S3 Battery Drain Thread - 1) False Cell Standby report 2) Standby Drain

[hexo]

Thanks for the research and findings John. I'll definitely give them a go. I've noticed that since moving on from ICS to JB (doesn't matter which ROM, i've tried a few) that whenever wifi is turned on, the battery drain is immense.

When i was on ICS, say i got my phone fully charged at 11pm, and left it till morning (say 6-7am) with wifi on, batt will only go down only 5-7% at most. But after moving to JB, it becomes power hungry for some reason. I can't leave it on for long periods, by morning there'll be only 30% or so left. Somehow turning wifi off but with data on the consumption went back as it was with ICS.

i'm just not too happy with this because our data plans are expensive, so best way to save is by wifi. i don't really want to go back to ICS though i don't really notice much of a difference between the 2.

 

[GrandM4x]

First of all, thanks John for your hard work. You have documented and possibly solved a problem I have been experiencing for a while.

My girlfriend and I have the same phone (S3) and she has a very good idle battery consumption (less than 1%/h) and I have a 6-8%/h drain. We have the same carrier, phone and contract, so that rules out 3G/4G/LTE related issues.

First I notice rebooting the phone a few times a week was necessary. If you don't you end up having all sort of issue (battery drain, signal issue, etc.)

I want to try removing the applications from Samsung but most can't be removed or even stopped (they reboot). How did you do it?

Cheers,

G-

 

[GrandM4x]

Got it:

How to disable built-in system application on Samsung Galaxy S3?

Go to Settings.
Select Application manager.
Select All tab.
Select the application that you want to disable.
Click on Uninstall updates (if have).
Click on Disable.
Confirm it by select OK.
That

 

[tejalakshman]

I opened the battery stats when i saw that the phone is switched off by the time i woke up after putting my galaxy for a full charge. Can you tell me what these services mean ?

com.sec.android.app.launcher - 26%
BroadcomMEMsService - 3%
avast - 26%
accuweather - 13%
android os - 14 %
mediaserver - 8%

i dont know why the avast etc are are running when i put it in aeroplane mode. I there is another way to put mobile into standby please tell me.

I havent got this problem before. I am facing it from 3 days. I even used it for 2 full days with the same settings.

I am sorry i couldnt post screenshots as the androidauthority needs me to be a user rather than new for me to post pics

 

[GrandM4x]

It works.

I see a huge improvement. Cell standby consumption was reduced by a factor of at least 4.

I believe deleting the samsung account may resolve this issue by itself since my GF's S3 never suffered from this issue and she didn't create one.

It seems my S3 still remains awake too much but I now got a much more decent drain in standby (1-2%/h)

I am still at 80% today with 52 minutes of screen viewing. 6 hours of standby. I usually would have been around 50%.

Thanks John for the fix.

Grandmax

 

[jamesino]

How does one go about deleting their Samsung account or verify if they made one in the first place?

 

[GrandM4x]

How does one go about deleting their Samsung account or verify if they made one in the first place?

Well you go into account and sync under settings.

Then you check what you want to sync or remove account.

Cheers,

 

[smallclone]

I'd just like to thank john, as I've been following this thread closely, and I'm impressed at his cool head - I would have lost my rag with the phone ages ago!

I've not had disastrous battery levels - but have disabled the Samsung apps - just in case.

cheers

 

[paperwaste]

John P. Thanks so much for all your hard working fixing this. I recently bought my S3 and have been baffled by how much battery it was consuming throughout the day. I spent a good 30 mins reading through this thread. God only knows how many nights you have spent in anticipation for a fix only to be let down again and again. I have disabled as much Samsung trash as I can and hopefully that fixed my issues, which have been identical to yours all the way.

I think everyone who reads this should email the link to Samsung in an effort that they sort their rubbish apps out and fix this issues properly. Or else I'm going to root my phone and install Cyanogenmod when its released.

