Failing battery

Gradually the battery on my 15-inch powerbook lasted for shorter and shorter amounts of time, till finally if I leave it unplugged for about a minute the thing shuts off and I need to connect it to turn it back on. Whenever this happens the date goes back to january 1st, 1970. I've been using the computer regardless for about a year now but now I've ordered a new battery. Today, though, a friend of mine told me that the exact same problem happened to her ibook, and we bought our laptops around the same time.
I remember apple was recalling some powerbooks but they didn't include my serial number. I just wanna find out if this was a common problem. I'm kinda upset that I have to buy a new battery because of what could be a common defect.

Hi Homer,
Depending on usage, batts can last from a year or so up to 3-4 years . . . .

Similar Messages

If my iPod Touch 5 battery is failing, can I pay Apple to send me a refurbished one before I send them the one with a failing battery? I don't want to go without my ITouch.

If my iPod Touch 5 battery is failing, can I pay Apple to send me a refurbished one before I send them the one with a failing battery? I don't want to go without my ITouch. I really don't want to go without it but I dont want to have to purchase a new one. The battery life is abysmal, and I am reluctant to upgrade my ios system to ios8 because all I ever see are complaints about upgrades killing the battery. I am still on ios6. When I upgraded my macbook pro (which is now DEAD) the battery got worse.
I am just sick of it. I called apple about my itouch battery and the help was terrible. All they were telling me to do was do a restart and UPGRADE TO THE LATEST IOS TO SEE IF THAT SOLVES THE BATTERY PROBLEM. They would not even tell me what to do if that would not work. Very rude.I kept asking and I finally had to find out myself through my own research that they cant replace the battery; instead they send you a refurbished ipod. They never told me that on the phone and they kept giving me the run around when I kept asking them what I should do if the IOS upgrade did not work or made the battery worse. Hopefully someone can answer my initial question. Thanks guys. I have a charger that I sometimes use plugged in to the ipod ( not all the time, I know that is bad for the battery) and I thought my battery life should be better than it is because I sometimes use it on the charger ( it should save the battery).

Not that I know of. You can do the exchange at an Apple store if they have refurbished ones in stock
- Make an appointment at the Genius Bar of an Apple store.
Apple Retail Store - Genius Bar

Failed Battery - still Discharging

As titled, I'm having a battery problem with my HP MINI 2080-210nr. Recently the battery stopped working (would not power up the laptop), so now my netbook is a small desktop. The puzzling thing is, it is still discharging, as though the battery were operating properly, but it is not chargning at all. Currently I have to use AC power to get it to work. The charge has gone from 41% when i noticed the problem, to 17%, over a period of about 2 weeks.
I always plug the adapter into a surge protector.
Any thoughts as to why its happening? I just don't want it to reach 0% and the netbook doesn't work at all anymore.

I ran in to the same problem a year ago. I do not think there is anything Lenovo is willing to do about a failed battery but you can try. I bought a new pirate batter for $70 with shipping back then. The cheapest price I have found for a battery with shipping now is $67 at Best Buy:
http://www.buy.com/retail/product.asp?sku=210980381&listingid=41335392&dcaid=17902
Then you can revamp your failed battery for $30 by following this video:
http://www.metacafe.com/watch/479447/laptop_battery_hack_dont_buy_a_new_one/

Abrupt Failing Battery and Kernel Panic?

About 3 days ago I experienced the first problem. My battery hit 0% and instead of my powerbook sleeping it just died.
On Reboot I got a "Mac OS X Unexpectedly Quit" dialog.. (unresolved kernel trap?), so I decided to reboot and reset the APU and PRAM. I received the kernel panic screen shortly after my desktop loaded which was alarming, so I restarted and received the kernel panic screen yet again. Thinking maybe it was due to heat I let the thing cool down for a while and restarted and it was fine.
However, I'm now going on my 5th abrupt powerdown when I hit 0%. I even tested it with nothing running and it just dies, and doesn't sleep.
The 12" powerbook is 18 months old and has 632 recharge cycles on it (I do web development and tend to move around while I work, guess I should have sat still and plugged in eh?).
I figure the abrupt shutdown is telling me I need a new battery, and checking it has 1939 of 4400mAh of its original capacity.
Interestingly enough I get about 1.5 hours of battery life still depending on usage, though it seems it likes to shudown and not sleep when it gets low.
My question is why the kernel panics and why is it failing so quickly all of a sudden?

