Battery Care

Hi,
I have been reading a lot of discussions in some of the forums in the web and some topics here on how to take care of the MBP battery and how it can last long. Since I am a first time Mac user, I'm quite clueless about battery care of the MBP.
I recently bought this new MBP as a replacement for my desktop computer, although I anticipate in the future that I can tote it along with me whenever I go travel or go mobile perhaps (meetings, presentations) to other places. But as of now, it is my main computer and work with it for 8+ hours a day.
What I do is that I charge the battery until it reaches 100% and then disconnects it until it drains up to say 10-20% left and then I plug the charger again to recharge it. Then the cycle goes on.
Now is this a good way? I've read that this is not a good idea and it's much better to keep it plugged in. Should I keep it plugged in all the time? I've also read about batteries bulging because the charger was plugged in all the time.
I'd like to hear your advice on this. Cheers!

Apple makes it very easy to care for your battery. The only things you really need to be concerned about is that you don't keep it plugged in 24/7/365 and you should never do is let the battery completely discharge.
Apple recommends that you use the computer on battery power once or twice a month. Unlike older MBP computers, those with batteries that aren't user replaceable (like yours) don't need to be calibrated. If you know you won't be using the computer for a week or more, make sure the battery is about 50% charged and turn it off. If you leave the computer unplugged and sleeping for an extended period of time you can totally discharge the battery which is very bad for its health.
To make sure I use my computer off the charger I have a repeating event in iCal for one Saturday a month. I use the computer off charger all weekend. Normally it gets more of a battery workout than that but just in case, this reminder makes sure I get in at least 2 days a month.
I don't recommend that you charger it and then use the battery all day when it isn't necessary. The more it gets used, the quicker you are using it up.

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Internal Battery Care

Hi all, I have a question regarding internal battery care. I have seen other people pointing to posts on battery care but unfortunately they pertain to removable batteries. Question is, what is the best way to take care of an internal battery? I mainly work at my desk with the computer plugged in, Before, I would remove the battery. Now that the battery is internal, I can not. Do I leave it plug the entire time? Or should I unplug it once the battery is fully charged? Thanks!

Systems at this level should keep the battery trickel charged.THE key thing to know is that for long-term storage Lithium-ION batteries are best stored half full.And unlike the old days in rechargabeles its not good to run then down all the way regularly that will shorten LI batteries. They do best if you keep them topped off. http://www.batteryuniversity.com/learn/article/how_to_prolong_lithium_based_batteries

Battery Care Question

What is the best way to prolong/take good care of the battery in the Mac Book Pro.
I will probably use it mostly at home. Should I always keep it plug into the outlet. Or should I allow it to drain and then recharge it and if so how often?
When I had my Dell laptop. I had it plugged in about 98 percent of the time. Then one day I needed to run the laptop off the battery and it no longer worked. The battery was cold and the battery life indicator was not lit.

I believe you can leave your notebook plugged in most of the time, but it is good to use the battery every so often.
Some good information here:
http://www.apple.com/batteries/
http://www.apple.com/batteries/notebooks.html
In particular:
"... batteries need to be used for maximum performance. If you don’t use your device often, be sure to complete a charge cycle at least once a month."
"For proper maintenance of a lithium-based battery, it’s important to keep the electrons in it moving occasionally. Apple does not recommend leaving your portable plugged in all the time. An ideal use would be a commuter who uses her MacBook Pro on the train, then plugs it in at the office to charge. This keeps the battery juices flowing. If on the other hand, you use a desktop computer at work, and save a notebook for infrequent travel, Apple recommends charging and discharging its battery at least once per month."
charlie

Battery Care Function for VAIO SVS131190X in Windows 8

Thank you Miguael, i had tried your solution several times already but the problems still presist. Now i return to use windows 7 instead.
But here are the list of problems I want Sony to solve.
1. The battery checker didn't solve the battery error problem. I have to manually stop some program from startup. (can't remember program name)
2. Battery function care and keyboard backlight are not installed when I install control center.
I bought win8 and expecting that every feature should work properly but I found that there are many feature missing and some drivers are not working properly.
Can u let me know when I can install complete version of win8 for my vaio?
i dont wanna waste my time on system recovery.
Thank you

Hello Tommy,
Thank you for the response.
Try re-installing the Battery Checker Software along with the VAIO Control Center Software and its update to troubleshoot the issue.
You can download and install the Battery Checker Software from here: http://esupport.sony.com/US/p/swu-download.pl?mdl=SVS131190X&upd_id=7868&os_group_id=24
VAIO Control Center Software from here: http://esupport.sony.com/US/p/swu-download.pl?mdl=SVS131190X&upd_id=7862&os_group_id=24
VAIO Control Center Update from here: http://esupport.sony.com/US/p/swu-download.pl?mdl=SVS131190X&upd_id=8273&os_group_id=24
If the issue persists, contact Sony Telephone Assistance Team here: http://esupport.sony.com/US/p/support-contacts.pl?mdltype_id=24
Regards,
Miguael
Note: If my post answers your question, please mark it as an "Accepted Solution."

