Help S4 gets hot+drains battery in 4-5 hours staying AWAKE all the time

[zia2000z]

I am a frustrated user of Samsung galaxy S4 user. During the last few days, my phone is playing weird. First it started getting very hot when I put it on home wifi (which is like always connected, phone does not have to keep on searching and connecting again and again for wifi). Connecting on wifi the phone temperature (through a widget) would reach to 42 degrees C which is usually around 25 degrees C. The battery in these cases would drain within 4-5 hours. I checked it and found that the phone remains

 

[deltaforce]

I am hoping that some experienced user will answer your exact question. Personally, as and when I have had similar problems or any problems for that matter which are not solved by quick googling, I have resorted to factory reset. Majority of the time, whatever is happening is fixed.

That said, I am a new user of S4 (Google Play Edition) and it was my first overnight charge last night. When I picked up the phone in the morning, I felt it noticeably warm (not hot). With room temperature in mid 70s (F), I was kind of alerted by this new phone. I am going to watch how it goes and may be both of us are going through the same pattern.

 

[zia2000z]

So last night I kept trying to disable the apps running in the background by going to setting>app manager>Running>stop, but I still see that all those apps come back again few seconds later. How can I disable the apps which are running in the background and keep my phone "AWAKE"

 

[speedlever]

I suggest get a battery monitor and learn what apps are causing your phone to stay awake. My personal fav is Battery Mix:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=jp.smapho.battery_mix

Being on a Canadian carrier, I don't know what bloatware your phone comes with. Hard to know what you can kill and what you can't. There are lists here which give some general info in that regard.

Here's one such thread:
http://androidforums.com/samsung-galaxy-s4/714277-t-safe-disable-bloatware.html

 

[itsallgood]

Welcome to the Android Forums. before I try to advise you about solving your problem, I need some more info. You mentioned that your phone stays awake, meaning the screen stays on and doesn't time out. If that is the case, what is the screen timeout time set for? Under the battery stats, how long was the screen on for? You mentioned the Android system is consuming most of the battery. In the battery stats, what is the total time its running for? (To see the time in the battery stats, just press whatever your interested in seeing more details about from the listed apps and processes.)

 

[zia2000z]

I am glad that my post got the attention of some senior members. I am hopeful that I'll find a solution now. Awake means working in the background, not the back lit screen thing. Screen goes off within 30 seconds. I was talking about the awake function which you can see in battery status.I am posting here the screen shots of battery status when my phone is running on mobile data and wifi is turned off.

You can see that graph is quite smooth and not that steep. As all the time the phone had been on mobile data. It was not awake most of the time. Thats good and thats the reason why it gave me a better life. Later today or tomorrow I shall post the pics with wifi on and you will see the difference.

Also I noticed that when I look at the apps running in the background when in "upset condition" (on wifi) , the running apps keep coming coming in and going out of that page very frequently which shows that as soon as I put my phone on wifi, apps start running on their own.

Another observation is that when on wifi, my app store does not update the apps. I can browse the net and use the internet on wifi but for some reason my app store can't update the apps. It keeps on saying downloading the updating, installing but it keeps on doing that for hours and nothing gets updated.

Please help

 

[itsallgood]

6655347[/URL]]I am glad that my post got the attention of some senior members. I am hopeful that I'll find a solution now. Awake means working in the background, not the back lit screen thing. Screen goes off within 30 seconds. I was talking about the awake function which you can see in battery status.I am posting here the screen shots of battery status when my phone is running on mobile data and wifi is turned off.

You can see that graph is quite smooth and not that steep. As all the time the phone had been on mobile data. It was not awake most of the time. Thats good and thats the reason why it gave me a better life. Later today or tomorrow I shall post the pics with wifi on and you will see the difference.

Also I noticed that when I look at the apps running in the background when in "upset condition" (on wifi) , the running apps keep coming coming in and going out of that page very frequently which shows that as soon as I put my phone on wifi, apps start running on their own.

Another observation is that when on wifi, my app store does not update the apps. I can browse the net and use the internet on wifi but for some reason my app store can't update the apps. It keeps on saying downloading the updating, installing but it keeps on doing that for hours and nothing gets updated.