Same thing going here with a two year old 1GHz 12". I was looking at the battery level display and it was 43% when it just died. I was ripping a cd and updating my iPod when it happened. The first time it happened there was a complete PRAM reset. The last couple times no messages or anything, and not sleeping, just shutting off without warning. I'm showing well over 400 cycles and about 1160 mAh full charge capacity. It's happened three times in the last month, and it started after I let my son play Lego Star Wars on the machine. I taught him to put the pb up on some popsicle sticks to help cooling, as it was very hot.

Failing battery in a Samsung SCH-u370?

I bought this at Costco last September, and have typically gotten most of a week's service out of the battery with light phone and zero text/web use. Bluetooth has been turned off since I bought it.
Suddenly over the past week, battery life has dropped to about one day, even when I haven't used the phone. Has anyone else seen this? I suspect that a new battery is in order, but thought that I'd look for suggestions.

You can probably find a new OEM battery online for little money (Batteries4Less, cellularaccessories, other websites, shop around to find a good deal). Batteries do wear out, but if it is less than a year, check your local Verizon corporate store. Your original OEM battery should have a 1 year warranty so you may be able to get it replaced that way.

Fail Battery Level Icon itunes 11. iPod Classic 160gb 7G

Hello,
I noticed that the icon that is responsible for displaying the battery level is incorrect in itunes.
The icon shows that the level is always 100%, whether it is with less battery. For example, if the ipod classic is a quarter of battery, itunes shows it is 100%.
Anyone else the same thing happens?
I use Mac OS X 10.8.2 and itunes 11.01 (last update)

Unclick Manually Manage Music and Videos, which is right above Enable Disk Use. You can then click on Enable Disk Use. I had the same problem as you and that fixed it.

How will I recognize failing battery?

Is there a common set of symptoms or figures that will alert me to immient battery failure on my mid-2009 MacBook Pro? My concern is not current performance, but a fear that it may slide quickly from acceptable to unacceptable performance.
The machine is shared by the three of us in the household, so I can't fully control how it is (ab)used. When new, it sat for hours on charge until I learned the error of that way. Machine still routinely sits for long hours in sleep mode. Occaisionally the battery is exhausted and must be plugged in to boot. This, from what I've read here, may at least be accomplishing a recalibration (?) Cycle count is currently 393 and "battery health" by my calculation is 97%.
Battery performance seems, somewhat degraded, but after 2.5 years of the use described above this seems understandable. Again, my concern is not current performance, but knowing how to recognize that replacement time has arrived. I don't want to leave home only to find that its suddenly in death throes. I'm 100 miles from the nearest Apple Store.
Thanks.

Then you will need to estimate via Z1 LED indicator.
Red = your battery percentage is below 15%
Yellow = battery is 15% above until 89%
Green = battery is 90% above
I'll give you some tips on how to maintain li-ion batteries.
* Charging li-ion batteries to max level (100%) will prolong battery capacity but shorten battery lifespan
* Frequent charging of li-ion batteries (not fully charge or random charging) will increase battery lifespan but shorten battery capacity
* High battery temperature is bad for li-ion
* Full discharging also shorten battery lifespan, but corrects battery stability and performance

Signs of a Failing Battery?

I've noticed in the past week the battery has been very erratic. For example, I left the hotel room when it was about 75% charged and about 1 hour later it says 10% left. Now I can barely last a day without charging. Also, the phone fully charges very quickly, usually when I'm down to 25% power I can charge it backup fully within 1 and a half hours. Is that normal?

