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Posted By: Bob Walker Power consumption in MacBook - 09/22/22 11:45 PM
Biab (2021 - 515) on my MacBook Pro really drains the battery. I can only go a few hours before I need to plug in. Is this a known issue? is there any fix?

For example: currently my Activity Monitor shows Biab with
Energy Impact: 21.9
12 hour power: 18.3
CPU: 17%
and it's not even the current window.

This is 4 to 5 times higher than any other process running (ie Musescore is the next highest at 4, 5 and 4)

Thanks for any info or feedback.
Bob
Posted By: AudioTrack Re: Power consumption in MacBook - 09/23/22 09:02 AM
Originally Posted By: Bob Walker
Biab (2021 - 515) on my MacBook Pro really drains the battery. I can only go a few hours before I need to plug in. Is this a known issue? is there any fix?

For example: currently my Activity Monitor shows Biab with
Energy Impact: 21.9
12 hour power: 18.3
CPU: 17%
and it's not even the current window.

This is 4 to 5 times higher than any other process running (ie Musescore is the next highest at 4, 5 and 4)

Thanks for any info or feedback.
Bob

Welcome to the forums, Bob.
You mentioned: build 515 so this is 2021 as you have stated. I'm not familiar with Mac, but are there other diagnostic tools that you can use to determine approximate current lifespan of your version?

Does the computer pass other performance tests, separately to BiaB?

Posted By: Bob Walker Re: Power consumption in MacBook - 09/23/22 09:21 PM
Thanks for the response.
I'm not sure what you mean by 'current lifespan of your version'. Do you mean the MacOS? It's up to date (10.15.7)

I suppose I could run other Mac diagnostics, but I'm not sure what more info this would give me. It's pretty obvious that Biab is an outlier application on my Mac in terms of resource consumption.

I've heard that some multi-platform applications (like Biab that runs on Windows and Mac), that are built from the same code sometimes can't always implement specific elements of the platform. For example, I don't think Biab on a Mac listens to the 'go to sleep' command from the OS.
Posted By: mrgeeze Re: Power consumption in MacBook - 09/25/22 11:56 AM
Please provide some specs on your macbook pro (year, ram,processors,drive,etc)
Battery life on Macbooks seems pretty variable as they age. That may factor in.

Check this out perhaps
https://support.apple.com/guide/mac-help/check-the-condition-of-your-computers-battery-mh20865/mac.

biab eats some resources but mostly during rendering. It seems pretty benign standing by.
Posted By: Bob Walker Re: Power consumption in MacBook - 09/26/22 03:45 PM
Again, thanks for the response. MacBook system info:

OS: 10.15.7
CPU: 2.3 GHz Dual-Core Intel i5
Memory: 8GB 2133MHz LPDDR3
Disc: 250GB Flash Storage.

However, my many years in IT Systems Analysis indicates to me that when dozens of applications are running on a system, and one of them uses 5 times as many resources as any other app, the problem lies in the application, not in the OS.

This morning my battery was at 80% after not being plugged in all night. I started Biab 3 hours ago, haven't even used it or loaded a song, and the battery is now at 28% (and dropping as I write this), and it is consistently using ~17% of the CPU doing nothing.

However, it appears that no one else is experiencing this, which was one of the purposes of this post, so I'll carry on as is. I'll just need to keep it plugged in when using biab.
Thanks.
(PS. Battery went from 29% to 20% during this writing)
Posted By: Matt Finley Re: Power consumption in MacBook - 09/26/22 05:02 PM
I have no knowledge of a MacBook but about your IT comment (me, too), I think it’s surprising how much in computer resources BIAB uses. Its functions are unique and it really isn’t comparable to any other digital audio program I’ve used.
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