Anomalous Battery Behavior/Reporting

Hi guys,
I've had my 3G since the summer of 2008 and I will be the first to admit I have not taken the greatest care of the battery in this time span (I tend to charge it overnight, and this often translates to overcharging especially when it's not that low). This isn't a complaint about reduced charge capacity.
Lately I've started to notice with the recent OS update that my battery has not been reporting its charge status accurately. I enabled battery % in the iPhone options and also pay attention to the "graphic" meter next to the percentage on the desktop.
Here's a novel example of what is going on: Last night before bed, I checked my phone and it said the battery was at 100% and the battery graphic reflected this. I knew this was wrong because I used the phone quite a bit yesterday but nevertheless I said okay fine, I won't charge it tonight. Fast forward to 20 minutes ago. I check my phone and the battery says it is at 1% in the red, and the graphic reflects that 1% status. Shortly after, the phone shutdown b/c of low batt.
I plug it in, it turns on and shows the lightning bolt and an empty battery with a tiny bit of red. 30 seconds later, the meter shows 30% full and is now green. 5 minutes after that, the charge meter is still green, but now says 20%.
What should I make of this behavior?

Hi iBook fan
Apple recommend that the battery be 'exercised' once a month, which means fully charging it until the charger turns green, and then using it solely on the battery, until it gets so low that that your laptop goes to sleep. Then once more charge it to full, and that is sufficient to keep the battery calibrated.
In between, you can run it either on battery or charger, however there is no need to have it on the charger all the time. But, if you are doing power intensive activities like burning disks, or performing a long operation like a backup where you don't want the power to fail, then using the charger is recommended in those circumstances.
In this Apple Doc. Apple Notebooks you may like to read the section on Standard Maintenance:
Apple Notebooks
regards roam

Similar Messages

  • GS60 Pro - Erratic battery behavior

    My GS60 Ghost Pro has a strange battery behavior since I got it earlier this week.
    As an example, I did a powercfg -batteryreport and got something like this:
    16:23:34   Active    AC    98 %    53,291 mWh
    16:32:36   Active    Battery    98 %    53,280 mWh
    16:34:44   Active    AC    98 %    53,280 mWh
    17:05:58   Active    Battery    98 %    53,280 mWh
    17:06:04   Active    AC    98 %    53,280 mWh
    17:09:11   Active    Battery    98 %    53,280 mWh
    17:09:17   Active    AC    98 %    53,280 mWh
    17:18:27   Active    Battery    98 %    53,280 mWh
    17:18:33   Active    AC    98 %    53,280 mWh
    As you can see, it switches between AC and Battery by itself while being plugged in. It happens randomly. Other times charge goes to -1 mWh:
    20:52:40   Active    AC    100 %    53,860 mWh
    21:19:44   Active    Battery    -   -1 mWh
    21:19:47   Active    AC    100 %    53,860 mWh
    21:34:49   Active    Battery    -   -1 mWh
    21:34:52   Active    AC    100 %    53,860 mWh
    I have also managed to get a "Battery not detected" message while the laptop was not even plugged. Powercfg reported:
     Installed batteries
    Information about each currently installed battery
    No batteries are currently installed
    Again, the laptop was running from the battery when getting this message.
    I have tried to do an EC reset and to run the MSI battery calibration tool, but this has not fixed the issue.
    Is there anything else I can try? Or is the battery defective and I should contact MSI already?

    No, it`s really simple, hold your finger on an icon for a few seconds before they start to wriggle, and hit Delete, or "X" i`m not sure.