Please help

Honestly, I don't see anything wrong with your battery drain. Actually, its pretty good. Tap the screen and android system to see how long they are running. As to the apps trying to update while on wifi, that might be a setting thing. (Check how apps are updated from within the Play store settings.) Also, some apps might have a setting, within them, to down load data when on wifi only. (You might want to check the settings on those apps.)

 

[oldmick]

I'm not an S5 owner, or a techy, but for the last year I have been a power user of a note 2 (my first smart phone), if there's one conclusion I have come to, it is that many little quirks of these mobile phone's are in the settings,
A few months ago I found some interesting little quirks pop up on my note after the major software update, it took a while for the penny to drop but some time later I decided to go through the phone settings, which I did over and over which yielded good results.
So I'm not any help to you but that is where I would start.
I did find through looking over and over again some settings I had missed the first couple of times around.
Also if there's an app user manual or an on line one , there may be some valuable info to be had there for your problem.
Best of luck.

 

[ewarren29]

I use better battery stats to get more specific details. However some options require root access . But it still could help . Have you tried doing a battery pull to see if that stops a rogue app ? I sometimes will try that before a full restore. https://play.google.com/store/.../details?id...betterbatterystats.

 

[oldmick]

I am glad that my post got the attention of some senior members. I am hopeful that I'll find a solution now. Awake means working in the background, not the back lit screen thing. Screen goes off within 30 seconds. I was talking about the awake function which you can see in battery status.I am posting here the screen shots of battery status when my phone is running on mobile data and wifi is turned off.

You can see that graph is quite smooth and not that steep. As all the time the phone had been on mobile data. It was not awake most of the time. Thats good and thats the reason why it gave me a better life. Later today or tomorrow I shall post the pics with wifi on and you will see the difference.

Also I noticed that when I look at the apps running in the background when in "upset condition" (on wifi) , the running apps keep coming coming in and going out of that page very frequently which shows that as soon as I put my phone on wifi, apps start running on their own.

Another observation is that when on wifi, my app store does not update the apps. I can browse the net and use the internet on wifi but for some reason my app store can't update the apps. It keeps on saying downloading the updating, installing but it keeps on doing that for hours and nothing gets updated.

Please help

I have go task manager on my note 2, I find that is pretty handy , I paid a few buks if a recall to get full functionality , i use it on occasion to see how much memory I'm using, it also has sort of a tune up feature, it may be worth a look.
The other some things I have learned with my note, I don't always need the screen on full full brightness, most of the time indoors I run it at about half brightness and that's plenty, also making sure things like gps are turned off, also looking at your app s and update settings is a good thing,
For example I have some factory apps/bloatware that I don't use, never will, so I make sure auto update is not turned on for those apps, as i mentioned in my earlier post I believe a lot of problems that people have with smart phones are in the settings, and it does take a while to get the hang of it, i would say keep at it, you will find the happy medium with the settings.
Goodluck.

 

[zia2000z]

Finaly I got it fixed. Just deleted about 20 apps which I never used and will never use. Surprisingly my battery is more than a day now. This was never this good, even when it was brand new. I am happy. Its running good so far for the last few days both on mobile data and wifi and battery is perfect

Thanks a lot group

 

[AdgeTimick]

I am having a similar problem with my Samsung Galaxy S4 after having it run just fine for over a year, and I have no idea what's causing this battery drain/overheating. My battery stats used to have "Screen" at the top as the biggest drainer, followed by Android OS, Android System, Facebook, and whatever else I used a lot since my last reset. Now, however, the top three drainers are Android System, Android OS, and Amazon App Store, and the phone shows as being "Awake" all the time. I uninstalled the Amazon App Store and a ton of other apps I hadn't been using much, but my phone is still running really hot and draining the battery quickly. Today it got up to 112 degrees Fahrenheit, which is the highest it has gotten. It is also resetting randomly (probably due to the heat).

