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Maxim Glukhov

macrumors member
Original poster
Oct 7, 2020
52
39
Hi,

2 days ago I received my Pro Display XDR and I connected my MBP 16 to it, coming from a 2017 iMac.

Yesterday, I took a quick look at battery health and it said 99% (the MBP is relatively new).
This morning, I looked at it again and I see that it dropped to 97%.
Is it really possible that the battery lost 2% health overnight? should I be concerned with it long term or it would be better off to think of a different setup?
Anyone else experienced battery health degradation for MBP 16 with external monitor?
 
Last edited:

cmaier

Suspended
Jul 25, 2007
25,405
33,474
California
Hi,

2 days ago I received my Pro Display XDR and I connected my MBP 16 to it, coming from a 2017 iMac.

Yesterday, I took a quick look at battery health and it said 99% (the MBP is relatively new).
This morning, I looked at it again and I see that it dropped to 97%.
Is it really possible that the battery lost 2% health overnight? should I be concerned with it long term or it would be better off to think of a different setup?
Anyone else experienced battery health degradation for MBP 16 with external monitor?

That seems unusual. Try rebooting? I’ve seen, occasionally, that the number can get screwed up until a reboot.
 

ght56

macrumors 6502a
Aug 31, 2020
839
815
The battery health on all portables fluctuates, but on the MacBook Pro 16-inch it fluctuates even more. This is even further amplified if you have Catalina's battery health feature enabled, which is enabled by default. I'm inclined to think there is a reporting issue. Mine has fluctuated between 89 percent and 100 percent over the period of a month of ownership, although actual runtimes have remained about the same.
 

Maxim Glukhov

macrumors member
Original poster
Oct 7, 2020
52
39
That seems unusual. Try rebooting? I’ve seen, occasionally, that the number can get screwed up until a reboot.
I tried to reboot, doesn't seem to solve it. In fact, it lost another 1% so it's down to 96%.
The battery health on all portables fluctuates, but on the MacBook Pro 16-inch it fluctuates even more. This is even further amplified if you have Catalina's battery health feature enabled, which is enabled by default. I'm inclined to think there is a reporting issue. Mine has fluctuated between 89 percent and 100 percent over the period of a month of ownership, although actual runtimes have remained about the same.
I just checked and you are right, it is enabled. I will keep an eye on it for the upcoming weeks and see what happens.
 
Last edited:

ght56

macrumors 6502a
Aug 31, 2020
839
815
I just checked and you are right, it is enabled. I will keep an eye on it for the upcoming weeks and see what happens.

I think you are good to go. The health statistics on the 16 inch MacBook Pro are just outright whacky. You might want to do a time test to see how fast the battery drains under your normal usage scenario and note it...down the road if the health statistics fall more, you can repeat the test with identical conditions (e.g., apps used, screen brightness, GPU selected, etc.) to see if there is a real-world change.
 
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Maxim Glukhov

macrumors member
Original poster
Oct 7, 2020
52
39
I think you are good to go. The health statistics on the 16 inch MacBook Pro are just outright whacky. You might want to do a time test to see how fast the battery drains under your normal usage scenario and note it...down the road if the health statistics fall more, you can repeat the test with identical conditions (e.g., apps used, screen brightness, GPU selected, etc.) to see if there is a real-world change.
Thats a good idea, thank you. I will try that.
 
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Minga089

macrumors regular
Jun 26, 2020
122
99
München, Bayern
It's the battery health management feature. If you disable it and use your machine a little that way, the displayed design capacity should increase to nearly 100% again. Did the same and I was at 94%. However, if you use your machine plugged in most of the time you should re-enable battery health management after your test.
 

rokit88

macrumors newbie
Sep 16, 2020
4
4
Hi,

2 days ago I received my Pro Display XDR and I connected my MBP 16 to it, coming from a 2017 iMac.

Yesterday, I took a quick look at battery health and it said 99% (the MBP is relatively new).
This morning, I looked at it again and I see that it dropped to 97%.
Is it really possible that the battery lost 2% health overnight? should I be concerned with it long term or it would be better off to think of a different setup?
Anyone else experienced battery health degradation for MBP 16 with external monitor?
Yes, and you will find that it has to supplement with battery power even when plugged into power. On many occasions, I've walked away to eat lunch and come back and my battery has gone from 100% to 0% in an hour, even though it's plugged into power. It happened this morning while my 16" MBP was doing a Time Machine backup and the screen and the external display were both off. The battery had gone from 100% to 4% in a little more than an hour. And the only way to get it to start charging again was to unplug the external display. The power system can't support the GPU and CPU Apple is selling for these laptops.
 

pugxiwawa

macrumors 6502a
Nov 10, 2009
536
1,244
That's completely normal. I noticed my new MBP ranges from 95% to 100% throughout the day, I don't pay too much attention to it. How do you like the XDR? I'm super jealous, lol, that's my dream monitor if I could afford one.
 

Maxim Glukhov

macrumors member
Original poster
Oct 7, 2020
52
39
Yes, and you will find that it has to supplement with battery power even when plugged into power. On many occasions, I've walked away to eat lunch and come back and my battery has gone from 100% to 0% in an hour, even though it's plugged into power. It happened this morning while my 16" MBP was doing a Time Machine backup and the screen and the external display were both off. The battery had gone from 100% to 4% in a little more than an hour. And the only way to get it to start charging again was to unplug the external display. The power system can't support the GPU and CPU Apple is selling for these laptops.
I think you are talking about the battery itself, I am talking about the battery health.
By the way it's been a few weeks since I posted this, battery health is at 95% now according to iStat. I am glad that it doesn't drop 1% every night like it was in the first 2 days.
Either way I am going to replace it with a Mac Pro for better performance, thermals and noise.
That's completely normal. I noticed my new MBP ranges from 95% to 100% throughout the day, I don't pay too much attention to it. How do you like the XDR? I'm super jealous, lol, that's my dream monitor if I could afford one.
It's a great monitor! I WFH for many months now and it's not going to change until January at least. I do programming as my daily job and as my hobby - so I stare at this screen almost all of my waking hours.
Text is sharp which was my number 1 priority, colours are great and I love all the real estate I am getting with 32 inch - compared to 27 on my iMac or 15 on the laptop itself. The USB hub at the back is actually quiet convenient, when I switch computers (work/personal) I hook the TB cable to a different computer and just switch the KB/Mouse/Trackpad with a cable that is already attached to it on the back.

Do keep in mind that sometimes you can see the shift in color on the edges even when you are staring at it directly. It's not a big deal, especially when looking at blacks. I don't do any photo/video editing stuff so I don't care that much - either way it does a better job than other monitors on the market with this size.

It's really pricey and definitely an overkill for many people (myself included) - I don't use most of the features of this display except the high pixel density which is really the only reason I bought this monitor. I didn't even care that much when they launched it - it only became more and more appealing when I started working from home.
 

4sallypat

macrumors 601
Sep 16, 2016
4,034
3,784
So Calif
So I have my 16" MBP connected to a 27" TB LED display since day one and the battery health has dropped to 85%.

Should I be worried ?


It's been a year and I do have AppleCare+....
Screen Shot 2020-11-11 at 8.16.39 AM.png

I do use the MBP with the 27" as a dual display (not clamshell) - and does run warm so I put a laptop cooler fan underneath the MBP since day 1 - not sure if that helps or not....
 
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