 

[JayS3]

Thanks a lot John. I too was experiencing atrocious battery life. Tried everything thing possible even bought an extended battery which seemed to last longer but once I really kept a log of things realised it lastee only a smidge longer. I knew then it was some sort of a software fault.. Just disabled all the Samsung sh*t and im going to run my battery down till my phone turns off so I can have a proper reading if this works for me, Which im sure it will! My usual battery after 10 hours at work + 1 hour travel(taking off charge around 8.30am and getting home at 7.30pm) would be around 40% if mildy used and yesterday after some moderate use was around 20!! I'll report my results back tomorrow

 

[Putty]

Here's mine. I'm rather happy with it.

 

[CaNo_X]

John, I registered on this forum just to thank you for your patience and your research in getting this problem resolved. This was my issue, and I was starting to lose hope as well, just like you. Such a fantastic phone, and such a major issue... But you solved it. Thank you so much John! All your hard work was greatly appreciated. You're the man!

 

[kianev]

John,

your awake ratio is almost 90% of the time during the night. You need to find out which app or what exactly is keeping your phone awake during the night. I have deep sleep ratio of 85% to 90% and for 6 7 hours during the night I lose 2% or 3% battery drain. I use GScam battery app and it shows exactly which app or process how many times awakes the device and for how many seconds. Than you switch off this process/App and the battery life will improve. Your deep sleep ratio should be at least 80%.

 

[Easilyamused]

So does this really work for you guys? I have a Samsung Account and use it on my S3, and have not removed any of the Samsung Apps (I also have the Samsung Store Installed) and none of the Apps has caused me any battery problems.

 

[GrandM4x]

So does this really work for you guys? I have a Samsung Account and use it on my S3, and have not removed any of the Samsung Apps (I also have the Samsung Store Installed) and none of the Apps has caused me any battery problems.

You are lucky. It was really bugging me. The fix did work. My phone was not in deep sleep. It was related to either the Samsung account, some Samsung apps or both.

My phone is now in deep sleep 80% of the time.

Runtime: 10h27
Deep sleep: 7h45
Awake: 2h32
Screen: 34m
Battery: From 100 to 65%.
Some calls, texts and emails on the phone.

 

[DeepDark1984]

Hello John P. I read all the post because I have the same problems with my battery. I have the last firmwire and I've discovered that in Settings/Data usage/ there is a new option called restrict background data. I'm discharging my bat until tonight and fully recharging until the morning. Tomorrow I'll post the results.

 

[DeepDark1984]

"I had a dog and his name was Bingo". It worked for me. 12 hours with 10 minutes of voice calls, one email sent 11% of battery from 100% to 89%). Restrict background data works. Also 2g network, wifi, bluetooth, gps off. I have also stopped as many programs I could, especially samsung and google apps (those I could stop). What I did also was to enable from Advanced settings "Do not keep activities". So that's it. Hope it will help you too.

 

[bobooo]

could be the sim my e1120 drained over 24hrs now it dont

 

[ibilln]

Thanks John P (!)

 

[Alphadan]

Hello all,


I have registered on the forum only to thank John for his really awesome work. I have been experiencing terrible battery life, my phone wouldn't last more than a day of usage, yet I kept seeing people bragging about how they could use their phones for two days on a single charge.

I have followed John's guidelines, and I'll see how the battery performs from now on.

Will keep you posted

 

[Campervan]

I've had battery drain for about 3 weeks now, having had my phone for 3 months. I've tried turning stuff off etc. Nothing helped improve the 10% or or more per hour battery drain. Juice Defender did help. BUT last night I read about turning off Email, Calendar etc auto sync. Then I charged my phone overnight, turned it on at 8am and by 8pm it still had 52% left. So solution for me - manually sync emails etc when I want to (which is how I used to do it on my old Nokia so no big deal).

 

[yogi799]

Wow, such sites are amazing. Here is my timeline of events and final SUCCESS...

