Hmmm. Well, even with a full charge, the meter just says 3:30. Even with the screen brightness way down and the Energy Settings to "Maximum Battery Life".
I guess I need to time that on my watch instead of trusting the timer.
12" Alubook, 10.2.6, full ram, 60 gig hd, combo CD drive (not super), everything turned off but Airport card. Screen brightness set at 3 bars (which is really kindof dim for me, how do you people use a darker setting, live in a cave?).
Turned computer off and let it fully charge over night. Started up, launched Safari and came here.
The calculator seems to be nudging it's estimate upwards, but the most it has displayed is 3:19. The most I hve ever seen is 3:40 back on 10.2.4
OKay, now the calculator shows 3:32. Well, now after editing this post some more I see the display says 3:42. Hmmm
Well I guess I'll have to try this again sometime and put a real clock on it so we can get something believeable.
Anyway, still not 5 hours. I've never seen even 4.
Wow, now it's at 3:55, this leads me to think that maybe it is better to turn the machine off to get a full charge. I don't fully buy the sleep argument to so many have made. I still think it is good to turn the thing off sometimes.
BTW: You guys should use X-Charge when testing battery life. In addition to time and percent, X-Charge displays Volt and mAh, draws a graph of battery power over time, and records battery-related events like plug, unplug, sleep, start charging etc.
Also, the estimate of time remaining in the battery status menu item is just that, an estimate based on current and prior consumption. X-Charge can help you record when you unplugged and when exactly your 'Book went to sleep. Or you can use a stopwatch. Don't trust the estimate in the battery status menu item if you want your test of battery life to be scientific!
robster I agree that sucks. Macs used to be great with battery before OS X. OS X sucks, literally. Last night I had 99 or 100 (sometimes it doesn't charge all the way, sometimes only to 95) % charge when I went to sleep. 11 hours later, there was only 86% charge. What! In OS 9 my iBook lost maybe 1% of the battery. Even the 520c I have banging around loses less battery when in sleep!
What ever happened to Save and Shutdown, where memory contents were saved to RAM and then the computer was shut down?
Last night I had 99 or 100 (sometimes it doesn't charge all the way, sometimes only to 95) % charge
this is actually a feature... if the battery is at anything above 95% when it gets plugged in it will not charge... this is so you dont overly charge that part of the battery...
Quote:
when I went to sleep. 11 hours later, there was only 86% charge. What! In OS 9 my iBook lost maybe 1% of the battery. Even the 520c I have banging around loses less battery when in sleep!
yeah this is bullshit... i haven't noticed it myself, but i usually try and keep my computer plugged in...
Quote:
What ever happened to Save and Shutdown, where memory contents were saved to RAM and then the computer was shut down?
dunno, when was this a feature? I remember reading about it, but i never actually saw it on the computer...
And I think that is with both batteries. Those laptops on IBM's website get about 2.5-5 hours per battery.
It weights 5lbs and it's with one high-capacity battery. Regular batteries get it 5 hours on full power. It's faster lighter and has longer battery life.
Have you noticed how fast OSX wakes up from sleep? It's a concious decision by apple. They draw more power from the battery to keep the machine in a "closer-to-wakeful" sleep state. I believe OS9 would actually write your RAM data to the disk and power everything down (what windows calls "hibernate") - I don't know that for sure though..
Anyways, OSX uses more power in sleep so that it can wake up faster ... I believe that's the main reason. And heck, I'm happy to have it wake up instantly...
My Rev A Ti 500 now reports little more than an hour of battery time, but then it can run at 0% for at least 15 minutes. I need to recalibrate the PMU.
I always run my Ti full tilt: max CPU, brightness, etc. 2.5 hours is about right, but I can get it to 3 with only minor tweeks.
Could a new battery help? Are the later revisions more efficient? Perhaps someone can shed some light.
UPDATE: Normally I run my Ti plugged in and have the battery indicator displayed as a %. I just unplugged it to see what time estimate would be reported. It said 2:22 at first, but is now steadily falling. Its leveled off around 1:40. Later I'll post the true battery life as its drained.
Their own pdf shows that everything but the monitor was turned off after 3-5 minutes and that they used the extra cost 9 cell battery. And the monitor was set to 5/8 brightness.
FYI, the 1.3Ghz version with bluetooth, a combo DVD/CD-R drive and the extra battery costs $2496.
Paul that's a cool feature. I would trade a few seconds of OS X waking for 20% over night. OS X means you can't leave your laptop sleeping for more than a day or two. I left my 520c for WEEKS sleeping on battery. Never had to care. However, there is a compromise. 10.3 should add "Hibernate" or "Save and Shutdown" which was in certain OS 9 builds on iBooks. I'll write Apple a letter tomorrow about it, and I think everyone here with a laptop should, that would probably be enough for them to implement it. I can't imagine it would be hard to do and it would AWESOME.
Why do computers access drives when they don't need to? My PBG4 likes to spin up a CD or a hard drive which has gone to sleep (and makes OS X lag for a few seconds, or at least Finder) when it has NOTHING to do with that volume? Like if it's a CD with a movie on it I can be doing something random, and not an Open/Save dialogue box for example where I could see why it's spinning it up. Let's say just browsing in Safari. the CD will spin up. Weeeird. Maybe The Man is snooping on our Mac?
The Wallstreet had some sort of down load from Apple which was meant to reset the battery. i tried this but alas I was a bit too late. Now my Wallstreet is chained to the wall.....
