Battery life dropped considerably on Mountain Lion.

It seems like Firefox is destroying your CPU. Try uninstalling it to see what the result is. 65% of the CPU being used for a simple web browser seems over the top.

I personally will use Safari on my rMBP due to its iCloud integration.

Neither Firefox nor the Flash pluin should be consuming that much processor %. What version of Firefox are you using? I'm on the beta release channel and running v.15 - and right now Firefox is running 9.3 of my processor % and Flash is running 7.4.

Do you have the latest version of Flash? And Firefox? Just curious because, unless you were watching some online videos at the time you took that screen shot, you should not have those two processes taking up such a high % of your CPU...

Clinton

I just ditched Firefox - which was completely up to date, as was the flash player. Turns out my laptop no longer sounds like an LAX runway and my battery life is now 5 hours instead of 2!

Now back to the topic of the discussion. Any idea if the battery life before ML was 5hr max or more?

Oh yes without doubt, even with Firefox installed and a bunch of other apps I was getting a good 6:30. Testing again but this time with 100% I'm only getting 4 hours.

Obviously firefox wasn't helping the issue but it certainly hasn't eradicated the issue completely.

I'm getting better battery life.... in my case I was using Chrome.

Started using Safari again, updated Flash to latest version and battery improved a LOT!

Still is a little erratic estimating time remaining, but fully charged I'm seeing again 6-7 hours...

Haha you have to wonder if it's all a ploy to get us using a closer to home browser 😉. I am astonished at the lack of any noise I'm getting right now 😀.

It's undoubtedly a problem with installed programs. Try disabling each program one by one and seeing if it helps the issue.

If not, I'd do a clean reinstallation anyways just to see if it's a hardware problem.

Without sounding like a broken record, check out the 176 page thread on the same issue/symptoms/fix attempts on this thread where people experienced the same issues from Snow Leopard to LION. You guys WILL go around in circles for the same year we did. We need Apple to step up. We shouldn't have to look to solve what is a problem of 1/2 battery life with same apps as previously.

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3194235

There are programs that run on your machines that we don't know about. Apple collected a lot of logs from me. It helped considerably when they found an old hidden USB modem driver and had me remove it (complex removal). I still to this day don't understand how it helped, I didn't think there were "drivers" even!!! It actually helped for a while but eventually went back to 3 hours. Apple (dev teams) continued to help but the conclusion was, it's the new GPU (I got this from Tim Cook's office who managed my concerns and helped interface with development. More programs (some legacy) are not using the GPU properly. There must be some truth to this because as we pointed out to Apple, if you run the GFXCARDSTATUS program (free download) and turn off switching, you get another 30% back.

I asked Apple to show me the documentation they provide to developers to help "update" their programs to use the GPU properly and they said their wasn't any. It's all very sad. I gave up 6 months ago and live with 3 hours battery life max on a daily basis (2 hours if I watch any movie). What frustrates me is that NO-ONE at Apple has stepped up to admit the problem or try to fix it. 7 hours is what they still sell.

Quite frankly:

Lion =/= Mountain Lion

Besides, most people still have the option of a 14 day no questions asked replacement if something does indeed happen to the battery life. If not, people have the one year free AppleCare. A dramatic decrease in battery can be attributed to hardware, therefore a replacement may be issued [especially with the new rMBP with glued on batteries].

Did you not ever think of using your Apple Care to get your Mac replaced?

It's not hardware. Too easy. I wish. Yes, I have AppleCare but Apple run diagnositcs BEFORE deciding to replace the machine. AN overnight decrease in battery life by upgrading firmware is very unlikely to be hardware. If you check the other post, some people tried that too.

But hey, maybe your right, what do I have to lose - 1 year after the fact and it's a cheap way to do a "clean" install.

While you're completely correct that it's definitely not a hardware issue, the Apple "Genius" would be an idiot to not see your estimated battery life. If it's not happening to all models, why not try a different model?

Best of luck. I'm going to do that.

Within an hour of uninstalling Firefox the following has happened:

Immediately after removing Firefox: Battery Life with 100% - 5:06

30 mins after removing Firefox: Battery Life with 100% - 3:34

1 hour after removing Firefox: Battery Life 94% - 2:27 (1:54 to recharge 6%!!!!!!!)

Its almost as if Mountain Lion is destroying the physical battery bit by bit grrr.

Take it to a Genius bar or email AppleCare. 2:27 of battery life is nothing near what they advertised. If Apple refuses to give you your replacement, I hope you're in the 14 day no questions return period. That's exactly what I'm doing. The day I get my rMBP [today or tomorrow] I'll install Mountain Lion. If there are battery problems, I'll send it right back and order another one.

Unfortunately my MacBook is a over a year old and no longer covered under AppleCare. All I can do is hope for a fix via software update.