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I'm on CM10 8/31 and I've been noticing that my battery life has been really poor lately, so I wanted to find out what the problem was. I thought about draining my battery fully and then charging it again. Once I drained the battery, I charged it, and restarted the phone after the charging began. Once the phone booted, it reported a 50% or so charge. I'm wondering if my phone is stuck at reporting battery at half capacity, and that when it charges to 100%, it's actually 50%. Anything I can do?
EDIT: Also, I should note that the battery has sometimes spiked up/down by about 20% after a reboot (including today before the drain).
This phone has a fuel gauge chip, fully discharging and recharging will not calibrate it. False readings after reboot are common, you may even notice it will climb back up as it begins to accurately reflect level.
There are apps to let you know what is causing drain. BetterBatteryStats and CPUSpy are recommended a lot.
ALBGunner04 said:
I'm on CM10 8/31 and I've been noticing that my battery life has been really poor lately, so I wanted to find out what the problem was. I thought about draining my battery fully and then charging it again. Once I drained the battery, I charged it, and restarted the phone after the charging began. Once the phone booted, it reported a 50% or so charge. I'm wondering if my phone is stuck at reporting battery at half capacity, and that when it charges to 100%, it's actually 50%. Anything I can do?
EDIT: Also, I should note that the battery has sometimes spiked up/down by about 20% after a reboot (including today before the drain).
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Click to collapse
Entropy doesn't frequent our forum much anymore, but he left some nuggets of wisdom behind.
As you have probably seen, he mentioned several times that generally our fuel gage doesn't need much attention. It may get a little out of whack if you have heavy usage followed by reboot, but generally the error is short-lived and goes away quickly (within an hour or so).
But apparently sometimes the fuel gage gets really confused, and in that case you can reset it (to un-confuse it) by powering down and pulling battery for 20-30 seconds. It certainly can't hurt to try.. that's what you try for any computer that was acting weird. That was discussed by Entropy here:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1209087&highlight=+gingerbread+fuel+gauge+
By the way, here is a link to the fuel gage chip (MAX17040) used in Infuse
http://datasheets.maximintegrated.com/en/ds/MAX17040-MAX17041.pdf
It has a heuristic model of the battery. The only input is the battery voltage. So it looks at time history of voltage and provides an output signal. Exactly what the output is I’m not sure. You’d think it would be an estimate of %. But according to the circuit diagram there is no inputs to the MAX17040 other than battery voltage.
And yet our phone also knows when it’s charging. And our Infuse phone also has a sensor that enables it to measure current while charging (but not to measure current while discharging). This according to the developer of Battery Monitor Widget:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=31295223&highlight=infuse#post31295223
Why the heck would we not use sensed charging current and charging status as an input to calculating our % battery (since the signal does not go to the Max17040)? Beats me, doesn't make sense. Maybe the output of he fuel gage chip goes to the integrated power chip MAX8998 which looks at these other inputs (charging status and charging current) and develops the % estimate... I’m not sure.
Hi everyone,
I've had my Sensation for about 14 months now and for the past month I've been having battery issues. Primarily, it's very quick to lose charge and will lose charge even while charging from the wall. First I bought a replacement battery but was still having the same issues. I've started using Better Battery Stats and Battery Monitor Widget but I don't have anything out of the ordinary running. In fact, not a lot is running at all. BMW has allowed me to see how the charging is going though which has been nice. During this period I have used Elegancia, Bruce's CM10, and am currently on ParanoidAndroid. All experienced the same issues.
Last night, for example, I put the phone on the charger at 16 percent. It charged up to 22 and then started the downward slide to death and I ended up waking up 35 minutes late.
Where do I go from here so I don't have to constantly be paranoid about my battery levels?
