Leopard is a battery hog

Was spotlight checking the disk and maybe the fan was running because of it?

Click on the spot light in the upper right (the magnifying glass) and see if it indexing. If spotlight is not doing its thing.. read the last reply of this thread...

http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=5699309#5699309

Message was edited by: LeRoy A

I also have terrible battery problems.
My battery life is about 1-1/2 hours now on my MacBook Pro (15" 2ghz).
Other problems include:
- system shuts down completely with no low battery warnings at all.
- battery time estimates are wildly inaccurate and fluctuate significantly.
- sometimes stops charging even though it is not completely charged.
- charging time estimates are crazy wrong: at the moment, with the battery down to 30%, it claims that it will only take :38 to charge... it will say :38 for about an hour and never update properly.
I have tried resetting the management unit. I have tried a different power adapter. Spotlight is not indexing. My fan is at a normal speed (and one of my fans doesn't work -- a different story there, I never even knew I had two fans because one has never worked meaning I never had it fixed under AppleCare 'cos I didn't know something was wrong!).
I have checked with friends, who are all experiencing the same sorts of problems so I'm confident it isn't my battery or my specific machine.
This is very disconcerting, and makes me worry that I will lose my work at any moment because of the lack of warnings before shut down.

I havent really noticed much difference in battery usage vs Tiger, but I have noticed a considerable difference in battery usage while on standby. Previously i used to be able to close the lid of my MacBook and not touch the MacBook for a few days and battery power would maybe be 10-20% less, now, If i close the lid, and go back to the computer a day later my battery is down 50%..

What gives?? I checked all my power settings, and everything looks to be normal, I've even completely drained the battery thinking it was just a bad charge..

10.5.1 update doesnt seem to make a difference w/ this issue.

*Leopard reduced battery life to ~1 1/2 hrs, down from 3 hrs.*
Trying to offset the detrimental effect on battery life, I even shut down some Leopard functions w/o success. I then added a second gig of RAM to reduce access to HD. Despite this, my fan ran at a rate of speed which was audible, like allot of Windows machines. The bottom of enclosure of my MacBook was 96 degrees at 68 degrees ambient room temp. I was concerned that over time, this would have a detrimental effect on my machine. Ultimately I restored a backup via Super Duper, which I'll accept as my Time Machine.
Greatly disappointed in Apples decision to market Leopard in the manner they did. Stopped into apple store, where sales rep told me his battery life actually increase his battery life because of improved memory management features in Leopard, and the problem was probably with my battery. I'm disappointed that Apple would coach their staff to pass of such inappropriate BS.
Battery life is back to 3 hrs w/ Tiger

Actually, he might be telling you his own experience.

I have found that my battery life is somewhat extended after installing Leopard.

I'm glad it worked out for you. There are some very nice features. System demands seem to greatly exceed what was implied by the published minimum system requirements.
Thanks,
Greg

I disagree. My battery life with Leopard is at least as good as it was with Tiger, on my 1st generation 2.16 GHz MacBook Pro.

Hmmm, Why is there such a disparity here? What is causing the difference?

One note, when my enclosure was hitting 86 degrees, I was only on the web, no demanding apps.

Heat can come from CPU, Hard drives, or optical drives.

One can't be sure that websites are not CPU intensive.

Sites with embedded Java or Flash, such as chats, can most certainly suck up CPU.
I've seen flash that ground my computer to a halt - often when the flash was looping or poorly written - but not always.

Sites with AJAX, which are increasingly becoming the norm, will constantly be refreshing the page content as you are on the page - and not as only as you load pages.

Also poor ventilation can contribute to heat build up. For example using a MacBook or MacBook Pro on a carpeted surface can block airflow as can using it on your lap.

I have a MBP C2D. Under Tiger, I had no battery problems and getting about 3 hours of life. Now, after a clean Leopard install, I am getting less than half that and my MBP will +shut down without warning+. I did the occasional battery conditioning and I did all updates in the past including battery firmware update. My fans are not running. It is not getting hot. I'll check occasionally to see if spotlight is re-indexing.

There may be a hidden problem with your MBP. Some in this forum have been having problems with the sleep mode. Simply put, the Mac doesn't sleep when you close the cover. If it doesn't sleep then even if you close the cover the Mac will run and thereby use power. Check it out. If the light on the latch does not pulsate 20 seconds after you close the cover, then it is not sleeping.

If this is the case, there are a number of remedies that have not been totally successful. Some say reset your PRAM. Others say delete your com.apple.powermanagement.plist. I am not sure if any of these home remedies will work.

Just for reference, I am getting about 3-4 hours on my MBP battery (with moderate disk usage).

Did the upgrade on my Macbook Pro, and no battery issues here...