Battery Care and Cable for Internet and Keychain :-)

I commend you people for helping out, so thanks!
I have a used sMBP I recently purchased. I noticed that the battery cannot be removed easily like the old MBP I had. Does Apple still recommend letting the battery go all the way down and right before it goes into safe mode, hook it up to power, let it fully charge and try to keep the charge around 60-70% charged? Should I do this "drain and charge to full capacity" once a month? Any reason when I initially hook it up to the white adapter, it does NOT say "charging," but it says" Not Charging." Somebody told me to reset the SMC controller (I think that is the right name) but the person gave me instructions for an older MBP, because what he told me to do did not make any sense
As far as hooking up the MacBook Pro to a wall internet connection should I use this type of ethernet cable or does it not matter? (The ethernet cable that came with the MBP is really loose at the MBP ethernet connection.) "Belkin RJ45 CAT 5e Ethernet Patch Cable (14 Ft.)" If not, any suggestions on the latest recommendation for an ethernet cable? Are there any ethernet internet plugs that take a firewire cable? I know sounds pretty stupid, but I thought I would ask.
Finally, why when I empty the cache n Safari 5.0.4 do some of my usernames and passwords get erased? I thought that would only happen if I "Reset Safari?" If I loose the passwords, are they stored in keychain if I have used them in the past?
thanks

Maybe I'm lucky. But here's my experience.
With the Lumia 800, battery life was poor initially but after a couple of days it impoved, and again too with software updates.
920 now I've had for two weeks and it is the only device I use. Habit I had with all my phones for last couple of years, is to have them charging overnight, with alarms set and in main profile for calls (text on silent). Same still with 800 and 920. Though both happily went through the night if I didn't plug them in.
920 originally battery wasn't great, but improved daily after about 3-4 days. This morning I took it off charge at 07:00, and it's still going strong at 21:30. Been on wi-fi, 3g, phone calls & texts in/out, podcast update check download and playing, email and calendars syncing. A fair amount of speech to text for calling and sms. Whatsapp, NFC and Bluetooth on all day. Screen brightness on 'high', Timeout at 3 mins. Much use of Facebook. Twitter, internet browsing, email, Bluetooth transfer, NFC writing and reading. Taken a couple of photo's and videoes, some Youtube viewing, and about half hour of games. Cloud Backup for text messages 'On', transferred photo's to skydrive and downloaded OneNote while away from wifi. Used several apps a few times throughout the day on wifi and/or 3g. Been on the Store.
Battery says 18% and 12 hours remaining. I think time remaining is somewhat misleading (as it's based on recent usage I suspect), but the percentage seems reasonably accurate, having checked it throughout the day. I plan to keep using it tonight for setting up more items on Nokia Reading, listening to music, some sms stuff, along with Facebook and Twitter mainly and will see when it dies.

IdeaPad N20P Chromebook Battery Care

Just got this laptop yesterday. My old laptop had a removable battery, so I would keep it plugged in and take the battery out to conserve its lifespan. The battery cannot be removed from this ideapad and I was not able to locate the settings for the battery (still getting used to Chrome OS). Just want a suggestion on when to charge and when to unplug to prolong the lifespan of the battery as long as possible. I use it at home so the duration it lasts is not an issue.
Should I only charge it when the battery gets low and unplug at 100%? How can I change the settings?
Not that knowledgeable on the subject, so thanks in advance for any help.

The best thing to do is to keep in in the charger and once a month let it discharge till 20%. It's much better to discharge a little bit and charge it again when it hits like 60 to 80%. This is the best way to preserve the battery life.

Mbp battery care before storing laptop for 2 months : anything special I should do?

Do I just shut it down or should I empty 50% of the battery as if I were leaving for 5 months?
Do I remove the battery?
Thank you!

Apple recommends that you store the battery with a 50% charge. If you store a battery when it’s fully discharged, it could fall into a deep discharge state, which renders it incapable of holding any charge. Conversely, if you store it fully charged for an extended period of time, the battery may experience some loss of battery capacity, meaning it will have a shorter life. Be sure to store your notebook and battery at the proper temperature.

