My Macbook pro is not even a month old, do I need a new battery?!

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My Macbook pro is not even a month old, do I need a new battery?!

I bought this laptop THIS month. It started acting up by shutting down with no warning. Just out of nowhere, a black sceen, and when I went to turn it back on, it would struggle to boot up. I fixed this by resetting the PRAM, and then after that the battery wouldn't hold a charge, and it had to be always plugged it. Resetting the SMC fixed that just fine. Great, everything is fixed.

No, it's not.

the next week, my battery started to say that I should replace it now. I though that was strange, so after restting the SMC again, I started my first ever battery callibration. After the battery was completely drained and I let it sleep for around 6 hours or so, I turned it on and started to charge it and use it, and BAM. Now the battery won't charge. It's only running off of AC power right now, after only 26 cycles.

I bought a macbook because I though it would be less maintenence than my Thinkpad Edge that had a terrible build quality and messed up system registery. Now I just think I have bad laptop luck. I don't think I have time to bring it into an Apple store soon because I'm at a University and its almost finals week... please help 😟

MacBook Pro, OS X Mountain Lion (10.8.3)

Posted on Apr 25, 2013 8:50 AM

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Answer 1

Apr 25, 2013 8:54 AM in response to youngks93

the best thing for your to do - since it's only a month old is to take it to Apple and have them look at it for you.

it's under warranty - take advantage of it.

one more thing - never - ever - try to calibrate your battery or let it get fully discharge - not sure who told you to do this but it's a bad idea on macbooks with built in batteries. as you can see from what you're experiencing right now.

good luck and hopefully you get it sorted out.

Portables with built-in batteries

Current Apple portable computer batteries are pre-calibrated and do not require the calibration procedure outlined in this article. These computers use batteries that should be replaced only by an Apple Authorized Service Provider.

MacBook

MacBook (13-inch, Late 2009) and later

MacBook Air

MacBook Air (all models)

MacBook Pro

MacBook Pro with Retina display (all models)
MacBook Pro (13-inch, Mid 2009) and later
MacBook Pro (15-inch, Mid 2009) and later
MacBook Pro (17-inch, Early 2009) and later

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Answer 2

youngks93 Author

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Apr 25, 2013 2:48 PM in response to Bimmer 7 Series

Thanks so much for the reply. After I reset the SMC again it started working again but as soon as I plugged it in it started to act up again. How long do you think they will take to fix it if I bring it into an Apple store? Just asking because I need my computer heavilty for the next 2-3 weeks...

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Answer 3

Apr 25, 2013 2:59 PM in response to youngks93

it all depends on how busy the Apple Store in your area is - best thing to do is make an appointment.

I had a battery replaced in a matter of hours and a trackpad replace that took half a day.

If they have it in stock - they might do it then and there for you - again, depending on how busy they are.

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Answer 4

youngks93 Author

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Apr 25, 2013 3:08 PM in response to Bimmer 7 Series

Alright, I'll have to give them a call than. Thank you very much for the help. 🙂

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Answer 5

Apr 25, 2013 3:09 PM in response to youngks93

You're welcome - hopefully it all gets sorted out for you.

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Answer 6

youngks93 Author

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May 1, 2013 3:45 PM in response to youngks93

Alright, so I went to the Apple store. The did a check on my hardware. Everything was 100% normal. They then looked through my console. They told me they think that Sophos antivirus is trying to scan google drive, making google drive crash, causing the computer to shut down and say "replace battery now" on start up.

I don't believe this is true... I don't have google drive running anymore since I quit out of it immediatley after turning the machine on. My computer still crashes and tells me to replace the battery. Even after resetting the SMC to get the battery status back to normal (resetting it usually makes the battery status normal again), it'll crash and have the same outcome. The apple store did NOTHING to my machine to fix it. They just told me a few things. Pretty aggrivated with apple...

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Answer 7

May 21, 2014 10:12 AM in response to youngks93

did you figure out what is the problem, I'm facing the same problem with macbook pro 2012 ?

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Answer 8

leroydouglas

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May 21, 2014 10:21 AM in response to youngks93

So did you un-install Sophos and google drive? Did this solve the issue?

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Answer 9

youngks93 Author

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May 21, 2014 10:29 AM in response to youngks93

To those of you asking, I did finally resolve the issue. Those "Geniuses" at the genius bar really don't live up to their name too well...

After bringing it to the Apple store multiple times, them telling me they have no idea what's going on with it and that they think it's Sophos and Google Drive blah blah blah, I FINALLY INSISTED that they take it in the back and open it up. They did so and they found that the battery was not seated properly with the logic board, so they gave me a new battery and logic board. And that fixed it!

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