  • Early 2011 MBP 17 Random Shutdown and Battery Behavior

    Hi all, new to the forums here.
    I recently purchased a refurbished early 2011 MBP 17' 2.2 Ghz i7 with 8gb and 10.7.5. Out of the box, machine looked great, but I noticed that the power cable was different than the one I had for my early 2011 MBP 15' I have for work. This raised an immediate redflag (buying from a refurb site outside of apple is always a cause for concern IMO) so I abstained from using that charger until I knew a little more. I plugged in the machine and booted it up and everything worked great. The batter was close to 100%, so after charging for approximately 20 min, I unplugged it, and the laptop immediately died. I powered it back on, and the harddrive began to spin for a few seconds, then the same result, total loss of power. Started up again, and I was able to boot into OS X and play around for a bit for a period of time before again, shut down.
    For the next few days, same story. I was able to at one point, drain the battery completely and do a full cycle charge. The first time I did this, no change in behavior. Again, a few days later, I was able to drain the battery and perform a full cycle charge, but this time, a major change in behvior. Since the second full cycle charge, I have had absolutely no power problems. I haven't really "pushed" my MBP to see if fully utilizing the CPU/RAM/GPU will produce the similar results I had early, but it appears that everything is working great.
    Here a few interesting notes to my situation.
    When I was first operating the system (when plugged in, there were no shutdowns, only while on the battery) I pulled up my system report, and noticed that my battery cycle was very low (~5). This seemed odd, because I had opted for a used battery instead of a new one.
    Prior to reinstalling Mountain Lion, my volume up key would trigger a few strange events. The screen for briefly get quite bright, then all open applications + the doc and widgets would restart (similar to killing explorer.exe in the windows task manager).
    Since performing the fresh install, I have had abslutely no issue with my MBP and I love it, its a beautiful machine. However, as I purchased refurb, I'm hesitant to proceed (I will exceed my return period in ~2 weeks) without knowing my machine is in prime working condition. I have read issues about early 2011 models having issues with batteries and GPUs, but my symptoms were dissimilar to those described by others with those particular issues.
    Any thoughts?
    I have a genius appointment tomorrow evening for a general diagnostics check, but if others have experienced these issues, I would appreciate some input.

    Do a SMC reset:
    http://support.apple.com/kb/ht3964
    Run an Apple Hardware Test:
    http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1509
    You may need to use OPTION D to start it.
    Install iStat pro and open Activity Monitor.  Set Activity Monitor to show 'All Processes' and '%CPU' to display values from high to low.  Post images of the two such as these:
    Ciao.

  • Weird Battery Behavior in 7.1.1

    Has anyone else noticed weird behavior after upgrading to 7.1.1 - on my 5s its not that the battery is draining quickly - in fact its showin 5 hours 40 minutes usage with 75% remaining - which i find hard to believe
    whats weird is standby time equals the usage time but i have turnd off and aback on the iPhone - I even did a hard reset - i have a monitor program which is showing the cpu as mostly idling at 90% or more ( although the monitor probably doesnt know about the M7 chip - it probably doesnt even know about the A7 chip too)
    The battery percentage is not going down quickly - it seems to be thr same rate as with 7.1 but i dont believe these numbers
    Im going to let the battery drain completely and do a battery calibration - that some times helps after IOS upgrades
    But i was wondering if anyone else was seeing this and had any suggestions

    Grant Hiesterman wrote:
    Out of curiousity, how were the issues fixed/resolved other the past?  With IOS updates? Other?
    The problem has always been an errant app that got stuck in a loop. It can happen any time, but is more likely to happen right after an update. My hypothesis is that the update process suspends running apps, and sometimes after the update they "lose their place" and spin their wheels trying to find it. (It's easier to say it that way then to talk about race conditions.) What will frequently fix it is to run the battery all the way down until the phone shuts off. This terminates all processes, even those that cannot be killed from the Quick Launch screen.
    You can also try to find the app; if it's email turning off any Push email accounts, rebooting, and turning them back on will frequently fix it. If it's a 3rd party app killing all apps in the Quick Launch will frequently fix it.
    Sometimes just turning off the phone for a few minutes will fix it.
    Restoring the phone as new will usually fix it, but restoring from backup may not, because the app state may be preserved in the backup.
    It really just a matter of trying things like these one at a time. One of them will work.
    Do you or Trevor have a CPU monitoring app you believe is a quality application?
    I've tried several, and haven't found any that I like. I like Trevor's answer.

