Quad Core MBP saving battery life by only using two cores

If you utilize only part of your CPU, don't you think that it will take longer to process a given item of data and that there will be no effective savings of battery resources? It may very well be that more energy will actually be required because real energy 'hogs' like the HDD will be needed for longer periods of time. I have faith in Apple engineers who have designed the CPU to be as efficient as possible and I see no virtue in pursuing this avenue. A SSD would be a better possible solution for extending battery life.

I know of no applications that you are seeking.

Ciao.

A SSD would be a better possible solution for extending battery life.

It certainly is. I bought one for my son for better performance. He said it made a slight improvement, but that his Mac was so much cooler and not spinning the motor in the drive meant that his battery lasted MUCH longer that way.

Bad idea, but read on:

https://developer.apple.com/library/mac/#qa/qa2001/qa1141.html

The power management built into Mac OS X verges on amazing.

Unix and Windows users sometimes complain because those others do nowhere near as good a job as what comes standard on your Mac.

I am not sure you are going to see a dramatic improvement over what is already in place in your Mac running Mac OS X.

This whole thread reminds me of some of the nutty ideas American carmakers came up with during one of the first gasoline shocks back in the 70's. Don't remember whether it was Chrysler or GM, hellbent on keeping their huge gas guzzler engines, came up with the idea of disabling one or more cylinders when "not needed". A totally Rube Goldberg-ian contraption ensued, more prone to failure than any potential gas it may have saved.

And while on topic and following Señor Grant's lead, last Wedneday decided to take my MBP to the edge. 8% battery charge remaining, that is. That took the whole of 7:15, while running at 50% backlight, WiFi, MS Word and two browsers going (all four cores, too). Then on Thursday 10.7.4 + Safari 5.1.7 came out. So, back to the drawing board on Friday. 7:20 and 6% remaining, got tired of waiting and all this mine is bigger than yours BS and plugged it back in... 😉😝

disabling one or more cylinders when "not needed"

Still available on several models, and not just American cars. The Honda Oddesy 2011 V6 has it, according to wikipedia.

Goes to prove that some things just refuse to die (see here: http://www.itworld.com/hardware/270936/living-computing-fossils-old-tech-holding -dear-life ). At least now the "selectable piston" engine is much more doable, given modern all-electronic engine management, including drive-by-wire.