RMBP - battery life improvements?

[johnhalsted]

From everything I read with mavericks and its power saving features we are supposed to be getting maybe an extra hour, but I don't see any improvement

Just been watching a .mp4 1080p movie on battery, 65% after 1 hour 19

Estimating a battery life of 3 hour 24 (total) according to activity monitor.
VlC using about 20% CPU and 150mb ram (while movie is playing), and was also using discreet graphics card

I don't expect the battery to be much better, but I was getting more before update, I would normally be getting 4 hours +

Anyone else notice anything similar?

Details:
Updated to mavericks not clean format (maybe that did something?)

Retina macbook pro 2.6 i7
16gb ram
512

brightness about 70%
volume about 70% also
Battery health 94%

Im not moaning I'm just curious is anyone has noticed any improvements ?

p.s film was RIPD, 5.5/10

 

[Atomic Walrus]

I don't have any stats one way or the other yet, but try this:
-Download "gfxCardStatus" - I know it's an vague unknown app, but many of us on this forum have been using it for years.
-Once it's running, exit anything that wants to use the dGPU and switch to "integrated graphics only." I can promise you VLC does NOT need the 750m (HD 5200 is ~80% as fast as 750m and even an HD 3000 could handle HD video playback without issue).
-Re-run the same test (play the same video for the same time with the same software). *Edit: Re-read your post, I won't make you watch the same movie again. Just make sure it's in the same format (same quality + codec) if possible.

Battery life quoted by Apple is always in iGPU mode; the dGPU is far less power efficient and will drain your battery almost twice as quickly in some cases.

And to repeat myself for the 500th time, Apple needs to add this functionality to OS X.

 

[johnhalsted]

Thanks i shall give it a try tomorrow but I just did another test

Made sure all apps are closed accept caffeine to stop it from sleeping, 70% brightness, bluetooth off, keyboard lights off,

Left for 10 mins and took dog out

Its just idling on desktop at 55%, 2 hours 30 remaining.

I also just reset SMC as i have had that problem

Surely just idling even at 55% I should get maybe 4 hours+?

Literally only app i have open is caffeine