Possible Fix for Battery Drain / Overheat

[LMMT]

I think I stumbled upon a simple fix for an issue, my phone had. The phone would get hot, and drain the battery at a rate of more than 20% an hour. It didn't matter if I had a good, or bad signal, or if I was on wifi, or what I was doing with it, as long as the screen was on, it would drain. I monitored the CPU clock speeds, and noticed all the cores were usually close to being "maxed out". I found "IndexService" (com.samsung.indexservice) was the culprit. As a test, I went to /system/app/, and renamed 'ContentSearch.apk' to 'ContentSearch.bak', and rebooted. The heat/drain was instantly gone. The only problem was, now, my phone's storage wasn't being indexed (obviously). I renamed the file, back to it's original name, and replaced my 64gb micro SD card, with a blank smaller card, I had lying around. Problem gone!.

I copied the contents of the 64gb card, to my computer, and deleted most of the files from the card. I re-inserted it, and added files back, a few at a time, until I found the folder that was causing the problem.

Let me know if this works for you.


tldr; Problem is caused by a file (possibly PDF) on the SD card.

 

[Borii]

So simply renaming the file and reboot? Lack of indexing has negative effects?

Sent from my SM-N900P using xda app-developers app

 

[LMMT]

So simply renaming the file and reboot? Lack of indexing has negative effects?

Sent from my SM-N900P using xda app-developers app

Well, yes, I guess you could just rename it, but that's not the best solution. You have something on your micro SD, or internal memory. You need to delete files, until you find the problem file. I backed up my card to my computer, and deleted most of the stuff on my card. It took more than an hour for the phone to index what was left on the card. Eventually all of the CPU cores went to idle, and my phone cooled off. I then added files back to the card, and gave it few minutes, each time, to stabilize. After putting one particular folder back, that contained a lot of PDFs, my heat/battery drain problem, returned. I had found my problem. I re-deleted that folder, and everything was good, again. I just googled it and found some other people in Italy (had to google translate), that came to the same conclusion.

Sent from my SM-N900P now Free

 

[sec1rxg]

Well, yes, I guess you could just rename it, but that's not the best solution. You have something on your micro SD, or internal memory. You need to delete files, until you find the problem file. I backed up my card to my computer, and deleted most of the stuff on my card. It took more than an hour for the phone to index what was left on the card. Eventually all of the CPU cores went to idle, and my phone cooled off. I then added files back to the card, and gave it few minutes, each time, to stabilize. After putting one particular folder back, that contained a lot of PDFs, my heat/battery drain problem, returned. I had found my problem. I re-deleted that folder, and everything was good, again. I just googled it and found some other people in Italy (had to google translate), that came to the same conclusion.

Sent from my SM-N900P now Free

All this makes sense, nice research. BTW what App did you use to monitor the CPU cores?

 

[LMMT]

All this makes sense, nice research. BTW what App did you use to monitor the CPU cores?

System Panel Lite:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=nextapp.systempanel

Sent from my SM-N900P now Free

 

[EillonCross]

System Panel Lite:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=nextapp.systempanel

Sent from my SM-N900P now Free

I LOVE System Panel. Been a pro user for years. I feel it is the best system monitoring software on the play store. I could be wrong, but I believe it is. Good find on this. I haven't encountered overheating yet, but when I do I'll already know what to do, all thanks to you. Good work my friend.

 

[xurinox]

I have around 4500 pictures on my 32gb micro SD card and I did have camera upload "on" on the drop box app....this was causing the same issue.... I did turn it off and erased whatever was inside a folder named "cloudagent" on the phone and the problem was gone... I guess the index service was constantly transferring cache and thumbnails from the SD card to the phone

 

[LMMT]

I have around 4500 pictures on my 32gb micro SD card and I did have camera upload "on" on the drop box app....this was causing the same issue.... I did turn it off and erased whatever was inside a folder named "cloudagent" on the phone and the problem was gone... I guess the index service was constantly transferring cache and thumbnails from the SD card to the phone

Good info, thanks for the feedback.

 

[xurinox]

Good info, thanks for the feedback.

you welcome!