  • Wireless Keyboard & Magic Mouse - Battery Power Reporting Problem

    Problem Description: OS X Bluetooth Manager is constantly reporting that my 2009 Apple Wireless Keyboard has a low battery. For instance, Bluetooth Manager reports my Wireless Keyboard Battery Level is 18%. At the same time Bluetooth Manager reports my Mouse Battery Level is 65%. Because the Keyboard Battery Level is low I am being constantly nagged by the Bluetooth Manager about Battery Level and the possibility of the Keyboard disconnecting.
    I decided to swap batteries between the keyboard and mouse as part of a test to see if there is a problem with the way the keyboard or mouse reports available battery power. Sure enough it appears there is a problem with battery power level reporting.
    The batteries that were in the Wireless Keyboard, and that are now in the Magic Mous,e are now reported as having a Mouse Battery Level of 65%, compared to a Keyboard Battery Level of 18%. The batteries that were in the Magic Mouse, and that are now in the Wireless Keyboard, are now reported as having a Keyboard Battery Level of 18%, compared to a Mouse Battery Level of 65%.
    Conclusion, either the Wireless Keyboard, or the Magic Mouse, or both devices are incorrectly reporting the Battery Power Level. It may also be that the OS X Bluetooth Manager is incorrectly reporting the battery level of one or both devices as well.
    This needs Apple to investigate & fix the issue through updates to either the Magic Mouse, 2009 Wireless Keyboard or the OS X Bluetooth Stack.
    I am using Duracell NiMH 1.2V 2000MAh "Stay Charged" Batteries (same as the Apple Store battery version)
    I'm running Snow Leopard 10.6.4 + Apple 2009 Wireless Keyboard Firmware Update 1.0 + Bluetooth 2.0.1. Firmware Update.
    So Apple Support Techs... there is the challenge; are you up for investigating and fixing this problem??
    Cheers Pete

    Thanks for the link David. I used the Community Forums because I've found in the past that Apple Support do monitor them and do pick up problems with Apple gear and pass the info back to their developers. Mostly I used the Community Forums because I just couldn't find the link you provided, so thanks again.
    ps Apple & Macintosh are one in the same. My Apple Wireless Keyboard & Apple Magi Mouse are actually performing as per the descriptions in their respective user manuals, especially in terms of how they report battery state through their built in LED lights. So I deduced this as a problem with the Mac-mini Bluetooth Stack, so beleive it is appropriate to this forum.
    I'm sure other users have noticed this, or similar problems, so perhaps they will add their experience of this issue to my original post. When I did a search of the Community Forums using the search term "Keyboard OR Mouse AND Battery" I found plenty of similar issues.
    Thanks again for the link I'll chase Apple through that channel.

  • Awkward battery behavior. Any ideas?

    Ok, here's the dealio. I have a six month old MBP 15". After analyzing my battery's behavior, I think something is going on. I have smcFan Control and iStat so I'll post what these apps have on it.
    Fan Control: Currently at 73 C & 4604 rpm each fan.
    iStat: 4604 rpm each fan.
    With medium brightness, only medium browsing I get about 1:30 hrs of battery use. It takes around 3 hrs, at the least, for the battery to fully charge. The top-left portion of the MBP, top and bottom, gets medium hot to very hot. I have tried placing the MBP on a level surface to no avail. Any suggestions?

    Hi JaMore,
    The "idle" rpm on that machine is around ~2000 RPM. The fact that you're over double that would most definitely indicate an issue. In Activity Monitor, if you show "My Processes" what else is running?
    Let's try this... shut the machine down for an hour or so (or overnight to ensure it's cool) and then start it up. Let it sit, idle, on the desktop with nothing running. Do the fans immediately ramp up? If not, go to use the machine as you normally would and take notice of what you're running. If so, go ahead and make a new user account on the machine and login to that user. Does the issue persist there as well?
    The fans on Apple portable computers are typically "reactive" rather than "proactive" so the fans may run for a bit even after the load-bearing process quits.

