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New laptop
This weekend I switched over - finally - to my new laptop, which I bought last summer on the general principle that they might get expensive and/or harder to obtain due to supply chain issues (which tbf doesn't really seem to be happening to the extent that I was afraid of back then, but having a good-quality and newish laptop is far too mission-critical for me as a writer to take chances).
So far I really love it in almost every way. The sudden jump of a few iterations of the Mac OS has been far less jarring than I was afraid of. I had to download new versions of a couple of programs, but on the whole the experience has been very nearly seamless, and I like far more of the changes than I dislike, which is a rarity for me - I really get used to having everything Just So, and I'm pleasantly surprised at how much I like or at least don't mind the interface changes. And the keyboard is an absolute joy to type on, especially after dealing with the flaky keyboard on the first-gen solid state Macs. As well as actually WORKING CORRECTLY, it has an extremely nice key-feel; actually I think it may be my favorite of the last few Mac keyboard iterations.
The one thing that's been a real disappointment so far is the battery life. On my previous laptop (2017 first-gen solid-state Macbook), I could go about 8-10 hours on a single charge if I was doing light activities like word processing, listening to music, and a little browsing. (That is, no video or high-end graphics stuff, which does drain the battery faster. But it was still far and away the most battery-efficient machine I've ever owned.)
... The new one gets 3-4 hours on a charge at the same level of usage. That's comparable to my old circa 2008 Macbook! It's ridiculous! This one is larger (I sprung for the 16" screen this time), which I'm sure makes a difference on the power drain, but it is absolutely bonkers that it would make that much difference, especially since the specs still claim 10+ hours of battery life. I can't even imagine how much you'd have to turn off to the point of absolute unusability to get that kind of performance if it drains like this with nothing running except a word processor and some occasional email-checking.
I've checked for unusually power-draining processes and not found any; there is nothing eating up the CPU that should be causing this, and the battery, as well as being almost brand new, seems healthy. But where my old laptop was cool to the touch when I had it in my lap, as long as I wasn't doing anything that was a processor hog, this one is always warm to the touch, which suggests there is a lot going on behind the scenes that's eating processor and consequently battery life.
I'm going to give it some time and see if it settles down a bit over time. One thing the new Macs apparently do is "learn" your habits and adjust things like the battery charge accordingly, so I'm going to see if that makes a difference, and if not ... I guess I deal with it until my next laptop change. The previous laptop is still perfectly functional - one reason why it took me so long to switch over - although it does need a battery change, not because the old one isn't working but because it's ... *cough* ... bulging, which tends to indicate Potentially Dangerous Badness. However, once I get the battery replaced, it should continue to be entirely usable, and I might end up using that one as my "on the go" machine and the new one as mostly a tethered graphics and writing machine.
I can't be more enthusiastic about the keyboard, though, and that's the part of it that I spend the most time with. And I'm pleasantly surprised by the transition to the new OS and general lack of "new operating system" bugginess with my old programs, and I also really like the new screentime-tracking feature and think I might end up using that a lot. So on the whole I'm pretty happy with it!
So far I really love it in almost every way. The sudden jump of a few iterations of the Mac OS has been far less jarring than I was afraid of. I had to download new versions of a couple of programs, but on the whole the experience has been very nearly seamless, and I like far more of the changes than I dislike, which is a rarity for me - I really get used to having everything Just So, and I'm pleasantly surprised at how much I like or at least don't mind the interface changes. And the keyboard is an absolute joy to type on, especially after dealing with the flaky keyboard on the first-gen solid state Macs. As well as actually WORKING CORRECTLY, it has an extremely nice key-feel; actually I think it may be my favorite of the last few Mac keyboard iterations.
The one thing that's been a real disappointment so far is the battery life. On my previous laptop (2017 first-gen solid-state Macbook), I could go about 8-10 hours on a single charge if I was doing light activities like word processing, listening to music, and a little browsing. (That is, no video or high-end graphics stuff, which does drain the battery faster. But it was still far and away the most battery-efficient machine I've ever owned.)
... The new one gets 3-4 hours on a charge at the same level of usage. That's comparable to my old circa 2008 Macbook! It's ridiculous! This one is larger (I sprung for the 16" screen this time), which I'm sure makes a difference on the power drain, but it is absolutely bonkers that it would make that much difference, especially since the specs still claim 10+ hours of battery life. I can't even imagine how much you'd have to turn off to the point of absolute unusability to get that kind of performance if it drains like this with nothing running except a word processor and some occasional email-checking.
I've checked for unusually power-draining processes and not found any; there is nothing eating up the CPU that should be causing this, and the battery, as well as being almost brand new, seems healthy. But where my old laptop was cool to the touch when I had it in my lap, as long as I wasn't doing anything that was a processor hog, this one is always warm to the touch, which suggests there is a lot going on behind the scenes that's eating processor and consequently battery life.
I'm going to give it some time and see if it settles down a bit over time. One thing the new Macs apparently do is "learn" your habits and adjust things like the battery charge accordingly, so I'm going to see if that makes a difference, and if not ... I guess I deal with it until my next laptop change. The previous laptop is still perfectly functional - one reason why it took me so long to switch over - although it does need a battery change, not because the old one isn't working but because it's ... *cough* ... bulging, which tends to indicate Potentially Dangerous Badness. However, once I get the battery replaced, it should continue to be entirely usable, and I might end up using that one as my "on the go" machine and the new one as mostly a tethered graphics and writing machine.
I can't be more enthusiastic about the keyboard, though, and that's the part of it that I spend the most time with. And I'm pleasantly surprised by the transition to the new OS and general lack of "new operating system" bugginess with my old programs, and I also really like the new screentime-tracking feature and think I might end up using that a lot. So on the whole I'm pretty happy with it!
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Sooooooo glad you're enjoying the new keyboard! ♥
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It's both possible that something is eating the processing, but also that you got a lemon battery, and you should be able to follow up re both I think.
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I'll see how this goes - my first priority is replacing the battery in the other machine before it does something like set the house on fire, but if that works out okay, I'll look into getting some battery tests run on this one. Or, tbh, just deal with it until I upgrade again in a few years - I don't need to run it off the battery THAT often, and I might just adjust my workspace so I need it less.
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That's valid! And I'm glad it's helping. :D
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Does it suffer from the typing lag of Big Sur, or has that been fixed?
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Sorry to hear about the battery though. That does seem pretty short.
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When I have in-person conferences again.
I love how light it is. When I do travel with it (even just to campus), I sometimes recheck that it's in my bag, because I can't feel it in addition to everything else in there!