Day 1 - purchase S GS3, test it, fully charged, set up gmail and Exchange emails, sync on, wifi on, battery saving off, gps off, screen set to brightest - I was used to enjoying my last phone, not be paranoid about conserving battery hence such options. Phone lasts on standby with some moderate use for nearly 24 hours (coming from iPhone 4 I was impressed).

Day 2 - loading up more apps and setting screen widgets. Installed Skype, Talk-atone, Dropbox, etc (so, some background apps). Turned on bluetooth to sync with my car. Did not pay attention to battery life that day (following my day 1 test and expecting the same, plus I keep my phone plugged during business hours anyway)

Day 3 - loading up more apps. Battery life takes an immediate hit. 2am full charged. Go to sleep, wake up at 8, half of the battery is gone. At noon the batter nearly dead. Less than 12 hours from battery with NO use of the phone at all, mostly standby.

Day 4-10 - testing stuff - turning off wifi, bluetooth, gps - everything shut down. Shutting down Skype, Talk-atone and all background apps. Battery dead from standby alone in 10-12 hours.

Day 11 - logging onto this forum. Trying several suggestions: disabling sync for all but my gmail/google and exchange accounts. Turning off Tilt Scrolling in Chrome (settings - developer tools). Turning ON wifi (suspecting from my research that contrary to my prev. belief LTE sucks up more juice than wifi these days). Phone fully charged at 2am. Wake up and go about my day. At 10.30am the phone has 81% of charge!!! (SUCCESS). So in 8 hours of standby and some minimal use, only 20% discharge. Back to normal, problem fixed (at least for now).

Because I've done a few things at the same time, I cannot tell which one actually fixed it but the suspects are:

- tilt scrolling in Chrome
- disable sync for all but my emails and calendars (which still gets me what I need via push)

I am grateful for this thread. Got me a fix that I needed. Still not sure how though, but will nail it soon I suppose (will start using Chrome again and identify the culprit)

 

[markyboy81]

I can definitely see the sense in disabling sync for emails, but is this pointless if you're using WhatsApp for example, as this will always be polling for data? Or other apps that maintain a connection, like Facebook or the yahoo mail app, which doesn't let you disable sync (AFAIK)

 

[Jabanero]

Phone fully charged at 2am. Wake up and go about my day. At 10.30am the phone has 81% of charge!!! (SUCCESS). So in 8 hours of standby and some minimal use, only 20% discharge. Back to normal, problem fixed (at least for now).

Can you give me an idea of what "minimal use" is by your standards ? 20% for 8 hours standby would be a dream come true and I have disabled all the same things you have.

 

[yogi799]

I can definitely see the sense in disabling sync for emails, but is this pointless if you're using WhatsApp for example, as this will always be polling for data? Or other apps that maintain a connection, like Facebook or the yahoo mail app, which doesn't let you disable sync (AFAIK)

No, I would not disable sync email. After we've fought with Apple and others to finally give us push email, why give up now and forget it? I have disabled dropbox and samsung sync, left all my gmail, exchg mail and whatsup synced up. Push email is a must for me. Now i still get emails but no more drain whatsoever (well, just "regular/acceptable drain")!

Can you give me an idea of what "minimal use" is by your standards ? 20% for 8 hours standby would be a dream come true and I have disabled all the same things you have.

I am now 13 hours since full charge and I have 65% left!!! I am back to normal then, expecting full day, maybe 30 hours of standby with "minimal use". OK, so how would I define "minimal": my guess would be 2-4 minutes of screen time per hour. Fair enough? Moderate use would be 10-12 minutes per hour (that's something I did on day one when I was getting myself familiar with the phone - and which also produced 24 hours of standby!).

Hence, with minimal use 30 hours would not be unexpected. 6 extra hours for much less use (basically, I work in the office so not much need to do anything on the phone).

Hope this helps.

My suggestion - try killing sync altogether for one day. See if it helps. Then remove Chrome and check it out too. One of these things did it for me. I was getting drained in 10 hours with no use... Then, start re-enabling things to find the real cause (re-sync one account at a time!)