[HOW-TO] Battery saving tips

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d14b0ll0s

Senior Member
Sep 4, 2011
1,213
448
As some of you have been complaining about your Infinity's poor battery life, I thought we should start a thread on getting more out of its battery. I invite you all to share your experiences, hopefully we could come to sth helpful together.
Perhaps when the development's carried on further by more XDA developers, we can split this to stock ROM and custom ROMs, as probably the latter will have more of these already included.

1. Arguably full charge and discharge does nothing good on modern Li-Ion batteries and it's rather advisable to keep it balanced - discharge a little, don't push it with charging all the time (however in case of the Infinity, as with many other devices, the charger will just stop consuming energy after [almost] fully charging your device). There is one reason for doing a few full discharges and charges however - so that the battery monitoring apps/widgets can learn more about your battery's life and power consumption.

2. Monitor your battery life and monitor it wisely (don't use power-consuming apps and widgets). I personally like Battery Monitor Widget, as it gives you mA and % / hour (either drain or charge), which is pretty cool, as you can see how much your usage exhausts your battery in real time. This way I've found out that switching the WiFi off while reading books actually gives me battery drain closer to 10%/h than 15%/h etc. You can see some other in this apps thread. Try different apps and see what fits you best. Don't rely on system battery usage stats, see what other apps show us and what apps and processes drain the most of your battery, show most wakelocks, etc.

3. Use as low power mode as you need (administered most easily through ASUS/Android notification bar on the bottom of your screen). There are three power modes:
  • power-saving (keeps your CPU at 1 GHz according to some apps, 500 MHz according to others) <- can give you up to 2 additional hours
  • balanced (keeps your CPU at 1,5 GHz)
  • normal / performance (keeps your CPU at the highest speed - in stock kernel 1,7 GHz for the 1st core and 1,6 for the others)

You have to try these for yourself. Most games run well on balanced, but may sometimes need the performance mode (keep in mind that overheating your CPU and GPU may cause the clocks to actually slow down). You may also find yourself happy with the power-saving mode, which really helps your battery to last longer, but I've noticed issues with some apps while running it (problems with pdf rendering, for example), as it probably changes more than just the CPU clock speed, but also the system behaviour. I hardly ever leave the balanced mode, mostly when curious about benchmark results ;)

There are also different CPU governors in Android/Linux kernel, which you can change if you are rooted, but perhaps leaving the default "interactive" one on should serve you well (you can also try "conservative", but it has been argued it doesn't save your battery so well in the long run).

(if rooted) You can also use CPU management apps like SetCPU, create your custom profiles or use the default ones according to your needs (for example ).

4. In ASUS setttings switch on both power-saving options at the very bottom of the list (WiFi and dock deep sleep [the former is the same as choosing "never" in WiFi advanced settings]).

5. Keep the screen brightness as low, as you can. It's better to adjust it manually through the notifications bar or a widget than to switch auto-brightness on (some recommend LUX app, personally I had problems with it trying to outsmart me when I was doing some manual changes). I like to keep it around 30-40% indoors during the day and 0-10% at night.

6. Switch WiFi off when you don't need it, unless you need it on constantly.
For me, it sometimes also helps organise my work too, when I don't get constant notifications or when I'm not eager to browse the web all the time, when just reading something and taking notes.

7a) (if rooted) Make your device fall into really deep sleep...

Add these to your build.prop file (see the thread on tweaking):

ro.ril.disable.power.collapse=0
pm.sleep_mode=1

7b) ...and make it scan for available WiFi networks less often, for example every 180 seconds (same as above):

wifi.supplicant_scan_interval=180

8. (if rooted) Switch off all the apps you don't need that auto-start on boot with a program like System Tuner.
(f not rooted) Use auto-killer for the apps you don't need (if rooted you can do the above two together as well).

You can also deactivate unused apps (settings -> apps -> [select app] -> deactivate). Remove bloatware, too (see the first few posts).

9. Adjust your minfree values, so the low level system task killer will take care of the apps running in the background for you (see the thread on tweaking). You can try with different settings and see what's better for you. Some apps drain your battery life even when you don't use them, while others don't and it's better to leave them in the memory than run them all over again every time. Do some tests and see what's best for you, if you have time for it.

