Mavericks MacBook Air 2013 Battery Draining

well, this is a log with many images.

basically:

right now:

Charge Information:

Charge Remaining (mAh): 750

Fully Charged: No

Charging: Yes

Full Charge Capacity (mAh): 1391

Health Information:

Cycle Count: 342

Condition: Service Battery

Battery Installed: Yes

Amperage (mA): 1387

Voltage (mV): 12488

but the History is quite colorful:

Oct 23 147 cycles and 4780 mAh (I just remember this but have no picture). I was actually happy with my 2009 MBP with 4GB, I am in Manila and rarely use it, more of a home office laptop.

Upgraded then noticed the Service battery sign. Checked and I had around 300 cycles ⚠ and 1280 mAh.

then I started playing with it (SMC reset) to get bet around 4450 mAh but only for a short time (I recalibrated few times, the cycles duly went up, right now 342).

The log says something like:

Nov 8 at 17:53

1277mAh

Amperage -1073

Voltage 12059

then at 18:02 (so within 10 minutes)

75% (albeit with a red color)

and starts growing (yes)

to around 4450 mAh

voltage 12137

then recalibrated and got full charge 4482 mAh and cycle 342 (today's)

then I let it be charged until today then I tried.

at 65% it simply gave up.

Now it shows what I stated (charging super fast, back to 62%)

Basically, the %, the time remaining, the full charge are unrealiable numbers. The total wifi length (I use it on wifi only) is roughly 1:30 (estimate), where before October I sued to be able to 1) skype with family roughly one hour 2) watch some online content (my only US tv here in Manila) 3) record my expenses, etc. taking well over 3 hours which made me a proud 2009 MBP user. I know the battery was due next year or so.

All in all, I upgraded not thinking: my Moutain Lion was good enough on my old machine to use for this stretch. After upgrading I can no longer take it to the cafe (I have my small device but still).

not sure what app can drain it am it may just be one of mine. matters not: the system should cater for my perfectly regular use (Skype, Mail, Safari, since I prefer the newer version over Chrome). If the Flash player is a culprit a) why was it not before b) still: am I not a user free to use it on Safari? I think I am.

About Mail: it did help - temporarily. I thought I found a thread about Mail doind something, I also use GMail on IMAP (converted from POP about a year ago, though not sure it was worth).

Backup is not an option until I get home to the US. Since I can use the laptop plugged in I randomly do that - hence the infrequent response. I will have time to wait if there is a fix (in which case I can replace the battery and still have my perfectly good laptop), or just think alternatives.

I've been using Macs since 2003 (laptop). I may not know them still that well but I do not have to. Am a user who experiences a flaw that many more of us do. it begs for an answer.

If one could tell me what (non private) info needed from my laptop, I can share (in time, b/c it is getting late).

salf

PS: while writing this has changed, observe the mAh creeping up (it will go all the way to 4450 keeping a 10% distance between the remaining and full capacity)

Charge Information:

Charge Remaining (mAh): 1137

Fully Charged: No

Charging: Yes

Full Charge Capacity (mAh): 1877

haha, my access is blocked not to edit/post longer 😀 Okay, still I have the problem, just wanted to state how hard it is to work on battery when there is no true information only blaming game. I cannot even fix showing my OS (that is 10.9)

So while the new OS may be fine I am regretting the upgrade and use my machine less. I have a MBAir (well, in the family) to use, we keep that on 10.8 just to be safe.

Mail may not be the answer. Anyway: good luck!

and please, stop replying that "mine works fine you should be just a user". I should be and I should be answered.

Repost please, the pictures do not come through.

About your log: the bettery must be replaced, it is clear about that !!

Why he has to replace it?

The list salf has posted (today 1:47pm) states clearly under "Health Information": service battery. This means replace. !!

Hey Folks

I found a solution for the battery drain that worked on my rMBP15 Late 2013 and my girlfriends MBA 13 Mid 2012. Battery-Time went from 4-5 hoursto about 9 hours on the rMBP since performing these steps:

1. Reset com.apple.finder.plist, com.apple.sidebarlists.plist and com.apple.desktop.plist
   - Open a new finder window
   - Choose Go > Go to folder. Your destination is ~/Library/Preferences
   - Locate com.apple.finder.plist and rename it to com.apple.finder_backup.plist
   - Locate com.apple.sidebarlists.plist and rename it to com.apple.sidebarlists_backup.plist
   - Do the same for com.apple.desktop.plist. Note: This file was missing in my (rMBP) folder. If so: nevermind.
   - Open Terminal and type: killall Dock
2. Reset your SMC:
   - shut down your system
   - plug in the magsafe
   - hold down shift+ctrl+alt+power for a second, then release. Your magsafe should blink
   - do this three times
3. Reset PRAM:
   - turn on your mbp and hold down alt+cmd+p+r immediately
   - hold down the keys until you hear the startup sound the second time
   - release the keys and let the MBP boot.
4. Give your system some time to adjust to the changes: after a while it should show you a much increased battery time.

