Stang70Fastback
Well-Known Member
I'm not trying to make a HUUUGE deal out of this, but I know there are quite a few folks experiencing battery drain issues after the 4.4.2 (KitKat) update. Well, I've finally (I hope) managed to solve it on my end. First, a little history.
I updated my phone when KitKat was released and instantly my battery life went down the drain. Like cut in half at least. I lived with this for a few months, occasionally posting a screenshot here and there showing how Android System was using 3x as much battery as my screen, and that clearly something was running in the background. Finally two months later I attempted a complete reformat, since folks told me that might solve the problem. No dice.
Well since it seems some folks have the problem and others don't, I figured I'd try a new phone. So a week ago I got a brand new (not refurbished) Note 3 from AT&T (thanks friendly tech support!) So now I have two batteries, two rear covers, two S-Pens, and two chargers, since all they needed back was the phone itself! Anyway, I turned it on hoping it might already have Kit-Kat, but it didn't. Updated everything to 4.4 and left it completely stock for a few days, and battery life was perfectly fine again! (And this is using my OLD battery.) So I started installing apps in batches, but I got impatient after I figured maybe it was the phone that had solved it, but NOPE. Battery life went to hell again, so it was clearly an app.
Well lo-and-behold we can suddenly root our phones now, so I was able to use BetterBatteryStats to look at the Partial Wakelocks, which had bam_dmux_wakelock listed at the top, and using two hours of CPU time - many, MANY times more than anything else. Turned out that meant something was holding a data connection open, or constantly pinging my location or something. So I started trying disabling random things based on suggestions on various threads. I tried Google Now... no dice. Tried disabling all tracking in Maps... no dice.
Finally I stumbled across one lone reply stating that they had tried uninstalling the Facebook app and that had solved the problem. Now Facebook was one of the first apps I reinstalled on my phone, and I do remember thinking that the battery life was a bit shorter that day. So I uninstalled the app, along with the Messenger app, and TA-DA! Battery life back to normal! bam_dmux_wakelock is gone, and my phone actually sleeps like 70% of the time now, according to System Monitor, instead of like 30 or 40%!
I guess I never thought to try the Facebook app, merely because SO many people use it and it's SO popular that I assumed I'd have seen it all over the internet if it was a problem, and also that it would have been fixed by now. But nope!
So to any of you still experiencing poor battery life, if you have the Facebook app installed, try uninstalling that and Messenger (I don't know if it's only one of them that causes it yet) and then reboot your phone and see what you end up with. It worked for me, maybe it will work for you!
I updated my phone when KitKat was released and instantly my battery life went down the drain. Like cut in half at least. I lived with this for a few months, occasionally posting a screenshot here and there showing how Android System was using 3x as much battery as my screen, and that clearly something was running in the background. Finally two months later I attempted a complete reformat, since folks told me that might solve the problem. No dice.
Well since it seems some folks have the problem and others don't, I figured I'd try a new phone. So a week ago I got a brand new (not refurbished) Note 3 from AT&T (thanks friendly tech support!) So now I have two batteries, two rear covers, two S-Pens, and two chargers, since all they needed back was the phone itself! Anyway, I turned it on hoping it might already have Kit-Kat, but it didn't. Updated everything to 4.4 and left it completely stock for a few days, and battery life was perfectly fine again! (And this is using my OLD battery.) So I started installing apps in batches, but I got impatient after I figured maybe it was the phone that had solved it, but NOPE. Battery life went to hell again, so it was clearly an app.
Well lo-and-behold we can suddenly root our phones now, so I was able to use BetterBatteryStats to look at the Partial Wakelocks, which had bam_dmux_wakelock listed at the top, and using two hours of CPU time - many, MANY times more than anything else. Turned out that meant something was holding a data connection open, or constantly pinging my location or something. So I started trying disabling random things based on suggestions on various threads. I tried Google Now... no dice. Tried disabling all tracking in Maps... no dice.
Finally I stumbled across one lone reply stating that they had tried uninstalling the Facebook app and that had solved the problem. Now Facebook was one of the first apps I reinstalled on my phone, and I do remember thinking that the battery life was a bit shorter that day. So I uninstalled the app, along with the Messenger app, and TA-DA! Battery life back to normal! bam_dmux_wakelock is gone, and my phone actually sleeps like 70% of the time now, according to System Monitor, instead of like 30 or 40%!
I guess I never thought to try the Facebook app, merely because SO many people use it and it's SO popular that I assumed I'd have seen it all over the internet if it was a problem, and also that it would have been fixed by now. But nope!
So to any of you still experiencing poor battery life, if you have the Facebook app installed, try uninstalling that and Messenger (I don't know if it's only one of them that causes it yet) and then reboot your phone and see what you end up with. It worked for me, maybe it will work for you!