Sounds like you might need another battery. In better battery starts did you notice any unusual wake locks? This could drain a battery. But since it looses charge even when charging I'd think it was the battery. I personally was experiencing some battery issues myself finally I broke down and got a mugen 3800mah battery from mugen. It was expensive but really worth it for Me.with really heavy and constant use I get 20 hours out of my battery, with normal use I get two days. I'm also running paranoid Android rom. For me the big battery solved my issues. Only one draw back, it does make your phone thicker. New back included with battery. This didn't bother me much because of the excellent battery life I receive. Now I finally don't. Worry about battery. However it's expensive at about 95 dollars. But I was so fed up with poor battery life it was worth it for me. You have to be careful when buying inexpensive batteries because there are a lot of fakes going around. And the mah is not really what it says it is on the packages. You can test the battery and make sure it is what it's advertised to be. If you don't want to go with that large of a battery you can also try anker extended battery. It's a lot less expensive and is a good battery. I personally needed more juice so I went with the big battery. I know you said you replaced the battery but sometimes the bargain batteries go bad quickly. It makes me suspicious of the battery because it's even dropping while charging. This is strange. If you ruled out any apps or wake locks that might be draining the battery I would buy a good reliable battery. The draining while charging is a red flag. I'd say the battery is going bad. I don't at all regret my purchase of the big battery. It for me, solved my issues. I do Hope this helps and I wish you the best. Hopefully you will get your issue resolved soon.
Sent from my HTC Sensation using xda premium
its either an issue with the battery or the battery reporting.
Only thing you can really try is to charge it up to 100%, wipe battery stats in recovery, then let it empty totally and charge it up again, see how its behaving. There is a chance that its the reporting that is off.
otherwise this looks like the battery is on its way out im afraid
realsis said:
Sounds like you might need another battery. In better battery starts did you notice any unusual wake locks? This could drain a battery. But since it looses charge even when charging I'd think it was the battery. I personally was experiencing some battery issues myself finally I broke down and got a mugen 3800mah battery from mugen. It was expensive but really worth it for Me.with really heavy and constant use I get 20 hours out of my battery, with normal use I get two days. I'm also running paranoid Android rom. For me the big battery solved my issues. Only one draw back, it does make your phone thicker. New back included with battery. This didn't bother me much because of the excellent battery life I receive. Now I finally don't. Worry about battery. However it's expensive at about 95 dollars. But I was so fed up with poor battery life it was worth it for me. You have to be careful when buying inexpensive batteries because there are a lot of fakes going around. And the mah is not really what it says it is on the packages. You can test the battery and make sure it is what it's advertised to be. If you don't want to go with that large of a battery you can also try anker extended battery. It's a lot less expensive and is a good battery. I personally needed more juice so I went with the big battery. I know you said you replaced the battery but sometimes the bargain batteries go bad quickly. It makes me suspicious of the battery because it's even dropping while charging. This is strange. If you ruled out any apps or wake locks that might be draining the battery I would buy a good reliable battery. The draining while charging is a red flag. I'd say the battery is going bad. I don't at all regret my purchase of the big battery. It for me, solved my issues. I do Hope this helps and I wish you the best. Hopefully you will get your issue resolved soon.
Sent from my HTC Sensation using xda premium
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Argh. I hope it's not the replacement battery too. I got a replacement HTC battery. The problem I'm having getting anything useful from Better Battery Stats is that rarely am I off the charger. In the settings it says I can log while charging but it may mess up the stats so I've shied away from doing that. I'm not against getting a bigger, better battery but I would hate to do that and have it actually be something else hardware-wise where I would need to get rid of my phone.
Hawke84 said:
its either an issue with the battery or the battery reporting.
Only thing you can really try is to charge it up to 100%, wipe battery stats in recovery, then let it empty totally and charge it up again, see how its behaving. There is a chance that its the reporting that is off.
otherwise this looks like the battery is on its way out im afraid
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'll give this a try if I can get it back up to 100%. Is the reporting in Recovery always correct? The battery never has issues charging while it's in Recovery mode. If that's the case then I'll charge it to 100% in recovery and then wipe and start fresh.
Thanks
I don't think it's the battery. This phones have errors in battery readings. I feel your pain man. Mine is from T-Mobile (Sensation 4G) and it discharges if I use it even at lowest brightness when it's charging too.