10. Switch auto-syncing apps to lower values when possible (sometimes PUSH is better, sometimes worse for your battery life).

11. Keep it simple. Too many funky animations, floating wallpapers, lots of nice widgets will make your battery drain really fast.

12. Try different custom launchers, you can set more UI behaviour rules in these (see this apps thread).

13. Use a dark wallpaper and dark themes / night reading modes (see why).


PS JuiceDefender reported to having disabled deep sleep, so stay away if possible.
Hotmail app has been said to trigger wakelocks, while overriding system wifi sleep when screen is off, so keep that in mind if you want better battery life over constant e-mail syncing.

Hit [THANKS] if it helps.
 
Last edited:

HoushaSen

Senior Member
Jul 10, 2012
305
93
First of all, thanks to d14b0ll0s for yet another great write up. I am one of those concerned with the battery life of the Infinity. Though some review says it got up to 9-9.5 hours with BALANCED mode I believe is the mistake. By using Power save mode, I think we can potentially get to that level but still hard.

My system is NOT rooted, but I have noticed significant change in my battery life so far with following:

1. Balanced Mode to Power Save mode.

This gets me like extra 2 hours or so. WIthout this change, 5-6 hours for my usage and with this it goes up to 7-8 hours screen time.

2. Under Wi-Fi Setting change Use wifi during sleep mode (mine is in Japanese so exact wording may be different) to never. Default setting was always. Prior to this change, I lost quite bit overnight unplugged; however, after the change it loses negligible amount.

Now rather than these, I am trying to play around with Juice Defender, which was recommended by d14b0ll0s in best application list he created. I have initially downloaded Juice Defender Free edition, and noticed may be minimal gain over #1&#2 already instituted. But concept was great. So I ended up purchasing Ultimate edition, which allows us to control when to turn of WIFI per individual application based without Root i.e. while reading PDF I don't think I need WIFI connection.

https://play.google.com/store/search?q=juice+defender&c=apps.

I am still tweaking and playing with Juice Defender, but I am certain without change in #1,#2 (which are actually taken care by Juice Defender in its own way), I can gain same battery life and my hope/guess is I can get even more battery life.

So in conclusion, for those not rooted try Juice Defender (at least free version). I will let you all know how the ultimate version does in next couple days.
 
Last edited:

d14b0ll0s

Senior Member
Sep 4, 2011
1,213
448
Thanks for this! ^^ Post 1 updated.

Have you noticed what power-saving mode changes apart from CPU (& GPU?) clock speed? Does it change auto-sync settings or unload some modules? I'm not using it, as it is too slow for me to render big pdfs consisting of scanned jpgs. But when I'm reading them with WiFi off on balanced, I normally get 9.9% drain per hour according to Battery Monitor Widget, which even with some other things that I do from time to time and some additional rendering when opening new files should give me about 9 hours on a single charge. Browsing over WiFi gives me about 7.

The Wi-Fi settings you mentioned are the same as WiFi power-saving settings on the bottom of ASUS setting list, but I've clarified that in post 1 now.

I'm happy JuiceDefender helped you, it's good to advertise it here. I'm adding the info about your post apart from the link to the list of apps.
 
Last edited:

masiegel

Senior Member
Mar 28, 2010
352
75
Thanks

I would also add that it's good the deactivate unused apps/widgets (settings -> apps -> "select app" -> deactivate)
it's only possible for apps which cannot be uninstalled
 

Ali I Hagen

Senior Member
Nov 20, 2011
99
10
I think the standby time is awesome. Wifi off, power save mode enabled and left the tablet over night right after full charged battery w/o dock. After 10h still 100%.
 

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d14b0ll0s

Senior Member
Sep 4, 2011
1,213
448
The system measuring system isn't exact, and early on so are all the indicators, so don't rely on it too heavily. There may be a variance of 1-3% and a lot more in the usage indicators. Try different battery / apps widgets and compare the results.
Anyway, deep sleep is nice indeed. It normally drains about 0.2% (-0,5%) per hour, mine is now 98% after the night off the charger and responding to a few e-mails in bed ;)
 

tedr44

Senior Member
Jan 2, 2012
276
23
Antutu's Battery Saver worked great on my 101, I'm observing how it will regulate the power drain on my 700. Hopefully it will keep the back of the tab cool as well.
 
i think the problem is when you have wifi on!