Lithium-ion Battery Care Tips

Hi
I read some tips in Yahoo Answers, Apple Articles and Apple Froum (below links)
I use my laptop 12-16 hours a day and set it to sleep after 3 min if I don't use it.
My questions are these:
I should keep the battery charge rate aroud %50-%60. It means I shoud unplug AC power when it reach %80 or more?
If no, how often I should unplug it?
If yes, I should reach 80%? what is the best rate?
More articles:
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20090916140048AA4zPLn
http://www.apple.com/batteries/

Here's what Apple says:
http://www.apple.com/batteries/notebooks.html
Now I'm gonna share a dirty little secret about all lithium batteries: Fact is, the biggest killers of these batteries are frequent full discharge/recharge cycles & heat. I'm well aware what Apple recommends, but I'm telling you that if you want your battery to last avoid discharging below 35 ~ 40% of capacity as much as possible & avoid heat. Every 3 ~ 4 months, it's OK to discharge to ~ 35% of capacity & then recharge to full. More often than that is not needed & will do more harm than good.
Charge whenever you can/want, you cannot overcharge, as charging automatically stops when your battery is full. You can leave it plugged in all the time, if you wish. Excerise as provided above.

Battery Life / Care

OK, guys, what's the deal with proper battery care on the iPhone 4?
I've read some things that say you need to do a "Full Cycle Charge" once a month. (Including the Battery Magice Elite App).
I've read other people say this is bunk and it doesn't matter.
So which is it?!
Proper "care" of the battery in the primary way I intend on maximizing my battery life. All the other "tips" I've read are comical...they all suggest turning off the features that I use a smartphone for in the first place - not going to happen. What's the point of having a kick-*** smart phone if I can't use the whiz-bang features for fear of battery drain. I'd rather have poor battery life.
I would just like a difinitive answer on how to properly care for the battery in terms of charging/discharging.
(Sorry to sound gruff...but, I've been researching this for a while and everytime I think I have it figured out, I read something that contradicts my understanding...)

??? Not sure what you mean, since repeated partial charging of a Li battery is fine and does not adversely affect life span.
Personally, I plug mine in whenever it is convenient to do so, so that it is always charged when I do need to go anywhere. I've been doing that for years with phone's now, and never noticed any problems of abnormally rapid loss of battery health because of it. I have chargers at home, in my office at work, in the car - and I use them whenever I'm at one of those places for any length of time. I also have external battery case chargers (FastMac iV for use when I am away from a plug for a long period.
Bottom line is your Li battery does not care how frequently you charge it. It does make a difference how long it sits in a static state. Fully charged, partially or fully discharged, a Li battery is decaying from internal oxidation as it sits, and lasts longest with regular use. So it is not wise to leave it plugged in to the charger for days at a time, nor does it do it any good to leave it turned off in a drawer for days at a time.
one place for info is http://batteryuniversity.com/

Optimizing iPhone battery life: Between charges and before replacement

FYI. An excellent iPhone battery care article by iPhoneAtlas.com:
Optimizing iPhone battery life: Between charges and before replacement
http://www.iphoneatlas.com/2007/07/09/optimizing-iphone-battery-life-between-cha rges-and-before-replacement/

OK, I agree that is a completely false statement. The rest of the article is pretty good.
If you assume a linear decrease in battery charge for each full cycle (which it really isn't, but much easier to model in a spreadsheet). Then 80% of original charge after 400 full cycles is approximately 0.8% loss in battery charge per full charge cycle (again this is a simplification, stay with me). This means that after 400 cycles, you are at approximately 80% of your original total charge level. As stated by Apple.
So, extrapolating that out to EOL (end of life) which Apple assumes to be 50% battery charge, it would take approximately 1,000 full charge cycles for your battery to be EOL (according to Apple). It would actually be slightly less than that since it won't be a linear function.
For me, that's 2 to 4 years of use depending on whether or not I continue using the iPhone as much as I have this first full week.

