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Help Huge battery drain since latest update

UKCatFan

Android Expert
Dec 15, 2010
793
122
I got the incremental update a few days ago and now my battery is sucking dry insanely fast. I am talking about 1% every 2 minutes! GSAM is saying it is the screen, but I lowered the brightness to the absolute minimum and nothing changed. I just lost 2% writing this post!!!! Any ideas on what is wrong? I am not rooted and completely stock BTW.
 
I don't know if this is helpful in diagnosis, but the bottom left is getting really hot during use. Is the WiFi radio there by any chance? I put it in airplane mode overnight to see what would happen. It was using about 1% an hour, which is a little higher than normal for mine. Now using it again it has gone through 6% over 15 minutes.
 
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Well, the factory reset did nothing to help. Looks like I am going to have to try a custom ROM. Any favorites that are on 4.4.3? I seriously think 4.4.4 caused this. If not, then it was a remarkable coincidence in timing. I hope we get L on this, but I am not holding my breath.
 
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I don't know if anyone is reading this, but I will continue updating my experience in case anyone else is having similar problems. I have now switched to the Franco kernel and that didn't help. I am literally out of ideas other than switching ROMs. I am not opposed to doing that, I just wanted to figure this problem out!
 
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Have you tried going to your battery and seeing what is high on your list?

Just a suggestion so that you and we can see what is causing this battery drain. :)

It is the screen using the vast majority of the power. Here is the strange part, I have it set to 0%! Something is just not right.

I need to clear one other thing up. At the same time I was going through a phone change so I had forgotten something. The update that seems to have messed me up was not the one that got me to 4.4.4, it was the small one that came a few days after that, which is supposed to be a fix to some problems others were having with the original 4.4.4 update. The small update didn’t change any version numbers.

I have been too busy to try, but I think I am going to load a custom ROM either tonight or tomorrow. I had never seen a need for rooting it until after this problem happened, so I don't have a nandroid backup from before it.
 
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Alright, I tried Validus and Dirty Unicorns. Both still had the battery drain problem. I am now going to try the 4.4.3 factory image. It could be that I am having a hardware failure that happened by coincidence at the same time. I might give the one you list above if I have no success with 4.4.3.
 
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I'm glad you recognise that this kind of coincidence is not uncommon and can lead you to all the wrong conclusions. If more than one ROM give identical symptoms on your N7 - symptoms that I and others don't see with any ROM - then I would strongly suspect a hardware fault as the most likely suspect.


They are all at 4.4.4 so far, so I am holding onto some hope... I have seen the 2013 version, not refurbished, for around $160 lately. That could work if I see that deal again.
 
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They are all at 4.4.4 so far, so I am holding onto some hope... I have seen the 2013 version, not refurbished, for around $160 lately. That could work if I see that deal again.

I mean honestly this is persistent after the factory reset?

If so than that would indicate some sort of hardware issue. Especially if you have pushed over the firmware from stock.
 
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I mean honestly this is persistent after the factory reset?

If so than that would indicate some sort of hardware issue. Especially if you have pushed over the firmware from stock.


I have not pushed the stock firmware yet. I will not get a chance to try until next weekend. The coincidence has me hopeful. I literally updated before bed one night and the next day I noticed the problem. I have not heard of an update causing hardware failure, but it is always possible.
 
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Well, my hand was played for me (sort of). 1Sale.com has the 16GB 2013 model (sure refurbished) for only $129 this morning so I ordered it. I am not normally a buyer of refurbished electronics, but that is a pretty good deal. If it lasts me over six months, then I figure I am ahead.

I would still not just give up on your 2012 N7, I think I would try to push over the stock firmware at some point next weekend, like you said, since you didn't have time to do so yet.
 
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I would still not just give up on your 2012 N7, I think I would try to push over the stock firmware at some point next weekend, like you said, since you didn't have time to do so yet.


I'm not. I am going to try to get it working right and use it at work. We have WiFi that we are allowed to use on off times like lunch. The battery still lasts a few hours, so it would work for that even if I don't fix it.
 
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I have also noticed that the battery life of my tablet has depleted seriously since the update. I'm not sure what is doing it as I'm not using apps or anything that I wouldn't usually use. My screen brightness stays right down on low seeing as I'm always using it indoors.

I have wondered whether the problem could be with my charger though. I lost my OEM charger a few weeks ago and I have been charging overnight with a samsung phone charger. Obviously, since I have been charging overnight, I cannot say what the rate of charge is or comment on how long it takes to charge. All I can say is that the tablet likes to run out of juice very quickly.
 
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