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faxao

macrumors regular
Original poster
Feb 20, 2008
177
12
Milano, Italy
The recharging time on my brand new Rev.B MBA after a full discharge took today 6 hours (3 cycles on battery). Is this normal?

I have read that battery charge is quite slow on MBAs but 6 hours.....:confused:

Thanks

p.s. apart from that Rev.B MBA rocks !!:p
 

jackiecanev2

macrumors 65816
Jul 6, 2007
1,033
4
I'm assuming that it's new, or relatively new? For whatever reason, the first few charge cycles on the MBA take forever. My first few with over 10 hours. It'll drop down though, no worries. Now it takes about 2-3 hours to charge mine, 4 from dead empty.
 

andreab35

macrumors 6502a
May 29, 2008
825
0
USA
Mine takes quite a while to charge, but that aspect of the battery doesn't bother me a whole lot.
My battery doesn't last too long... I think I give it about 2 1/2 hours without doing intensive work and with as much power savings options as I can on.
 

faxao

macrumors regular
Original poster
Feb 20, 2008
177
12
Milano, Italy
I'm assuming that it's new, or relatively new? For whatever reason, the first few charge cycles on the MBA take forever. My first few with over 10 hours. It'll drop down though, no worries. Now it takes about 2-3 hours to charge mine, 4 from dead empty.

Yes ..it is infact brand new: as a matter of fact this was the first full charge since I have switched it on for the first time 3 days ago....

Hope it will get better soon and in the meantime I enjoy this awesome laptop, the snappiest I have ever owned :cool:

Thanks for the prompt responses...
 

GMACUK

macrumors newbie
Dec 26, 2008
9
0
Mine takes quite a while to charge, but that aspect of the battery doesn't bother me a whole lot.
My battery doesn't last too long... I think I give it about 2 1/2 hours without doing intensive work and with as much power savings options as I can on.

I'm thinking of buying my sister either a Macbook or MBA for University but are you saying the MBA battery only gives you around 2.5 hrs use?? Is that normal? My girlfriend has the new Macbook Pro and she is getting around 4hrs on it and i've got the previous gen macbook pro and i'm getting around 4-4.5hrs. So to me 2.5 is pretty poor.
 

Mactagonist

macrumors 65816
Feb 5, 2008
1,108
198
NYC - Manhattan
I'm thinking of buying my sister either a Macbook or MBA for University but are you saying the MBA battery only gives you around 2.5 hrs use?? Is that normal? My girlfriend has the new Macbook Pro and she is getting around 4hrs on it and i've got the previous gen macbook pro and i'm getting around 4-4.5hrs. So to me 2.5 is pretty poor.

2.5 is pretty poor, I might get that with heavy downloading or something. I get about 4 hours for browsing and light office type use.
 

andreab35

macrumors 6502a
May 29, 2008
825
0
USA
I'm thinking of buying my sister either a Macbook or MBA for University but are you saying the MBA battery only gives you around 2.5 hrs use?? Is that normal? My girlfriend has the new Macbook Pro and she is getting around 4hrs on it and i've got the previous gen macbook pro and i'm getting around 4-4.5hrs. So to me 2.5 is pretty poor.

2.5 hours is pretty poor I do agree... for what Apple claims that this baby is supposed to get around 4 hours of battery life.
But, don't let that stop you from purchasing a MBA. It's a beautiful machine that is so rewarding to have.
If my battery does get worse, it's going to the Genius Bar.
 

mikey28

macrumors 6502
Aug 6, 2008
419
0
Battery Charge

I am glad that you brought this up, because I got my new Rev b 1.8/128SSD, Tuesday (4 days ago!) and it's taking the longest time to charge. I was wondering what was up with that.

Meanwhile, I really love this upgrade. It is soooo much faster than my rev A 1.6/80G-- and no lines (I was so worried about that...).
 

EspressoLove

macrumors 6502
Jun 29, 2007
423
2
Bay Area
My girlfriend has the new Macbook Pro and she is getting around 4hrs on it and i've got the previous gen macbook pro and i'm getting around 4-4.5hrs. So to me 2.5 is pretty poor.

Try encoding a movie - good luck with having more than 1.5 hours on MBP ...

2.5 is pretty poor, I might get that with heavy downloading or something. I get about 4 hours for browsing and light office type use.

MBA.B SL's consume less at idle, than P/T's in UMBP's, but when you load them max - you essentially have the same chip (same die, same 45nm tech, even same cache), and 30% speed difference (1.86 vs 2.53) doesn't translate into same power consumption difference ...
Whatever thermal difference you have mostly helped by still lover voltages on SL's.
That means MBA's consume comparable energy under load, so while having 2/3 of MBP's battery, they scale the runtime losses much faster.
 

EnderTW

macrumors 6502a
Jun 30, 2007
727
279
Try encoding a movie - good luck with having more than 1.5 hours on MBP ...



MBA.B SL's consume less at idle, than P/T's in UMBP's, but when you load them max - you essentially have the same chip (same die, same 45nm tech, even same cache), and 30% speed difference (1.86 vs 2.53) doesn't translate into same power consumption difference ...
Whatever thermal difference you have mostly helped by still lover voltages on SL's.
That means MBA's consume comparable energy under load, so while having 2/3 of MBP's battery, they scale the runtime losses much faster.

Yeah with a bunch of stuff in background I get 2.5-3 hours at most. It's enough for me. I don't even carry the battery charger around. I just use it for notes on the go.

As far as charging, it doesn't really bother me because it stays charged overnight. I am getting work to buy me a battery adapter, till then I'll start using it at work as well.

I love this mba, got the rev b with the hd option. To me it's a little slow to open stuff but once it's open, the hard drive becomes negated. I don't notice any real slow downs. Then again I don't encode stuff or move huge stuff around on my hd.

I still prefer windows on my desktops, but when it comes to laptops, OSX is just so productive. (Spaces, GESTURES!!, keyboard short cuts) this mba definitely feels like a fully fledged out keyboard.
 

EspressoLove

macrumors 6502
Jun 29, 2007
423
2
Bay Area
... when it comes to laptops, OSX is just so productive. (Spaces, GESTURES!!, keyboard short cuts) this mba definitely feels like a fully fledged out keyboard.

Yeah, I'm envious for you ;):cool::D
Nearly bought 2.4MB, but I still cringe at how ugly it is [screen] when sitting next to MBA & MBP.

It's beyond me why they have it in window display at [SF] Apple store side by side.
MBA & 15"UMBP look surprisingly the same, and MB's plain ugly :mad:
 

McGilli

macrumors 6502
Nov 11, 2008
380
0
After 2.5 months with my rev b it takes 8.5 hours to charge from 0 to full.

Same as it did in early november when i got it.
 

EspressoLove

macrumors 6502
Jun 29, 2007
423
2
Bay Area
After 2.5 months with my rev b it takes 8.5 hours to charge from 0 to full.

Same as it did in early november when i got it.

Oh man, that sucks ...
As they say - never buy rev.B products, or do they ;):D

Did you try to talk to geniuses? (or Apple Suport 1-800 if you not close to store)

You have to insist (that it's "not within the spec" ... which prob. not exitsts btw) - just yesterday I was literally schooling a genius ....
He's nice guy and all, he even worked at Mac repairs shop before for few a years, but I still managed to impress him (he btw inspected my MBP i was carrying :rolleyes:).
And the thing was - replace top case (with keyboard) on an out of warranty [white]MB - He said it's not possible (I have to pay) ...
And it took quite a while, and my firm insistence that it's not the case.

Be polite yet appeal to a common sense - not the specs - try to keep conversation within english - not techy ;)
 
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