The battery meter calibration may be off, or there may be an errant process that's draining the battery.
1. Reset the phone by simultaneously pressing the home and sleep/wake buttons until the Apple icon appears (ignore the red slider).
2. Let the battery drain until the phone shuts down (not just to the low battery warnings) and recharge fully - for at least 4 hours.
3. If the battery still doesn't function properly, it or the charging circuit may be bad. Make an appointment with your Apple Store Genius Bar: http://www.apple.com/retail/geniusbar/

Old FileVault crashed my MacBook Pro, had to delete, reinstall and Time Machine restore failed. Trying to manually rebuild. No iPhoto pics, no iTunes music and NO DOCUMENTS found! Any thoughts?

Here's the ordeal. I'm running a 2007 MacBook Pro 17 inch with Lion OS. When I converted to Lion, I didn't have enough room on my harddrive to convert to the new FileVault, so I remained on the old system. Less than a week ago I reboot my computer because iPhoto seems to be stuck on "cataloging" my photos, though after days of letting it run, it doesn't do anything. After the reboot, my computer appears as if it had been reset to factory settings with all my programs gone, etc. I'm like, hey, I've got Time Machine, I'll restore it. After the restore is run, when I go to login, I get the dreadful error message, "You are unable to log into the FileVault user "John" at this time. Logging into the account failed because an error occurred". I searched the internet via my iPhone for suggestions and followed everyone of them, all the way down to erasing my harddrive and reinstalling Lion. So I get back into my computer and think I'm golden. I go to restore my computer via Time Machine and wham....I'm right back to that error message. I think, ok, I'll do it again. This time it messes us even more, giving me two login screens, one for the new Lion like before I restored the computer and then a second, as if it were restored, but unable to login. On top of that, I couldn't get back to the Command-R page! I thought I was really screwed! Well, I finally figured a way back, or maybe it was just that it finally decided to cooperate, I don't know, but I erased my harddrive again, and reinstalled again and thought, well, I'll rebuild manually by selecting what I want to restore from the Time Machine drive. I was able to get all my applications back and running, but to my dismay, I seemingly have lost all my iTunes music (except that which Apple has graciously setup to redownload now "thank you!) plus all my iPhoto's and even worse, all my DOCUMENTS!!!! Here I thought Time Machine from backing all this stuff up, but with over a years worth of back-ups I cannot locate any photos, music, or my documents on my drive to extract! Needless to say, I will never be using Time Machine again to back up my computer, I'll find another program or at least do it all manually. But my question is: am I looking in the wrong places for this files? Are they hidden under some unknowning folder that doesn't list it as music, photos or files? I can manage with the music, I can live with the photos because my wife has many of them on her computer and I have many uploaded to Facebook, but my files! My documents, thousands of them, many with information I won't be able to compile again, seemingly gone unless someone out there has any ideas?!!!
I even had iPhoto search the drive for photos and after hours of the barber shop pole spinning I cancelled the command for I figured it wasn't going to find anything.
If anyone has any suggestions, or if Apple, you are reading this and can provide some direction, I would greatly appreciate it.

Also - my battery has been telling me "service battery" for a LONG time and then it switched to "replace soon" som time ago. Can't really see what this has to do with anything but whatever.
That could conceivably explain all the problems you're describing. Replacing a Mac's battery should not be postponed since a failed battery will cause other problems to occur. It is also possible that its hard disk has failed, which means the information on it may soon become unrecoverable.
... my latest TM back up was from April 2014, can I just run this when I have rescued everthing and then it might not be as slow?
If that Time Machine backup remains intact, it may be the only viable means of recovering that Mac's information. I suggest you do not attempt to restore its contents to your ailing Mac.
Given that you are having trouble creating a newer Time Machine backup you should stop using that Mac immediately and have it serviced as soon as you are able. Do not take it to anyone other than Apple or a service facility authorized by Apple, for the very reasons you explained. If there are no Apple Stores in your vicinity search for an Authorized Apple Service Provider using the Contact Us link below. Use one of the options that appear under Contact Apple Support. The language on that page will be different for your location.

