Charge limiter app AlDente - now works on M1 Macs

[Mike Boreham]

What was your setting for the "app closed" option? See Help page

My reply above is only relevant for Intel Macs with Thunderbolt 3. The Help page says:

For Silicon macs:

"When your MacBook is powered off, apps are not able to run and do any changes. Therefore, AlDente is not able to make any changes to the charging behavior of your MacBook while it is powered off. As a result, your MacBook will always charge to 100% when it is plugged in and powered off, regardless of the set Charge Limit in AlDente. Due to Apple Silicon MacBooks resetting internally when they are shut down, it is not possible to stop or limit charging when they are shut down. The only way to avoid letting your MacBook go to 100% is to not shut it down and let your MacBook go into sleep instead."

For Intel Macs with Thunderbolt 3, AlDente can use the setting in my screenshot as this:

"Therefore, we implemented the feature “Stop charging when powered off”. When this feature is activated, AlDente will stop charging right before your MacBook is powered off. As a result, your MacBook will stay at the current battery percentage it had just before it got shut down. Therefore, the battery will not charge to 100%".

 

[sierrablue]

I have the M1 base Mac. I can live with pulling the plug when I want to give my Mac a rest but the Launch at Login toggle clearly does not launch when I restart my MacBook.

 

[adcx64]

This software rocks. Launch day MBP used daily, and I'm only at 11 battery cycles.

 

[Javi74]

Hi!
I'm not sure if this could be useful to anybody, bu I prefer to share it just in case. I've seen an improvement in my battery health (reported by Better battery 2) since I set up Aldente this way:
- Discharging until 20%
- Charging to 100% and keeping it at 100% a couple of days.
- Discharging the battery to 80%.
- Setting Aldente at 50% without discharge option.
- Letting the Mac plugged and slowly discharging to 50%.
- Repeating the same process every month (after a month, it will not have reached 50% yet).

Battery health has gone from 94-95 to 98%.

Sorry for possible mistakes, English not my mother tongue.

 

[ChildOfTheWW]

Hey guys,

can someone say which chargers are the safest to use with AlDente? Or is it irrelevant? Do PPS Charger have some benefit? Looking for a 12V Charger for my Powerstation.

 

[DrCC]

Any Power Delivery charger should work. I am using AlDente with a Thunderbolt 4 dock and I have no issues. It also works the same with a 3rd party Power Delivery 60W charger.

 

[Grolubao]

What's everyone opinion on a Macbook Pro 14"? Aldente or no Aldente?

My Macbook Pro is connected to my USB-C screen all the time so charging through the monitor

 

[BigMcGuire]

What's everyone opinion on a Macbook Pro 14"? Aldente or no Aldente?

My Macbook Pro is connected to my USB-C screen all the time so charging through the monitor

Definitely AlDente. My work MBP spends most of its life plugged in - set to 70% AlDente.

 

[Fred Zed]

So the option to "stop charging when powered off" is not present anymore? Or is just named Stop charing when in sleep now?

Its been mentioned earlier, the app doesn't launch after a restart, right? cheers

 

[CMMChris]

Stop charging when powered off does not work on Apple Silicon. The SMC is at least partially reset when you shut down. That's why the option is gone on M1 Macs.

App not launching on restart is not a thing. This works perfectly fine. No manual launch required.

 

[Fred Zed]

Stop charging when powered off does not work on Apple Silicon. The SMC is at least partially reset when you shut down. That's why the option is gone on M1 Macs.

App not launching on restart is not a thing. This works perfectly fine. No manual launch required.

Thanks, if App not launching on startup wasn't a thing, then I wouldn't have mentioned it.

 

[DrCC]

Check the Launch at Login and it will auto start.

 

[Fred Zed]

Check the Launch at Login and it will auto start.

View attachment 1979878

Thanks., Launch on login was enabled but I re-installed the app and all seems fine now. Maybe it was the helper that I didn't install correctly who at the time, who knows..
In any case such a great app, I think I need to go Pro to show my support for the developer.

 

[BigMcGuire]

Thanks., Launch on login was enabled but I re-installed the app and all seems fine now. Maybe it was the helper that I didn't install correctly who at the time, who knows..
In any case such a great app, I think I need to go Pro to show my support for the developer.

Yeah after updates I sometimes have to reinstall the helper manually (in the app).

 

[cool11]

I try to use aldente.

I use the free version.