If I reboot, I get the battery boost. I have tried EVERYTHING I read here and nothing worked. I even have 4 batteries. All of them in good condition.
I even tried three times discharging it fully and without turning it on, charge it in the night and when I wake up 7-8 hours later, it's still charging. I tried wiping stats, changing ROMs, changing the usb cable and the charger. Everything... I believe it's a hardware issue. (Thank HTC for that) I'm not buying another HTC when I have to upgrade.
KerberosKomondor said:
I'll give this a try if I can get it back up to 100%. Is the reporting in Recovery always correct? The battery never has issues charging while it's in Recovery mode. If that's the case then I'll charge it to 100% in recovery and then wipe and start fresh.
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Click to collapse
Interesting...so if you were to charge the phone in recoery how long do you think it would take to get to 100%?
I would definitely do what you said, charge in recovery then wipe battery stats and go from there.
If you're interested in having something to compare to, it takes my phone about 3 hours to charge to 100% (by the way I'm using an Anker extended capacity battery), with a peak current usually around 800 - 900 mA. Fully charged I have somewhere around 4100 mV. If you haven't already, I'd suggest adding a Battery Monitor widget with mA, mV, and % available being displayed and it will be pretty easy to get an idea what's going on.
KCuadrado said:
I don't think it's the battery. This phones have errors in battery readings. I feel your pain man. Mine is from T-Mobile (Sensation 4G) and it discharges if I use it even at lowest brightness when it's charging too.
If I reboot, I get the battery boost. I have tried EVERYTHING I read here and nothing worked. I even have 4 batteries. All of them in good condition.
I even tried three times discharging it fully and without turning it on, charge it in the night and when I wake up 7-8 hours later, it's still charging. I tried wiping stats, changing ROMs, changing the usb cable and the charger. Everything... I believe it's a hardware issue. (Thank HTC for that) I'm not buying another HTC when I have to upgrade.
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Click to collapse
I'm leaning towards hardware issue too. That's why I figured I'd post and see if there was anything else that I can try. It's also why I don't really want to buy an expensive battery since who knows what it'll fit next. I know what you mean about the reboot battery boost. You can almost gamble and bet on percentages when you reboot. I've seen 50% swings before.
goatee84 said:
Interesting...so if you were to charge the phone in recoery how long do you think it would take to get to 100%?
I would definitely do what you said, charge in recovery then wipe battery stats and go from there.
If you're interested in having something to compare to, it takes my phone about 3 hours to charge to 100% (by the way I'm using an Anker extended capacity battery), with a peak current usually around 800 - 900 mA. Fully charged I have somewhere around 4100 mV. If you haven't already, I'd suggest adding a Battery Monitor widget with mA, mV, and % available being displayed and it will be pretty easy to get an idea what's going on.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
In recovery I would guess that it wont take very long to charge to full. I have battery monitor widget installed and while plugged into the wall with my 1.0A charger, it will typically pull 100-200mA but sometimes it'll spike to 700-900mA. No rhyme or reason. When idling and functioning properly, without a charger plugged in it drops 9-100mA. Sometimes though while charging it'll sit at negative 100-200mA.
HA! Just rebooted my phone and it went from 68% to 100%. So I rebooted into recovery, it also said full so I wiped stats.
KerberosKomondor said:
In recovery I would guess that it wont take very long to charge to full. I have battery monitor widget installed and while plugged into the wall with my 1.0A charger, it will typically pull 100-200mA but sometimes it'll spike to 700-900mA. No rhyme or reason. When idling and functioning properly, without a charger plugged in it drops 9-100mA. Sometimes though while charging it'll sit at negative 100-200mA.
