Macbook shuts down on battery power

My macbook shows 99% battery but if I disconnect the power cable it shuts down after a few minutes and I can't get it to boot without the power cable attached. Is it the battery? This is a late 2008 macbook with the original battery.

yes it is the 5.1
Battery Information:
Model Information:
Serial Number:          DP-bq20z951-3981-3c62
Manufacturer:          DP
Device name:          bq20z951
Pack Lot Code:          0000
PCB Lot Code:          0000
Firmware Version:          002a
Hardware Revision:          0005
Cell Revision:          0100
Charge Information:
Charge remaining (mAh):          1761
Fully charged:          No
Charging:          Yes
Full charge capacity (mAh):          2110
Health Information:
Cycle count:          135
Condition:          Check Battery
Battery Installed:          Yes
Amperage (mA):          -578
Voltage (mV):          12033

Similar Messages

MacBook shuts down on battery power at high cpu usage

I have a black MacBook core 2 duo (MacBook 2,1) that has always worked perfectly, but about 2 weeks ago it started to shut down without any notification.
When I am doing CPU intensive tasks I can hear a click and immediately after the computer turns off. This happens with different applications and even running Windows trough Boot Camp.
My first thought was that the computer shuts down itself to prevent overheating but since I only get the problem when running on battery power I rejected that theory.
In the other side my battery is working well, because it has only 183 charge cycles and the full capacity is 4169 mAh, meaning 82% of the capacity of a new one. With airport and bluetooth turned off and low brightness on the screen I can still read PDFs for more than 5 hours.
Another suspicious behavior is that last week, several minutes before the computer shut down, it couldn’t make any sound. I rebooted it and sound started working again. Maybe this is an independent problem but since they started together it can be related to the high CPU shut down one.
Has anybody seen this kind of behavior? Any idea about what is producing the problem?
Thanks in advance

yes it is the 5.1
Battery Information:
Model Information:
Serial Number:          DP-bq20z951-3981-3c62
Manufacturer:          DP
Device name:          bq20z951
Pack Lot Code:          0000
PCB Lot Code:          0000
Firmware Version:          002a
Hardware Revision:          0005
Cell Revision:          0100
Charge Information:
Charge remaining (mAh):          1761
Fully charged:          No
Charging:          Yes
Full charge capacity (mAh):          2110
Health Information:
Cycle count:          135
Condition:          Check Battery
Battery Installed:          Yes
Amperage (mA):          -578
Voltage (mV):          12033

Mac Book Pro Shuts down on Battery Power

First, I apologize to everyone for asking this question yet again. I have gone through the previous posts and I am still at a loss. So thank you for your patience and help.
When I run my MacBook pro on battery power it will run for around 15 - 20 minutes... then just be dead. No low battery warning. No shut down. Just poof and gone.
I have looked at my power settings to see if my battery is bad. But I don't have a Status indicator in there. I see This:
System Power Settings:
AC Power:
System Sleep Timer (Minutes): 0
Disk Sleep Timer (Minutes): 10
Display Sleep Timer (Minutes): 0
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): 0
Disk Sleep Timer (Minutes): 10
Display Sleep Timer (Minutes): 0
Wake On AC Change: No
Wake On Clamshell Open: Yes
Display Sleep Uses Dim: Yes
Reduce Brightness: Yes
Battery Information:
Battery Installed: Yes
First low level warning: No
Full Charge Capacity (mAh): 1185
Remaining Capacity (mAh): 1185
Amperage (mA): 0
Voltage (mV): 12426
Cycle Count: 174
AC Charger Information:
Connected: Yes
Charging: No
Hardware Configuration:
UPS Installed: No
I have also looked at the directions on http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1490 about how to calibrate my battery. It says:
" 1. Plug in the power adapter and fully charge your PowerBook's battery until the light ring or LED on the power adapter plug changes to green and the onscreen meter in the menu bar indicates that the battery is fully charged.
2. Allow the battery to rest in the fully charged state for at least two hours. You may use your computer during this time as long as the adapter is plugged in.
3. Disconnect the power adapter while the computer still on and start running the computer off battery power. You may use your computer during this time. When your battery gets low, the low battery warning dialog appears on the screen.
4. At this point, save your work. Continue to use your computer; when the battery gets very low, the computer will automatically go to sleep.
5. Turn off the computer or allow it to sleep for five hours or more.
6. Connect the power adapter and leave it connected until the battery is fully charged again."
Only I have a problem withe step 3 and 4. I don't get the warning, and it doesn't go to sleep. So, I don't think any calibration is working.
Do I need a new battery? Should I just buy one? This computer is WAY out of warranty and I never purchased and apple care plan for it.
Again, than you for any and all advice on what I may need to do.

