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Help Battery Drain due to Software Bug w/GPS?

Are you able to replicate this same issue?

  • Total voters
    112
Just want to add that I can also verify this problem. Now I realize that, just by accident, I have been toggling the GPS button, so my battery life has been satisfactory. Thanx to lexluthor for this thread.
 
my battery life is so much better after reading the tip to toggle the gps on/off. after a day of barely using my phone, i would be at ~30%. now after a day of barely using my phone, i'm ~90%. hopefully they will fix this soon.
 
dangerous said:
Now that i updated my FB, it does Not Sleep. So, Yes, i had the same issues with GPS in the pass, NOW, if i run FB, it will not sleep (unless you cycle GPS). IE. Even if GPS is off, and i go to FB. it will not sleep. If i Cycle GPS (in my case ON then OFF), it will sleep..

So, is there a program that will cycle the GPS automatically when the screen turns off?
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Check to see if there is another FB update available. They fixed that problem.
 
For those users who say that toggling the GPS on/off is not solving the battery drain problem, are you sure that you are refreshing Spare Parts after seeing the DX running at 100%. As the OP said previously, you need to back out of the Spare Parts Battery History screen by using the "back" button to refresh the screen. If you don't then you will be seeing the same screen from when your DX was running at 100%.

I am using Beautiful Widgets GPS widget to toggle the GPS on/off, refresh Spare Parts and it has solved the battery drain problem. Hopefully this helps those that are not seeing the same results as I am.

Mo
 
bbuck002 said:
just posted a pretty lengthy rant on the support forum at motorola...cuz now i'm getting pissed no one will pay attention to us, besides matt from that forum that is.
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I see that Matt (Moto rep that seems to do support via messages boards) replied to you there:
Please don't shout.

I just posted a couple of posts back, and I've been active on this thread for several days. I have said that I will report it and see what we can learn. This is primarily a peer-to-peer support forum, not a Motorola-staffed channel, so there are not going to be Motorola employees all over the place here. But my role is find issues like this, determine if they have merit, and bring them back into the company for resolution. I'm doing that. The topic is not being ignored.
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Please let's not try to piss anyone off OK!! :) I know this was from a few days ago, but they are looking at it now.

I see that this Matt just posted today:
Our guys have looked at this over the weeekend. I'm trying to learn a little more before giving you all a more complete report. Stay tuned...
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I've noticed that my DX also won't sleep after a night of charging. When I pull out off the charger and put it to sleep it status pegged at 100%
 
yep ive noticed the charging thing too. its more than the gps thing. it pegs after charging(even after letting it sleep as soon as i pull it off the pod). this phone is really messed up. maybe a droid 2 on the 12th for me. well see....
 
This is a great find!!! Had my DX for 6 days now and battery life was to say the least disappointing. I toggled, I played I eventually turned off GPS and now it is after 5:00 PM EST and the phone is at 80%. Thanks again this has enhanced my ownership greatly. I may not even need the extended battery or worry about carrying a car charger. How many new bugs will we find in 2.2?

Thanks again,
SH
 
We've gotten a pretty substantial response back from motorola on the support forum...

This is from forum manager Matt,

Yes, but not a complete one yet. We have verified that something is going on here -- you are not crazy.

Our guys have actually looked at this really closely, but there are several aspects and I know I'll make a mistake if I don't wait to get my report reviewed. What I'm particularly interested in finding out is the actual impact of this in terms of battery life. There is a lot of discussion about that. Secondly, I'm trying to verify that it will be corrected. That seems pretty certain right now.

I won't say tomorrow because I thought I would have more today. But I think we're getting close to a full understanding.

Thanks for your persistence here.

this is needless to say encouraging!

@lexluthor--you rock man, thanks for identifying this and getting all the forum threads started!
 
I'm really happy Motorola has chosen to actually listen to bug reports and gripes from customers. All too often today companies just say f*ck you to customers, while Motorola is working to improve relations with consumers.

