AppleCare.....and how long a battery *should* last

Posted:
in Genius Bar edited January 2014
Apple refuses to replace my powerbook battery- which is less than two years old. Despite resetting the PMU and using all power saving techniques, it can hold no more than a 50 minute charge. It seems commonsensical to me that Apple should replace a relatively new battery that works poorly- but maybe I'm wrong. So I just have a few questions for the AI Genius Bar literati:



How many cycles on average does a battery last?

How long is that in years/months, usually?



What do you recommend?

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 4
    torifiletorifile Posts: 4,024member
    Apple's got pretty strict about replacing batteries lately. They are considering them "consumable" parts so won't replace them if they're older than about 6 months - or so I've heard. Sorry to hear you're having trouble.
  • Reply 2 of 4
    mmmpiemmmpie Posts: 628member
    My ibook battery gave up the ghost at 20 months. It holds a charge for 20 minutes. All of the recommended things have failed to make a difference.



    A battery should handle 500 full charge cycles. Partial charges will do less damage, you might get 2000. I probably used my ibook on a daily basis without power, so, at worst, Ive done 1000 charge cycles, mostly partial. Bigger batteries dont last longer.
  • Reply 3 of 4
    ipodandimacipodandimac Posts: 3,273member
    if you use your portable a lot over a two year span, its battery life WILL suffer. it's just physics. i know my ipod is gonna turn to crap sooner than later, but i use it all the time and dont mind paying to get it replaced. i'd rather get one year out of something but use it anytime i want rather than have it last 2 years but always be stressing out about saving battery life and doing all the right things.



    when i first read the title for this thread, i was expecting another story of a powerbook battery turning bad after a few weeks. i can't sit here and tell you that "only" getting ~2 years out of a battery is bad.
  • Reply 4 of 4
    alcimedesalcimedes Posts: 5,486member
    yeah, two years is a long time for a battery. i know that my two year old battery has about a third of the life of the new battery i bought to replace it. that's just the nature of the beast where rechargable batteries are concerned.
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