Is the 'charge limit', the only option I can set?
Is 80% a good setting?
How can I set to periodically discharge to 30%?

 

[cool11]

I also wonder, how aldente handles the battery charging, when I turn off my mbp?
I mean, then the battery charging is beyond its control, so the mac charges till 100%?

 

[misiektoja]

I also wonder, how aldente handles the battery charging, when I turn off my mbp?
I mean, then the battery charging is beyond its control, so the mac charges till 100%?

Yes, you need to remove the charging cable every time you power your MBP down (also includes restarts for example while doing MacOS ugprades). I got used to it.

 

[DrCC]

I also wonder, how aldente handles the battery charging, when I turn off my mbp?
I mean, then the battery charging is beyond its control, so the mac charges till 100%?

Don't turn off you Mac for regular usage, you don't need it, put it in sleep. I've used mine for months and I have yet to shut it down, the sleep function is so efficient, I don't see battery loss from one day to the other.

AlDente keeps the battery at the set limit if the Mac is in Sleep mode so there is no need to unplug the cable.

 

[SnackyD]

What is a good % to set the battery to for a device that will never leave it's dock? I believe it should be 40-50% since I read that batteries are best stored with half capacity but it's been a while since I've read that article and not sure if that is true anymore. What do yall think?

 

[Apple_Robert]

What is a good % to set the battery to for a device that will never leave it's dock? I believe it should be 40-50% since I read that batteries are best stored with half capacity but it's been a while since I've read that article and not sure if that is true anymore. What do yall think?

Keep at 70-80% and once a month let the app do a calibration down to 20% and then let it recharge.

 

[ChildOfTheWW]

Don't turn off you Mac for regular usage, you don't need it, put it in sleep. I've used mine for months and I have yet to shut it down, the sleep function is so efficient, I don't see battery loss from one day to the other.

AlDente keeps the battery at the set limit if the Mac is in Sleep mode so there is no need to unplug the cable.

Do you really see no battery loss unplugged? When i have AlDente installed my Macbook Pro 16 2021 cant go into deep sleep and always pulls around 2 Watts from the socket.

 

[BigMcGuire]

Do you really see no battery loss unplugged? When i have AlDente installed my Macbook Pro 16 2021 cant go into deep sleep and always pulls around 2 Watts from the socket.

On my 16MBP I see 6-10% loss a night when I let my laptop "sleep" - never thought for a second to think that aldente was preventing it from "deep" sleeping or not. Have you done tests with/without it to verify this?

The thought of my laptop sitting at 100% CPU for a few weeks makes me cringe

 

[ChildOfTheWW]

On my 16MBP I see 6-10% loss a night when I let my laptop "sleep" - never thought for a second to think that aldente was preventing it from "deep" sleeping or not. Have you done tests with/without it to verify this?

The thought of my laptop sitting at 100% CPU for a few weeks makes me cringe

Yep, when i am at 100% battery without AlDente installed it pulls 0 Watts from the socket after a few seconds going into sleep. With AlDente installed the laptop pulls around 2 Watts constantly in sleep mode.
Optimize Charging is really terrible and doesnt work at all for me. Hope in the future Apple gives the option to limit the battery level without that intelligent AI.

 

[BigMcGuire]

Yep, when i am at 100% battery without AlDente installed it pulls 0 Watts from the socket after a few seconds going into sleep. With AlDente installed the laptop pulls around 2 Watts constantly in sleep mode.
Optimize Charging is really terrible and doesnt work at all for me. Hope in the future Apple gives the option to limit the battery level without that intelligent AI.

Thanks for the info!

I just noticed my sleep option greyed out and pmset -g saying it was disabled at the system level!

I also recently noticed my 16' MBP was not sleeping (external monitor would stay on all night despite logging out, bit warm in the backpack with lid closed (not overheated)) - I was losing 10+% every night.

So I found: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/sleep-greyed-out-mac-stopped-going-to-sleep.2195256/page-2 and https://github.com/davidwernhart/AlDente/issues/601 - looks like version 14 had a sleep fix in it?

Either way, I had to do a sudo command to turn sleep back on and reboot. Now sleep is available in the option menu again (not greyed out). I also have Aldente 1.16.1. Will monitor this myself.

 

[BigMcGuire]

I have no idea, is this my MBP sleeping or not? lol - I put it to sleep before going to bed (plugged in).

CPU graph from istat menus.