Help services starting on their own, eating battery!

[ajaynatu83]

hi,
last 2 weeks I have observed that my battery doesnt get charged evrn after connecting it for 6hrs, charges by max of 10-15% !!! :-(
The phone heats up after 10 mins of operation and battety drops 50% within that 10mins :-(

-services like google play store , Google Maps and Gmail update on their own when I have deselected auto updates off

-if I disable FM radio and Google Maps they continues to run in the background.

-also some 'DSMLawmo' service is active in the background, if I manually kill it then around 30-40MB of RAM space gets free.

once I uninstall the updates and kill the processes only then the phone comes back to normal temperature, however after sometimes these services start again and phone goes slow and hot :-(

i really need some help here as its causing immense problems. using standard wall charger provided by samsung and taking care of the handset. These software glitches are making me loose interest in android :-(

pls help !!!

 

[PiscesCloud]

hi,
last 2 weeks I have observed that my battery doesnt get charged evrn after connecting it for 6hrs, charges by max of 10-15% !!! :-(
The phone heats up after 10 mins of operation and battety drops 50% within that 10mins :-(

-services like google play store , Google Maps and Gmail update on their own when I have deselected auto updates off

-if I disable FM radio and Google Maps they continues to run in the background.

-also some 'DSMLawmo' service is active in the background, if I manually kill it then around 30-40MB of RAM space gets free.

once I uninstall the updates and kill the processes only then the phone comes back to normal temperature, however after sometimes these services start again and phone goes slow and hot :-(

i really need some help here as its causing immense problems. using standard wall charger provided by samsung and taking care of the handset. These software glitches are making me loose interest in android :-(

pls help !!!

Hi again ajaynatu83

I see from your previous posts that you have had battery problems a while back but since this episode seems recent, I guess its due to a rogue app that you have installed. I use GSam Battery Monitor and it shows by what percentage each app is discharging the battery. To establish a datum I suggest you switch off the handset, charge to 100% and restart the device. Do this before going to bed and check it out in the morning.

When I did this (after upgrading my SGN2 to 4.1.2), I was quite surprised what was going on in the background and had a field day of disabling bloatware and uninstalling the apps I did not really need.

Incidentally, I can not disable either of Maps or FM radio on my SGN2 so I suppose we are both (as you mention) stuck with them unless we root (with all the costs / benefits that entails). If I recall correctly 'DSMLawmo' service has been mentioned in an earlier thread if you care to look it up.

As a long shot, have you tried switching off and then removing the battery for a few minutes?

Cheers

David

 

[tdodd]

Another thing to try is, once charged (or any time you remove the phone from the charger), make sure the phone is awake and unlocked before you remove the charger cable. If you do not there is/was a bug in some ROMs which can prevent the phone fully sleeping, or at least there was in the past.

 

[PiscesCloud]

Another thing to try is, once charged (or any time you remove the phone from the charger), make sure the phone is awake and unlocked before you remove the charger cable. If you do not there is/was a bug in some ROMs which can prevent the phone fully sleeping, or at least there was in the past.

To build a little on this reply and on my previous response, I suggest you run CPU Spy when you check out GSam in the morning. You'll need to scroll CPU Spy to the bottom of the list to compare the time in 'Deep Sleep' with 'Total State Time'. If I recall correctly, on my phone, there is typically about an 1 hour difference in a total of about 9 hours.

 

[ajaynatu83]

hi,
Thank you every one for the response

-Have tried taking off the battery number of times but the problem keeps persisting... also tried factory reset,it works for just 3-4hrs and then it crops up again
-Tried a friends battery again and got same result, so Iam pretty sure its some software glitch...

- I have checked up with CPU spy and it remains in the 200 state for 6 7hrs when i have touched the phone.
- will try out GSam. and post what results I get
-will surely try the method of having the phone awake and unlocked when taking off the charger

FINGERS CROSSED ...
hope to find some solution ASAP.. .. !