MacBook Pro 15 inch mid 2009 Battery Life issue

Hopefully someone can give me some useful info on what to do!!
About 3 days ago I noticed that the battery status on my MacBook pro 15 mid 2009 changed to service battery.
I checked the system profiler and this is what I get:
Charge Information:
Charge remaining (mAh): 1430
Fully charged: Yes
Charging: No
Full charge capacity (mAh): 1430
Health Information:
Cycle count: 169
Condition: Check Battery
Battery Installed: Yes
Amperage (mA): -1130
Voltage (mV): 11895
I have tried resetting the SMC to no avail and have also done a battery calibration. Surely this is not normal.
Lastly, I have no extended applecare, and the 1 year warranty ran out about a month ago (yay!).

Hi Nick
That seems unusually low cycles for a failing battery - contact apple customer support, despite the warranty and/or the seller, depending on consumer law in Australia.
There was an apple mention of expected minimum battery life somewhere, - not sure if it applied to your model... hopefully someone'll recall the link.

IPod Touch 3G replacement battery not living up to what was promised

I have had my iPod touch for almost 4 years. The battery started to run down (loose charge more quickly or just not charge up all the way) about 3 to 6 months ago. I took it in to the Apple shop and they gave me a replacement iPod touch 3G after I paid the battery replacement fee. This gave me a 90 warranty on the fix.
I took the new iPod touch home and charged it up and set it up as a new iPod Touch. No restore. After doing this, I used it for about 30 minutes reading a book. Then it gave me a "20% battery remaining" message. After 30 minutes. So I killed the book software and loaded the battery monitoring software. It showed that, sure enough, I only had 20% battery remaining. But, as I watched, it jumped up to 25%. And then up again to 35%. So I went to plug it into the computer to charge. When I did, it jumped up to 80% charged as soon as I plugged it in. I unlocked it and, on the batter monitoring app, it stated I had an 85% charge. So I charged it back to full then unplugged it again. This time I restarted it, hoping this was just some boot error. It did the same thing repeatedly over the next few days. It would give me a "battery 20% charge" warning, then jumping up to between 35% and 70% as I watched. Then back down to 20% again like some drunk metronome.
I took it back to the apple store and told them my problem. Realizing that this is an old iPod Touch model and future replacements would be similar if not worse, I offered to pay the rest of the money needed to just purchase an iPod Touch 4G. As in, take the original amount paid for the repair, as I had not gotten a battery replacement that worked, and add to that to make up the difference to purchase the newer one with a good, working battery.
This was refused. Instead I was given another iPod Touch 3G to take home. And, again, this one is doing the same thing as the first replacement I received. If I had not been there to see that there were, in fact, two different iPod Touches involved, I would have thought that it was the same one. This newest one has the same drunk metronome battery as the last "new" one.
I have been an Apple customer for many years now and the offer is still open to just pay the rest of the difference to upgrade to an iPod Touch 4. Because I don't want to and cannot play iPod Touch roulette via mail returns for the next month until I finally get one that has a working battery. That and the fact that it costs money for me to get to the nearest Apple store every time I go. So going any more would eat up any money saved on getting that original battery replacement back. But Apple would keep that money and it wouldn't have done what they said they would do. Which is, replace the battery with a working one.

It would have been difficult to take up the problem with the manager of the Apple store as I live in Japan and the manager is Japanese and doesn't speak English.
I did go through many discharge cycles, yes.
That may true and the percentage indicators used in battery information apps may not be reporting the correct percentage. However, when the iPod Touch itself is giving me the 20% battery life remaining warning and then going back up to almost 50% then back down to 20% and displaying a warning 4 times in 10 minutes for two separate iPod Touches, I don't think it is the percentage indicator's that could be wrong on two consecutive iPod Touches. Especially given that the original iPod touch I had, even with the failing battery it had inside of it, did not bounce around that much... Or at all.

IGo universal adapter not charging the battery?