I think the standby time is awesome. Wifi off, power save mode enabled and left the tablet over night right after full charged battery w/o dock. After 10h still 100%.

this is good when you have wifi off. however, when you have the wifi on, it shows 80% wifi and 20% screen consumed by battery. you can stop network access by disabling wifi from Asus customized settings and also in wifi setting, you can keep wifi on during sleep to NEVER. this helps a lot..
 

d14b0ll0s

Senior Member
Sep 4, 2011
1,213
448
Stock battery (usage) stats are not relevant, use other battery apps or widgets for that.

I've heard good things about AnTuTu's bat.sav., but also that it doesn't let you have more insight into what it's actually doing, so JuiceDefender seems a better option in that matter.
 

Redefined301

Senior Member
Jul 20, 2012
142
13
TAIPEI CITY
d14b0ll0s:
Do you know the specific voltage setting / configurations coming out of the usb line?
Is it 16V and how does it distinguish between 16V and 5V on the single USB cable.
For example does the voltage cable go on different lines for 16V and 5V for the TF700?
Or is it 16/5V dual switchable on the same power cable?
I'm asking this is because there's interest to charge the tablet by using alternative methods such as mobile battery with 16V setting.
If so, then does a DC to USB cable be suffice for the job? Or is the cable wired differently as proprietary ASUS?

Thanks!
 

d14b0ll0s

Senior Member
Sep 4, 2011
1,213
448
Sorry, I wouldn't know that. There some ppl here that are doing some testing with the batteries and hardware, perhaps the_kreature or MartyHulskemper could know something. You should post it as a thread in Q&A too.
 

firetech

Senior Member
May 23, 2009
183
64
Lund
firetech.nu
d14b0ll0s:
Do you know the specific voltage setting / configurations coming out of the usb line?
Is it 16V and how does it distinguish between 16V and 5V on the single USB cable.
For example does the voltage cable go on different lines for 16V and 5V for the TF700?
Or is it 16/5V dual switchable on the same power cable?
I'm asking this is because there's interest to charge the tablet by using alternative methods such as mobile battery with 16V setting.
If so, then does a DC to USB cable be suffice for the job? Or is the cable wired differently as proprietary ASUS?

First of all, the charger gives 15V, not 16V. Avoid giving your tablet too much voltage as that can kill it...

Secondly, the included cable is a USB 3.0 cable and therefore has 5 extra pins (you can see them if you look straight into the USB plug). These extra pins are used to get 15V from the charger. I don't know exactly how that works, but I guess the tablet tells the charger it wants 15V over the power lines (same power lines as 5V) rather than the charger giving 15V over these extra pins (because that could be devastating to other USB 3.0 gadgets). This is why the tablet won't charge if you insert an old (USB 1.0 or 2.0) extension cable between the charger and the tablet.
 

watwat1234

Member
Dec 28, 2010
7
5
Hey I'm running with wifi on during sleep and I seem to get great battery performance (2% loss over 11 hr standby). No build.pro tweaks so no deep asleep our anything like that. I'm wondering if anyone else has gotten similar performance?

I thought it was interesting because the results were the opposite on my tf300t, and my usage pattern hasn't changed much between the two devices.

Sent from my ASUS Transformer Pad TF700T
 

Fabipro

Senior Member
Feb 7, 2011
307
26
Augsburg
Hey I'm running with wifi on during sleep and I seem to get great battery performance (2% loss over 11 hr standby). No build.pro tweaks so no deep asleep our anything like that. I'm wondering if anyone else has gotten similar performance?

Same here. Battery life on deep sleep with WLAN is great!

But I think the Infinity needs a lot of power while reading news, tapatalk, Reader HD..
Not more than 4 hours Screen On Time! :confused:
And that with balanced mode and 50% brightness.

Any problems with the fifth companion core?

PS: Is there an app which shows the activity of the different cores?

