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Simon · May 26, 2006, 04:01 AM

I just experienced this happen three times in a row with my MBP 2.0GHz (10.4.6, all firmware updates applied, SMC update done).

When running down the battery I get the battery low warning (or in one case not even that) and almost immediately after the MBP shuts down completely because the battery is totally empty. There is no 'grace period' between the warning and the MBP going to sleep. And actually it doesn't even go to sleep, it just loses all power and shuts off. I connected AC power, rebooted and let the battery charge again. Disconnected power and ran the battery down. Same behavior. I reset the PMU (shut down, remove battery, press power button for five seconds, put battery back in, reboot) but that didn't change anything about this behavior.

I also noticed that my battery capacity (type "ioreg -l | grep -i LegacyBatteryInfo" in the terminal) dropped form the initial 5800 to 4000. Is this real? Or is this info not reliable with Intel Macs?

Has anybody experienced something similar? Could it have to do with any of the recent firmware updates or last week's SMC update?

Any ideas why the MBP doesn't go to sleep when the battery is almost empty?

Enigmaaron · May 26, 2006, 08:12 AM

You need a new battery. At least you get most of the juice out of it. I would only get maybe an hour to an hour and a half before my MBP would shut down without warning. Apple replaced my battery and it's been fine since. Maybe you heard of the "silent battery recall" as some were putting it?

Maflynn · May 26, 2006, 08:14 AM

I don't know why it doesn't go to sleep but an easy solution is don't run the battery down to zero.

Mike

mgl · May 26, 2006, 08:16 AM

I've had this problem with Apple laptops before, but only with ones where the battery was going bad. Your MBP is new so this shouldn't be happening.

I doubt that this is the cause, but I was interested to note that the calibration technique for the MB and MBP differed from my last Apple laptop. Instead of just charging it to full and then discharging it to calibrate, now you have to charge it to full, wait 2 hours, discharge it, wait 5 hours, and then re-charge it again. What a pain. I would estimate that only a fraction of users will ever do this.

Enigmaaron · May 26, 2006, 08:25 AM

Here you go.

Thread about this issue:
http://forums.macnn.com/showthread.p...acbook+battery

Article on recall:
http://www.macnn.com/articles/06/05/...attery.recall/

And just a note mine didn't do this at first. I had it for about a month and ran the battery down several time without a hitch before this appeared.

Liquidity X · May 26, 2006, 09:09 AM

Happened to me also, just call Apple for a replacement.

Simon · May 26, 2006, 01:09 PM

Problem is, the macnn article quotes serial numbers up to W8608, but my MBP is actually a W8612. According to that article I shouldn't be having the issue.

skyman · May 26, 2006, 01:13 PM

Originally Posted by Simon

Problem is, the macnn article quotes serial numbers up to W8608, but my MBP is actually a W8612. According to that article I shouldn't be having the issue.

Call Apple! 1 800 SOS APPLE.

Simon · May 26, 2006, 01:15 PM

Will do.

Liquidity X · May 26, 2006, 01:25 PM

it has to do the the battery SN, not the MBP, they will ask for the Batter SN when u call to verify its production date, you prob had bad luck and got a lose one that slipped through he cracks.

Simon · May 29, 2006, 05:07 AM

I called Apple and told them about the battery issues I was having. Interestingly, they claimed to know nothing of a faulty set of MBP batteries or any 'silent recall' and my battery's serial number wasn't in a flagged range or something. They were surprised that it was shutting down w/o warning and w/o going to sleep first, but what really got their attention was the fact that my less than two month old MBP was only getting 1.5h of battery.

They are sending a new battery (3-5 working days) and want me to send the old one back in return. Very friendly service. Fast and effective. If it keeps on working this way, I'll be very pleased with Apple's support.

Can anybody confirm if the ioreg command is still the proper way to check battery capacity or has it become obsolete/inaccurate with the Intel chipsets? I'm not sure I can trust it due to the naming 'legacy battery info'. But I'd like to be able to check the new battery once it arrives.

cms · May 29, 2006, 09:23 AM

Same issue here on a 15" MacBook Pro, ordered on the day of release back in January. In the last week or so, I've noticed a sudden and dramatic reduction of battery capacity -- down to 77% and no improvement after recalibration. So, called Apple UK Tech Support this morning -- often a frustrating and scarily confrontational experience -- and they couldn't have been more accommodating. I half expected no reply, as it's a Bank Holiday weekend here in the UK. But no, the chaps in the call centre in India were right on the case. New battery is on its way and should be here before the end of the week. I was able to get a senior customer care bod to acknowledge that it's a known but unpiblicized issue. The fact that they agreed to replace it without any discussion whatsoever was most encouraging.

This almost painless eperience has gone some way to restoring my faith in Apple's UK customer care/support, which is usually pretty dire. I could make your hair curl with some of the stories I could tell -- but I'll save those for another day and another thread.....!

Simon · Jun 2, 2006, 09:39 AM

So, after three days Apple's replacement battery arrived and I'm charging it up as I write this.

Right off the bat, something's changed. The old battery started at a capacity of 5800 when I got it but dropped to <4000 within a month. The new battery is showing 5600 before calibration.

The old battery had a 6N612... serial, the new one is *KF619... Does anybody know what the * in front of the serial means? Oh yeah, before I forget, the original battery was made in China, this one says made in Japan.

I'm anxious to see if the unexpected forced shutdowns stop now. Here's hoping.

kalani79 · Jan 26, 2007, 11:57 AM

Had the same issue, but was only getting ~40 minutes of life out of my battery. My charge capacity was somewhere near 1100 mAh.

