Battery life dropped considerably on Mountain Lion.

turn your Powernap function off, that drain power

After upgrading to ML my battery is practically useless. Only 10% capacity left in 3 months?!? And I get only 0:41 out of it.

And only 70 loadcycles?!?

And I tried almost every advice on this and other threads. Apple should not keep quiet about this issue. It clearly affetcs many users.

Not lucky, but they are standard. I had numerous posts previously, and I can assure you that ML is not at fault. Having fixed three macboks, I can only deride those that, instead of reading previous posts (such as richadams or mine), come here and whine and complain that Apple let them down. untrue.

and mitja "it clearly affetcs many users." Actually, it clearly does not. You have no numbers, and no stats, but what we know is that they shipped millions and millions of ML and macbooks since, and extremely few people have such an issue of even I would have hear more about it. It is so few that all geniuses and sr techs I spoke to had not even heard of it.

How was it fixes? In all three cases the battery was defective. Two were old and had been misused. Two of my MBAs that arrived had defective batteries. One had been sent back (as they did not bother trying to swap the battery). My current MBA arrived Nov 2012, its battery was draining too fast, was replaced and it now works flawlessly. So I get:

- 6 to 7 hours usage doing wifi surfing at 50% brightness

- Did a rapid charge and just watched five 55 minute episodes of Sopranos, AVI files on VLC, and still got 20% left. Do the math, and drain averages 850 mAH. That is over 6 hours of video on full screen.

What I can cofirm is that:

- Power nap does drain somewhat

- Any attachments, wifi dongle, etc DO DRAIN IT while asleep no matter the time

- If testing sleep, the first night it looses 5% over 10 hrs (or 10 days standby) but then it flattens at 1% drain (30 days)

- ML does drain a bit faster on older systems. But am also running it on a 2008 PRO and it runs BETTER than SL and LION (lion was the worse). I tried 8 installs over 9 weeks. Key was using a new Apple battery in that system as well.

- A single misuse of a battery can wreck it. If somehow over heated, that battery can become defective in one cycle. That goes for any Li Ion battery.

- ML and its batteries run very nicely when unplugged. Plugging is best for charging.

When the geniuses saw my MBA drain 1% per 1.5 minutes in front of their eyes, they did not even bother, just sid "battery." Battery issues occur more often then evident, regardless of OS, Iincluding LION- check those forums too. Back then people also took 200 pages to whine vs Apple, while the rest of the world had no problem.

Most of the previous posters are gone, and the reason is they had their problem fixed. GO replace your battery, come back after 2 weeks testing (it needs two weeks to settle, new battery etc) and then we might not hear back at all.

ML works as advertised, but not all hardware does.

Mitja, go have your battery replaced, do a clean install, then come tell us two weeks later. Until then, it is your repsponsability taking apropriate steps, not Apple's.

Most of the previous posters are gone, and the reason is they had their problem fixed. GO replace your battery, come back after 2 weeks testing (it needs two weeks to settle, new battery etc) and then we might not hear back at all.

I've already replaced my battery, First week i did clean install after Apple has replaced my battery and my MacBook Pro runs smoothly without draining fast for just 3 weeks and than it started draining fast. Between my battery was replaced last month and now the cycle count is 10, Again last week i took my laptop to Apple Store they checked the logic board, battery (the new one) and the system information and then they told me that there is no issue found for the battery drain.

The person at the service center checked my laptop carefully and they've noticed that the battery is dropping faster every 1% per minute of use and the guy told me to “wait for new update” version of Mountain Lion and he said me that the battery life issue may get resolved on the up-coming version. I agreed with his discussion. Now i've got to await for the new update and i have nothing to do also they can't even replace my laptop because they haven't found any issues that's relating to battery.

I'm the “previously posters” in this thread and i have been silent for month now. My issue is not resolved yet and now i've got to await for the new update. I assume that may fix the battery life issues.

Anyway last time you've told me to replace the battery i had already done with that discussion afterwards it failed.

241,100 views and 2,882 replies in this thread alone shows it really affects only 3 people?!? Come on. I'm happy for you that you aren't experiencing same problems but Apple advertised that you can get 9 hours out of the MBP when I bought it. It was one of the key things when I was making the decision.

Every time I'm at work I use power cord instead of battery and I have all in all 70 cycles?!? And now you are saying I should pay another $150 to get the replacement like it is something ordinary. I paid more than $2000 which was more than $1000 more than next laptop on my list.

And Apple is letting its users down. I have never had any battery problems and I've been using many laptops over last decade. My laptop is 8 months out of warranty and I can't replace the battery free of charge.

According to your findings I could only fall in this category:

- A single misuse of a battery can wreck it. If somehow over heated, that battery can become defective in one cycle. That goes for any Li Ion battery.

