1. Forum
  2. Usenet
  3. UK.COMP.SYS.MAC

  • Maximising battery life?

    From Phil Taylor@21:1/5 to All on Tue Aug 16 12:46:08 2022
    I remember reading somewhere (here?) that the best strategy for
    maximising battery life is to use your Macbook on mains power whenever possible, keeping the battery fully charged, but occasionally (say once
    a month) run it completely flat and recharge from scratch.

    That was a long time ago, and batteries have changed since then, so I
    looked up Apple's current advice, and all I could find was "If your
    Macbook is to be unused for a long period, leave it half-charged."

    That suggests that the best strategy would be to keep the battery
    somewhere in the middle of its charge range, unless you actually need a
    full charge to get you through the day?

    Phil Taylor

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Jaimie Vandenbergh@21:1/5 to [email protected] on Tue Aug 16 12:38:40 2022
    On 16 Aug 2022 at 13:18:58 BST, "Jaimie Vandenbergh" <[email protected]> wrote:

    On 16 Aug 2022 at 12:46:08 BST, "Phil Taylor" <[email protected]d>
    wrote:

    That suggests that the best strategy would be to keep the battery
    somewhere in the middle of its charge range, unless you actually need a
    full charge to get you through the day?

    Macs self manage now, so as not to stress out the battery. Keep on
    charge most/all of the time is fine.


    Trying to manually manage the charging cycle to keep the battery at eg
    70% will do more damage to the battery than just leaving it the well
    alone. Modern battery tech degrades when the levels go up or down, and
    are more or less chemically stable otherwise when their charge is not
    changing. Creating a zigzag charge/discharge pattern is worse for it
    than just leaving it at whatever the laptop decides is ideal.

    Cheers - Jaimie

    --
    I always wanted to be someone. I should have been more specific.
    -- Lily Tomlin

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Jaimie Vandenbergh@21:1/5 to All on Tue Aug 16 12:18:58 2022
    On 16 Aug 2022 at 12:46:08 BST, "Phil Taylor" <[email protected]d>
    wrote:

    That suggests that the best strategy would be to keep the battery
    somewhere in the middle of its charge range, unless you actually need a
    full charge to get you through the day?

    Macs self manage now, so as not to stress out the battery. Keep on
    charge most/all of the time is fine.

    Cheers - Jaimie
    --
    "the first successful time machine will be used to retrieve
    lost Doctor Who episode footage." - KKC, ugvm

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From John Doe@21:1/5 to [email protected] on Tue Aug 16 21:54:27 2022
    On 16 Aug 2022 at 13:38:40 BST, "Jaimie Vandenbergh" <[email protected]> wrote:

    On 16 Aug 2022 at 13:18:58 BST, "Jaimie Vandenbergh" <[email protected]> wrote:

    On 16 Aug 2022 at 12:46:08 BST, "Phil Taylor" <[email protected]d>
    wrote:

    That suggests that the best strategy would be to keep the battery
    somewhere in the middle of its charge range, unless you actually need a
    full charge to get you through the day?

    Macs self manage now, so as not to stress out the battery. Keep on
    charge most/all of the time is fine.


    Trying to manually manage the charging cycle to keep the battery at eg
    70% will do more damage to the battery than just leaving it the well
    alone. Modern battery tech degrades when the levels go up or down, and
    are more or less chemically stable otherwise when their charge is not changing. Creating a zigzag charge/discharge pattern is worse for it
    than just leaving it at whatever the laptop decides is ideal.

    Cheers - Jaimie

    Thanks Jaime. That does make sense.

    Phil Taylor

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)