  • Erratic Battery Behavior after 2.0 Update

    Ever since my I updated to the 2.0 firmware my battery life is horrible. I have a nearly full charge and put my ipod to sleep at the end of the day. I get up the next morning and the battery is so drained the ipod won't start up until I plug it into a computer. what gives? Do I have a defective battery? I just got this thing in May. It shouldn't be having a problem like this. I want to take it to a genius bar but I'm afraid they're just going to tell me the battery issue is from wear and tear. I do have apple care on this.
    anyone else having this problem?

    No, it`s really simple, hold your finger on an icon for a few seconds before they start to wriggle, and hit Delete, or "X" i`m not sure.

  • Sudden shutdown- then strange battery behavior?

    About a week ago I was using my 2009 Macbook before I went to take an exam. When I left it had very little battery left (it has given me a warning) but I just shut the top and left, figuring it would go into Safe-Sleep. When I came back, I found that the fan was running very loudly and that the screen was dark. When I plugged in my MagSafe charger, it didn't recognize that it had been plugged in. In an attempt to prevent the fan from burning out, I took the battery out for awhile and then put it back in again... and the fan began to run again. I figured I would let it run for a little while and eventually the fan turned off and a while after that the computer turned on.
    Ever since, I've been getting strange readings about my battery from the built-in indicator and my iStat Pro widget. When it's not plugged in, the built-in reader doesn't tell me how much battery is left, but instead lags and then tells me that it is plugged in and "Not Charging"
    Right now iStat Pro is telling me that my battery is 29% charged when not plugged in but when I plug it in it tells me that I have 10 hours of charging remaining until I reach 100%.
    I'll have this laptop for a year next week, it seems a little early for battery problems of this scale. I swear I haven't dropped it! Anyone have any ideas before I bring it in?

    My iBook seems to take a long time (15 minutes) to calculate the battery charge.
    A note on the lower right-hand of this page:
    <http://www.apple.com/batteries/notebooks.html>
    says 300 cycles is the battery design life.

  • Strange battery behavior

    i haven't used my nano in 2 months. i am going on a trip and i wanna bring the nano... so i plug it in.
    i get a large battery icon in the middle of the screen. it is an empty battery with a lightning bolt on the left side.
    like the one at the bottom of this page...
    http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=60970
    i got the nano for christmas of this past year... 2005. the battery can't be out of re-charges already.
    Windows recognizes the nano... is shows up in 'my computer'... but itunes does not see it. it has been connected for 2 hours now... and the screen shows a do not disconnect icon.. and then up in the right corner there is a small battery icon that keeps going from empty to full over and over. there is also a small 'refresh' icon in the upper left corner... an up arrow and down arrow spinning around to make a circle.
    can someone tell me what is going on?
    thanks
    jer
    nano 4gig Windows XP Pro

    Run it until it goes totally dead in which case the machine turns off. This does not mean to go into sleep or hibernate. Thats not dead!!
    You either have to configure power manger to not do anything in case of weak battery or boot into something else where there is no power management EG CD tool or something.
    The fully charge it and see what its says for its level. Once charged you can go into the TVT Powermanager and look at the state of the battery and also confirm/test it further.
    T520 Model 4239 Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-2860QM CPU @ 2.50GHz
    Intel Sandy Bridge & Nvidia NVS 4200M graphics Intel N 6300 Wi-Fi adapter
    Windows 7 Home Prem - 64bit w/8GB DDR3

