Tuesday, January 02, 2007
Macbook Pro Batteries
CROSSPOSTED FROM IMAGESPACE--ARTS AND WEB 2.0
The battery life on my office laptop, a 15 inch MacBook Pro, has been getting shorter and shorter. Recently the computer would conk out at, what looked to be, half a charge. As you can imagine, if you are travelling and working on a document and suddenly your computer dies it can be somewhat distressing. Last night when I powered the machine up to do a little work, the computer indicated that there was no battery available at all. I flipped the computer over and verified that the battery was installed correctly. This battery has completely ceased to charge.
I had been thinking about taking it to the genius bar at our local Mac Store--Metro Denver has three--when I googled "Macbook Pro Battery Charge Failure" and was suprised to find this exchange page which indicates that they are doing a battery swap. Normally Apple sends a notice to all those who could be affected by a recall. In fact, my wife recieved two such notices on her iBook.
After doing some additional research, it appears that this recall has been going on since at least May of 2006, quietly. It also turns out that there are a slew of instances strewn across of the Internet of others with just this same situation.
If you have the following symptoms:
1) Reduced Battery Time
2) Unexpected system shutdowns when on battery power
3) A completely dead battery
You should head to the exchange page and check to see if your computer is one with this problem.
Come on Apple, you *should* be proactively contacting folks. I know that the failure I'm experiencing doesn't cause fires, but it sure is an irritant.
The battery life on my office laptop, a 15 inch MacBook Pro, has been getting shorter and shorter. Recently the computer would conk out at, what looked to be, half a charge. As you can imagine, if you are travelling and working on a document and suddenly your computer dies it can be somewhat distressing. Last night when I powered the machine up to do a little work, the computer indicated that there was no battery available at all. I flipped the computer over and verified that the battery was installed correctly. This battery has completely ceased to charge.
I had been thinking about taking it to the genius bar at our local Mac Store--Metro Denver has three--when I googled "Macbook Pro Battery Charge Failure" and was suprised to find this exchange page which indicates that they are doing a battery swap. Normally Apple sends a notice to all those who could be affected by a recall. In fact, my wife recieved two such notices on her iBook.
After doing some additional research, it appears that this recall has been going on since at least May of 2006, quietly. It also turns out that there are a slew of instances strewn across of the Internet of others with just this same situation.
If you have the following symptoms:
1) Reduced Battery Time
2) Unexpected system shutdowns when on battery power
3) A completely dead battery
You should head to the exchange page and check to see if your computer is one with this problem.
Come on Apple, you *should* be proactively contacting folks. I know that the failure I'm experiencing doesn't cause fires, but it sure is an irritant.