Quick tech support call on a Friday, new battery showed up the next Monday, works like a charm.

Flying Meat · Jan 28, 2007, 12:24 AM

Perhaps the most informative (though accuracy could be questioned...) tools I've come across is coconutBattery.
It's free, so, what the heck.
Here is what it reports for the times I've saved the data:
2006-12-03 99% (5491 mAh)
2006-12-07 99% (5486 mAh)
2007-01-20 99% (5467 mAh)
2007-01-27 99% (5467 mAh)

Current Battery Charge: 5318 mAh
Maximum Battery Charge: 5467 mAh
thermometer = 97%

Current Battery Capacity: 5467 mAh
Original Battery capacity: 5500 mAh
thermometer = 99%

Additional Info
Battery-Loadcycles: 6
Age of your Mac: 2 months
Charger connected: Yes
Battery is charging: No

gmsmith · Jan 28, 2007, 08:53 AM

I had the same issue with my MBP 17" 2.16. I called up Apple the guy didn't appear surprised, setup a replacement battery to be sent to me.

On the old battery iStatPro (awesome app) was showing a battery health of 50%, the new one is back to 100%.

tbo · Jan 28, 2007, 09:21 AM

Originally Posted by Simon

...
Can anybody confirm if the ioreg command is still the proper way to check battery capacity or has it become obsolete/inaccurate with the Intel chipsets? I'm not sure I can trust it due to the naming 'legacy battery info'. But I'd like to be able to check the new battery once it arrives.

How about trying the widget "MiniBatteryStatus" (look for it on the Apple website)? Works fine on my PB and saves you from using the terminal. If you are using Growl, you are notified of any critical levels you can define.

Eriamjh · Jan 28, 2007, 09:43 AM

I use XBattery.

Reinfield · Jan 28, 2007, 11:00 AM

My MBP is on it's fifth battery from Apple. That's FIVE (5) brand new batteries in ten months.

All of the replacements fail from variations on the above listed maladies. So far, none have died with exactly the same sympoms. All were replaced under warranty.

Number five shut down prematurely yesterday with three minutes left on the meter. I get the sense that number six will be coming soon. As portables go, the MBP is a great desktop unit.

MBP CoreDuo 2Ghz, W8613, Purchased April 2006.

skipwiley · Jan 28, 2007, 12:06 PM

I had the same sudden shutdown problem on my MBP17 for a few months, then one day the battery stopped showing up in the system, just a red X on the battery icon. I removed the battery and saw a distinctive bulge causing the casing to split open a little near the button and lights. Called Apple and they sent me a new battery within 2 days.

TheoCryst · Jan 28, 2007, 02:26 PM

After eight months and 120 load cycles, I've started to have this same problem with my MacBook (NOT Pro). The other day I was just surfing teh intarweb, got a low-battery warning, and then had the system immediately shut down about a minute later. It still reads as 90% capacity though, so I'm not sure what to do. I also had it go unrecognized once, but taking it out and putting it back in solved that problem.

bozwayed · Jan 28, 2007, 02:59 PM

I just downloaded and tested the battery and this is what i got
Battery Capacity 4453 mAh
Original Capacity 5500 mAh
Loadcycles 77
Age of mac 3 months

I have a macbook pro core 2 duo 2.33
the battery doesn;t give me more then 2 hours and it takes for ever to charge
any suggestions?
Thanks

gregjsmith · Jan 28, 2007, 03:01 PM

Mine has started shutting down with 50% or more of apparent battery life. I can start it again and it will run for a bit more before it needs a power adapter.

I'm on my second battery from Apple. It's less than a year old. Took it to the apple store and the Genius said it was some sort of internal wiring issue, not a battery problem.

Flying Meat · Jan 28, 2007, 03:57 PM

I would suspect something other than the battery if you've gone through 5 batteries.

Power manager damaging the battery? That would probably be a motherboard replacement at worst, or a power in/out board (are they still separate?).

But yeah. 5 batteries couldn't all be bad...

Flying Meat · 04:05 PM

TheoCryst. I would see that as operating normally. The point of the low battery warning is to let you save and shutdown normally. If you do not save and shutdown immediately, then expect the machine to power down on it's own.

It depends on a number of things, as to how quickly it shuts down.
You mention just surfing the web, but what was the display brightness set to? Keyboard backlighting on? Bluetooth enabled? Wireless? Other external devices connected?

tpressman · Jan 29, 2007, 12:48 PM

the low battery/reserve warning will only pop up if you are running the battery menu extra... otherwise your computer will just run until it shuts down.

-t

Reinfield · Jan 30, 2007, 09:03 AM

Originally Posted by Flying Meat

I would suspect something other than the battery if you've gone through 5 batteries.

Power manager damaging the battery? That would probably be a motherboard replacement at worst, or a power in/out board (are they still separate?).

But yeah. 5 batteries couldn't all be bad...

My feelings exactly. And I suggested that to the specialist. But after putting me on hold for a lengthy chat with a technician, my MBP specialist shipped another battery.

yvandermeer · Mar 17, 2007, 07:28 AM

I bought my MacBook Pro early May 2006 (serial number starts with W8612) and have not had a problem with it until about a week ago. Experiencing the same problems described here, I looked on the Apple website and it turns out my battery falls under the July 2006 battery recall program.

Filled in my serial numbers and address in the online form, got confirmation that it does indeed fall under the program, and they'll send me a replacement.