Hi guys i have now had my little baby of a macbook pro for 3 weeks now and have loved every minute of it although i think my mac's a bit too smart for me... on my old com once the battery reached full charge it keep charging and charging the battery to death unless you took the battery out or took the battery out...
However on my macbook it seems to be a different story... when it reaches full charge and the light turns green until the little power cord button it says 'Battery is charged... Power Source: Power Adaptor'...
i was wondering does that mean that it has stoped putting more and more electricity into the battery and is only using the power adaptor as its power source?
I've always been very picky about battery chage cycle, trying to make my battery last as long as possible but it seems that my new mac does all the worrying for me
thx

Sure does!

I know the feeling mate...my old PC Craptop did the same thing...would just charge the shit out of the battery when you left it on power...was so bad that after a year of use, the battery would last no longer than 10mins

Thankfully my MacBook is smarter than that!

If you are interested in keeping an eye on your battery stats easily...good for a great, free program called 'Coconut Battery'

he i can beat you my first battery got to the point where it didnt work at all, not even one second and that was only in 6 months of usage too...

good to hear that my mac's smarter than me, and yeah i got coconut battery already, very useful, im still at 99% max capacity

thx guys you always reply so fast

I would think it does.
Lithium ion batteries have a nasting habbit of exploding if you overcharge them.

And they stop working completely if their charge level gets too low. Sigh, they need very careful management by devices that use them. And don't worry macbook has it all under control.

When my PowerBook G4 battery is fully charged it starts cycling between 95% and 100% so as not to burn out. Do the MacBook batteries do this too?

and what is the proper way to calibrate the macbook/pro batteries? I can never get a straight answer for this.

I think it is not the battery that gets calibrated but rather the battery meter. Please correct me if I am wrong, but the process of completely discharging the battery can't be good for it.

http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=86284

Another Apple article talks about maximising battery life. It mentions nothing about calibration.

http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=50666

OK so .. if the battery stops charging then how can companies like Kensington and Belkin produce FM transmitters they claim that not only power your iPod and keep it playing.. but also charge the battery and transmit the frequency to your FM radio?

http://batteryuniversity.com/parttwo-34.htm

Yes.

so this all means that it is safe to leave it charging overnight? 8 hours?
I have had it a few days, and let it run down to completely empty each time.
Up to my third cycle, after my last big charge, it actually increaded my mpa from what it was originally when I got the computer which is interesting... (know this thanks to coconut battery)
it also said that it was 7 weeks old when I launch coconut battery. This normal time (age) it takes to get to a store? and sold which in my case was the day after it came in...
I have a surge protector powerboard too which could help if anything trips etc.

Yer it is fine to leave overnight...I do all the time. Be careful leaving it charging when you are not there though...I always unplug mine if I am not going to be home etc.

It is quite common for the capacity to go up I think...if you have a good battery anyway. Mine is currently at 5490 when the original is 5200 after nearly 50 cycles = HAPPY

Get five hours out of it at uni with airport off...easy

Ah thanks mate,
we are the lucky ones I guess hehe
so far so good, knock on wood.

you guys must have had pretty shitty or old laptops that did this, not one of the PC laptops i own in my sig do this - once it gets to 100% it will sit there at 100% and will not charge the battery again until it drops below 95% - this is exactly the same behaviour as the macbook/ibook G4 i have.