I hope this works for some of you. Please keep in mind that you do this on your own risk. Some styling-settings for finder and your finder-sidebar e.g icon sizes and the like might get lost in the process. But 5 hours of extra battery should be worth that.

Best regards and hopefully I could help some of you

Bart

Hi bart, it may help, or may not. Your point 1: you may delete the plists you mention, rename not necessary, because while starting up new plist are made. And it should be Killall Finder.

I know I have to replace. But: right now (after charging) it shows 96% and healthy. The problem is, it gos to around 65% then stops working, when I start again then it shows the service battery. This means somewhere the notification is wrong and that did not happen under ML. Hey, under ML it did not shut down at 65%. Right now:

Charge Information:

Charge Remaining (mAh): 4382

Fully Charged: Yes

Charging: No

Full Charge Capacity (mAh): 4552

Health Information:

Cycle Count: 343

So the answer (on my 2009 MBP that has a battery I will replace, I know) is not about me not knowing it. it is about the battery algorithm not counting correctly. unreliable. I will try what ChrBart wrote.... without much hope...

Why did you not include the Health info: it sasy "normal" or "service battery". But I suspect you will have to replace sooner than later.

🙂

I could paste the picture but that does nto work. 4576 mAh is quite healthy (except it is not a true assessment) for my 2009 MBP. let me show (though at this point I merely repeat myself, no acting more until further update on OS X).

Charge Information:

Charge Remaining (mAh): 4514

Fully Charged: Yes

Charging: No

Full Charge Capacity (mAh): 4588

Health Information:

Cycle Count: 343

Condition: Normal

Battery Installed: Yes

Amperage (mA): -986

Voltage (mV): 12486

This looks good, but is not: it should not vary between reads in the SystemInformation.

Is this the original battery that came with the mav when new?

Or has that been replaced already? and if so, is this a real Apple battery?

Do the SMC reset again, THREE times.

After that do the PRAM reset.

After that check the "battery health" and "full capacity" every day, for 10 days or so: as soon as the two values change more than say 10% post here again.

(quickest read in SystemInformation: drag the SystemInformation icon to the Dock from the Utilities folder)

salf wrote:

I could paste the picture but that does nto work.

salf ~ Presumably you're now using the Camera icon as mentioned previously, but getting an error — perhaps because your screenshot was taken via the Grab utility in TIFF format, which is not accepted in these Communities.

If, instead, you use Shift-Command (⌘)-3 or Shift-Command (⌘)-4 to take the screenshot, the format will be PNG, which is accepted in these Communities — see this Apple doc:

OS X Mavericks: Take pictures of the screen

...And if, after the above, you still have problems posting pictures via the Camera icon in the Reply toolbar, post back with the details and someone may be able to help.

Alternatively, Captur is a simple, free screen capturer which sits in the menu bar and the file format can be easily set in its Preferences:

No. We don't want some cheap attempts to increase the battery life. We want permanent software fix to the fundamental problem.

I also have the same problem with a MacBook Air 2012. Battery life down from 5.5 to 3.5 hours immediately after upgrading to Mavericks. Very annoying. And I'm not seeing any error message on the battery OR any indication that the battery indicator is not accurate.

My suspicion is that the culprit is Chrome. Switching to Safari increased battery life dramatically. However, I actually want to continue to use Chrome.

Looking at Activity Monitor you will see that Chrome almost never naps yet uses considerable energy. If Apple were to nap Chrome when it was not the top screen this would make an enormous difference. Same goes for GoogleTalkPlugin and Dropbox.

Off course, there is the issue of using Hangouts on Chrome. If the app were to nap, that would be a problem for those who want to stay connected. So it's an issue for Google to solve as well as Apple.

At the least, I would like to have some app nap options via the Activity Monitor screen, then I could make a choice about Chrome.

Alan