Haven't owned a laptop in many years, but now have a 2015 Macbook Pro and so want to figure out what's the current standard for charging/keeping it plugged in, etc.

Is there still a need for an app like Fruit Juice? Is it okay to just keep it plugged in most of the time and only unplug when going portable? Or, does one need to condition the battery/cycle the battery on some sort of schedule?

This MBP has about 350 cycles (out of 1000 recommended as max by Apple).

Thanks.

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My Lenovo has a battery management option that keeps it between 20%-80% charge.

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I don't think keeping a MB plugged in most of the time, is a good idea, unless you're using it during most of that time.

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pinkoos
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This MBP has about 350 cycles (out of 1000 recommended as max by Apple).

where do you see Apple quoting 1000 MAX cycles? what happens after 1000/ I definitely owned laptops that went past 1000, I think I had one 1200 and the battery was still at almost 90% of the original capacity. 1000 typical, yes, that means some will die at 700 cycles, some will last 1300 cycles. I have never seen 1000 quotes as MAXIMUM number.

When Apple switched to non-removable batteries in their laptops one of their reasons given at the time is that the non-removable batteries should last 1000 cycles.

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MacBook Owners

Your battery is designed to retain up to 80% of its original capacity at 1000 complete charge cycles. The one-year warranty includes replacement coverage for a defective battery. Apple offers a battery replacement service for all MacBook, MacBook Air, and MacBook Pro notebooks with built-in batteries.

[www.apple.com]

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space-time

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pinkoos
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This MBP has about 350 cycles (out of 1000 recommended as max by Apple).

where do you see Apple quoting 1000 MAX cycles? what happens after 1000/ I definitely owned laptops that went past 1000, I think I had one 1200 and the battery was still at almost 90% of the original capacity. 1000 typical, yes, that means some will die at 700 cycles, some will last 1300 cycles. I have never seen 1000 quotes as MAXIMUM number.

Find your particular model in the list below:

[support.apple.com]

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space-time

Quote
pinkoos
...
This MBP has about 350 cycles (out of 1000 recommended as max by Apple).

where do you see Apple quoting 1000 MAX cycles? what happens after 1000/ I definitely owned laptops that went past 1000, I think I had one 1200 and the battery was still at almost 90% of the original capacity. 1000 typical, yes, that means some will die at 700 cycles, some will last 1300 cycles. I have never seen 1000 quotes as MAXIMUM number.

Quote
space-time

Quote
pinkoos
...
This MBP has about 350 cycles (out of 1000 recommended as max by Apple).

where do you see Apple quoting 1000 MAX cycles? what happens after 1000/ I definitely owned laptops that went past 1000, I think I had one 1200 and the battery was still at almost 90% of the original capacity. 1000 typical, yes, that means some will die at 700 cycles, some will last 1300 cycles. I have never seen 1000 quotes as MAXIMUM number.

[support.apple.com]

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Thanks, that pages does indeed say MAXIMUM. I did not notice that before.

What that means is that the battery is expected to last 1000 cycles, so in my opinion the word MAXIMUM is somewhat misleading. It can definitely go beyond 1000.

But yes, you are correct, Apple does use the word MAX.

[support.apple.com]

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ztirffritz
My Lenovo has a battery management option that keeps it between 20%-80% charge.

I did a lot of reading on battery maintenance and this is close to ideal. I have 2 older Dell Latitudes and have their battery management set for 30-85%. Apple really needs to add this type of charging option.

maybe Apple already does that, how do we know what is really 0% and 100%? They could use 20-80% and recalibrate Finder to show 0-100%.

Is there any evidence that the Lenovo and Dell with that feature can go much more than 1000 cycles?

My car supposedly never charges the battery more than 80% and never discharges under 20%, well, unless you are out of gas, then supposedly can go a few more miles on battery. I never tried that 9and probably never will), but I saw that on youtube.

Yup, it's mostly arbitrary. And in fact I think it's reasonable to assume that Apple hedges their number a bit to the center get those 1000+ cycles, at the cost of a few minutes of runtime.

