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Quick MBP 13" poll, please take part

R

ryans79

macrumors regular
Original poster
Apr 12, 2009
226
0
Hey there!
I'm in 2 minds if to take my new MBP to the shop or not, heres the deal:

When i lower my screen brightness to 50% and keyboard brightness to 50% and have wifi on (like it says on the apple site) but **dont do ANY work**... just leave it on like that i am getting 7hrs 10-20mins battery life.

But if I browse around or do anything else like type an email etc i am getting 4-5hrs.
Which in one way is right on apples specs of a 7hr battery but its not really true because no one buys a laptop just to keep it on for 7hrs.

Would appreciate your input on what battery life you are getting in a normal day's use
(i have not used the poll functions of this forum because i think there are different variables from user to user)

Thanks!
 
ryans79 said:
Hey there!
I'm in 2 minds if to take my new MBP to the shop or not, heres the deal:

When i lower my screen brightness to 50% and keyboard brightness to 50% and have wifi on (like it says on the apple site) but **dont do ANY work**... just leave it on like that i am getting 7hrs 10-20mins battery life.

But if I browse around or do anything else like type an email etc i am getting 4-5hrs.
Which in one way is right on apples specs of a 7hr battery but its not really true because no one buys a laptop just to keep it on for 7hrs.

Would appreciate your input on what battery life you are getting in a normal day's use
(i have not used the poll functions of this forum because i think there are different variables from user to user)

Thanks!
Click to expand...

I get 4-5 Hours with my 2.26 13 inch, on 1/2 brightness and wifi.

i guess that's pretty normal.
 
Sounds right to me. And you'll have many other people telling you the same thing, with long boring explanations about how why this is so. Do an search and you will find that your battery is fine.
 
Sounds about right. Roughly 5 hours at 50% brightness, wifi on, web browsing, mail, messenger, etc. running with the occasional other program here and there.

Mid '09 2.26 13"
 
Same here -- about 4-5hrs with 50-60% brightness, wifi on and browsing. Given the power of these machines, I think that's pretty good.
 
I get about 4-4.5 hours with mine, screen is on 75% brightness and keyboard backlight about the same. My WiFi is on all the time, plus I monitor the CPU temp and fan speed and adjust what I do accordingly to get the extra hours out of the battery.

I'd love it to last 7 hours! I'm guessing Apple did a test with the screen on its dimmest setting, the backlight on the keyboard off, hard drive having hardly any access, bt and WiFi turned off at a steady room temperature. I don't expect my battery to last that long.

I put mine to sleep rather than power it off over night too, that eats some juice too

pac
 
I use it at maybe 3 bars of brightness, keyboard light off (I don't need to see any keys, the light just distracts me :p ), Wi-Fi on (5GHz Airport Extreme N network), and Safari, iChat, Mail (push), and iTunes. Maybe 5-7 hours is what I usually get.

Install Clicktoflash. It disables all Flash until you specifically click on that instance of Flash in a page, it drastically improves battery life. I can get closer to 8 hours with it on Snow Leopard, 2.26GHz MBP 13"

Hope this helps!
 
Thanks for replying guys, looks like nothing wrong with my battery after all... but i am feeling a bit gypped.
After reading what was written on the apple site and the tech sites like Ars i expected 7hrs of battery when just browsing sites (no flash) and using a word processor... which made me spring for a new MBP at a not-so-good financial time.

I never tried leaving it on without touching it, though.
Click to expand...
Nope, you gotta be a special kind of nuts to do that... I come from a rare breed :)

plus I monitor the CPU temp and fan speed and adjust what I do accordingly to get the extra hours out of the battery.
Click to expand...
Mind telling a new Mac user like me...how do you do that? any special tools? I only know of activity monitor.

@omgitscro, thanks, installed click2flash, didnt know about that...
any other tools anyone recommends?
I mainly use FF because of its add ons, didnt know Safari suppored stuff like that. (i do monitor FF via the utilities->activity monitor to make sure its not the hog)
3bars of brightness? Dude! You must have awesome sight because anything less than 50% and i really cant work. If you didnt get 7hrs(at least) with 3 bars it _would_ be a crime!

Sorry i forgot to write in the beginning, BT is off as well, no music,chat,movies,flash and my MBP is around 45days old.

Cheers!
 
ryans79 said:
Thanks for replying guys, looks like nothing wrong with my battery after all... but i am feeling a bit gypped.
After reading what was written on the apple site and the tech sites like Ars i expected 7hrs of battery when just browsing sites (no flash) and using a word processor... which made me spring for a new MBP at a not-so-good financial time.


Nope, you gotta be a special kind of nuts to do that... I come from a rare breed :)


Mind telling a new Mac user like me...how do you do that? any special tools? I only know of activity monitor.

@omgitscro, thanks, installed click2flash, didnt know about that...
any other tools anyone recommends?
I mainly use FF because of its add ons, didnt know Safari suppored stuff like that. (i do monitor FF via the utilities->activity monitor to make sure its not the hog)
3bars of brightness? Dude! You must have awesome sight because anything less than 50% and i really cant work. If you didnt get 7hrs(at least) with 3 bars it _would_ be a crime!

Sorry i forgot to write in the beginning, BT is off as well, no music,chat,movies,flash and my MBP is around 45days old.

Cheers!
Click to expand...

iStat menus. Works awesome for monitoring CPU/fans/memory & more:
http://www.islayer.com/apps/istatmenus/
 
every computer company touts their battery at "best case scenario"

no one in the real world could actually get those times. there are so many variables like, wifi, the sites your surfing, that play a factor in battery drainage. therefore anytime you see an advertised battery time take off about 2 hours and you will have the "real world" time.

kinda like the sexual partners rule. ask a guy how many women he has slept with, take their number and divide by 2 and you will have the correct answer.

ask a women the same, but multiply by 2 and you got it.
 
jfyrfytr25 said:
kinda like the sexual partners rule. ask a guy how many women he has slept with, take their number and divide by 2 and you will have the correct answer.

ask a women the same, but multiply by 2 and you got it.
Click to expand...

LOL! Thanks! Needed that laugh!:D

There are exceptions to every rule though, for example, a "friend" of mine used to work in a pron production company... and after the shoots "he" used to get with some of the models, but when my...umm, his girlfriend asked him how many before her it just didnt make sense to give the correct number... because of the fight that would follow later on.
 
ryans79 said:
LOL! Thanks! Needed that laugh!:D

There are exceptions to every rule though, for example, a "friend" of mine used to work in a pron production company... and after the shoots "he" used to get with some of the models, but when my...umm, his girlfriend asked him how many before her it just didnt make sense to give the correct number... because of the fight that would follow later on.
Click to expand...

absolutely there are exceptions. like ugly fat girls. they follow the same rule as men. divide by two...
 
Unfortunately, even those end up fat and ugly after marriage and a birth or two.

It's really a lose/lose situation.
 
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