4fce9b25-0023-25c5.jpg



FAbi
Gesendet von meinem ASUS Transformer Pad TF700T mit Tapatalk 2
 
Last edited:

polish_pat

Senior Member
Nov 30, 2011
1,823
488
Montreal
this is crazy, i got my tablet on monday, used it about 3-4 hours restoring all my apps and signing in to everything, and i havent used it much since but today, i'm still at 76%, havent plugged it in it or docked it. I also forgot to mention my dad played with it a bit also...prob about 1 hour
 
Last edited:

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  • 39
    As some of you have been complaining about your Infinity's poor battery life, I thought we should start a thread on getting more out of its battery. I invite you all to share your experiences, hopefully we could come to sth helpful together.
    Perhaps when the development's carried on further by more XDA developers, we can split this to stock ROM and custom ROMs, as probably the latter will have more of these already included.

    1. Arguably full charge and discharge does nothing good on modern Li-Ion batteries and it's rather advisable to keep it balanced - discharge a little, don't push it with charging all the time (however in case of the Infinity, as with many other devices, the charger will just stop consuming energy after [almost] fully charging your device). There is one reason for doing a few full discharges and charges however - so that the battery monitoring apps/widgets can learn more about your battery's life and power consumption.

    2. Monitor your battery life and monitor it wisely (don't use power-consuming apps and widgets). I personally like Battery Monitor Widget, as it gives you mA and % / hour (either drain or charge), which is pretty cool, as you can see how much your usage exhausts your battery in real time. This way I've found out that switching the WiFi off while reading books actually gives me battery drain closer to 10%/h than 15%/h etc. You can see some other in this apps thread. Try different apps and see what fits you best. Don't rely on system battery usage stats, see what other apps show us and what apps and processes drain the most of your battery, show most wakelocks, etc.

    3. Use as low power mode as you need (administered most easily through ASUS/Android notification bar on the bottom of your screen). There are three power modes:
    • power-saving (keeps your CPU at 1 GHz according to some apps, 500 MHz according to others) <- can give you up to 2 additional hours
    • balanced (keeps your CPU at 1,5 GHz)
    • normal / performance (keeps your CPU at the highest speed - in stock kernel 1,7 GHz for the 1st core and 1,6 for the others)

    You have to try these for yourself. Most games run well on balanced, but may sometimes need the performance mode (keep in mind that overheating your CPU and GPU may cause the clocks to actually slow down). You may also find yourself happy with the power-saving mode, which really helps your battery to last longer, but I've noticed issues with some apps while running it (problems with pdf rendering, for example), as it probably changes more than just the CPU clock speed, but also the system behaviour. I hardly ever leave the balanced mode, mostly when curious about benchmark results ;)

    There are also different CPU governors in Android/Linux kernel, which you can change if you are rooted, but perhaps leaving the default "interactive" one on should serve you well (you can also try "conservative", but it has been argued it doesn't save your battery so well in the long run).

    (if rooted) You can also use CPU management apps like SetCPU, create your custom profiles or use the default ones according to your needs (for example ).

    4. In ASUS setttings switch on both power-saving options at the very bottom of the list (WiFi and dock deep sleep [the former is the same as choosing "never" in WiFi advanced settings]).

    5. Keep the screen brightness as low, as you can. It's better to adjust it manually through the notifications bar or a widget than to switch auto-brightness on (some recommend LUX app, personally I had problems with it trying to outsmart me when I was doing some manual changes). I like to keep it around 30-40% indoors during the day and 0-10% at night.

    6. Switch WiFi off when you don't need it, unless you need it on constantly.
    For me, it sometimes also helps organise my work too, when I don't get constant notifications or when I'm not eager to browse the web all the time, when just reading something and taking notes.

    7a) (if rooted) Make your device fall into really deep sleep...

    Add these to your build.prop file (see the thread on tweaking):

    ro.ril.disable.power.collapse=0
    pm.sleep_mode=1

    7b) ...and make it scan for available WiFi networks less often, for example every 180 seconds (same as above):

    wifi.supplicant_scan_interval=180

    8. (if rooted) Switch off all the apps you don't need that auto-start on boot with a program like System Tuner.
    (f not rooted) Use auto-killer for the apps you don't need (if rooted you can do the above two together as well).

    You can also deactivate unused apps (settings -> apps -> [select app] -> deactivate). Remove bloatware, too (see the first few posts).