 

[eliasif3]

same problem on galaxy note 3

I think I stumbled upon a simple fix for an issue, my phone had. The phone would get hot, and drain the battery at a rate of more than 20% an hour. It didn't matter if I had a good, or bad signal, or if I was on wifi, or what I was doing with it, as long as the screen was on, it would drain. I monitored the CPU clock speeds, and noticed all the cores were usually close to being "maxed out". I found "IndexService" (com.samsung.indexservice) was the culprit. As a test, I went to /system/app/, and renamed 'ContentSearch.apk' to 'ContentSearch.bak', and rebooted. The heat/drain was instantly gone. The only problem was, now, my phone's storage wasn't being indexed (obviously). I renamed the file, back to it's original name, and replaced my 64gb micro SD card, with a blank smaller card, I had lying around. Problem gone!.

I copied the contents of the 64gb card, to my computer, and deleted most of the files from the card. I re-inserted it, and added files back, a few at a time, until I found the folder that was causing the problem.

Let me know if this works for you.


tldr; Problem is caused by a file (possibly PDF) on the SD card.

I had the same problem on my Galaxy note 3 and solved it by removing the SD Card ... I don't have any PDF files on it but I'll back up the data and format it and keep the files that needed

 

[LMMT]

I had the same problem on my Galaxy note 3 and solved it by removing the SD Card ... I don't have any PDF files on it but I'll back up the data and format it and keep the files that needed

Good. I've also heard of corrupt mp3s causing the problem. Let us know if you figure out what file caused yours.

Sent from my SM-N900P

 

[Herk718]

Simple fix, @freeza BeastMode kernel v1.5

 

[LMMT]

Simple fix, @freeza BeastMode kernel v1.5

Uhhhh, NO. Excellent kernel, though.

Sent from my SM-N900P

 

[Herk718]

Uhhhh, NO. Excellent kernel, though.

Sent from my SM-N900P

Well sorry but I don't suffer from battery drain nor overheating dued mainly in part to beast mode

 

[LMMT]

Well sorry but I don't suffer from battery drain nor overheating dued mainly in part to beast mode

I don't either, anymore, lol. But thanks for trying to help.

Sent from my SM-N900P

 

[nerys71]

and............. you failed to mention THE FOLDER that caused the problem as you copied the files back to the card ??

so what was it?

 

[Vitsya818]

I have the same problem, I'm using a note 3 and i didn't have this problem before. I had a water damage and after drying, changing the charging port everything is working fine except my battery would die within hours; even if i Do Not use the phone it would drain within 6-8 hours. I just tried it without the sd card today and so far in 4 hours i have 80+ % and i have over an hour of screen time. Im not sure what the causes this problem, i'm thinking of cleaning the motherboard with 99% Isopropyl Alcohol Antispetic Solution to make sure the is no power leakage.
Also how much data do you guys have on the sd card, could i be because we have more then 32gb ? Any ideas what i should look for on the sd card ? i mostly have music and pictures.
Thank you

 

[LMMT]

I have the same problem, I'm using a note 3 and i didn't have this problem before. I had a water damage and after drying, changing the charging port everything is working fine except my battery would die within hours; even if i Do Not use the phone it would drain within 6-8 hours. I just tried it without the sd card today and so far in 4 hours i have 80+ % and i have over an hour of screen time. Im not sure what the causes this problem, i'm thinking of cleaning the motherboard with 99% Isopropyl Alcohol Antispetic Solution to make sure the is no power leakage.
Also how much data do you guys have on the sd card, could i be because we have more then 32gb ? Any ideas what i should look for on the sd card ? i mostly have music and pictures.
Thank you

My 64gb card, was almost full (about 52gb), when I transferred it from my Note 2. I've deleted enough files now, to get it down to 35-40gb used. From what I've read, it can be a corrupt mp3, or video. My problem was a pdf document. I backed up, reformatted card, and added files back a little at a time, until I found the folder, causing my problem. I haven't bothered checking to see which pdf in the folder, was actually causing my problem.

Sent from my SM-N900P

 

[Vitsya818]

My 64gb card, was almost full (about 52gb), when I transferred it from my Note 2. I've deleted enough files now, to get it down to 35-40gb used. From what I've read, it can be a corrupt mp3, or video. My problem was a pdf document. I backed up, reformatted card, and added files back a little at a time, until I found the folder, causing my problem. I haven't bothered checking to see which pdf in the folder, was actually causing my problem.

Sent from my SM-N900P

Thank you LMMT

I'll format my sd card and try adding a folder at a time as well, hopefully i can figure out too. :good:

 

[eve6er69]

wow i hadn't heard of an overheating issue before but thanks for the heads up. it funny how naming a file with a different destination can cure something like this.