My four-month-old macbook pro's battery when fully charged is now down to 2 hours life from 7...in the last week. Why?

Question

My four-month-old macbook pro's battery when fully charged is now down to 2 hours life from 7...in the last week. Why?

I bought my macbook pro 13" about four months ago and have been in love with it ever since - especially as compared to my old PC laptop, the battery stays cool and lasts forever when I am working. Best charge was 7 hours. However, in the last week I have noticed the battery suddenly becoming hot when I unplug the charger, and the best length of time I can get on a full charge is 2 hours.

I have made sure all the settings are for prolonged battery life - which they've been since I first set up - and turned off all programmes running in the background, but this has not made any difference. I have been using iMovie a lot lately which takes a lot of battery which is probably why I didn't notice the battery being low as it automatically seems to make the battery slump to 2 hours when it's on. It's off now, and my battery won't improve.

I have also now followed the instructions (below) about calibrating, but this has had no effect. My housemate bought the same model a month ahead of me, uses it probably slightly less, but his is still 7 hours for a charge.

Is my battery faulty?

Calibration instructions used:

PowerBook G4 (15-inchDouble-Layer SD), MacBook (all models), MacBook Pro (all models), and MacBookPro (17-inch) (all models)

Thebattery calibration for the PowerBook G4 (15-inch Double-Layer SD) and anymodel of MacBook or MacBook Pro has been updated because of a new batteryreleased with this computer. With these computers, follow these steps tocalibrate your battery:

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.
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.
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.
At this point, save your work. Continue to use your computer; when the battery gets very low, the computer will automatically go to sleep.
Turn off the computer or allow it to sleep for five hours or more.
Connect the power adapter and leave it connected until the battery is fully charged again.

Tip:When the battery reaches "empty", the computer is forced into sleepmode. The battery actually keeps back a reserve beyond "empty", tomaintain the computer in sleep for a period of time. Once the battery is trulyexhausted, the computer is forced to shut down. At this point, with the safesleep function introduced in the PowerBook G4 (15-inch Double-Layer SD)computers, the computer's memory contents have been saved to the hard drive.When power is restored, the computer returns itself to its pre-sleep stateusing the safe sleep image on the hard drive.

MacBook Pro

Posted on Jul 8, 2011 3:06 AM

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Answer 1

sig

Level 8

35,862 points

Jul 8, 2011 4:09 AM in response to my_dear_bernard

Let's try launching System Profiler and select Power in the left side column. No copy and paste the Battery Information from the right side column into your reply post.

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Answer 2

Jul 8, 2011 4:12 AM in response to sig

Thanks Sig. The information is here: Anything useful stand out?

Battery Information:

Model Information:

Serial Number: 9G1130CJVD3MA

Manufacturer: DP

Device Name: bq20z451

Pack Lot Code: 0000

PCB Lot Code: 0000

Firmware Version: 0201

Hardware Revision: 0002

Cell Revision: 0158

Charge Information:

Charge Remaining (mAh): 5663

Fully Charged: Yes

Charging: No

Full Charge Capacity (mAh): 5663

Health Information:

Cycle Count: 59

Condition: Normal

Battery Installed: Yes

Amperage (mA): 261

Voltage (mV): 12574

System Power Settings:

AC Power:

System Sleep Timer (Minutes): 10

Disk Sleep Timer (Minutes): 10

Display Sleep Timer (Minutes): 10

Wake on AC Change: No

Wake on Clamshell Open: Yes

Wake on LAN: Yes

Current Power Source: Yes

Display Sleep Uses Dim: Yes

Battery Power:

System Sleep Timer (Minutes): 10

Disk Sleep Timer (Minutes): 10

Display Sleep Timer (Minutes): 2

Wake on AC Change: No

Wake on Clamshell Open: Yes

Display Sleep Uses Dim: Yes

Reduce Brightness: Yes

Hardware Configuration:

UPS Installed: No

AC Charger Information:

Connected: Yes

ID: 0x0100

Wattage (W): 60

Revision: 0x0000

Family: 0x00ba

Serial Number: 0x00262704

Charging: No

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Answer 3

Jul 8, 2011 4:24 AM in response to my_dear_bernard

Also, here is a screenshot of my (only just downloaded) Coconut Battery readout: (my Mac is in fact on 12 weeks old!). Should the battery be that hot?!