But if Apple is writing software that overheats the batteries who is it than to blame? My laptop is (almost) always on stand and has enough airflow. I can't remember (if ever) when was the last time my MBP was even warm. So overheating is a far fetched option but only besides ML.

And like Sulaiman I was quiet for couple of months now. But since my MBP is not usable as a laptop anymore (I can't take it to any meeting that would last more than 30 minutes) I said it is time to speak up and encourage all other users to check their batteries too with coconutBattery app. This could be the only way to make us heard and for Apple to look into the problem. Now they are acting like the problem doesn't even exists.

Another thing that I noticed.

My current capacity went up 2% just today. If this issue is not software related, I don't know what is:

lovejam2012 wrote:

you have not YET 🙂

consider yourself a lucky person then

I have been using ML (and Lion before) since they were released, I do not feel lucky, just normal.

Mitja,

I do not know the specifics of your machine, but if you use the power cord and not the battery you are indeed damaging it. Previous posts provide both the reasons and science behind it, as well as links to Apple and specialized reference site. Plugged in = damaged battery. two words: parasitic drain. If it does not make sense, go through the previous posts.

Your battery IS USED EVEN WHEN PLUGGED IN, hence parasitic drain. Using it as such damages it and is not withing Apple's usage guidelines. The battery is means to be cycled. You can use it plugged when recharging and working, but at 100 %, or when fullly charged (they are not the same), you unplug and let it drain. So if you use it 70 days plugged, that should have damaged it. Period. For the rest it is difficult to speculate against Apple when you did what you are not supposed to do : WORKING WITH IT PLUGGED AT 100%. The top threshold of the Li keeps producing parastic power and shortening both the lifespan and capacity of it. Makes sense? if not, reread previous posts.

So you are describing a physical problem and trying to culprit the OS. Sorry, cognitive dissonance. Your battery is producing and sending erratic numbers. the time you got the SERVICE BATTERY icon was your warning of a hardware issu and it means "Battery is fubared, bring me to service. Beyond that point (around the 80% marc) it is Apple's turf provided you bring it in. Since you have it in your possession, I can only speculate the issue lies with your course of action and not at all with ML or Apple. It's like someone complaining of steering loss on their vehicle and blaming the manufacturer, but for 2 weeks did not go bother check that liquid leak under the car and have it serviced... Had you brought it to Apple, they would have told you the battery MUST be replaced. had you listened it would have been done.... Or since you have the same, we know it was not done. In life we got two choices: whine about a situation, or try everything within our means to solve it. By 10% battery life, sorry, sounds to me you had lots of time to spent NOT adressing and issue. This should be seen as a life lesson a bit.

Prove me wrong (work order numbers that you went there and they refused to do it for you) and I will retract.

1% a minute, that is beyond clear issue. I replaced 3 MBAs since august, one for the drain issue. In the end, the current one, after they replaced the battery was told me if the drain continued, they would replace the logicboard. It did not, as it turns out, it was the battery.

I do not know why you are notgetting the same solution as everyone else, and you should take that with Apple. If your unit is not out of warranty, x 2 drain = logicboard replacement. All geniuses I saw, and 2 sr advisors, confirmed this. So curious, why have they not replaced your logicboard yet? I do not believe that the issue lies with Apple when they confirmed to me the solution is standard: drain = hardware (battery or logicboard). Rule out the first then you got the second.

Count me among those that are less than impressed with battery life under Mountain Lion. The battery definitely drains more quickly while using my 2011 MacBook Pro under ML vs. Lion. But since actually using the computer has so many variables, it's easier to simply compare battery drain while the computer is sleeping. I'll use my MacBook Pro sporatically throughout the day and plug it in to charge whenever I know I won't be using it for the rest of the night. Then, before I go to bed, the MacBook is fully charged (green light on the AC adapter cable) so I'll typically unplug it and let the computer remain asleep. In the morning, I grab the MacBook Pro and away I go with sporatic use throughout the day.

With Lion, after a full charge and 6-8 hours of sleeping on battery, my MacBook Pro would show 97-99% of battery life when I opened it for the first time of the day. Sometimes it even showed 100%.

Under Mountain Lion, same conditions, my MacBook Pro shows 86-91% of battery life when opened for the first time that day.

Before putting the MacBook Pro to sleep, I always quit all apps. Nothing could possibly be running during sleep (and shouldn't be trying to run during sleep anyway).

Again, a 2011 MacBook Pro so Power Nap isn't an option.

It's pretty darn annoying. And ML 10.8.1 and 10.8.2 didn't make any difference. If anything, it got worse with 10.8.2.

