Yet another battery thread (MBA 2012)

[Andrei221]

I bought a Macbook Air in late 2013. It was my first macbook, and I was really satisfied about it. The battery life was great, everything was great.

After the 1 year warranty was gone (for a premium product, I consider the warranty to be a bit too less), the problems started. The battery sits now at 81-82% health, right after the warranty is over. I can get only 4 hours of normal usage (web browsing with safari).

I do not know what to do in this situation, is there any way in which I can calibrate my battery? It was my first and last time when I bought an Apple product. As a student, I tried to save money in order to get this laptop after the problems i have had with Dell laptops, but it seems that Apple products suffer from the same issues, and they have less warranty too.

Battery life is extremely important for me, and i thought that i will buy a laptop which will function as advertised (for a number of 1000 cycles, the battery should not go below 80%. it did not go below 80%, but it sits at 82% and the performance is weak in my opinion)


I am sorry Apple, it was nice to use your products, but me and my friends are not going to buy them anymore, unfortunately.

I hope that I can find a solution in order to calibrate it, or do something. I do not really want to pay for a replacement battery, because instead of doing that I would sell this laptop and get one with windows on it. It is a pity that i could barely afford this, and that it did not met my expectations.

MacBook Air (13-inch Mid 2012), OS X Yosemite (10.10.2), Manufactured in early 2013

Is there any e-mail apple support? My country does not have an official apple store.

 

[Samuelsan2001]

Apple care

I bought a Macbook Air in late 2013. It was my first macbook, and I was really satisfied about it. The battery life was great, everything was great.

After the 1 year warranty was gone (for a premium product, I consider the warranty to be a bit too less), the problems started. The battery sits now at 81-82% health, right after the warranty is over. I can get only 4 hours of normal usage (web browsing with safari).

I do not know what to do in this situation, is there any way in which I can calibrate my battery? It was my first and last time when I bought an Apple product. As a student, I tried to save money in order to get this laptop after the problems i have had with Dell laptops, but it seems that Apple products suffer from the same issues, and they have less warranty too.

Battery life is extremely important for me, and i thought that i will buy a laptop which will function as advertised (for a number of 1000 cycles, the battery should not go below 80%. it did not go below 80%, but it sits at 82% and the performance is weak in my opinion)


I am sorry Apple, it was nice to use your products, but me and my friends are not going to buy them anymore, unfortunately.

I hope that I can find a solution in order to calibrate it, or do something. I do not really want to pay for a replacement battery, because instead of doing that I would sell this laptop and get one with windows on it. It is a pity that i could barely afford this, and that it did not met my expectations.

MacBook Air (13-inch Mid 2012), OS X Yosemite (10.10.2), Manufactured in early 2013

Is there any e-mail apple support? My country does not have an official apple store.

Apple care would have covered that for three years.

Try Contacting apple they may replace your battery if it hasn't been too long past your warranty. Apple website and log into your account go to support and talk to someone online.

Buying something where you have no support in your country is a decision you have made and now have to live with. An apple certified technician could probably replace it for a couple of hundred dollars if it comes to it.

 

[motrek]

...
After the 1 year warranty was gone (for a premium product, I consider the warranty to be a bit too less), the problems started. The battery sits now at 81-82% health, right after the warranty is over. I can get only 4 hours of normal usage (web browsing with safari).
...

It sounds to me like nothing is wrong with your battery.

It's very easy for certain web pages to use a lot of CPU power.

You are probably visiting some of these web pages or keeping them open.

I don't know if Safari has a way to see which web pages are using how much CPU power but I'd do that before I start blaming the battery, which seems like it's working fine.

Chrome does have a way to see which web pages are consuming power.

EDIT: another quick question: you've had the laptop for a year and you have over 300 charge cycles. That means you are completely discharging your laptop almost every day. Maybe you're not able to plug in the laptop during the day and you have to use it all day, but I wanted to make sure you're aware that keeping it plugged in is better for the battery.

 

[Andrei221]

I keep it plugged in mostly in my charger. It is manufactured in 02.2013 and i bought it around 05.2013.

The EU consumer laws maybe should help me too with the warranty.
About the browsing - nothing too fancy - facebook, forums such as macrumors and that's it

 

[motrek]

I keep it plugged in mostly in my charger. It is manufactured in 02.2013 and i bought it around 05.2013.

The EU consumer laws maybe should help me too with the warranty.
About the browsing - nothing too fancy - facebook, forums such as macrumors and that's it

Just saying the names of web sites gives us no information about how much power they use.

I can't find a way in Safari to get it to tell me how much CPU power any given tab is using.

I would recommend switching to Chrome and if you think your battery is draining too fast, you can use its Task Manager window to see which tabs are causing the problem.

 

[Andrei221]

Chrome uses even more resources than safari

 

[GGJstudios]

After the 1 year warranty was gone (for a premium product, I consider the warranty to be a bit too less), the problems started. The battery sits now at 81-82% health, right after the warranty is over.

That is still considered healthy, as Apple won't replace batteries until they've dropped below 80% before 1000 cycles.

I can get only 4 hours of normal usage (web browsing with safari).

There are many factors that impact your battery life. See the BATTERY LIFE FROM A CHARGE section of the following link for details, including tips on how to maximize your battery life.

I do not know what to do in this situation, is there any way in which I can calibrate my battery?

The built-in batteries in the newer Mac unibody notebooks come pre-calibrated and do not require regular calibration like the removable batteries in older Apple notebooks. Also, calibration has nothing to do with battery health. It only served to make readings more accurate, and is no longer needed on current Apple notebook batteries.