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Answer 4

sig

Level 8

35,862 points

Jul 8, 2011 4:38 AM in response to my_dear_bernard

I see no problems but why not query at the Apple store?

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Answer 5

Jul 8, 2011 4:39 AM in response to sig

Thanks, I wanted to know whether it was worth the hassle of trying to get a Genius bar appointment. Looks like I'll have to. Thanks for your help.

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Answer 6

Lexiepex

Level 6

14,102 points

Jul 8, 2011 5:06 AM in response to my_dear_bernard

Look in Activity Monitor and click the CPU Column. Is (are) there app(s) that use a lot of CPU?

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Answer 7

Jul 8, 2011 5:10 AM in response to Lexiepex

Hi Lex,

I'm honestly not sure what's a lot, so here's a screenshot: is that a lot?

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Answer 8

Lexiepex

Level 6

14,102 points

Jul 8, 2011 5:36 AM in response to my_dear_bernard

Anything more than 10-15 % consistently is a LOT. Remove the Firefox Plugins.

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Answer 9

iporã

Level 1

0 points

Jul 13, 2011 6:22 PM in response to my_dear_bernard

My battery was sinking strangely quickly for some weeks, and I was worried, thinking I was misusing it, but some googling and luck got me to the spot. After reading about this CPU issue I've checked myself, and I had a so called HPShortcutManager using 80-90%, going to zero and starting again.. My scanner isn't HP, but at the lab and mys mom's house it is, so I downloaded some software in order to put these stuff to work (I wanted my old photos from my mom's collection, and at the lab I may need itsooner or later).

A solution was posted here: http://bit.ly/q3Mfh6

A solution can be found here: OS X scanner driver maxes CPU

Open: Activity Monitor

Quit: HPShortcutManagerStartup and HPShortcutManager

Open: Finder

Go to: /Library/Application Support/Hewlett-Packard/

Remove: HPShortcutManagerStartup

This should stop HPShortcutManager from automatically starting up next time you reboot.

I have also removed HPShortcutManager just to be sure — not a problem because I don't use the shortcut buttons.

I hope this help!! And thanks toLexSchellings, who had the original hint!!

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Answer 10

Lexiepex

Level 6

14,102 points

Jul 14, 2011 1:32 AM in response to iporã

you are wellcome

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Answer 11

Lexiepex

Level 6

14,102 points

Jul 14, 2011 1:39 AM in response to my_dear_bernard

When the battery is loosing power fast it is always good to look in Activity Monitor to see which App using a lot of CPU power.

In your case the Firefox plugin. Disable it, Deinstall it.

System Profiler and Coconut screenshots: There is nothing wrong with your Battery, as Sig already said. No need for the moment to go to the Genius Bar.

The battery life time has nothing to do with the age of your MBP, it has to do with Battery Loadcycles.

You can read a simplified info here: http://www.apple.com/batteries/.

In the newer MBP there are batteries that do between 600 and a 1000 loadcycles, depending on the sixe of the batteries, which is depending on the physical size of you MBP (the 15" has a somewhat larger battery than the 13"). Having it plugged in often means less loadcycles.

Throw the Firefox Plugin out.

success,

Lex

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Answer 12

Jul 24, 2011 8:20 AM in response to iporã

@iporã: This was fixed in a later release.

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Answer 13

iporã

Level 1

0 points

Jul 24, 2011 12:41 PM in response to TheSmokeMonster

You mean that HP fixed the issue?? I downloaded these utilities just 3/4 weeks ago from HP USA's website (since the brazilian version didn't have any mac options, only windows). Well, me'be I didn't get the last version...

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Answer 14

Jul 24, 2011 12:44 PM in response to iporã

huh maybe not, depends on your scanner really. but it's good that you pointed it out anyway, carry on my wayward son!

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Answer 15

Aug 22, 2011 8:00 AM in response to my_dear_bernard

I'm getting similar experiences and I'm not sure but I think mine coincided with the 10.6.8 supplemental update. I think your op might have been before that came out, but I'm trying to look around for related or similar notes and a dramatic and sudden drop in battery performance is definitely being noticed recently around the mac community in recent weeks/months on otherwise young/healthy batteries.

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