OS X 10.8.2 Restores Notebook Battery Life to OS X Lion Levels

[JHankwitz]

Am I reading this right that a SSD has a shorter battery life then a HDD? I would of thought something with moving parts used more power then something that has no moving parts.

Why would you think that? Once the disk is spinning, it takes next to no power to keep it going. Friction is near nonexistant and the tracking arm is so light it almost moves by itself. SSDs have millions of electrical paths that need to continually need to switch. When you have millions of switched compared to two simple parts, the millions adds up to more than the two.

 

[Passels]

Still Showing 10.8.1

After installing update... version still shows as 10.8.1... anyone have any idea why?

 

[baryon]

Looking at that graph, how come computers with SSDs have a shorter battery life? Shouldn't the lack of moving parts decrease power consumption?

EDIT: Post above explained it… lol

 

[DonRivella]

I am just surprised that it took Apple so long to fix this. Considering the very limited number of mobile hardware OSX is running on, trouble shooting should really be quicker.

 

[RipeRetina]

Almost certain its coinidence that I need to replace my battery because I've had below %20 battery life before Mountain Lion, I think. Either way, 10.8.2 will help!

 

[Jimrod]

Why, with seemingly every update to an OS does battery life seem to take a nose dive? Of all the things that piss people off this must be No.1 with new firmware and yet they still seem unable to test these things properly.

Concerned I've waited for my phone upgrade to be yet another next gen guinea-pig that presumes these massive corporations learn from their mistakes...

 

[flottenheimer]

Apple are you listening. Far too many products - hardware and software are being released that clearly need months more development testing. You mojo will be lost sooner rather than later if this continues.

I wonder what the iPhone 5 has wrong with it......

OS'es and software these days has become so complex that flawless code is almost impossible to deliver.

My Sony flatscreen has updated its OS twice since I bought it two months ago. My iPhone apps are constantly updating. My PS3 games are regularly being updated. My WiFi router has had several updates. My car had a software update last time I had it serviced. Heck, even my Canon DSLR has had 3 firmware updates.

Is it a pain? Yes, indeed. Is it avoidable? Nope.

The iPhone 5 / iOS 6 will have several flaws. But luckily they both can and will be fixed.

 

[whoknows87]

hopefully the release is soon

 

[applemag]

I"m very glad to see this (although I suppose you could argue they should have got something like this right at the beginning!. I suppose as the OS gets more complicated with more features it's bound to get through the battery quicker. But this seems like it'll be a very good update!

 

[Woodcrest64]

So excited about this! My retina macbook is getting 4 to 4.5 hours of battery life right now on 10.8.1

 

[shulerg]

Good. It hasn't been that bad for me, but the decrease in battery life in 10.8.0/1 is noticeable.

 

[wlossw]

I've lost about an hour. This is a welcome fix!

 

[dlastmango]

But is Safari snappier?

and would Steve allowed this?

 

[MacDav]

Great news!

 

[k995]

Wauw it takes apple only 2+ months and 2 releases to fix battery issues. Guess we have to wait for 2 releases before getting something decent .

 

[ixodes]

Now _this_ sounds like a very good update.

 

[k995]

Why would you think that? Once the disk is spinning, it takes next to no power to keep it going. Friction is near nonexistant and the tracking arm is so light it almost moves by itself. SSDs have millions of electrical paths that need to continually need to switch. When you have millions of switched compared to two simple parts, the millions adds up to more than the two.

Absolute bs, working an average hdd takes 6+ watt sss 1 to 4
Idle is the same hdd 4+ sdd 0.5 to 1.5

You dont realise that sdd isnt like ram, it only updates changes ( hence the solid parts in its name)

2,5. " the diffence is less but still existing

 

[HornetMontana]

Hi guys; I performed the tests for The Mac Observer. Some low speed, energy efficient HDDs have closed the gap in power consumption with SSDs, but YMMV.

FFS, WTF is YMMV.

 

[jassco2]

It was already stated in article. The HDD they happened to use was less draw then the SSD. My SSD(not intel 320) has less draw the the HDD they used in the article. This happened to be a 320 series review, but shows other SSDs.

They have a pretty varied power draw by brand.

Read:
http://www.anandtech.com/show/4244/intel-ssd-320-review/12

 

[ArmCortexA8]

Something is fishy about this article, because despite me having developer access there is no 12C45 build, as the latest is 12C43. So this statement "The big change came with 10.8.2, which is still undergoing developer testing. Using the latest build, 12C35, we saw a tremendous increase in battery life, to the point where running time was a few minutes longer than even that of 10.6.8." in reference to the 10.8.2 build is incorrect, as this build does not exist for developers to download.

 

[tanousjm]

FFS, WTF is YMMV.

YMMV = "Your mileage may vary," meaning that drives of all types, SSD and HDD, have different power requirements and that not everyone will get the exact results we did in our tests.

 

[HiRez]

Ahhh now I can upgrade. Always just a matter of waiting it out.

 

[tanousjm]

Something is fishy about this article, because despite me having developer access there is no 12C45 build, as the latest is 12C43. So this statement "The big change came with 10.8.2, which is still undergoing developer testing. Using the latest build, 12C35, we saw a tremendous increase in battery life, to the point where running time was a few minutes longer than even that of 10.6.8." in reference to the 10.8.2 build is incorrect, as this build does not exist for developers to download.

The build stated in the article is 12C35 (not 12C45 as you mention initially). It was released on August 29.

You're right in that the language of "latest build" is no longer correct. 12C35 was the latest build until September 5, when 12C43 came out. The research and testing took over 2 weeks to complete, and we missed the release of 12C43.

 

[HiRez]

I"m very glad to see this (although I suppose you could argue they should have got something like this right at the beginning!. I suppose as the OS gets more complicated with more features it's bound to get through the battery quicker. But this seems like it'll be a very good update!

True that the OS gets more complicated and power-hungry as time goes on, although that may be somewhat balanced out by newer power saving techniques (some software, some hardware).

But generally optimization is one of the last things you do (when you change things in the OS, you generally have to go back and retest and rewrite optimizations), so it makes some sense that early OS X major updates are less efficient than later ones.

 

[ArmCortexA8]

Interesting times indeed