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Click to collapse
I normally get 2 to 3 mA drain with the phone sleeping. When charging you may not necessarily get close to the 1 A current delivery of the charger straight away, typically it will ramp up over time and reach peak charge current as it gets closer to 100%. Once at 100% it wants to just "trickle" charge to maintain 100% charge until the charger is disconnected, so any wakelocks etc. that cause a current drain during that "trickle" charging will actually decrease battery charge until the charger ramps up to compensate for the drain. Random spikes in charging current would suggest a hardware problem where the electronics are struggling to properly govern the charging process, as would a large negative current drain with the charger plugged in. Silly question but what's the actual plug connection to your phone like? Nice and solid, pins all OK?
So I picked up a Nexus 5, and I like it, but being that it has a sealed battery I'm a little OCD over prolonging the life of it. After doing some digging, I have come up with the following tips to follow (and some of these are common sense with regards to a lithium battery):
Don't let your battery dip below 20% often
NEVER let it die completely (unless you have to calibrate your phones battery readings)
Charging to 100% isn't the best for it, and especially don't let it sit at 100% due to heat issues
Don't charge it in subfreezing temperatures, or especially in 100+ degree weather
Generally speaking, small charges spaced out (adding 15-30% or so at a time) is better than ~75% at a time due to heat issues
Very, very small charges done in rapid succession (adding 5-10% - A.K.A. "bump charging"), is bad
Qi supposedly heats the battery too much
OK, so that's what I've established in doing some research... Anyone disagree with this?
So generally speaking, what I should do to maintain maximum battery health is use my phone from 90% back down to 20% (and back up to 90%) regularly, correct? Obviously this is in a perfect scenario, but it's good to know.
Well I had a few side questions of my own:
If you get a quality Qi charger that runs (acceptably) cool, will it still be too hot to use day in and day out for optimum battery health?
If you do shorter charges on Qi (say 15-30% as mentioned above), would that be OK at that point?
What if I want to go use my phone heavily (lets say play a game for an hour), is it less stress on the battery to use it while on the charger (and get hot), or just let the battery cycle on it's own and charge it multiple times in the process? Basically, does using the phone while plugged in (whether charging, or trickle-charging at 100%) cause more degradation than cycling the battery multiple times?
Is letting your phone off the charger at night (cycling the battery, even if just a little bit) really better than leaving your phone plugged in at 100%?
This is an interesting topic to debate, and I want to hear what you think!
rytymu said:
So I picked up a Nexus 5, and I like it, but being that it has a sealed battery I'm a little OCD over prolonging the life of it. After doing some digging, I have come up with the following tips to follow (and some of these are common sense with regards to a lithium battery):
Don't let your battery dip below 20% often
NEVER let it die completely (unless you have to calibrate your phones battery readings)
Charging to 100% isn't the best for it, and especially don't let it sit at 100% due to heat issues
Don't charge it in subfreezing temperatures, or especially in 100+ degree weather
Generally speaking, small charges spaced out (adding 15-30% or so at a time) is better than ~75% at a time due to heat issues
Very, very small charges done in rapid succession (adding 5-10% - A.K.A. "bump charging"), is bad
Qi supposedly heats the battery too much
OK, so that's what I've established in doing some research... Anyone disagree with this?
So generally speaking, what I should do to maintain maximum battery health is use my phone from 90% back down to 20% (and back up to 90%) regularly, correct? Obviously this is in a perfect scenario, but it's good to know.
Well I had a few side questions of my own:
If you get a quality Qi charger that runs (acceptably) cool, will it still be too hot to use day in and day out for optimum battery health?
If you do shorter charges on Qi (say 15-30% as mentioned above), would that be OK at that point?
What if I want to go use my phone heavily (lets say play a game for an hour), is it less stress on the battery to use it while on the charger (and get hot), or just let the battery cycle on it's own and charge it multiple times in the process? Basically, does using the phone while plugged in (whether charging, or trickle-charging at 100%) cause more degradation than cycling the battery multiple times?
Is letting your phone off the charger at night (cycling the battery, even if just a little bit) really better than leaving your phone plugged in at 100%?
This is an interesting topic to debate, and I want to hear what you think!
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Click to collapse
First off, BUMP!
