Need help with reading iStat!

[MrRoyksopp]

Hello Guys.

- I just want to ask if anybody could give me some help to read/understand the iStat Pro widget on my dashboard.
The one which interests me most, is the battery part.

How low should the battery health get, before I should worry about it, and can you bring the health up again?

And what does "cycles" mean?

Thanks!

 

[imaketouchtheme]

The battery health is just the overall life the battery is. The health will never go up, it will only go down. Also, you can assume that 90% battery health will give you 90% of how long the computer could originally last.

For example, let's say your MacBook/Pro could last 6 hours brand new. If you had 90% health, it would then last 5.4 hours. 80% health would be 4.8 hours and so on and so forth.

Cycles refers to how many times the battery has been charged.

 

[MrRoyksopp]

The battery health is just the overall life the battery is. The health will never go up, it will only go down. Also, you can assume that 90% battery health will give you 90% of how long the computer could originally last.

For example, let's say your MacBook/Pro could last 6 hours brand new. If you had 90% health, it would then last 5.4 hours. 80% health would be 4.8 hours and so on and so forth.

Cycles refers to how many times the battery has been charged.

Great, thank you!
- Is it good or bad to have many cycles then? Or doesn't it even matter?

 

[JonasDK]

For understanding the iStat widget, read: http://islayer.com/help/terminology/

About the battery in Apple Notebooks: http://www.apple.com/batteries/notebooks.html

Also, define 'many cycles'. Taken from the link above: 'The built-in battery of your MacBook, MacBook Pro or MacBook Air is designed to deliver up to 1000 full charge and discharge cycles before it reaches 80 percent of its original capacity.'

 

[iphonsteve4ajob]

Great, thank you!
- Is it good or bad to have many cycles then? Or doesn't it even matter?

It matters when your laptop starts to age. But I think its relative. Depending on when your computer was made the battery is rated to retain an 80% charge up to 1000 cycles, and differs for each model of Mac.

http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1519

Website above will give you lots of information. Most "new owners" of Macs are pretty paranoid about their total "current capacity," relative to the battery's "design capacity." If your design capacity is 6700 mAh, and your battery's capacity is reading 6650 mAh, then you are at 99% capacity. This number fluctuates up and down - as low as 93-94 as high as 101, 102 in some cases.

Sure if you bought a new computer and it reads 85% after a proper calibration, it might be warranted to take it in for a check up.

Ultimately, batt capacity is important to owners because as it drops so does your usage time. You may be getting close to 7hrs with your new laptop and 2 years later only 4hrs.

Apple will install laptop batteries for owners when they purchase the battery. It's pretty moderate about $129 last I checked for a friend's MBP. Something to consider when updating an older laptop.