I think it's time to buy a new battery

Ibook shuts down on battery power

Same problem as others when on battery power. ibook shuts down after 10 to 30% on battery
Battery info:
Battery Information:
Charge Information:
Charge remaining (mAh):    2000
Charging:    No
Full charge capacity (mAh):    2010
Health Information:
Cycle count:    0
Condition:    Good
Battery Installed:    Yes
Amperage (mA):    0
Voltage (mV):    16584
This is while on AC power. Can anyone help?

It runs on battery power but shuts down between 10% and 50% of usage. I had to replace my adapter after accidently kicking it while it was plugged into computer. Since I bought a new adapter the battery indicator shows that it is charging until full charge. The battery is bout two years old. May have damaged the dc board when I tripped over the original power cord.
More accurate battery info:
Battery Information:
Charge Information:
Charge remaining (mAh):    932
Charging:    Yes
Full charge capacity (mAh):    2010
Health Information:
Cycle count:    216
Condition:    Good
Battery Installed:    Yes
Amperage (mA):    1198
Voltage (mV):    16306
The previous battery info was while on AC power and the indicated a full charge

Premature shut down on battery power . . .

So I have seen this issue posted in other topics but nowhere have I seen an answer so I thought I would start a new thread. Actually I have two issues.
To start, I am using a 14" ibook G4 (the most recent version with the 1.42 GHz chip), 1.5gb RAM, 60GB HD. The ibook was purchased new in early September. It is still under warranty, but not phone support.
Issue 1. When I use my ibook on battery power often (but not always) it shuts down when I have about 20% power left in the battery. There is enough power to restart and work for several more minutes (sometime as much as half an hour). When it shuts down like this there is no low battery warning it just shuts off. And in fact it freezes. That is to say the screen is dark, the little white light that snores when the ibook is asleep in not on. However the only way I can restart is to hit control-apple-power, rather then just the power button alone. Usually when I restart my ibook it then runs fine till I get the low battery warning.
I have tried resetting the PRAM and I have re-calibrated my battery, neither of these things seems to have helped. I have lost some work with this so I really want to figure it out. Any ideas on how to make this stop?
Issue 2. As stated previously this is a relatively new ibook (4 months old). My battery only gives about 4 hours of work time max. I installed CoconutBattery in December and I had only 89% capacity (after 64 charge-cycles). This capacity has not changed since I first installed CB (now at 71 cycles). How low a capacity does a battery have to have to be eligible for replacement under the apple warranty. It seems a new battery should have over 90% capacity.
I really was hoping to be able to get closer to 5 hours of work time out of the battery. One of the reasons that I went with the ibook instead of the powerbook was for the longer battery life.
ibook g4 Mac OS X (10.4.3) PowerMac Mirror Door dual 1ghz

1. Resetting the PMU should take care of it.
2. Here are a few tips to maximize battery life.
A. Lower the brightness to about 5 or 6 bars.
B. Turn Airport off if you don't need it.
C. If there's a disc in the optical drive, remove it.
D. Set the processor performance to Reduced or Automatic in Energy Saver preferences.
89% and 4 hours run time after 71 cycles seems to be pretty good to me. All manufacturers take the steps I noted above to test battery longevity. If you expect to get the same results you have to setup the computer the same.
John

Adjusting automatic shut-down on battery?

Before installing Mountain Lion this summer, I used to have a slider or some way of controlling when my Macbook (13-inch, Aluminum, Late 2008) shut down on battery power. I was able to set it for 10% battery life or whatever, and go through a full discharge cycle. There were also warning pop-up alerts, letting me know when I was in critical time zone with battery life, and I think there was even a message like "you have 15 minutes of battery power left."
Now with ML and the last two updates, my battery reaches about 30% battery life and poof! everything goes black. No warning. No pop-up alert. Just a black screen.
I've searched Apple, the support forums and the web for a fix and the closest thing I find is info about UPS and uninterrupted power. I'm sure there is an easy way to adjust this in system preferences but I can't seem to find it. This is what my energy saving options are:
It's bad enough ML has reduced my battery power in half (I'm down to about 2.5 - 3 hours when I used to often get more than 4.5 - 5 hours), but this automatic everything-goes-black shutdown when I have 30% battery life is making me want to throw my laptop out the window. (And don't even get me started on the Spotlight indexing problems I'm having again with the 10.8.2 update... I've tried multiple things with that and am delaying the pain of having to reinstall ML for the third time since it came out this summer). FWIW, I have 290 battery cycles, but until ML I didn't have any sort of battery life issues.
Can you point me some direction? Thank you!