Mark

Seems like a perfect POP (Proof Of Problem) to me. Good work, Mark..!

Mitja, I do believe you have a battery defect, OSX plays no part on battery capacity/wear. That is entirely done by the onboard battery electronics and the SMC on the computer (which you can reset). If your computer is still under warranty, I would have Apple take a look at it if I were you. Your current power load is excellent at less than 10 watts. That tells me that OSX is currently managing the CPU speed and voltages correctly. The power management on other MacBooks is the main issue with ML, which is the same issue I have. Reverting to Lion fixed my problem and the same for many others. With ML, my power load is about 19 to 22 watts while doing nothing, just idling, hence cutting my battery life in half. Lion does not have this problem, keeping my load within 11 watts and giving me back the advertised battery life with one charge.

Beisarius, you are ill informed. Leaving the computer connected to the power supply and leaving it plugged-in DOES NOT DAMAGE THE BATTERY. It does wear the battery down for sure, since the computer will do what is called a trickle charge just to maintain the levels nominal, and the wear takes years for it to be relevant. In my case, it took 4 years of doing that to loose approximately 15% of my battery capacity, and even then I still get a good 4.5 hours with my computer. Actually, even with my PowerBook and its original battery from 2004, leaving it plugged in 24x7, the battery still has over 80% capacity, same thing with other computers I have owned.

So guys, stop looking for issues with ML and battery wear. If your computer is draining the battery faster, use a tool like CoconutBattery and see what your battery load is while idling. Should never be above 13 watts at half brightness with a modern MacBook, with Bluetooth off and WiFi on. If the load is above that, backup your machine, install SL or Lion, and compare. That way you will know if the issue affects you.

And again, this issue with ML has no effect on battery capacity or wear! Is just power load issue due to poor or non-existing speed stepping for the CPU, which is the culprit of poor battery life as I have previously explained.

ML Battery Issue

Not that I've reverted back to Lion and have gone through a few cycles, I can say that there is a problem with ML that affects the battery health / life of some MBP/A users. In my case, I've made three key observations. First, battery health is relatively constant under Lion whereas under ML it had dropped by 6% in less than 4 months. Not big drops, but certainly a decline. Second, Lion takes longer to finish charging the battery than ML (ML is faster). Third, Lion uses less current than ML when sitting idle.

The 3rd item offers a suggestion as to why some people experince shorter battery life with ML than with Lion. Since ML has higher current, that translates to a greater draw on the battery and shorter battery life. The 1st and 2nd items could be related. Two things that can damage a Lithium Polymer batter are heat and improper charging. Given that Lion takes longer to finish charging the battery than ML, it is possible that they have changed the battery charging algorithm. If that's the case, it could certainly damage the battery and would explain why some people experience problems with ML but not when they revert back to their original OS.

Yes, the SMC / Firmware is supposed to handle a lot of this for us. But the observations seem to suggest that the OS also plays a role. Without access to the source code, only Apple can determine what is going on. But there is enough evidence to suggest that the OS plays a contributing role in the problems.

My background: Years as a firmware engineer. Unfortunately I don't have access to the Apple source code or test equipment or I'll pull a small team together to track down and solve this problem for them (for an undisclosed price).

Beisarius wrote:

1% a minute, that is beyond clear issue. I replaced 3 MBAs since august, one for the drain issue. In the end, the current one, after they replaced the battery was told me if the drain continued, they would replace the logicboard. It did not, as it turns out, it was the battery.

I do not know why you are notgetting the same solution as everyone else, and you should take that with Apple. If your unit is not out of warranty, x 2 drain = logicboard replacement. All geniuses I saw, and 2 sr advisors, confirmed this. So curious, why have they not replaced your logicboard yet? I do not believe that the issue lies with Apple when they confirmed to me the solution is standard: drain = hardware (battery or logicboard). Rule out the first then you got the second.

Yes, At least i'm not in America. I'm currently living in Malaysia and there is no genius bars here there is only service center (which includes with the Reseller store). So the service center are very strict as they're not aware of this issue, That they've always keep telling me the issue is “softwares that aren't compatible with Mountain Lion” But i've already tested all of my apps everything that has been optimized for Mountain Lion and they don't still believe. So a another guy told me to await for the new update for Mountain Lion like the one i mentioned in previous post.

They've only replaced the battery not the logic board. When i got replaced the battery the device ran smoothly without fast drain just for 3 weeks. Now the drain has returned again. Anyways I'm in warranty with AppleCare and my 1 year warranty is finished but i have 2 more years extended.

However I paid money for the battery replacement and they told me the battery service doesn't includes with the AppleCare so i got charged for that. Now i'm highly disappointed as Apple Customer and the service is very ridicluous.