Second, here are some results I've had. While idling, the battery life is RIDICULOUSLY good, however, whenever the screen is on the battery is terrible... It's like a Toyota Prius with a V10 hybrid-drive; around town it is very efficient, but get on the highway and VROOOOOOOOM!
The phone was at 42% charge after two days. Granted, there was only 37 minutes of screen usage, but I did quite a bit of Bluetooth / Spotify streaming. Wifi was on and connected almost the entire time. I do notice that my idle drain goes from .2% to .6% lost per hour on wifi, to 1.5% to 3% lost per hour while on HSPA+ / LTE.
rytymu said:
So I picked up a Nexus 5, and I like it, but being that it has a sealed battery I'm a little OCD over prolonging the life of it. After doing some digging, I have come up with the following tips to follow (and some of these are common sense with regards to a lithium battery):
Don't let your battery dip below 20% often
NEVER let it die completely (unless you have to calibrate your phones battery readings)
Charging to 100% isn't the best for it, and especially don't let it sit at 100% due to heat issues
Don't charge it in subfreezing temperatures, or especially in 100+ degree weather
Generally speaking, small charges spaced out (adding 15-30% or so at a time) is better than ~75% at a time due to heat issues
Very, very small charges done in rapid succession (adding 5-10% - A.K.A. "bump charging"), is bad
Qi supposedly heats the battery too much
OK, so that's what I've established in doing some research... Anyone disagree with this?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Most of those aren't really wrong, they're just massively over-exaggerated.
A. Heat only matters if you're getting the battery up to like, 50C often. Note that the phone will actually stop charging if it hits these temperatures.
B. Small charges don't really help or hurt.
C. Qi doesn't heat the battery itself that much.
Overall, you're overthinking it way too much. Just don't leave your phone on the car dash in the middle of the summer sun, don't leave it on the charger for an entire week without unplugging it, and try not to drain it completely to 0%.
Li-Polymer batteries are far more resilient than people give them credit for. Even if you used your phone absolutely perfectly, over the course of a couple years you'd be lucky to get an extra 5% of life out of it. It's not worth your time and stress at all.
I have a Lenovo laptop and its got a great software that helps to maintain the battery lifespan. Is it the same for phones where you should once in a while drain the battery to empty, also should you only do a full charge rather than topping up?
Im into emulation but that tends to be a battery killer so advice would be really helpful.
Nope just keep charging it. Don't drain it completely
You sure, in the two weeks Ive had Ive already started to notice a difference.
http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2011/02/ask-ars-what-is-the-best-way-to-use-an-li-ion-battery/
Interesting. What about when doing battery intensive stuff like playing games or using emulators, would you suggest playing with the charger plugged-in or to instead recharge when the battery goes low (obviously not too low).
I don't think ot really matters, just don't be afraid to put the thing on charge whenever you want realistically
Thanks again. Last question, after a whole day usually my battery is quite low (below 30, usually below 20). Is it better in those cases to do a half charge and then do another half charge later, or is that the same as doing a full charge in one go?
So my 4a has been having fast battery drain since few months now. I remember it having very good battery life initially. However now it drains battery very fast.
This is also surprising since I keep brightness low due to me being sensitive to it.. and also keep the phone charged upto 80% capacity only as I read that it prolongs battery life.
One thing I could note is that the phone drains slower in the 80 - 100 % range if the phone gets fully charged occasionally.
Hence I have been suspecting the 'rapid' charging which is enabled by default on stock charger to be one cause.
Is there some way to enable slower charging like what happens in case of 'Adaptive charging' post 80% capacity? I hope that will lead to lesser wearing down of battery.
Don't use a compatible cable/charger and it'll change slowly. I don't think any PC I've connected to can do rapid charging, for example, and the cheap USB chargers I have definitely can't do it, only the one that came with the phone can do it.
purezen said:
So my 4a has been having fast battery drain since few months now. I remember it having very good battery life initially. However now it drains battery very fast.
This is also surprising since I keep brightness low due to me being sensitive to it.. and also keep the phone charged upto 80% capacity only as I read that it prolongs battery life.