I'm having the opposite problem...
I leave it playing music in my speaker dock, and it shuts off on its own after about 1/2 hour even though I'm still listening.
I have not been able to find any controls for controlling or disabling the auto-sleep.
Please let me know if you find anything related to this

MacBook Shuts Down After Unplugging Powercord Although Battery is Installed

Hi,
Whenever I disconnect the power cord of my MacBook, the OS shuts down within 2-5 seconds. The battery is installed and it has a 80% health and it has 185 charge cycles. I've been experiencing this strange behavior after two days of installing (Secrets Preference Pane). But I'm not sure if it was behind the problem. I even uninstalled Secrets preference pane but the problem still exist.
At first I though the battery is dead, but for some reason I tried running the laptop later on the battery power and it ran for whole 2+ hours until it was fully discharged. I then charged the battery fully and used it again and it was working like a charm. But later the problem returned and the MacBook shuts down whenever it is not connected to the power cord. If the battery was dead, then how come it runs without a problem sometimes? also the health indicator shows that the battery is 80% healthy and the charging cycles is not much and whenever the system shuts down, the indicator on the bottom of the battery shows that it is fully charged.
I don't know what is causing the problem, and why sometimes the problem arises and sometimes it goes away.
I am using a 2007 white MacBook with the original battery (provided with the laptop). I am running Mac OS 10.6.2.
I tried several solutions such as:
- Cleaning the battery and MacBook ports.
- Resetting the PRAM.
- Fully discharging the battery and then fully charging it.
But it seems that I am not able to resolve the problem. I would appreciate any provided help.
Thanks,
shaknon
Note: Here are two pictures that shows stats about the battery:
1- http://jump.fm/SAOBW
2- http://jump.fm/JBHYI

I am having identical issues as you described - although I haven't installed secrets preference pane (so I doubt that's involved).
My problem went on for hours one night, I got sick of dealing with it and went to sleep with AC adapter unplugged and macbook off. The next day, it worked fine all day long. Now here I am in the evening - had a power cut, AC adapter went off obviously, and MacBook powered off. Again now I have this problem.
I tried everything you've talked about (PRAM reset) as well as SMC reset, no change. My battery stats look great, says battery is healthy. This started happening to me a few days ago, I upgraded to 10.6 a few weeks ago.. not sure what caused this to start happening.
I found one VERY interesting thing, maybe you can check this: when I have the problem, with AC adapter unhooked, when I try to power up my MacBook it comes up for 2-5 seconds (sometimes until the apple tone, sometimes not), and turns off. If I HOLD THE POWER BUTTON for 5+ seconds the MacBook remains on, the white light on the front flashes, and I get a long tone. This procedure is supposed to be used for firmware updates or something. Anyway, when I do this, the computer comes up perfectly and it uses the battery. When I hook an AC adapter up, that works, but as soon as I unplug it I am back to the same problem. You should try this and see if it works for you, it may be a clue. If nothing else, it's a good way to still use your laptop if you are on the go and can't be dead in the water
My wife has a MacBook slightly newer than mine, I'm going to try her battery when possible to see if that solves the problem. I hesitate to go to the genius bar as they are terrible where I live and it's always been a waste of time
(Also, the battery update fails for me as well).

My macbook pro (late 2008) shuts down but battery is at 25-30%

My macbook pro (late 2008) shuts down but battery is at 25-30% and I don't get a low power warning box before this happens. This only happens when the power chord is not connected, and it restarts with no problems once I put the power chord in. Does this mean I need a new battery, or is it an indication of something else? Using osx 10.5.8