 

[tdodd]

The phone will stick at 200MHz whilst charging (unless some activity sends it higher). It won't sleep until you take it off charge.

If it is still sticking at 200MHz once taken off charge then that is almost certainly the charging bug I mentioned in post #3. It seems the bug might still exist on the latest official German Jellybean ROM - certainly I've seen evidence of it once with my phone very recently when I failed to follow my own advice to wake/unlock the phone before removing the charger. I did kind of assume the bug was fixed, but perhaps not.

 

[PiscesCloud]

The phone will stick at 200MHz whilst charging (unless some activity sends it higher). It won't sleep until you take it off charge.

If it is still sticking at 200MHz once taken off charge then that is almost certainly the charging bug I mentioned in post #3. It seems the bug might still exist on the latest official German Jellybean ROM - certainly I've seen evidence of it once with my phone very recently when I failed to follow my own advice to wake/unlock the phone before removing the charger. I did kind of assume the bug was fixed, but perhaps not.

Thank you for this TDodd; this bug might well be the reason for some of the battery problems I have read about elsewhere. If a phone is affected by this bug, how can it be recovered?

 

[tdodd]

I know of no solution except waking and unlocking the phone before removing the charger - and you need to do that every time, not just once. To be honest it has become second nature for me to do that as a matter of routine. If you experience the bug you may well find the phone getting hot a few minutes after taking it off charge.

 

[ajaynatu83]

the phone remained at 200 when it was unplugged.....
and i cant recollect if i unlocked the phone before i unplugged it...
i will follow the instruction and see if any change...

but-
- is this a common problem throughout androids?
- is this the problem only on samsung phones?
- i do not want to root my phone, how can i still stop the background processes? checked the phone and now even DMSLawmo thing is up and it is running the software update, bookmark and few more services.... as far as i remember it was not there when the phone was brand new...

is loading ICS all over again the solution to all this? coz hard reset has not worked.....

 

[tdodd]

I don't know if this is a general Samsung problem, an Android problem or just a few phones. I think for the Note the problem has always existed since the original Gingerbread ROM - I've had my Note for 16 months, so it is one of the earliest ones sold. Maybe there are custom ROMs which avoid the bug, but I don't have any reliable data on any of those things.

I think it's pretty safe to say that reloading the ROM is not the answer. At least it will not solve the bug, if that is the cause of your problems.

As for running processes, these are not necessarily a problem. Stuff does have to run in the background or your phone wouldn't be smart and wouldn't work at all. The question is, are these processes using up too much power in the background, either by consuming CPU cycles or keeping the phone awake or using data. It really is unlikely to matter if they are loaded into memory, but sitting there quietly doing nothing. It's the greedy resource hogs you need to focus on. For those answers you will need to dig deeper, using tools like System Panel Lite and BetterBatteryStats, or any others you fancy.

My guess is that your biggest single problem is the charging bug. There may be others, but until you clear that one out of the way you may not easily be able to tell what is next.

 

[ajaynatu83]

each single time i charge d phone to 100%... unplug it and start my stop watch..with 4and half mins the battery drops to 65%!!!
shocking! ...as u hv said it is 'some bug' thats causing it to burn the juice :-(

 

[tdodd]

How old is your phone? Maybe your battery is FUBAR.

It's 8:50 hours since I took my phone off charge and with WiFi, Bluetooth and Mobile data disabled (and some apps frozen) it is still showing 100%. This is the original, 16 month old battery.

EDIT : I turned WiFi on just prior to taking the screen print because I wanted to upload the screen print from the phone to my laptop in order to post here. It had been off for the previous 8:50 hours, because I've been at my laptop and had no need for the phone to be doing any data related activities like getting email, surfing etc..

Having enabled WiFi, downloaded a couple of queued apps, taken the screen prints and uploaded the files the battery did drop a couple of %, so it was barely clinging on to 100% when I took the screen prints, but there is no way the battery should be collapsing at the rate your does unless it is well and truly f....d.