One thing I could note is that the phone drains slower in the 80 - 100 % range if the phone gets fully charged occasionally.
Hence I have been suspecting the 'rapid' charging which is enabled by default on stock charger to be one cause.
Is there some way to enable slower charging like what happens in case of 'Adaptive charging' post 80% capacity? I hope that will lead to lesser wearing down of battery.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It's more likely an app that drain your battery in background than your battery dying already. Quick charge and adaptive charge are made to not harm the battery.
Are you rooted? If yes, install Franco kernel manager app from playstore.
In first page you'll see your battery life estimation (from system) and clicking on live monitor go-to the processes tab.
Just like top cmd on Linux you'll see which process is active and how much cpu it use
For me as an exemple i realized that when I'm using YouTube music. The AdAway app goes crazy and drain my battery. And its something that's not shown on settings/battety tab.
Fast charging stresses the battery more than slow charging. That said I almost always fast charge. I expect 1-2 years of battery life on my N10+'s though.
Charging past 80% or discharging below 30% stresses the battery; Li's like frequent midrange power cycling.
Don't start charging below 72F, 82F or higher is best. High temp cut off is about 102F.
Never attempt to charge a battery colder than 40F!!!
Erratic fast charging is a sign of battery failure.
A rapid decline in capacity is another sign of a battery failure.
Any rear cover bulging ie battery swelling is a failure, replace asap.
Once a battery is below 80% of it's original capacity it's degraded and has reached the end of its service life, replace it.
Degraded Li's are more likely to fail which can easily destroy the phone.
If the phone is used heavily or is 2-3 years old, probably time to replace the battery. Just do it.
On most phones the cost is low.
a1291762 said:
Don't use a compatible cable/charger and it'll change slowly. I don't think any PC I've connected to can do rapid charging, for example, and the cheap USB chargers I have definitely can't do it, only the one that came with the phone can do it.
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Click to collapse
Mine does rapid one only Thankfully connecting a usb to a socket board does non-rapid
Dead-neM said:
It's more likely an app that drain your battery in background than your battery dying already. Quick charge and adaptive charge are made to not harm the battery.
Are you rooted? If yes, install Franco kernel manager app from playstore.
In first page you'll see your battery life estimation (from system) and clicking on live monitor go-to the processes tab.
Just like top cmd on Linux you'll see which process is active and how much cpu it use
For me as an exemple i realized that when I'm using YouTube music. The AdAway app goes crazy and drain my battery. And its something that's not shown on settings/battety tab.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the response
Frankly don't have that much usage of my phone. Will give sometime to observing with non rapid charging. Will give this a try if that still persists.
blackhawk said:
Fast charging stresses the battery more than slow charging. That said I almost always fast charge. I expect 1-2 years of battery life on my N10+'s though.
Charging past 80% or discharging below 30% stresses the battery; Li's like frequent midrange power cycling.
Don't start charging below 72F, 82F or higher is best. High temp cut off is about 102F.
Never attempt to charge a battery colder than 40F!!!
Erratic fast charging is a sign of battery failure.
A rapid decline in capacity is another sign of a battery failure.
Any rear cover bulging ie battery swelling is a failure, replace asap.
Once a battery is below 80% of it's original capacity it's degraded and has reached the end of its service life, replace it.
Degraded Li's are more likely to fail which can easily destroy the phone.
If the phone is used heavily or is 2-3 years old, probably time to replace the battery. Just do it.
On most phones the cost is low.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the response. That was insightful
UPDATE:
Started slow-er charging since few days now.. and I really feel that the battery performance has considerably improved
Also update to Android 12 since few days as well so not sure if that has a role to play though I don't think so
purezen said:
UPDATE:
Started slow-er charging since few days now.. and I really feel that the battery performance has considerably improved
Also update to Android 12 since few days as well so not sure if that has a role to play though I don't think so
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If it seems to work better... I don't see any difference on my N10+'s though. Run times are the same slow/fast charging.
Keep a close eye on it as erratic fast charging is a sign of battery failure... I have seen that