Mine is Unibody 15" MBP late 2008, with the exact problem as yours. It can be a sudden shut down at 25-32%, or, after upgrading to OS 10.7.2, can be hang all of sudden on battery power.
Condition on, "Replace Soon". From 4.5 - 6 hours when new, goes down to 1 - 2 hours on discrete graphics.
But after 'abusing' it for the first year in the heat of Jakarta's climate in a non AC room when doing a video editing, before moving back to a comfort AC room at home sweet home, the battery performance is still top notch comparing to other kind than Apple. Also, it caused me to replace the right fan, after a lot of hard work on that first year. Oh, and by the way, I regularly done the battery calibration, at least once or twice between 3-6 months.
Here's also an useful link about battery I found on the internet:
http://batteryuniversity.com/learn/article/how_to_prolong_lithium_based_batterie s
My battery condition:
Battery Information:
Model Information:
Serial Number:          6N8389BD13EB
Manufacturer:          SMP
Device Name:          bq20z951
Pack Lot Code:          0
PCB Lot Code:          0
Firmware Version:          002a
Hardware Revision:          000a
Cell Revision:          100
Charge Information:
Charge Remaining (mAh):          2192
Fully Charged:          No
Charging:          Yes
Full Charge Capacity (mAh):          2716
Health Information:
Cycle Count:          616
Condition:          Replace Soon
Battery Installed:          Yes
Amperage (mA):          254
Voltage (mV):          12392
System Power Settings:
AC Power:
System Sleep Timer (Minutes):          0
Disk Sleep Timer (Minutes):          10
Display Sleep Timer (Minutes):          15
Automatic Restart on Power Loss:          No
Wake on AC Change:          No
Wake on Clamshell Open:          Yes
Wake on LAN:          No
Current Power Source:          Yes
Display Sleep Uses Dim:          Yes
GPUSwitch:          2
PrioritizeNetworkReachabilityOverSleep:          0
RestartAfterKernelPanic:          157680000
Battery Power:
System Sleep Timer (Minutes):          10
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
GPUSwitch:          2
Reduce Brightness:          Yes
RestartAfterKernelPanic:          157680000
Hardware Configuration:
UPS Installed:          No
AC Charger Information:
Connected:          Yes
ID:          0x0100
Wattage (W):          85
Revision:          0x0000
Family:          0x00ba
Serial Number:          0x0063ac36
Charging:          Yes
Got the battery replacement today. Hopefully it will last for at least 3 years like it predecessor.

MacBook shuts down instead of sleeping when battery low

Like many people, I had the infamous MacBook sudden shutdown problem where my MacBook (original model) would suddenly shut down wihtout warning regardless of if it was running off battery or AC adapter. I took the MacBook into the Apple store, they did their magic, and two weeks later an updated MacBook was shipped to me, free of the problem. I also applied the firmware update when it came out.
Now I have a new problem...it's that the MacBook doesn't seem to want to sleep when the battery gets low. Instead, it will suddenly shut down without warning. In the past, I seem to recall that it would give alerts saying that my power was low, and eventually force itself to sleep. However, now the battery can be as high as 15-20% and the MacBook will shut down. This never happens when the battery is not on the low side, so I'm wondering if this is a problem with the MacBook guaging how much power it has left. Sometimes, I notice that when I plug it in and reboot, the battery says it is at 0%, even though it clearly was not prior to the shutdown (though that didn't happen just now when it shut down - when I rebooted after connecting the AC adapter, it was at 15%).
I tried resettting the SMC firmware, which seems to help transietly, but the problem recurs. 90% of the time I use my computer plugged in, so that's why I've not noticed it much

The same thing happened to me last night -- the Macbook shut down because of low battery instead of sleeping, and it gave no warning messages at all as the battery power got low.
I never had the sudden shutdown problems, though.
I also checked the battery capacity with CoconutBattery, and it reported that the Max Battery Capacity was 4105 mAh, which is only 78% of the battery's original max capacity. Today, CoconutBattery reports that the battery's max capacity is 5035 mAh (96% of original capacity), which is more reasonable for a laptop less than a year old.
Perhaps resetting PRAM or the Power Management Unit could solve this problem.
Any experts out there with a solution?
MacBook Mac OS X (10.4.8)

MacBook shuts down when not connected to power supply

Hey everyone, I'm making this topic for an issue that has gotten me edgy lately.
My MacBook (not new) has a habit on shutting down on me instantly for some reason when the MacBook is not plugged into charge. Here is the strange thing though, if I unplug the charger plug and set it still on my desk, I have more of a chance of the laptop not failing on me, but when I carry the MacBook around, it has a 90% (guestimate) chance of shutting down on me.
Even after having the laptop plugged in for 12 hours, the laptop just goes into suspend mode.
I have to wait a couple of seconds before I can turn it back on (by pressing the power button, not any key).
Also, when I shut down more programs at certain times when not plugged in, and having the screen brightness low, the Mac does not shut down so fast.
Any advice?!
Thanks
Message was edited by: Biz Bizzle

Could be you battery. Mine shuts down when showing 40% charge left and I have to plug it into the power supply to fix it. I found out it was the battery by downloading coconut battery. It's an application that allows you to check the status of your battery (Link at bottom). I suggest you get that and when your macbook shuts down again, plug it into the mains, start it up and run coconut battery. If it shows your nearly out of battery power then that's your problem.
I was showing 40% left when it shut down. Did the above and I had no power left. It happens when the battery is old about 250-400 loadcycles
Hope this helps.
http://www.coconut-flavour.com/coconutbattery/index.html

MacBook shuts down on 60% battery percentage.

