This is why for problems or oddities with power management like batteries disappearing, refusal to sleep, a very sluggish Mac combined with system fans blazing loudly, graphics cards acting up, are all very classic symptoms of needing to reset the SMC to get things back on track.

What is an SMC anyway?įor those who don’t know, SMC stands for System Management Controller, and it handles power functions and other core hardware roles on Macs, thus inexplicable issues with power management are almost always resolved by resetting the SMC. You won’t always find an exact reason as to why the system management controller goes haywire along with core system and power functions, but the basic idea is that at some point something was corrupted, maybe for a reason or maybe not. Thus you will have to go back and make those minor power customizations again. It’s important to point out that resetting the SMC will cause you to lose many power-specific options and customizations you may have made to OS X with System Preferences, ranging from screen brightness levels, to settings in Energy Saver for how the Mac handles things like auto-dimming based on lighting and power sources, screen sleep behavior, sleep when idle, etc. In other words, it took only two minutes fix the entire problem, from adding up all the power-related issues, saving an important file or two, shut down the Mac, reset the SMC with the aforementioned keyboard sequence, then reboot the Mac to normalcy again. Note the total elapsed time in the clock is 2 minutes.

Here’s an example of the “No Batteries Available” menu, then after the fix the battery is shown functioning as normal again: Here are the precise key sequences for what an SMC reset looks like on a MacBook Air or a MacBook Pro (Retina) keyboard:Īfter the Mac has rebooted normally again, things should be all well and good again.

Press the Power button as usual to start the MacBook.

Hold Shift+Control+Option+Power concurrently for a few seconds, then release.

Shut down the MacBook and connect the MagSafe power adapter – let the Mac completely power down before proceeding any further.

You can find instructions for other Macs and older Macs here if needed. This will be the same on a MacBook Air & MacBook Pro Retina, technically any Mac with a built-in non-removable battery. This is a technical process but it’s very easy to follow. Get the Battery Back & Fans Normal By Resetting the SMC

Macbook pro battery x fix