Kudos, Motorola.
 
That's great that Moto is really on this.

I agree with Matt from Motorola's comments and am very curious to see what they feel the actual impact is on battery life. There's so many factors involved that makes it very difficult for us to try to determine that.
 
Summary of how to maximize Droid X battery life with Android 2.1

-turn off GPS when not in use
-turn off WIFI when not in use
-after charging, unplug phone, shut off phone, boot phone
-examine your apps using Spare Parts or other battery monitor app. Uninstall problem apps.
-dial *228 to update PRLs (if Cell standby is eating battery power)

-pray you get the update soon

What did I miss?
 
Another X user here. I let my phone drain all the way down last night (the phone shut it's self off) and then charged it up for about 3 hours while the phone was off. The battery status showed 100%, so I unplugged it and turned it on. I crawled into bed and was planning on letting it "sleep" for a couple minutes and then checking spare parts before going to sleep myself to make sure that everyone was kosher. Well of course, I fell asleep before checking the phone and when I woke up 7 hours later the phone was at 40%, and spare parts was showing that the phone had been running the entire time (running time was at 100% in the spare parts battery history). So when I got to work, I toggled the gps icon plugged the phone into the charger to reset the counters in spare parts, let the phone sleep for 5 or so mins and then checked spare parts, low and behold, the phone was still showing 100% running time (and yes I backed all the way out of spare parts before checking the history again, so I was not just seeing the same update from earlier that same morning). Then I tried toggling airplane mode, same result, 100% running time. I rebooted the phone and the phone finally feel asleep.

WTF is going on here?
 
i've noticed over the last couple days that i'm also running at 100% every time i look at spare parts no matter what i do...and i've def seen it running at 30-40%, just not lately
 
I've been closely monitoring this situation as well, and I can certainly replicate the issue with the phone not falling asleep after GPS is activated. If I turn GPS off (or toggle it), the phone will sleep.

However, I have noticed NO difference in battery life either way. Whether I leave GPS off all day or leave it on, I get the same amount of battery life (or at least no noticeable difference). Of course, if I actually USE the GPS for any length of time, the battery will drop quickly (navigation). But even when Spare Parts is showing the phone running at 100% all day, the battery life does not seem any different than when I turn GPS off and Spare Parts shows a small percentage of running time.

So what does this mean? I don't know, since many of you guys have reported a difference in battery life. But I've been doing this for several days now and really see no difference. On the other hand, using a Live Wallpaper all day will dramatically reduce my battery life.

I normally get no more than 12 hours of battery life under moderate use. When I use it quite a bit throughout the day, I might only get 8 hours. I had the extended battery coming in a few days and will be eager to see if there's a noticeable difference.
 
I figured out an other app that uses the GPS a whole lot. Lookout that great app for locating your lost phone. It uses the GPS to locate it for you. FYI 8)
 
gotmydroidx said:
What a difference a day makes...yesterday I walked into VZ store and we watched my phone which had been turned on for 4 hours not used go from 25% battery to zero- dead in 10 minutes in front of our eyes. I let it sit at zero battery for 5 hours until I got home and charged it up last night.

Today it's been on for 5 hours and the battery has not gone down a smidge. I don't think there is anything wrong with the phone, it's the battery and the VZ guy is well aware of the problem.

On a positive note they ordered me a new phone and it will be here Monday. The wifi problem and the dead pixel was enough..they did not even question it.
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VZW just sent me a new Droid X.

I mention this as you will be required to use the same battery, sd card, and battery cover you already have in your new X when it arrives (unless they have given you a new battery special order).
 
Travisimo said:
I've been closely monitoring this situation as well, and I can certainly replicate the issue with the phone not falling asleep after GPS is activated. If I turn GPS off (or toggle it), the phone will sleep.