While the scale is almost completely arbitrary, there are industry best practices depending on your intended use case, with electric cars prioritizing recharge cycle #s (10+ yr lifespan) and cell phones prioritizing individual runtime (2-day battery life but 2-3 year lifespan).

As an aside, your Mac and iPhone will report 100% charge when there is still around a 4% discrepancy between the current and full mAh ratings in System Profiler. They will still continue to charge to that real max capacity mAh number but the number stays at 100%, and also does so on the discharge cycle. That's why your phone and Mac seem to stay at 100% for longer than you might expect and then start going down 99% 98% 97% more quickly than that first 100 to 99% drop.

So I'm still not getting a good sense of what all the laptop users here do - stay plugged in most (all?) of the time unless/until you need portability, or use one of those apps (Coconut Battery linked above or Fruit Juice) to continuously "exercise" the battery?

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space-time
maybe Apple already does that, how do we know what is really 0% and 100%? They could use 20-80% and recalibrate Finder to show 0-100%.

Don't know if they do that, but on all the recent Apple laptops I have used the charging cycle does not kick in unless the battery is under a 95% indicated charge.

That is what GM uses to maintain the battery in the Chevy Volt and Bolt.

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Lew Zealand

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ztirffritz
My Lenovo has a battery management option that keeps it between 20%-80% charge.

I did a lot of reading on battery maintenance and this is close to ideal. I have 2 older Dell Latitudes and have their battery management set for 30-85%. Apple really needs to add this type of charging option.

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MacResource User Map: [www.zeemaps.com]#

Id prob just not worry about it and use it however you see fit.

Doing all the song and dance to maybe get a few more minutes or a few more cycles years from now seems, well, kinda like a waste of time.

5 years from now, if you are still using it, and the battery is acting funky, just get a new one. Like $200.

[www.apple.com]

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Edited 999 time(s). Last edit at 12:08PM by jdc.

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space-time
Thanks, that pages does indeed say MAXIMUM. I did not notice that before.

What that means is that the battery is expected to last 1000 cycles, so in my opinion the word MAXIMUM is somewhat misleading. It can definitely go beyond 1000.

But yes, you are correct, Apple does use the word MAX.

[support.apple.com]

and it could crap out after 500. Just saying.

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Racer X

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space-time
Thanks, that pages does indeed say MAXIMUM. I did not notice that before.

What that means is that the battery is expected to last 1000 cycles, so in my opinion the word MAXIMUM is somewhat misleading. It can definitely go beyond 1000.

But yes, you are correct, Apple does use the word MAX.

[support.apple.com]

and it could crap out after 500. Just saying.

Yeap. When it comes to out of warranty battery, anything is possible.

For my part, I tend to leave it plugged in most of the time whenever there is power available because I want to make sure it is fully charged should I need or decide to use it on the go.

Thanks for the discussion.

I had bought the Fruitjuice app from the MAS back when I replaced my wife's Air with another Air. I've now loaded it on my Pro and will see how it does in terms of trying to maximize battery life/lifespan.

The linked Coconut Battery seems to just be a battery health monitor. As far as I could tell, it doesn't have the features that Fruitjuice has. Someone correct me if I'm missing something.

[itunes.apple.com]

My (limited) understanding is that Li-Ion batteries don't have a "memory effect" like the old NiCds did, but they also don't have an unlimited number of cycles - no battery does.

So I wouldn't be surprised if it wouldn't be better to keep your laptop plugged in "all the time" at home, to keep the cycle count down - ie, don't make it cycle when you don't need to.

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pdq
My (limited) understanding is that Li-Ion batteries don't have a "memory effect" like the old NiCds did, but they also don't have an unlimited number of cycles - no battery does.

So I wouldn't be surprised if it wouldn't be better to keep your laptop plugged in "all the time" at home, to keep the cycle count down - ie, don't make it cycle when you don't need to.

This is my rationale, in so many words.

Quote
pdq
My (limited) understanding is that Li-Ion batteries don't have a "memory effect" like the old NiCds did, but they also don't have an unlimited number of cycles - no battery does.

So I wouldn't be surprised if it wouldn't be better to keep your laptop plugged in "all the time" at home, to keep the cycle count down - ie, don't make it cycle when you don't need to.

Interesting theory