  • Weird battery behavior

    A week ago while running on battery power my machine shutdown with no warning. I couldn't get it to power up until I plugged in the charger. My battery indicator at that time said "0" but I had been running on somewhere north of 70% when the shutdown occured. It obtained a full charge, according to the indicator, in about 20 minutes, which is unheard of for me when starting from zero.
    Today, again while running on the battery, my machine hung for just a couple of seconds when I opened it and was about to resume work. (I hadn't logged out or put it to sleep prior, but simply closed the display, which is what I generally do when security isn't an issue.) I noticed almost immediately that my battery indicator read "0" where I would have expected it to be close to fully charged. Nevertheless, the machine didn't power down, and I used it for several minutes before rebooting to see it rebooting would reset the power indicator. It didn't. I used it for a few more minutes, then did a full shutdown. When I returned to the machine an hour later, it wouldn't power up until I switched to a different battery.
    I have practically no experience with laptops and battery issues. This particular battery is less than a year old. This all reminds me of mobile phones I've had in the past that would suddenly power down or refuse to power up because the battery had become loose from use. A temporary fix for that was a business card wedged between the phone and the battery, but I don't think that's a great idea with laptop.
    Anyway, just wondering if anyone has had a similar experience?
    I'll keep you posted as the situation plays out.

    There are known issues with the MBP batteries, which resulted in Apple extending warranty coverage for batteries to two years for all Core Duo laptops (they did not extend C2Ds, but those are all still under warranty). That extension is described on the linked page below, along with the statement "Apple has recently discovered that some batteries used in its MacBook and MacBook Pro notebooks may have battery performance issues."
    http://www.apple.com/support/macbook_macbookpro/batteryupdate/
    Check your cycle count in Utilities > System Profiler > click on Power. If the Full Charge Capacity is less than 4400 mAh for a 15" MBP or less than 5000 mAh for a 17" MBP, the battery is failing. Also check the cycle count. If you have more than 300 cycles on your battery, Apple will tell you that your battery is failing normally, and you will need to buy a new one. If you have less than 300 cycles on the battery, based on the symptoms you describe they will replace if for free (as they did for my 15 month-old out-of-warranty MBP).
    Hope this helps...

  • Odd battery behavior and strange recalibration results

    I have a 14" iBook G4, just over a year and a half old, and have been having problems lately with my battery. I think I am at the point where I just need to buy a new one, but I wanted to know if anyone had any extra advice or had the same problems as me. Information:
    Battery Installed: Yes
    First low level warning: No
    Full Charge Capacity (mAh): 1584
    Remaining Capacity (mAh): 1584
    Amperage (mA): 0
    Voltage (mV): 16405
    Cycle Count: 229
    I know my cycle count is high, which has something to do with it, but lately my full charge capacity has been dropping dramatically. I did a textbook Apple battery recalibration last night following all instructions, and my full charge capacity DROPPED from 1840 to the above stated 1584. Is this normal? My cycle count is high, but it isn't as high as what would be reflected in my charge capacity, correct? Can anyone help me out or have any ideas? Is it just time to bite the bullet and buy a new battery?
    iBook G4 Mac OS X (10.4.8) 14"

    That's possible, I suppose but more likely:
    Overcharing lithium batteries is really bad. So bad that well designed devices turn off charging when the capacity is reached. At this point, I believe one of two things can happen. The device might be powered by the charger, however with the battery no longer receiving any charge, or (easier) the device can run on the battery after the charger has been disabled. The plug icon in the battery icon indicates charger not charging but connected. I think the iPhone is smart enough to run off the charger while not charging, however batteries can lose charge over time even when they are not being used.
    The computer takes longer to charge the battery so it spends less time connected but not being charged than when you use the wall plug. I've seen this on a Palm PDA as well, although a little more dramatic. I believe the Palm was not smart enough to run off the charger and instead ran of the battery. Depending on when you disconnected, it could be truly fully charged or a few % low.