However, I have noticed NO difference in battery life either way. Whether I leave GPS off all day or leave it on, I get the same amount of battery life (or at least no noticeable difference). Of course, if I actually USE the GPS for any length of time, the battery will drop quickly (navigation). But even when Spare Parts is showing the phone running at 100% all day, the battery life does not seem any different than when I turn GPS off and Spare Parts shows a small percentage of running time.
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I'm actually in the same boat - I was getting appalling "battery life" at first... 40% battery gone in a half hour (according to the battery meter on the phone) or so. I googled around a bit and found out about the GPS thing, and so I started leaving it off, and I found that in many situations my battery life still sucked. MSNtalk raped about 40% of my battery in 15 minutes or so!

I read conjecture (at least, there was no technical evidence included with the statement) on one of these forums (they all blur together) that the battery takes a few large cycles to calibrate it's sensors or whatever, and basically my phone wasn't going more than an hour or two without being charged, so I left the GPS on all day without having it plugged in... close to fourteen hours, the last 4 hours or so of which it sat at ~15%. Fourteen hours with moderate use and the GPS on the whole time (and no I didn't toggle it off after maps, and yes I can repeat the behavior in spare parts/INFO) is not terrible at all, and if the GPS pegging "usage" at 100% while the phone's in standby is actually a battery drain I'm really excited to see what kind of life I get out of it when/if Moto fixes it.

But I'm left wondering that if I can get 14 hours of life out of the phone while it's allegedly going full steam ahead, I'm wondering if the issue is more in Android's reporting of the stats that INFO is grabbing, and less the phone actually not sleeping.

I'd be inclined to think that anyone who only gets 4 hours or so of actual standby time out of their phone and the phone actually shuts off from low power, rather than just thinking it might be running low on juice... don't screw around, send your phone back and get a replacement (or at least a replacement battery) - I don't think that will be "fixed in software".
 
I can report that the GPS bug on my phone is present also. Since buying my X a couple weeks back, the battery life has been unbelievably bad. Twice as bad as my Dinc, and that's saying something. I finally tried ATK, and it has helped tremendously probably quadrupling my bat life. Last night I read this entire thread, and indeed my phone has not been sleeping at all. So after toggling the GPS on/off, my phone now sleeps. I expect my battery life to improve even more keeping the GPS bug from letting my phone sleep. Hoping 2.2 will remedy this problem (along with the low volume speaker volume lol).
 
Completely reproducible on my phone and it DOES impact my battery life. The worst day before I knew about this bug I got less than 5 hours of use (mostly with the phone sitting in my pocket) on a full charge. And yes, the phone shut itself off due to low battery.

Since turning off the GPS except when using it (and I do use it a fair bit, having just moved to a new city) I've had great battery life. With stuff like screen brightness on low and moderate use I've gone more than 36 hours without charging. In general I use the phone a bit more than that and keep some of the settings cranked up and still end the day (16 hours or so unplugged) with a comfortable buffer.
 
Don't know if this will help anyone figure any of this out but i was playing around this morning, if you put your blur widgets and the power bar widget(builtin) on the same screen they don't toggle right. The blur gps widget does not make the gps but the control widget does turn on the blur one. I also noticed after 3 toggles i took my phone off the charger and it made the phone crash and reboot.
 
Ok, Alex gave me a number for tech support and George told me that the USB12V2A is 2A max output and 2 devices that require 1A each would get that.

He did look it up, but I'm still not 100% confident he was correct, but I'll go with that and order one.
 
Instead of installing Spare Parts, you can just dial *#*#4636#*#*

Click on battery usage. If your "Running" is at 100% then you're experiencing the bug.

If you charge with the phone off, you MAY need to turn on the phone, unplug the charger, turn off the phone, and turn on the phone to get around the bug. Otherwise with phone on just unplug the charger, turn phone off, turn phone on.

By the way, I'm usually over at droidforums, but we've been following this thread of yours. Droid X battery problems discovered!!!!!!! - Droid Forum - Verizon Droid & the Motorola Droid Forum
 
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