Computer Shuts Down on Battery between 30-40%

Hey guys/gals,
My Macbook (bought May 2007) has been great. But in the last couple months (last month actually) if I have my Macbook off the charger and my battery goes between 30-40%, my computer just shuts off. At first I thought It was from overheating, or the like, but it starts right back up and works fine, but it shuts down with no warning, nothing, and that is with Caffeine running (a program to make sure it doesn't go dim/shut down). Everything works fine other than this, what can I do? I am warrantied until 2010.
Thanks.

Try resetting your battery by using it until it dies. Then plug it in and don't touch it overnight. If it still shuts down, then your battery is finished.
That's my experience. I don't know why batteries do that, but what you're describing is not new to me.

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Welcome to Apple Support Communities
Reset the SMC (System Management Controller) and re-calibrate the Battery - make sure you do this re-calibration every 2-3 months (I'm guessing you've never done it?)

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Then there's this...
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I'm running on battery now.. saving all my work diligently pretty much every minute on the minute... currently 1hr 42mins remaining of battery life - so it says.
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Computer shuts down randomly; Battery goes flat from 1:30h to 0 in 1min

I have a strange behaviour on my laptop;
I fully charge the battery and then disconnect from power plug.
Checking the battery both through Battery icon as well as pressing the button on the battery itself shows that it was more than half full.
Within 2 minutes the battery goes from half full to a shut down and can only be revived through connecting the power cord again.
Anyone having seen this and any solutions out here
thx J

Your battery has unfortunately gone bad. After a long while these batteries can be mischarged so that even though there is only a small amount of battery power it reads as full and there is no way to fix this that I know of. Its a fact of life with most laptops out there.
If you have not tried it, to be sure, you can reset your power management and let the battery charge back up and see if it any better.
Info on Battery Calibration: http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=86284
Info on resetting Power Management:
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=14449

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I have a MacBook Pro 4,1 2.4GHz. I am experiencing battery issues. I will have it plugged in until full charge, and then when the power is removed, the percentage depletes very quickly, and then at about 60%, the computer just shuts down.
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This is almost exactly what is happening to me, except it doesn't seem my battery needs to be replaced. The computer shuts down without warning (not sleeps) around 60%. Do you know what I can do?
Battery Information:
Model Information:
Serial Number:
Manufacturer: SMP
Device name: ASMB014
Pack Lot Code: 0002
PCB Lot Code: 0000
Firmware Version: 0110
Hardware Revision: 0500
Cell Revision: 0102
Charge Information:
Charge remaining (mAh): 2751
Fully charged: No
Charging: Yes
Full charge capacity (mAh): 3224
Health Information:
Cycle count: 412
Condition: Fair
Battery Installed: Yes
Amperage (mA): 1300
Voltage (mV): 12513
System Power Settings:
AC Power:
System Sleep Timer (Minutes): 0
Disk Sleep Timer (Minutes): 10
Display Sleep Timer (Minutes): 20
Automatic Restart On Power Loss: No
Wake On AC Change: No
Wake On Clamshell Open: Yes
Wake On LAN: Yes
Display Sleep Uses Dim: Yes
Battery Power:
System Sleep Timer (Minutes): 60
Disk Sleep Timer (Minutes): 10
Display Sleep Timer (Minutes): 5
Wake On AC Change: No
Wake On Clamshell Open: Yes
Display Sleep Uses Dim: Yes
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Hardware Configuration:
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AC Charger Information:
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Computer shuts down with charge on battery and no warning

without warning and plenty of charge on my battery my mac book pro shuts down? if it just sits there in sleep unplugged it seems to run fine, but if its unplugged and i try to use it (with a charged battery) it shuts down with out warning. started about 3 months ago. Is the battery just old..?

It is almost certainly a sign that your battery is dying, timskins.
The problem is that when batteries deteriorate their internal resistance increases and they are no longer able to deliver power when it is demanded, even though they still have the ability to store it. They may chug along providing low power for quite a bit longer, but when your computer suddenly needs a bit more (because of increased CPU or GPU demand, or the HD spinning up or whatever) it is unable to provide it and the computer shuts down unexpectedly.
Think of it like driving a car with a bad fuel pump. Your car is driving along a highway with a full tank of gas. Its running smoothly enough. You put your foot down to accelerate up a hill or overtake a another vehicle and the engine dies because the fuel pump can't meet the greater demand for gas. The tank is still pretty full but the fuel can't be pumped in fast enough to keep it running in a high demand situation, so it shuts down.
See the section dealing with increasing internal resistance in batteries at http://www.batteryuniversity.com/parttwo-31.htm for more about such things, or http://www.buchmann.ca/Chap9-page1.asp for a longer, more technical, account.
Once this starts happening the only options are to get a new battery or to avoid any work that makes much demand on power (like visiting a "Flash" based website or, when it gets bad enough, even spinning up the HD from a stationary situation.) Unfortunately even with light use the battery will soon reach a point where the regular peaks of CPU and HD use will become too much for it and you will suffer more and more unexpected shutdowns until the battery is replaced.
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When my battery is fully charged and i remove the power lead the computer shuts down, evan when the power lights are fully green on the charger and the battery pack indercating lights.
Regards