    9. Adjust your minfree values, so the low level system task killer will take care of the apps running in the background for you (see the thread on tweaking). You can try with different settings and see what's better for you. Some apps drain your battery life even when you don't use them, while others don't and it's better to leave them in the memory than run them all over again every time. Do some tests and see what's best for you, if you have time for it.

    10. Switch auto-syncing apps to lower values when possible (sometimes PUSH is better, sometimes worse for your battery life).

    11. Keep it simple. Too many funky animations, floating wallpapers, lots of nice widgets will make your battery drain really fast.

    12. Try different custom launchers, you can set more UI behaviour rules in these (see this apps thread).

    13. Use a dark wallpaper and dark themes / night reading modes (see why).


    PS JuiceDefender reported to having disabled deep sleep, so stay away if possible.
    Hotmail app has been said to trigger wakelocks, while overriding system wifi sleep when screen is off, so keep that in mind if you want better battery life over constant e-mail syncing.

    Hit [THANKS] if it helps.
    5
    First of all, thanks to d14b0ll0s for yet another great write up. I am one of those concerned with the battery life of the Infinity. Though some review says it got up to 9-9.5 hours with BALANCED mode I believe is the mistake. By using Power save mode, I think we can potentially get to that level but still hard.

    My system is NOT rooted, but I have noticed significant change in my battery life so far with following:

    1. Balanced Mode to Power Save mode.

    This gets me like extra 2 hours or so. WIthout this change, 5-6 hours for my usage and with this it goes up to 7-8 hours screen time.

    2. Under Wi-Fi Setting change Use wifi during sleep mode (mine is in Japanese so exact wording may be different) to never. Default setting was always. Prior to this change, I lost quite bit overnight unplugged; however, after the change it loses negligible amount.

    Now rather than these, I am trying to play around with Juice Defender, which was recommended by d14b0ll0s in best application list he created. I have initially downloaded Juice Defender Free edition, and noticed may be minimal gain over #1&#2 already instituted. But concept was great. So I ended up purchasing Ultimate edition, which allows us to control when to turn of WIFI per individual application based without Root i.e. while reading PDF I don't think I need WIFI connection.

    https://play.google.com/store/search?q=juice+defender&c=apps.

    I am still tweaking and playing with Juice Defender, but I am certain without change in #1,#2 (which are actually taken care by Juice Defender in its own way), I can gain same battery life and my hope/guess is I can get even more battery life.

    So in conclusion, for those not rooted try Juice Defender (at least free version). I will let you all know how the ultimate version does in next couple days.
    2
    Thanks

    I would also add that it's good the deactivate unused apps/widgets (settings -> apps -> "select app" -> deactivate)
    it's only possible for apps which cannot be uninstalled
    2
    I also had problems with network location draining battery. The problem seemed to be a bug in google maps. You have to once enable the location settings in maps so you can get to the configuration menu and then disable location refresh settings.

    This worked for me and now I can safely leave the tablet in sleep mode without loosing any battery during the day. I can also use network location in apps that need it (leave network location enabled in system settings).

    Hope this helps. :)
    2
    "I would love" to not have to re-root and reload all my apps, too bad unlocking voids the warranty, thus no nandroid. Even with Titanium it is a PIA. Your reply of wiping is about as good a reply that Best Buy Geek Squad or the Manufacturer gives. Maybe a "not-thank you" button would be appropiate as well.

    The other suggestions on here (like the Auto Airplane Mode App) are helpful and the reason why XDA is better.

    Wow, sorry for trying to help. I'm sorry that you don't like my answers, but you seem to not want to really find out what the real problem is. You also seem to want to blame the Location services service for being the problem, yet nobody else has that problem.

    My point is that there is some app causing your battery drain - the fastest and easiest way to determine which app is causing the problem is to start fresh and a) see if the problem still exists and then b) start re-installing apps slowly and monitoring to see which app is causing it.

    Auto-airplane is not a solution to your problem - it is a workaround that will also cause you to lose functionality.

    But, regardless, since it seems that you are really not interesting it getting to the root of the problem, since it's too much work, good luck - I will not bother you any more!

    Sent from my ASUS Transformer Pad TF700T using Tapatalk 2