 5 comes. As it is now on my iPad Pro, I use Microsoft one note and love it infinitely more than Apple notes. If thats the kinda quality I could expect from Microsoft, I'll be happy as a mofo

I use Google Photos and LastPass. iMessage isn't a big deal since I have my phone/iPad near me always.

I never said the SP4 is flawless (to the rebuttal above). It's not for everyone, but I know the new MBP wasn't for me. YMMV and choices are fantastic.

 

[djgamble]

A majority of the people complaining about poor battery life are using Chrome and won't even entertain using Safari.

Yeah or Firefox. I don't get why people feel that installing Chrome is an elite thing to do.

Question... does ungoogled-Chromium use less battery life? (I believe it disables all the trackers and stuff).

 

[JohnnyGo]

This is a real issue. 15inch maxed, coming from 2013 15inch retina maxed.

Edited photos in Aperture today: 90 minutes.
Regular browsing with Safari, Mail, Messages, Tweetbot: 3-4h.

From Time Machine backup, might try clean install. What a hassle.

Try a clean install and let us know if battery life improves

 

[konqerror]

I bought a maxed out 13-inch Touch Bar model and I've been using it for about a week. With light use, I've been consistently getting around 5-6.5 hours when mainly browsing. Apple claims 10 hours wireless web but my battery has never lasted this long.

No they didn't. From Apple's tech specs:

Testing conducted by Apple in October 2016 using preproduction 2.9GHz dual-core Intel Core i5-based 13-inch MacBook Pro systems with a 512GB SSD and 8GB of RAM (wireless web test and iTunes movie playback test)

On top of that, you need to turn brightness down:

The wireless web test measures battery life by wirelessly browsing 25 popular websites with display brightness set to 12 clicks from bottom or 75%.

 

[zeram1]

Ah the new world of being an Apple post-beta guinea pig. Tim Cook is more concerned with making ride-sharing deals in India and China for $billions (or should I say rupees and yuans), than the North American $million dollar laptop market.

 

[Ellsass]

I've never had a laptop, including three MacBooks, get more than 50% of the advertised battery life, even with "normal" usage like browsing the web. I just assume I will only get half and adjust my expectations accordingly. It sucks, but it's just the way things are.

FWIW, I use Safari and get ~5 hours on my 2016 13" MBP which is about the same as my 2013 13" MBP. I'd love 10 hours but I never expected anything over 5.

 

[TMRJIJ]

External displays have their own power source.

It takes graphics power and battery power for MacBooks to use the display. He's not talking about powering the display. USB-C External Displays can charge this MBP while it's using resources. Others can not.

 

[simonmet]

You forgot a few:
-Keyboard is worse than previous generation
-Soldered components (cannot upgrade)
-three-finger drag issues on track pad
-Higher cost
-Gimmicky touch-bar
-Loss of mag-safe
-Loss of useful ports

For the sake of completeness:

-Integrated graphics downgrade in 15"
-Loss of optical audio

I tried the new 15" in the store and wasn't impressed with the touch bar which took longer to achieve certain common tasks (adjusting brightness and volume).

I think the only way I'll buy a new MacBook Pro again is if Apple releases a 15" without the touch bar. I don't want a gimmicky emoji display. Touch ID would be nice but I can live without it.

 

[bladerunner2000]

A majority of the people complaining about poor battery life are using Chrome and won't even entertain using Safari.

Safari isn't worth entertaining.

 

[randyrando]

I looked at your screenshot you had many apps running. Closing a window is not quitting ha. Try quitting chrome and Dropbox.

All the apps were closed. Activity monitor also shows a history of the previously opened apps. You need to look at the 'energy impact' column.

 

[smacrumon]

My thoughts are going out to all the loyal and passionate MacBook Pro users that have purchased one of the most expensive computing devices in recent history which is severely plagued with many critical issues. These customers have to stuff around now to get the issues fixed.

You have to wonder if Apple did enough testing on this device before release.

Apple Disgracebook late 2016. There are no other words to describe this.

 

[TMRJIJ]

Exactly! But the Apple apologists will still somehow come up with a bs counter-argument.

He made no argument at all. Everyone knows that Chrome is terribly coded and a resource hog

 

[bladerunner2000]

So just to sum up the new MacBook Pro:

-it doesn't connect to any devices easily
-it costs £400 more than previous versions
-the Speakers explode
-The graphics go crazy after 2 weeks
-The battery life is nonsense
-Keyboard is worse than previous generation
-Soldered components (cannot upgrade)
-three-finger drag issues on track pad
-Higher cost
-Gimmicky touch-bar
-Loss of mag-safe
-Loss of useful ports
-Loss optical audio

Pros:
-emojis to express your disappointment.

Updated your list.

God damn... this macbook is pig schlock.

 

[cmaier]

I think a lot of complaints from owners are legitimate but I agree that a lot of people never planned or can't afford to buy and make themselves feel better by bashing a computer they never owned. Technological insecurity.

True. In the various other battery threads that have been floating around the last couple of weeks, I see people generally happy with the new machines and able to get good battery life, usually after an SMC reset. Most of the "omg what a piece of crap!" posts seem to be from people who can't afford or weren't going to buy them anyway.

 

[Reticuli]

Its thinner tho!

 

[keysofanxiety]

Question... does ungoogled-Chromium use less battery life? (I believe it disables all the trackers and stuff).

I honestly don't know. The only times I've seen Chromium installed are on malware-ridden Windows systems, with very few exceptions.

Not to say Chromium is malware or that it's even bundled with PUPs. But it seems unusual that it's installed, especially for people who didn't look to install it. Plus it doesn't appear in Programs & Features either and the executable is exclusively floating around in AppData/ProgramData.

Just seems unusual. Though back to your original question: I don't know

 

[iBluetooth]

Don't use Chrome which is a known power hog. Test it by using Safari and tell us the numbers. By the way Safari has improved a lot and is now faster than Chrome, I think I will switch from Chrome to Safari.

 

[bladerunner2000]

Neither are power-user applications. If that beast cannot even run a multi-platform browser like Chrome properly, well, kiss that "Pro" moniker goodbye and spend that money on a machine that deserves the name.

You don't need the MacBook 'Pro' to fail at running Chrome to know that it's garbage. Just look at the specs, the price and now the GPU failures thanks to another shoddy 2011'esque AMD Radeon.

WHO WOULD BUY THIS THING?! LOL!!!!

 

[weup togo]

So just to sum up the new MacBook Pro:

- it doesn't connect to any devices easily
-it costs £400 more than previous versions
-the Speakers explode
-The graphics go crazy after 2 weeks
-The battery life is nonsense.

Pros:
-emojis to express your disappointment.

This deserves to appear on every page of this thread.

 

[Flore]

Try a clean install and let us know if battery life improves

I will, but I really don't have time for these experiments, that's one aspect of a "Pro" machine. Oh well. Here is for reference what my estimate says right now, light browsing on low screen brightness, internal graphics. Did SMCD reset by the way.

 

[TMRJIJ]

I will, but I really don't have time for these experiments, that's one aspect of a "Pro" machine. Oh well. Here is for reference what my estimate says right now, light browsing on low screen brightness, internal graphics. Did SMCD reset by the way.

That's pretty terrible.