My MacBook shuts down on random percentages when used on battery power. I can only use it for FIVE minutes before it shuts down. And as I said, it shuts down before the battery runs down to 0%.

Go to the Apple in the upper left corner and select About This Mac, then click on More Info, then select Power from the left hand column of the System Profiler. Copy and paste the Battery Information back here.

My MacBook shuts down without warning. Recently installed snow leopard. Battery is fine. Any ideas?

My MacBook shuts down without warning. I recently installed Snow Leopard and increased my RAM/Memory. My battery is fine. When I took it to the Genius Bar and they ran a diagnostic, nothing showed up. It appeared fine and did not shut down during the time I was in the Apple Store. Of course, once I made the two-hour drive home, my computer shut down within two minutes of using it. Any ideas? Do I need a new computer? This one is about 5 years old.

Sounds like a buggerd battery chip. If the MacBook turns off at a certain percent all the time, then your battery's status chip is damaged and is (quite literally) lying to Mac OS X.
If it is actually hitting 0%, then temperature could be an issue or a there may be an issue with the battery itself.
My advice: you may need to get a new MacBook as a new battery for 2006-model MacBook may be hard to come by (and defintiely no warranty support from Apple).

Macbook shuts down unexpectedly when battery reaches 20% and unplugged

I noticed this behavior after installing the Bonjour Update 2010-001 (version 1.0) and the Remote desktop client update (version 3.3.2) last night. Upon reaching 20% of battery capacity, the macbook shuts down, and will not restart until it is plugged in. There is no warning, it just turns off.
Does anyone know what's going on?
Message was edited by: incomethax

Wow! I recently had this same EXACT problem and called Apple Care about it last week and said that they cannot do anything about it since my battery cycle is too high ( only 315) ! MacBook is the same model as yours. I finally brought mine in today at a local genius bar (Otay Ranch) and they replaced the battery even though My Mac's just a little over a month its 1 year warranty. I will now calibrate this battery and see if the same problem persists. When I called about this problem, the Apple Care rep says that he has never seen this problem before but now I just saw this and glad that I wasn't the only one, maybe its a faulty design on the first generation Unibody with removable batteries (Late 2008)

Macbook Shuts downs without any warning.

Hi All,
Recently I have noticed that my Macbook shuts down without any warning when the battery is out of power. Previously i used to get a warning when about 9-10 mins of power was left.
I have all the updates installed. Also I have not installed any new hardware.
Is there any settings in the System Preferences. What should I do to correct this situation.
Best,
Siva
Battery Information:
Battery Installed: Yes
First low level warning: No
Full Charge Capacity (mAh): 4600
Remaining Capacity (mAh): 3580
Amperage (mA): 1542
Voltage (mV): 12220
Cycle Count: 113

I'd try a SMC reset - that usually clears battery/power related settings and might do the trick.
Blackbook C2D Mac OS X (10.4.9) 120Gig, 1Gig, Superdrive.

OS X: Gray progress bar, then MacBook shuts down

Hi Apple Community,
Last year I bought my first Mac ever for University and have been quite happy with it so far.
A few days ago I closed my MacBook when its battery was at ~2%. Normally when battery is that low when closing the MacBook it usually goes into hibernation instead of sleep. When put it on power again about an hour later and opened it again it wouldn't start properly. When I try to boot it now, I see the apple logo with the rotating thingy and a progress bar which fills up in about 5 or 7 minutes. After the bar is filled up the MacBook shuts down and I have to do it all again. So the computer never starts.
I did some research on the subject but all of the solutions couldn't help me. Internet recovery doesn't work, because it doesn't allow me to connect to my university VPN (which is necessary to use in uni accomodation). I also don't have a Recovery CD.
When I start Disk Utility (Cmd + Alt + R + P or something) it won't work as well and just tell me that the Macintosh HD "could not be repaired after three tries" or similar.
HOWEVER: It can't be a hardware problem, because I'm running Windowss 7 via bootcamp (from where I'm writing right now) and everything seems to be alright on here.
My Mac:
MacBook Pro 13" (mid 2012) running on Mavericks.
I'd really appreciate anyone who could help me. I have all my important files synced to my dropbox, but I don't really like the idea of reinstalling OS X
Thanks in advance,
Luka

Guess that's really my only option, thanks. I thougt OS X were indestructible.

Macbook shuts down on battery power

Similar Messages

Maybe you are looking for