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Perusal of the 'Support' pages turns up literally thousands of people who have this or similar faults, all the way back to 2006, and I've not seen anything yet indicating that Apple have got a grip of it.
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Macbook Pro 15" Mac OS X (10.4.10)

Retired Engineer, would please you post a cite for "+...purchased between February 2006 and April 2007, the warranty on the battery was extended to 2 years.+"?
My finaceè's MBP is just over a year old, and thus past warranty. He already received a new battery about 6 months into ownership via the first replacement program.
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We took it to the authorized Apple dealer where it was purchased. They found that the replacement's serial number is covered in the new battery recall, but claim that Apple refused to replace the faulty battery this time as the MBP's original warranty was finished.
So an official cite for the extended battery warranty would be much appreciated.

No sleep but shut down when battery drained

Hi there,
just bought a new battery for my MacBook - what happens now is that when I get the battery drained alert (10 min) my Mac quits just about 2 minutes thereafter. Unfortunately it doesn't go to sleep so I have to reboot it after connecting it to power...
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macbig, you haven't read much about recent Apple notebooks, have you? All portables since the first white MacBook has had a 'Safe Sleep' mode, which is supposed to activate automatically when battery power drops below a certain level. Active memory is saved to disk, and the computer shuts down all power draining activities. It is then essentially completely off. The difference between this and a standard shut down is that when the power button is next pressed (with a power supply connected), the system resumes after a short wait, with everything still open, just as it was left. This is very similar to a Windows PC's hibernation mode.
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Computer shuts down without going to sleep

hello,
i've had an increasingly swollen battery with a corresponding diminished life. to a point that it barely fit, lasted ten minutes on its own and when it became depleted, the macbook pro would just shut down without a warning.
so i bought a new one and although it lasted about 2h30 on its first cycle, when it displayed the low battery warning, the computer shut down without going to sleep...
tried resetting PRAM, and SMC to no avail.
i charged it back up a bit and it shut down again.
it's on its 3rd cycle and battery health already dropped from 100% to 94%.
anything i can do?
thanks...

Are you sure it is shutting down and not going to sleep "permanently"? I say this because I have (and others) a somewhat similar problem but it's not shutting down, it sleeps forever:
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1400708
Also, I was going to suggest maybe your battery has died out, but you said it is plugged in, so probably not your battery as the problem.

Computer shuts down after 5-15 minutes

After 5-15 minutes of inactivity the computer shuts down when on battery. As long as the computer stays active, it will not shut down; ie: netflix watch now not a problem.
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rakki,
Just curious. When did this problem start? Possibly when you upgraded from 10.4 to 10.5? (10.4.11 to 10.5.5 even?).
I'm having similar though not identical issues with battery performance that started the day I upgraded to 10.5.5 from 10.4.11.
See this thread: http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1745812&tstart=0

HELP!!! Card reader short circuit. Computer shuts down, not lighting up again...

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This question was solved.
View Solution.

Try a hard reset (take out memory and battery and remove power and hold down power button 30 seconds then reassemble and try turning it on). I think you borked it which means a new motherboard I fear.
Message Edited by Huffer on 12-02-2009 12:48 PM

Computer shuts down when calibrating

Hi.. I've been having problems when trying to run the Battery Calibration and the computer shuts off when it gets to the discharge part of the calibration. Seems to be when it hits the 15 to 20% part of the discharge. I'm using a Compaq Presario CQ56-219WM and running Windows 7 64 bit Home Premium. The battery calibration that I am talking about is when you first start the computer... press ESC to get menu and press F2 for Advanced Diagnostics then Battery Calibration. It checks to see if battery is there.. whether it is charged and charges if needed then goes into the drain battery part to find lower limit or 0% of the battery. It doesn't show any errors detected up to the part of discharging the battery and don't even show that the test was even run in the error log of the Advanced Diagnostic Menu. I've tried restoring the Bios to default values, uninstalling and reinstalling everything (programs and drivers), did a restore drive to original and updating everything and all is STILL the same. I've tried calibrating in Windows with the Support Assistant and all I get is the battery needs calibrated is this (after running calibration - waiting 3 hours plugged in and recalibrating:
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is your notebook still in warranty? Warranty status check web page
It certainly seems by your description that the battery has issues.
Battery warranty is for one year, so it would be a good idea to replace it. Be sure that you buy a guaranteed compatible battery that comes with a one year warranty.
Best regards,
erico
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2015 Microsoft MVP - Windows Experience Consumer

Computer Shuts Down on Battery between 30-40%

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