  • New 3rd party battery randomly reports 0%

    Works fine most of the time, but occassionally will read 0% when running from battery before going back to it's actual charge. It has had one unexpected shutdown when it's done this. The battery is still in the return window with Amazon, but I'm concerned it may be a problem with the battery connector, as the problem occurs less often on sturdy tables. No warranty, and I've installed new hinges at home from Powerbook Medic, so if it's a loose battery connector, I'm sure I could tighten the screws.

    Took out the battery- it had a 1mm wiggle at the connector which the old swollen battery didn't mind- tightened as much as I could and got it down to a .25mm wiggle. Took off the topcase and found a cable that wasn't routed properly... The display power. Only time will tell if these are the issues to cause the shutdown and the 0%, but it's been fine for ten minutes atleast. We'll see over the next couple days I guess.

  • Another odd battery behavior

    a few nights a week when I've finished using the mac, I'll close the screen and assume it has gone to sleep. The next day I will open the macbook and it will not power on. I'll plug in adaptor and see a dim version of my desktop with the battery icon saying the %left from the night before 65% for example. but at the bottom there will be a row of bars implying it is taking energy from adaptor until the screen will kick in again and the battery will show it has been discharged. Do I have to formally put the computer in sleep or is this a defect with the macbook/and or battery I purchsed it in late august and it started happening about a month into ownernship. thanks for any suggestions about what I should do. I did some of the fixes for improved battery use I saw here.

    That's possible, I suppose but more likely:
    Overcharing lithium batteries is really bad. So bad that well designed devices turn off charging when the capacity is reached. At this point, I believe one of two things can happen. The device might be powered by the charger, however with the battery no longer receiving any charge, or (easier) the device can run on the battery after the charger has been disabled. The plug icon in the battery icon indicates charger not charging but connected. I think the iPhone is smart enough to run off the charger while not charging, however batteries can lose charge over time even when they are not being used.
    The computer takes longer to charge the battery so it spends less time connected but not being charged than when you use the wall plug. I've seen this on a Palm PDA as well, although a little more dramatic. I believe the Palm was not smart enough to run off the charger and instead ran of the battery. Depending on when you disconnected, it could be truly fully charged or a few % low.

  • Odd battery behavior

    I took my MacBook Pro last night and flattened it. I put Leopard on it, then installed Vista on it as well. Battery fully charged. I hibernated the machine and went to sleep. This morning, got up, and launched the machine. Battery at 93% (which is about right as I used it a little last night). Within 20 mins, I got the exclamation point and told to get this baby plugged in or I was going to lose data.
    How does the battery drop that fast?? Is there some weird driver issue I'm not aware of?

    Hi Roger,
    Welcome to the discussions.
    Try discharging the battery completely. Then reset the PMU and see whether it charges up properly.
    Cheers!
    Karl

  • Unusual Battery behavior: Possibly Obsolete??

    I have an old version PalmOne LifeDrive (TM) with a 1660mAh battery.
    1) can I replace the battery with the new standard 1850mAh without damaging my device?
    2)The battery has been charging with power rating jumping to 55% dropping to 7% etc... while charging. Is this a battery issue or is my palm going bad? I read somewhere about soft reset and did that but the problem persisted. Before I did this I have charged the battery for hours but it was dead in the field.
    Post relates to: LifeDrive

    1. You can replace the battery as long as it states it is for the lifedrive. It should not damage the device as long as it is a compatible replacement.
    2. the charging issue could be related to 3 things. The battery, AC charger or the charging circuit in the handheld.
    I would replace each item separately to see if it makes a difference. Start with the AC charger then the battery and last repair the lifedrive.
    It has to be one of the 3 that is causing the issue.
    For reference purposes, click on the following link for the support page for your device on the kb.palm.com webpage.
    http://kb.palm.com/wps/portal/kb/na/lifedrive/lifedrive/unlocked/home/page_en.html
    There are links on the page to the user guide, troubleshooting, how to's, downloads, etc.

Maybe you are looking for