I am very compulsive about closing apps, so I don't usually have a lot running at once. I rarely have Bluetooth, GPS, or WiFi on unless I'm using them, which is not often at all for GPS (maybe for at most, 30 minutes when I am running or 5 minutes when I am searching for a map). WiFi might be on for a few hours at a time, but that has never caused a problem before. Bluetooth is never on longer than 20 minutes at a time. I keep my screen brightness at half of the full amount or less. I use the stock battery monitor app and the Battery Doctor app to keep an eye on which apps are using the most battery, and it has definitely changed.

Here are just a few of the many changes I have tried with no success in getting the fast battery drain/excessive overheating to abate:

- replaced the battery
- updated the Android software via AT&T
- formatted microSD card and then re-added my files, just in case media search server was constantly running (per another site's suggestion)
- my phone is not rooted, but I installed Wakelock Detector and did the workaround to use the app and see what was keeping my phone awake. There were a lot of apps that I used only occasionally, so I uninstalled them, but the problems continue, and now I can't get Wakelock Detector to work correctly again.
- turned off gestures, voice activation, some accounts that were syncing (like Google and Samsung)

I have attached my recent battery details and battery history details as png files, as well as an old png of battery details. Please let me know what additional info you need from me to help me remedy this situation. Thanks.

 

[amcrann]

I am having similar problems since the last firmware upgrade. My battery has always been excellent, but now drains in about five hours. It also gets extremely hot, as others have mentioned. I've removed the battery several times but the problem continues. What's really strange is that the battery screen (under settings) no longer shows all of the apps that are running. It only shows Android OS (75%), Screen (13%), Android System (4%) and Google Services (3%). Other apps that I know are running do not appear here anymore. And most alarming is that the OS now consumes 75% of my battery compared to around 20% or less before the firmware upgrade. I can't seem to find a way to get more details on what, exactly, is running under the heading "Android OS".

Any ideas on how to resolve this would be great!!

 

[oldmick]

Regarding firmware/ updates, i had one early this year,and while for the most part it went without a hitch , but i did find some things no longer functioned as they did before,
because some of the phones settings had been reset back to default as a matter of course,
i might add i did experiment a tad using some of the default simple mode software that i had not done when the phone was new, this caused a couple of things to longer work as expected.

in my earlier post i mentioned having a good look at settings and that is still my 1st priority when problems occur.

if i can just impart a bit of wisdom i picked up as a mechanic many years ago, and something i have learned with experience over the years, often when problems occur on mechanical things or devices, i think it is it often something we have done or altered, or something we have added ,
you see this when young blokes modify cars and it on occasions has unexpected results (sometimes causes problems).
my thought process is to look back at when the device was running good and think about to what has happened to the device since that time, ie , have i added anything? have i changed any settings ?
it took me going over the settings on the phone a number of times , it payed off in the end.
if the device is running hot, it sounds like something is in back ground running, something cpu intensive, perhaps disable the apps you can disable one by one until something shows up in regard to battery consumption.
Good luck.

 

[astribling]

Hi, I just wanted to add that I'm having the exact same issue. I had an ATT firmware update yesterday, and since then my battery has been terrible. I hardly used it today and it went down to 10% in 6 hours. Horrible! I'm not noticing a heat issue, but the battery usage stats also show Android OS at the top at 58%, Then screen at 19%, android system, google services, and a few others. But my battery has never drained this fast since I have had it.

 

[AdgeTimick]

I am having similar problems since the last firmware upgrade....I can't seem to find a way to get more details on what, exactly, is running under the heading "Android OS".

Any ideas on how to resolve this would be great!!

@ amcrann, I just downloaded GSam Battery Monitor yesterday, and below (as PNG files) are my stats for a recent usage period of 2 hr and 4 min of my phone. It lets you know what processes are included in Kernel (Android OS) and Android System, among others.

I'm close to just doing a factory reset of my phone, because it is basically unusable at this point. Gets way too hot and the battery doesn't last at all. I don't want the battery exploding in my pocket or, more likely and less dramatic, frying my phone's processor and forcing me to go buy a brand new phone at full price.

