[atc ben]

Recently I've noticed that my MBP (specs in sig) battery barely lasts an hour. Also, for some reason when the battery gets to around 50%, the fans come on at max speed (6000rpms) even though I'm only browsing the web. They never come on when I'm on AC power doing the same tasks. I calibrated the battery today (mostly because the battery went to 0% from 98% before I got out of an hour long class), but it doesn't seem to have helped. I checked the System Profiler > Hardware > Power > Battery and full charge capacity is only 4056mAH after 73 cycles. That sounds pretty low to me, but I wanted some opinions. I don't think I have a battery that's been recalled according Apple. I'm planning a trip to an Apple Store next week, so should I bring it in and see if I can get it replaced? I think I'm getting pretty close to my one year warranty being up, so I gotta check on that, but is this a normal battery life span?

EDIT: Now for some magic reason, full charge capacity has jumped up to 5106. What gives?
Also, I forgot to mention that I downloaded the battery update today, but I have the same problem.

[Simon]

Apple claims their notebook batteries should retain 80% of the capacity during the first 300 cycles. You can check the number of cycles and your capacity in System Profiler > Hardware > Power > Battery Information.

Calibrate the battery and reset SMC and PRAM. If that doesn't help you probably have a bad battery. If you're under warranty or if you have AppleCare they will replace your battery for free.

And there's also this battery replacement program.