Does anyone know if there is the same sort of thing-a-me for a Pismo?
Why do computers access drives when they don't need to? My PBG4 likes to spin up a CD or a hard drive which has gone to sleep (and makes OS X lag for a few seconds, or at least Finder) when it has NOTHING to do with that volume? Like if it's a CD with a movie on it I can be doing something random, and not an Open/Save dialogue box for example where I could see why it's spinning it up. Let's say just browsing in Safari. the CD will spin up. Weeeird. Maybe The Man is snooping on our Mac?
Comments
I guess I need to time that on my watch instead of trusting the timer.
Turned computer off and let it fully charge over night. Started up, launched Safari and came here.
The calculator seems to be nudging it's estimate upwards, but the most it has displayed is 3:19. The most I hve ever seen is 3:40 back on 10.2.4
OKay, now the calculator shows 3:32. Well, now after editing this post some more I see the display says 3:42. Hmmm
Well I guess I'll have to try this again sometime and put a real clock on it so we can get something believeable.
Anyway, still not 5 hours. I've never seen even 4.
Wow, now it's at 3:55, this leads me to think that maybe it is better to turn the machine off to get a full charge. I don't fully buy the sleep argument to so many have made. I still think it is good to turn the thing off sometimes.
I'll shut up now.
Also, the estimate of time remaining in the battery status menu item is just that, an estimate based on current and prior consumption. X-Charge can help you record when you unplugged and when exactly your 'Book went to sleep. Or you can use a stopwatch. Don't trust the estimate in the battery status menu item if you want your test of battery life to be scientific!
Escher
What ever happened to Save and Shutdown, where memory contents were saved to RAM and then the computer was shut down?
Originally posted by Existence
This is so sad. An IBM T40 runing a Centrino at 1.6GHz gets 7 hours at full power.
But how much does IT weigh?
And I think that is with both batteries. Those laptops on IBM's website get about 2.5-5 hours per battery.
Originally posted by Aquatic
Last night I had 99 or 100 (sometimes it doesn't charge all the way, sometimes only to 95) % charge
this is actually a feature... if the battery is at anything above 95% when it gets plugged in it will not charge... this is so you dont overly charge that part of the battery...
when I went to sleep. 11 hours later, there was only 86% charge. What! In OS 9 my iBook lost maybe 1% of the battery. Even the 520c I have banging around loses less battery when in sleep!
yeah this is bullshit... i haven't noticed it myself, but i usually try and keep my computer plugged in...
What ever happened to Save and Shutdown, where memory contents were saved to RAM and then the computer was shut down?
dunno, when was this a feature? I remember reading about it, but i never actually saw it on the computer...
Originally posted by Ebby
But how much does IT weigh?
And I think that is with both batteries. Those laptops on IBM's website get about 2.5-5 hours per battery.
It weights 5lbs and it's with one high-capacity battery. Regular batteries get it 5 hours on full power. It's faster lighter and has longer battery life.
Have you noticed how fast OSX wakes up from sleep? It's a concious decision by apple. They draw more power from the battery to keep the machine in a "closer-to-wakeful" sleep state. I believe OS9 would actually write your RAM data to the disk and power everything down (what windows calls "hibernate") - I don't know that for sure though..
Anyways, OSX uses more power in sleep so that it can wake up faster ... I believe that's the main reason. And heck, I'm happy to have it wake up instantly...
I always run my Ti full tilt: max CPU, brightness, etc. 2.5 hours is about right, but I can get it to 3 with only minor tweeks.
Could a new battery help? Are the later revisions more efficient? Perhaps someone can shed some light.
UPDATE: Normally I run my Ti plugged in and have the battery indicator displayed as a %. I just unplugged it to see what time estimate would be reported. It said 2:22 at first, but is now steadily falling. Its leveled off around 1:40. Later I'll post the true battery life as its drained.
Originally posted by Existence
This is so sad. An IBM T40 runing a Centrino at 1.6GHz gets 7 hours at full power.
Dude, don't be a fool. We can all go to IBM's website and read for ourselves that the unit wasn't run at full power.
http://www.ibm.com/pc/ww/thinkpad/batterylife
Their own pdf shows that everything but the monitor was turned off after 3-5 minutes and that they used the extra cost 9 cell battery. And the monitor was set to 5/8 brightness.
FYI, the 1.3Ghz version with bluetooth, a combo DVD/CD-R drive and the extra battery costs $2496.
link
How much for the 1.6 ghz version? I don't know. Didn't dick around on IBMs website long enough to find out.
Edit: OK, I dicked around. $2922 with additional Bluetooth card:
linky
Obviously this is the battery life when I'm just using Word. However this goes whay down when using InDesign or Maya.
Does anyone know if there is the same sort of thing-a-me for a Pismo?
I've looked but i cant find anything.Pismo
Originally posted by Aquatic
Why do computers access drives when they don't need to? My PBG4 likes to spin up a CD or a hard drive which has gone to sleep (and makes OS X lag for a few seconds, or at least Finder) when it has NOTHING to do with that volume? Like if it's a CD with a movie on it I can be doing something random, and not an Open/Save dialogue box for example where I could see why it's spinning it up. Let's say just browsing in Safari. the CD will spin up. Weeeird. Maybe The Man is snooping on our Mac?
That happens on every computer
Why do computers access drives when they don't need to?
Why? Having a CD in the drive even if you don't use it munches battery.
I wrote Apple about Save and Shutdown. Fellow 'Book users please join me in doing so and if we see it in Panther then thank you in advance!