Lion - Horrible MacBook Pro Battery Life

I think what we need is CPU and disk usage profiling on Lion. I remember reading somewhere that Mac does have quite a bit of profiling tools (you can launch them by issuing commands within the terminal app), but I, for the life of me, can't find the bookmarks. I think that may shed some light into what it is.

Hey found it! It is dtrace toolset under Mac

There is a blog that talks about it http://dtrace.org/blogs/brendan/2011/10/10/top-10-dtrace-scripts-for-mac-os-x/

For Disk usage, there is "sudo iosnoop"

For CPU, there is "sudo cpuwalk.d"

For Disk usage, I find that Dropbox is often a big offender in "indexing" even if you don't add or remove files. It just consumes all CPU powers to index for a long long time.

For CPU, there is a ton of launchd (the one that handles background services) behind the scene, but it doesn't shed much light as to which background services are running in the background

Hi Papalapapp, i have the same 13" and i have the same problem!!!

I believe in ML 🙂

Apple - Batteries - Notebooks

CT, yes, i know.

i have bought a new battery.

i have installed Lion again.

I have ALWAYS the same problem. Only 2.30 h of battery life (without wifi, bluetooth, ecc...).

Ok so I agree with you guys it has to do something with Lion. I just got my Macbook Pro less than a month back and the battery health has just been declining until now it is at a stable 90%, let's hope it doesn't go lower. Knocks on wood. My old Macbook Pro which is a late 2010 when upgraded to Lion suddenly showed the battery as in needing of replacement when it had run perfectly on Snow Leopard. :S this is so bizarre.

Went in the Apple store today to try out the new Retina display Mac Book Pro's. Unlugged the power for a few mins and it was settled at about 8 1/2 hours. Nice.

Then fired up Safari and Face time. I did not connect to anyone in face time but did run the Apple Store video ad from within Safari. After a few mins, it dropped to 2hrs and 57 mins and after 5 mins, it settled at 3:15. I ran Activity Monity and nothin else was running (CPU was < 5%).

So, there you go. Not Scientific. I shut down both apps for another 5 mins and it went back up to 8 1/2 hours. Ran just Safari, Apple Video and was down to about 4.45 hrs. Fired up face time and went to around 3hrs 15 again.

So, Battery "status" was pretty acurate and I was getting pretty much what I see on my own MACbook pro. Was on the machine for 30 mins so got a pretty good idea that the new MACbooks are the same at least as the existing ones.

Funnily enough, I went over to the 13" MacBook Air retina and got about the same results but plus an hour. On the tests above, Mac Air would have giving about 4hrs and 30 mins!

@Franc_Iphone, it is normal that battery time reflects upon the level of load you place on the system. What matters the most is the overall battery time based on average computer usage load.

With iPad, Apple seems to be very good at providing awesome real world battery life estimates. But I wonder why they can't do the same with MBP.

Antonywi... I concur. All I ran, on a brand new Mac Pro (3 days old in the store) was Safari (no flash) and FaceTime. It's no wonder, since my "real-life" consists of VMWare, Twitter, Iphoto, Adium, Drop box, that all I get is < 3 hours. I just wonder what you have to do to get 7+ hours (playing video) as the announcement for the new Apple Mac Pro's claimed!!!!! I do get 4 1/2 hours if I run GFXcardStatus (30% more) so it's not just my machine but the O/S too!

Ipad's programs, there's few that are real work-horses so estimating is 10x easier, as it is on my DROID XOOM tablet.

I have a 17" Macbook pro. Am about to get the battery replaced for the third time in four years. It runs too hot to touch (hot enough to burn skin), loses 100% of its charge in 1 hour 45 minutes. I have been through this twice before, same problem. This power loss is just doing email, and yes Apple, I follow all of your instructions to maintain battery life.

Since owning this computer I also had to have the video card and a few other things replaced.

After a while the ease of operation does not make up for poor durability. With regrets, my next computer will not be a Mac. The competitors products are very good now.

There's no way three batteries could have been faulty. Something else is wrong with your system that is causing the battery to drain rapidly.

1. Check Activity Monitor to see what's using up all your power while the battery is draining.

2. Remove all items from

 > System Preferences > Users & Groups > Login Items

3. If you're on Lion, boot into the Recovery Disk, choose 'Disk Utility' and 'Repair Disk'.

4. Do both a PRAM and SMC reset for good measure.

@Rbisha, have you tried the smcFanControl? That program helps regulate the fan speed to keep the temperature in check. For my 15" MBP, I mainly use it for development and code compilation. From time to time, it does heat up, sending the fan speed up to 5000 rpm, but so far so good.

I haven't yet decided on whether my next laptop will be a Macbook Pro or ThinkPad X1 Carbon (or even the good old T series), but I definitely have better battery life with my ThinkPad than with my MBP. And yet, working with MBP remains quite a pleasure, as long as it is plugged in to the outlet.

In principle I agree, one would think there should be something else wrong to have this many battery problems. However, when I have taken it to the Apple store with battery issues (and only Apple technicians have ever worked on it), they have assured me everything else is fine. Yes, we have checked the Activity Monitor. (I am using Snow Leopard.)

So, either there is something wrong with the computer or the systems that Apple technicians have failed to identify or tell me about, or there is something wrong with the batteries. Neither option leaves me wanting to buy another Mac.

To use an automobile analogy. If you buy a car, and have to replace the battery three times in four years, only to discover there is something wrong that the dealer's own mechanics didn't catch, would you buy that brand of car again?

I didn't think so.

I appreciate antonywu's suggestion for fan control, to look at the multiple discussion boards this seems to be a common and longstanding problem. Thanks too for the suggestion for ThinkPadX1 Carbon, I will check it out.

I've taken my cars to plenty of dealers with crap mechanics.

Apple store 'technicians' aren't necessarily always all they are cracked up to be. Did you get a store 'genius' clerk, or a real tech pro? Did you get someone (like I did at the Epson Service center with my printer) who was wanting to go on a break, but had to deal with you first?

If you've tried the steps I gave you above, run your mac in Safe Mode. Does the battery still get depleted as fast? My bet is 'No', in which case you have a 3rd party software problem. If I'm wrong, then the best suggestion I can offer you is go to a different Apple store.

I say again, the chances of three batteries in a row being faulty is so slim that it is almost 100% certain that there is something else to blame.

I had the same problem (drastically shortened battery life after upgrading to Lion.

Resetting the SMC (System Management Controller - similar to CMOS in Windoze systems) did the trick for me.

Resetting the SMC on portables with a battery you should not remove on your own

Note: Portable computers that have a battery you should not remove on your own include MacBook Pro (Early 2009) and later, all models of MacBook Air, and MacBook (Late 2009).

1. Shut down the computer.
2. Plug in the MagSafe power adapter to a power source, connecting it to the Mac if its not already connected.
3. On the built-in keyboard, press the (left side) Shift-Control-Option keys and the power button at the same time.
4. Release all the keys and the power button at the same time.
5. Press the power button to turn on the computer.
   Note: The LED on the MagSafe power adapter may change states or temporarily turn off when you reset the SMC.

Original article: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT3964