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when did you guys replace your original battery?

a-m-k

a-m-k

macrumors 68000
Original poster
Sep 3, 2009
1,581
148
At what percentage of battery capacity do you start to consider replacing the battery. I'm at 15 months 289 cycles 5190 mAh out of the original 5450 mAh with a 95% capacity. Do I want to wait until it goes down to something like 10%, lower, sooner? If I let it run on the adapter when it goes down completely will I damage my MBP?

Just prepairing to know what to do when the time comes.

Thanks. :)
 
A low capacity (less than 50% health) battery does not damage your notebook.

Replace the battery whenever you feel you don't get as much battery life as you would like.

95% health after 200+ cycles is quite good. My MacBook has 216 cycles and "only" 91% health, but it is more than bearable (three to four hours battery life).
 
a-m-k said:
At what percentage of battery capacity do you start to consider replacing the battery. I'm at 15 months 289 cycles 5190 mAh out of the original 5450 mAh with a 95% capacity. Do I want to wait until it goes down to something like 10%, lower, sooner? If I let it run on the adapter when it goes down completely will I damage my MBP?

Just prepairing to know what to do when the time comes.

Thanks. :)
Click to expand...

Depends on your model. Do you have an unibody computer that is supposed to last for 1000 cycles or what?
Personally, I got ~700 cycles with 85% original capacity out of my Black MacBook, before I even thought about replacing it.
Anyway, you'll know when the time comes to replace it. If you feel it isnt lasting it as long as it used to, and you can't stand it, do yourself a favour and buy a new one. Otherwise, if it's working fine for you, keep the one you have.
You can also run your macbook without the battery in it, it's perfectly fine. I also ran my PowerBook for about 2 years with a dead battery and nothing ever went wrong...
 
mgartner0622 said:
Depends on your model. Do you have an unibody computer that is supposed to last for 1000 cycles or what?
Personally, I got ~700 cycles with 85% original capacity out of my Black MacBook, before I even thought about replacing it.
Anyway, you'll know when the time comes to replace it. If you feel it isnt lasting it as long as it used to, and you can't stand it, do yourself a favour and buy a new one. Otherwise, if it's working fine for you, keep the one you have.
You can also run your macbook without the battery in it, it's perfectly fine. I also ran my PowerBook for about 2 years with a dead battery and nothing ever went wrong...
Click to expand...

You can run it without it, although I would just leave the battery in, even if it doesn't work well. That way, if you accidentally pull the magsafe, you at least have a minute to put it back in, rather than the computer instantly dying
 
On my original 2.0 GHz MB I had it replaced under Apple care at around the 200 mark. I know a lot of people that had this done including my brother and 3 friends. As for the second battery, it's got about 225 cycles on it and I still get about 4 hours use, 5 if I turn the screen down to about 30%.
 
My macbook pro...

is the alluminum one that has the black boarder around the screen that is 13.3 inches in size and has the option to illuminate the keyboard in a darker room.

Model identifier is MacBookPro 5,5. (I can't tell if it's "5.5 or 5,5" even with corrective lenses to correct astigmatism its sometimes hard to tell.)
 
a-m-k said:
is the alluminum one that has the black boarder around the screen that is 13.3 inches in size and has the option to illuminate the keyboard in a darker room.

Model identifier is MacBookPro 5,5. (I can't tell if it's "5.5 or 5,5" even with corrective lenses to correct astigmatism its sometimes hard to tell.)
Click to expand...

That's the same model that I have! These are designed to go to one thousand charge cycles before the battery reaches 80% of it's health. You're good for a long time!
Good choice by the way. :)
 
mgartner0622 said:
That's the same model that I have! These are designed to go to one thousand charge cycles before the battery reaches 80% of it's health. You're good for a long time!
Good choice by the way. :)
Click to expand...

LOL, thank you, but it was the ONLY choice. I WAS going to get the whitey because I used it before. (My brother who doesn't live where I am, and his wife has one.) My dad and I went to two seperate Best Buys. Though, I suppose I could have gotten the white one, but I don't think it was readily available. I probably would have gotten the white macbook. Though, I am not sure if it would have the one thing that attracted me to the MBP anyway. (Garageband.) I want to get a demo going....)
 
I think this is awesome, but I don't know why?

My battery is is the middle of a charging session (almost done), the last time I wrote, I had a 95% battery capacity, and it's now jumped to at least a 97% capacity. Great. but why did it do that. I am not sure if I will get the full 100% capacity back after the full charge. I am in the middle of the callobration/recharge thing. (I don't remember now.) Does callobration improve capacity?

Man, I love my MBP. Certainally a lot less stressful to deal with than the old family laptop. :) (Or as we call an expensive paperweight.)
 
Do you guys all keep track of how many cycles you've had with the battery, or is there a way to tell?
 
Wow just checked my cycles.... not even a year old with 277 cycles! AppleCare says the battery loses charge after 250 or so cycles.... O boy haha
 
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