@ oldmick, I agree with your philosophy, but I'm not a rooter or someone who tinkers with things much. I install apps and uninstall them. Rarely change any important settings from what they've been sat at for the last year. Recently, I've gone through the settings and done a lot of fussing with them, uninstalled a bunch of apps, disabled and re-enabled certain apps, all in an attempt to find the culprit, but nothing is solving the overheating problem. I have a 5200 mAh extended battery that for over a year used to last me two days at most (with not much usage), one day at least (with high usage), and now it doesn't even last 6 hours. I put the factory OEM battery back in and the battery itself is definitely not the problem, because I find that it overheats no matter which battery is in. The factory battery lasts about 2 hours at most now.

Has anyone here contacted Samsung or AT&T about this problem or a similar one recently?

 

[johnny_w]

Poking around and I found this. Perhaps this could help?
Solution to Google Services and Android Syst… | Google Nexus 4 | XDA Forums

 

[garumph]

I was having the same problem. I was getting 2 to 3 hours of battery time. I had just swapped back to my S4 so lots had changed. I traced it to "Temple Run 2". It was using 8% of the battery even after I forced quit and did a reboot. It was doing something in the background that was killing my battery. I uninstalled it and now I'm back to normal. Actually much better since I went through and turned off a bunch of other crap that I wasn't using.

 

[AdgeTimick]

Poking around and I found this. Perhaps this could help?
Solution to Google Services and Android Syst… | Google Nexus 4 | XDA Forums

I've read so many pages with advice and taken a lot of the advice I've seen in here, but while my battery seems to be overheating less since I uninstalled Flash Player Plug-In, it's still dying after about 5-6 hours of light usage. As I've said before, it's an extended battery that should be lasting 24-30 hours with heavy usage. My phone is constantly awake, and I am just about to do a hard reset and sell the damn thing so I can buy a new phone. What's incredibly frustrating is how great a phone it was for a little over a year.

 

[speedlever]

I suspect if you do a hard reset you will find your issue resolved. Until you install whatever app is keeping it awake, that is.

I finally did a FDR on my phone about a week ago. That fixed several little issues that I've lived with since the last update. Of course it wasn't much fun installing and tweaking everything all over again, but I think I've pretty much got my phone running with the apps and tweaks that I want... or at least that I can remember.

 

[AdgeTimick]

Just found another symptom: crazy amounts of background data being eaten up. I recently marked "only update apps over Wi-Fi", so maybe that's the culprit? I've never had that option enabled before, and now all of the sudden Android System is draining my battery and I'm up over 5 GB of data in just 10 days. Usually I never use more than 3 GB in an entire month.

 

[hecooo]

i have same issue with mine s4 GT9506 , it's get awake , its 3 months old phone , first 2 months was battery like 3 days with mobile internet on and normal usage , 2-3 calls , viber calls and little facebook , now battery is not even 2 days and phone gets awake like 20 h , sometimes it's not awake but usually it is , like 80% of time , i have 4 app on phone , on side default ones , most of defaults are turnet off .
In night time , when it is 11 pm and 100% batter , in morning it was 98 or 97 , now it is 88 or 85 , 15% in night is a lot for phone that was spending 2 or 3% and doesn't have a lot app ,even more , i am not using wireless a lot , just few hours in few days , mobile internet is on when i need internet but i keep that off most of time when phone is not used by me . really wonder what it is , i tihnk google.location service , but one company like google wouldn't let that bug i think , it's suxxs to have new phone and big issue .

 

[hecooo]

i found out what is problem , email . Stock app for email , i deleted account from phone and now it works fine , 2 days it's good so i think it's email .

 

[hecooo]

Here it is

 

[AdgeTimick]

The overheating has abated, but I'm still getting crap battery life on a brand new extended battery.

OTHER ISSUES:

Now I'm randomly getting "no SIM card detected" messages and being forced to reboot my phone. That's fun.

Also, I don't know if turning off any of these stock apps would cause the problems I've been having, but I am just going to add a screenshot to show which apps I have turned off.

Right now, I have my phone booted into Safe Mode, and it seems to be eating battery just as quickly as before. Thrilling.