IPad first gen 3g, battery died, wont start

I have been happily using my iPad first gen since i got it when the iPad 3g launched. Every night i would put it on the charger, but recently i went back vacation and didnt charge it for a week. When i got home my iPad was dead, so i placed it on the charger. It shows the charger connecting, the symbol on the face turns to the lightning bolt with a flashing red empty battery. After sitting like this for four hours, it still refuses to boot up. This is the exact same charger i have used for years, and i have tried pressing the home and lock button to force a restart (after about 6 seconds it just turns off). No idea whats wrong, hoping he isnt dead because i cannot afford a new one =(

Check that your cable is in good working order and that you are using the appropriate charger. The iPad required a 10W charger, not the 5W that comes with an iPhone. Most other third-party chargers not SPECIFICALLY stated to be for iPad will charge, but very slowly.
Also, you should;t let the battery drain completely before charging it. You can do that maybe once per month, but repeatedly doing this is not good for Li-ion batteries. Follow Apple's recommendations for battery care and you should be ok. https://www.apple.com/batteries/ipad.html

20 minute battery life

I have a 15 inch powerbook G4 1.5 Ghz, with 512 MB of RAM. It was purchased a little less than a year and a half ago. The battery life on it was never very good (maxing out at about an hour and thirty minutes), but recently it's taking a turn for the worse. The computer now just shuts down (no low battery warning) once the battery is at about 50-60%. This takes about twenty minutes. When I press the button on the battery , it shows that it has an almost full charge remaining. I've tried resetting the PMU, but it doesn't help. Any help here would be greatly appreciated!

Welcome to the Apple discussions.
You may have already read the Apple note on battery care, which is located here. Note the guidance too on PB settings to maximize battery usage.
How many charge/discharge cycles do you have on your battery? What does the full charge capacity and remaining capacity show when it's charged up? You can find this in your system profiler (blue apple, about this mac, more information, power, battery information).

Leaving MacBook Battery in on constant AC power

I use my macbook everyday at home as my main computer and I have it plugged into A/C power 100% of the time. Is it alright to leave the batter in, or should I take it out? I have been told that leaving the battery in will cause it to die sooner, but I wanted to see what everyone else has to say about this.
Thanks.

It is OK to leave your battery hooked to the charger most of the time. The only time I unhook mine from the charger is when I calibrate or for a few minutes to use in another room. You should calibrate every two months or so to keep the battery fully functioning. If you use your MacBook infrequently, it’s best to re-calibrate the battery at least once a month.
It is best not to use your battery unless you need to. Some people have hurt their batteries by charging then discharging every time they use the MacBook. This will age a battery very fast and cause you to buy a battery sooner than you should have too. Don't discharge the battery just because you used it. Li-Ion batteries prefer small charges over big ones. Use it and then plug it in as soon as you can. The only time my Battery is ever fully discharged is when I'm doing a calibration.
The following links have good information about the MacBook and the care of it's battery.
Apple: Tips for maximizing your Notebook battery charge
Apple MacBook and MacBook Pro: Reduces processor speed when battery is removed while operating from an A/C adaptor
Apple portable computer's battery does not show a full charge in Mac OS X
Look here and here for some good tips about battery care.
Apple MacBook: How to remove or install the battery
Apple: Determining Battery Cycle Count
Apple: Use and cleaning of MagSafe power connector

Is keeping the your macbook plugged in while battery charged ok?

Is it harmful to your macbooks overall battery life if you keep it plugged in if the battery is fully charged?

It is OK to leave your battery hooked to the charger most of the time. The only time I unhook mine from the charger is when I calibrate. You should calibrate your battery once a month. Li-Ion batteries prefer small charges so anytime you want to charge is fine.
The following links have good information about the MacBook and the care of it's battery.
MacBook reduces processor speed when battery is removed while operating from an A/C adaptor
Apple portable computer's battery does not show a full charge in Mac OS X
Apple Notebook Batteries
Lithium-ion Batteries
MacBook: How to remove or install the battery
Determining Battery Cycle Count
Use and cleaning of MagSafe power connector
Look here for some good tips about battery care.

Is it possible to power the macbook pro on just the wall charger, without the battery?

I'd like to be able to not even use the battery on my computer. Is it possible to run it just off of the wall plugin?

I have a late 08 Macbook Uni, I wanted to run it without the battery when I first got it since I got used to running my Dell Laptop without batteries to save my battery from dying because of windows bad power management.
I found out that my macbook runs much slower without the battery. Can't really tell you why it just does.
Do remember that Macbooks have a much better power management system than windows. My Dell Laptop battery didn't even last 3 years before it fully died.
My late 08 Macbook is way over it's 1000 charge cycle ( i'm at 1067 ) and i'm still getting over 3 hours from my original battery.
I suggest you leave your battery in.
Just follow apple's battery care procedure to make your battery last longer - if that's what you're worried about.
good luck

Battery Care

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