The link below should answer most, if not all, of your battery/charging questions, including tips for maximizing battery performance. If you haven’t already done so, I highly recommend you take the time to read it.

Apple Notebook Battery FAQ​

 

[motrek]

Chrome uses even more resources than safari

You don't seem to have any idea which tabs are using how much power in Safari so you'll excuse me if I don't trust your "data" about how much power Chrome uses.

You say that you're just doing some basic/light web browsing but then say you're using Facebook. If your Facebook feed is anything like mine, then it's full of Flash videos that start streaming and playing as soon as you mouse over them. That takes a HUGE amount of CPU/battery power.

It sounds to me like you have no problems with your battery and the problem is that you don't understand how much power certain activities require on your computer and you seem to be unwilling to investigate and inform yourself.

 

[Andrei221]

Chome is known to be one of the worst browsers on Mac. Fact.

Facebook, as far as I know, does not use flash in order to play the videos. Despite of this, the option to auto play the videos is turned off by me.

 

[motrek]

Chome is known to be one of the worst browsers on Mac. Fact.
...

Some people I respect share and agree with your opinion.

Others do not.

I have always used Chrome on OS X and it has never used an inordinate amount of memory or CPU power for me.

You say it's fact, how about you post some data to prove your point?

----------

...
Facebook, as far as I know, does not use flash in order to play the videos. Despite of this, the option to auto play the videos is turned off by me.

I see you are unwilling to make any effort to try to figure out why your battery is draining so quickly.

So fine, go replace your stupid battery. Pay a lot of money to get a new one. Come back to this forum when it gives you the same battery life as the old one. It's the circle of idiocy.

 

[flur]

FWIW - I noticed my battery was draining really fast and it turned out to be a seemingly innocuous site - dictionary.com. I've no idea why, but once I stopped leaving that tab open, my battery life went back to normal. It wasn't flash - I have that blocked. So...it can happen.

 

[g.t. rags]

did anyone else notice in the right picture that it said the computer is 12+ years old

 

[GGJstudios]

did anyone else notice in the right picture that it said the computer is 12+ years old

If I recall correctly, that's a screen shot of coconutBattery, which has been known to have issues with accuracy, especially with the age reading.

 

[technosix]

Chrome uses even more resources than safari

True.

It's my favorite highly stable and fast browser. I'm using it on all my Apple products and my Androids and PC's.

For years I was a huge Safari and Firefox loyalist. Then we went to Chrome in the engineering lab where I work. Wow, I was so immediately impressed that I switched at home as well.

I've been completely happy.

 

[FuNGi]

did anyone else notice in the right picture that it said the computer is 12+ years old

I saw that too. Lol. No wonder the battery's not so hot.

 

[Andrei221]

Down to 80% in just a few days.

 

[SSD-GUY]

Down to 80% in just a few days.

Call Apple. In the EU you should be given a 2 year warranty as standard and Apple know this know, just takes a little convincing. I too am facing battery problems. At first the battery was amazing, but now, almost a year later my battery health is down to 90% with only 150 cycles!

 

[Andrei221]

I will call Apple. At this moment I e-mailed the retailers from my country

 

[motrek]

Down to 80% in just a few days.

This statistic fluctuates by +/- a few percent every few days anyway.

It might go up to 82% tomorrow.

You have to stop with this nonsense, stop thinking anything is wrong with your battery because it's working just fine, and start trying to figure out what's using power on your computer.

----------

Call Apple. In the EU you should be given a 2 year warranty as standard and Apple know this know, just takes a little convincing. I too am facing battery problems. At first the battery was amazing, but now, almost a year later my battery health is down to 90% with only 150 cycles!

How is 90% a problem?

You people are insane.

 

[SSD-GUY]

This statistic fluctuates by +/- a few percent every few days anyway.

It might go up to 82% tomorrow.

You have to stop with this nonsense, stop thinking anything is wrong with your battery because it's working just fine, and start trying to figure out what's using power on your computer.

----------



How is 90% a problem?

You people are insane.

If a battery is meant to keep 80% of it's capacity at around a 1000 cycles, how is 90% health in less than 20% of that time good? It's basic maths, I'm just using the current data that I have to make a judgement call about the future of the battery, i.e, by the time it reaches 300 cycles, it could already be at 80% health which is quite bad.

 

[GGJstudios]

If a battery is meant to keep 80% of it's capacity at around a 1000 cycles, how is 90% health in less than 20% of that time good?

Because it's not a straight line decline. It may decline faster at some times than others, may remain at the same level for a long time, may even go back up at times. You can't accurately predict when it will hit 80%, based on the past decline rate. ... as stated in the Battery FAQ I posted earlier.

 

[SSD-GUY]

Because it's not a straight line decline. It may decline faster at some times than others, may remain at the same level for a long time, may even go back up at times. You can't accurately predict when it will hit 80%, based on the past decline rate. ... as stated in the Battery FAQ I posted earlier.

Be that as it may, I think an exponential decline isn't out of the question. Within 500 cycles theres a 95% chance within two CIs that the battery health will be at 80%

 

[motrek]

Be that as it may, I think an exponential decline isn't out of the question. Within 500 cycles theres a 95% chance within two CIs that the battery health will be at 80%

I like how you clearly have no idea how batteries work but you're pretty sure that charge capacity declines either linearly or exponentially.

Go ahead, go complain to Apple that your battery is still functioning within specs.