 

[ajaynatu83]

bought the phone in october last yr....
do u think its the handset problem?

 

[tdodd]

Before going on I need to point out that I am not some technical wizard with all this, just a normal user with enough time and savvy to get a basic clue about these things and to read up on XDA-Developers to learn more about my device.

So in answer to your question I honestly have no idea. You have not provided any diagnostic information from BetterBatteryStats or System Panel Lite and I'm not ideally skilled to interpret the output from BBS in any case. It could be a rogue program, a glitch in the ROM itself, phone hardware, the battery - some people have reported battery failures as early as six months, even though mine is going strong after sixteen. Do you use only official chargers or do you use any dodgy cheapo chargers that could wreck the battery with unstable charging currents. for example?

If it was my phone behaving like this I would certainly look to performing a factory reset to clean out any cobwebs and making sure that nothing I had installed was screwing things. However, if you are on a stock ICS ROM you need to be aware of the "Brick Bug", which can kill your phone. There is (was) plenty of chat on the subject over at XDA-Developers when it was first discovered. Solutions are to downgrade to Gingerbread before wiping and then upgrade back to ICS, or flash a safe kernel before wiping.

I would also be looking for signs of a mis-shapen battery - a clue that it has become f....d. - and get a replacement from eBay. Even if it appears normal that is not proof that it is fine, but if it looks abnormal that's a pretty strong indicator that it's time for a new one.

Beyond that it might be faulty hardware, in which case your warranty (I assume you have one) really should cover any repair.

I'm afraid I'm out of other ideas, so I wish you luck with your pursuit of the problem. It really is a great device, when it's working, and I expect mine to continue serving me well for a few more years yet. I may need to buy a new battery somewhere down the line though, ;-)

 

[PiscesCloud]

the phone remained at 200 when it was unplugged.....
and i cant recollect if i unlocked the phone before i unplugged it...
...........................................

is loading ICS all over again the solution to all this? coz hard reset has not worked.....

Since you have already done a Factory Reset and are already having to restore the apps etc, there is no harm in trying a (hopefully) more thorough reset as detailed by NeoGrandizer on the SGN2 forum (Reply #6) at

4.1.2 updated battery drain

Admittedly, doing this further reset is a long shot but since you have already eliminated the battery by trying your friend's, it seems to me that the only other alternative is to return the phone to the shop under warranty.

 

[PiscesCloud]

Hi

I have searched the net on “DSMlawmo”. There were plenty of questions from people who consider it a problem but I found very little concrete information regarding it and certainly no proven solutions .

For what it is worth, my conclusion is that it seems to be something to do with the Samsung Dive service. I suggest that you logon to Find my mobile | Samsung Content & Services on a PC and ensure that all Dive functions such as Tracking and Call / Message forwarding are disabled. I have not tried doing so but it might be worthwhile removing your phone number or giving it a false one.

I hope there is something that you can do with this lead and would be very interested to hear how you get on.

Search results :

Possibly the most authoritative lead was at

http://www.contextis.com/files/tabletsintheenterprise.pdf and I quote from page 25:-

“The vulnerability could be exploited by creating an arbitrary application that could
send broadcast intents such as those listed below:
• android.intent.action.dsm.DM_FACTORY_RESET
• android.intent.action.dsm.DM_FORWARDING
• android.intent.action.dsm.DM_LOCK_RELEASE
• android.intent.action.DM_LOCK_MY_PHONE
These intents were received and acted upon by the Samsung DSMLawmo
application, which is responsible for implementing the remote control functions
available via the Samsung Dive service.
It should be noted that it is not required for a victim user to have previously signed
up for the Samsung Dive service for their device to be vulnerable. Context has
notified Samsung of this issue, and the problems have since been reported as
having been fixed by Samsung through over-the-air firmware updates.”
------------------

At http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1863011 there is a post:-

“DSM states for "Dedicated Security Management " Which allows this app to get a full control over the phone using voice channel only... Dsmlawmo is to get full control over the phone, track it, reset and stuff like that. It's probably to control and repair the phone remotely when calling tmo cs.

u can freeze it using TB(Titanium backup)”

 

[ajaynatu83]

ya, had gone through same links...cant do much about DSM

have read that charging phone for 8-10hrs,not more than 10, gets the battey back in shape. tried it last night and battery didnt charge above 78%...!

did go to the service center some time back. discussed the problem. as per them there is no battery or device hardware problem.

the battery heating problem seems like a software bug causing it. so i will try to load ICS all over again today. fingers crossed.

