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The De-evolution of My Laptop Battery

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Re: The De-evolution of My Laptop Battery

#101

Post by kalleboo »

gz5 wrote: post #78
tomkarlo wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you point to data showing competitors that are doing it better? Seems like the battery life problem impacts everyone pretty equally, and the batteries being used inside Macbooks are pretty similar to those used by every other manufacturer.

agree, this is not specific to macbooks. bottom line is today's batteries only achieve (relatively) limited charge/discharge cycles and i don't believe (could certainly be wrong) there is much business motivation to improve that.

There's plenty of business motivation in fields that combined exceed PCs monetarily, such radio, military, space, automotive, aeroplanes, power grid, anywhere you use energy

Re: The De-evolution of My Laptop Battery

#102

Post by kalleboo »

phillmv wrote: post #10
voidlogic wrote: post #7

>letting the battery cycle* Wait- I thought that was for NiCd batteries and Li-ion batteries where suppose to always be topped off? Furthermore going below 15-20% charge hurts their max charge level? *By cycle he means running it down and charging it up?

Yeah, can someone who knows how this shit works chime in? There's a lot of conjecture on the internet but few answers. Apple's advice seems to be "don't worry, be happy, don't let it be in a discharged state for a very long period of time, occasionally cycle through it". I'm on my third battery for this 2009 Macbook unibody (granted, the first one was water damaged but still…), and 300 cycles in it's starting to give…

There seems to be no exact science with Li-ion battery life. Even defining "life" is difficult, since some people say the batteries "life" ends at 80-50%.

Of all the things I've heard about Li-ion batteries, the only ones that haven't been refuted are:

- Li-ion batteries like living at around 70%. More or less will decrease their life

- Li-ion batteries will always lose 30-50% capacity in 3 years even if they're just lying on a shelf due to their chemistry

- Li-ion batteries dislike heat. More heat reduced battery life. Coldness will temporarily reduce capacity, but has no long-term effect on lifespan.

Re: The De-evolution of My Laptop Battery

#103

Post by tokenadult »

This discussion is very interesting. I'm puzzled about how to keep batteries working longer, so I looked around for some sources,

http://batteryuniversity.com/learn/article/how_to_prolong_li...

http://lifehacker.com/5875162/how-often-should-i-charge-my-g...

http://www.latimes.com/business/technology/la-fi-tn-five-fre...

http://gigaom.com/2013/06/06/new-ti-chips-speed-charge-times...

with background information about batteries. It would be great to hear comments about what these sources say. I need a reality check on how to take better care of batteries in rechargeable devices.

Re: The De-evolution of My Laptop Battery

#106

Post by iloveyouocean »

YooLi wrote: post #4

If your cycle count is 223 and you are nearing 80%, then your battery is defective, plain and simple. Apple will replace it. It's happened to me a couple times and Apple took care of it with no hassles.

2012 Macbook Air: Cycles: 138 Health: 83%

Is this replacement worthy? What am I doing wrong?

Re: The De-evolution of My Laptop Battery

#107

Post by untothebreach »

gambiting wrote: post #91
untothebreach wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I remember correctly, with the Macbook Air it will have to be '"that's not right...", and grabbed another Macbook Air, and started migrating my data, etc, etc...'

Nope. Had a battery replaced in my 2012 Air recently(only because a clip separating the battery from the case broke,not because of the battery life) and it took 30 minutes to get it done at an Apple Store.

Ah, my mistake.

Re: The De-evolution of My Laptop Battery

#108

Post by hedgehog »

mistercow wrote: post #83
JimmaDaRustla wrote: post #64

WHOA!! Huge mistake here - he says he cycles his battery! DO NOT DO THIS TO LITHIUM ION BATTERIES! Lithium Ion will last longer by NOT allowing the cells to be fully discharged! This is the opposite of Nickel Metal Hydride and Nickel Cadmium - these types of batteries DO require a full discharge and full recharge in order to provide a longer life. In addition, the number of discharges, the temperature, etc all come i…

The really dumb thing is that, as far as I can tell, a battery's controller generally counts a "cycle" as "started discharging, started charging", regardless of time in between. At least, that's how it was with my MacBook a few years ago. Unplug, plug in, cycle count increases. The crappy thing about that is warranties. Apple, for example (at least last I checked; I don't use a Mac anymore) , would replace a battery…

I don't believe that description of cycle count has ever been accurate for Apple hardware and certainly isn't for recent MacBook Airs:

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1519

Re: The De-evolution of My Laptop Battery

#109

Post by untothebreach »

mikeevans wrote: post #50
untothebreach wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I remember correctly, with the Macbook Air it will have to be '"that's not right...", and grabbed another Macbook Air, and started migrating my data, etc, etc...'

They recently replaced the battery on my Macbook Air. They didn't replace the whole computer, just the battery. Took about 15-20 minutes.

Ah, I thought the battery was permanently attached to the body.

Re: The De-evolution of My Laptop Battery

#110

Post by tdfx »

__david__ wrote: post #52
sixothree wrote: post #20

Is this guy really a developer? I can't imagine using a single 15" monitor to accomplish anything at a productive pace.

That's funny, I can't imagine being tethered to a single spot and accomplishing anything worthwhile! Snark aside, I love big monitors as much as the next guy, but I've seen very productive developers that never even maximized their code window, let alone used multiple screens. Getting in the flow is way more important than having a nice setup.

I work all day on a MacBook Air 13. I spend 70% of my time in a terminal, so screen size doesn't matter much to me.
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