Since yesterday I have realized that my apple adapter for the PowerBook G3 PDQ (aka wallstreet) has died. I plugged in the adapter and the battery icon just stays the way it is. So I plugged in the iGo Juice 70 and yeah the laptop shows the thunderbolt on the battery. Since I know when you use the laptop while charging, it is suppose to charge slowly. In two hours it said the battery is full. I thought the adapter charged it faster. Today I used it in battery mode and it show a full battery. When it was at 92% the laptop fell asleep. I checked the battery tester and it shows that the battery is empty. So I plugged in the same adapter, woke up the laptop, and it showed it was charging from 0% and in one minute it went up to 100%. I also have realized that the battery tester doesn't light up when it is charging. I tried this in OSX 10.2.8 and OS 9.2.2. Is it the adapter, laptop, battery??? Something else???

Vstream,
It does not sound like a power adapter issue. Since the adapter will power/run the powerbook, it has sufficient voltage to also charge the battery. Be sure to check if the battery charges in sleep or when turned off. You mentioned that the battery showed 100% charged; you then disconnected the power adapter and let the 'book run on battery; at 94% the 'book shut down. This has nothing to do with the power adapter; you either have a failing battery or a hardware problem in the 'book. Your problems are almost certainly a bad battery with classic symptoms...test LEDs refusing to light and random shutdowns when running on battery.
A definitive test is swapping batteries with a known-good Wallstreet, but this is usually not an available option.

Why is my battery running down on an iPhone 4 running iOS 7?

Why is my battery running down on my iPhone 4 when I'm not using my phone and all apps are closed? My phone will have a full charge at night, no apps running. Bluetooth is off, automatic updates are off, backgroud app refresh is off, and by morning the battery's charge has dropped to 50%. Some nights it will only drop 1-2% though, with no changes made. How can I fix this?
Also, since the update I am not receiving push notifications for some apps that I have them turned on for (turned on both in settings, and the app itself).
Any helpful advice is greatly appreciated.

I had been having battery problems with my Iphone 5 and decided to make a trip to the genuis bar, in the end they replaced my battery and reset my software because i had a failing battery and the hardware was malfunctioning. You may have something similar. I would recommend making a reservation to the genius bar online. They can then run a diagnostic on your iphone and get back detailed results on the current condition of your battery and wether or not the software controlling it is working. If you have applecare currently then they can replace the battery for free, if not there is a charge of around $70. If it turns out you have a different problem than they probably will be able to find out and give you better advice than I can!
Good Luck!

E71 Battery Life gone

My E71 battery life has gone off a cliff. One day it was lasting 2-3 days with constant use. Next it's lasting less than one day. It's 6 month old. Anyone got any idea why ?
I haven't changed my use, nothing is running in the background except bluetooth for my headset. I have not updated the software. Even tried running battery flat a couple of times and recharding.
Any help or ideas apperciated as it's very frustrating. Main reason I bough E71 was battery life after the appaling battery life for E66.

How many cycles do you think the battery has performed?
Around 200-300 Cycles is probably good.
They don't last forever, contrary to what some people believe.
If you have switched off stuff like WLAN Bluetooth and 3G and the battery is not lasting very long then I would consider getting a new battery.
They are pretty reasonable, around GBP £20, €30 approx depending where you are.
Rapid decline in battery charge hold is indicative of a failing battery.
Additionally if the handset is getting hot, then you should get it looked at, at a Nokia care point without delay.
Shunts...
I will mostly be communicating with a Nokia E72 Zodium Black
Nokia E72-1 with Vr 051.018.207.04 Software
If this post helped... Add some kudos!!

I Pod classic 160 gb Battery Problem

Right my problem is that my battery went low with the message 'connect to power' so i connected it to a usb power adapter,it says it's charging and the menu comes and u can play music when its connected,ive had it on charge on the usb power adapter for hours but as soon as i disconnect it,the screen goes blank and it wont turn on at all.If i connect it to a computer it comes up with 'charging please wait' but it stays like that for hours! What exactly is wrong here?

Possible a failed battery.
Maybe this page has some useful information for you...
The iPod/iPhone Battery unplugged . . .
http://www.vsa.cape.com/~danh/ipod.htm
No first hand experience with this issue myself. Sorry.
Good luck,
Patrick

Failing battery

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