 

[tdodd]

DSMLawmo always starts on my phone, but it consumes 0 CPU and just sits there as a cached process doing nothing. The same is true of many processes. They are preloaded in anticipation of being required, in order to speed launch times when needed, and should be doing no harm just sitting there quietly. This screen print shows DSMLawmo still at 0 CPU seconds a little over three hours since booting the phone.

 

[ajaynatu83]

hi,

sorry for the late reply, have been away for work.. just dumped the Gnote at home and took my bb...

well, i uninstalled every single app, did a factory reset, charged it for 10 hrs today since morning and battery has gone to just 27%
also now its started to get BURNING HOT !!!!!!!!

-how do i find if any rogue app or wake-lock is draining the battery?
-once i know which wake-lock is causing battery drain how do i stop it????
-my google play automatically gets update even when i have disabled auto updates
-how do i stop software update? even if i force stop it after few mins it enables on its own.

last but not the least- if i have to load ICS 4.0.4 all over again, what is the procedure?

thank u, looking forward for suggestions

 

[tdodd]

If it's burning hot it almost certainly means that the CPU is being driven at full speed, so what is running and gobbling up huge amounts of CPU? You can use System Panel Lite to get a CPU usage figure for all apps and services that are loaded into RAM.

You may have wakelock problems as well, for which you can use Wakelock Detector to help track the problem down.

There is a wealth of information on Wakelocks here - http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1827676 - written before the above app was launched. It could still prove very useful.

My best guess is still that you are suffering the "charging bug".

As for returning to ICS, you need to download a suitable ICS ROM and flash it using Odin. Instructions and files here - http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1424997

 

[ajaynatu83]

thanx ...
will check it up today and post the results again...

 

[ajaynatu83]

Hello Guys,

Sorry for the delay in posting back. Been away for work.cguru:

Back to business- well, 3 days back went to the service station and upgraded to JellyBean :rock:

And must say , i am impressed with the battery backup i am getting now... same moderate usage as before, been 16hrs and my battery still showing 47% ...while before i used to get max of 4-5hrs to 0% with no usage...!!!!!!
I have a live wallpaper running all through the time and phone not heating up either as before :thumb::dancing2:

Dont know how JB has helped, but for me its been a boon.... :thumbup::rock:


Have read in few threads that JB is eating battery and not working correctly...
From my personal experience i wud suggest pls pls pls do not update over Kies. Its the worst ever thing in your Note:shot:. If you read all the posts , ppl having problems have updated through Kies...

Will post more battery usage data soon.

Thank you

 

[PiscesCloud]

Hello Guys,
......................
And must say , i am impressed with the battery backup i am getting now... same moderate usage as before, been 16hrs and my battery still showing 47% ...while before i used to get max of 4-5hrs to 0% with no usage...!!!!!!

......................

Dont know how JB has helped, but for me its been a boon.... :thumbup::rock:

ajaynatu

I am delighted to hear that your problem has been sorted at long last; you can now relax and just enjoy this great phone.

 

[ajaynatu83]

i am truely enjoying the phone now ...

Going through many threads around here and other sites saying JB isnt the best upgrade... !!! If anything i would again suggest pls pls pls dont use Kies for upgrade. Almost all who have reported phone working bad after upgrade have done it through Kies. Even the authorized service station guys have told me Kies isnt the best software.

Still its individuals choice .......

I am having a blast the Note now ...