SOLVED: ICS Upgrade - Factory Reset Does Not Fix Battery Drain

[nim6us]

EDIT: Please see my other thread for solutions to this problem.

I never thought I'd be that guy saying don't upgrade to ICS, because the OS is so slick and fun. However the glitch with the battery drain nullifies it's value. My brand new phone, less than two months old will die before the end of the day without me making a single phone call. I'm talking maybe an 1 to 1.5 hours of use texting, checking mail, surfing, and my battery now runs dead before I even get home from work. If you go into Settings > Battery it will show you the break down of what's using what. At the top should be your display, it takes a lot of power for to run the ultra bright display and this is what I saw before the ICS update. After the update these are the numbers:

• Android OS: 58%
• Screen: 18%
• Cell Standby: 10%
• Phone Idle: 7%
• Android System: 2%

The OS is taking 58% of the battery?!? This is crazy!The buzz going around the net is if you do a factory reset it will fix the issue, well it does, but only for a very short time.

I went through the pain and formatted my SD card, then did a factory reset on my phone lost everything, well I backed it up, but still was a long process. After all that I loaded up my apps, and everything looked great. If you I went into the battery break down Screen was back at the top and the Android OS was several rungs below. I was SO happy! It was worth it after all.... THEN

Imagine my chagrin I woke up this morning to a full charge. Didn't make one phone call, just checked a couple emails, and being only a HOUR into my day my battery is at 76%!! I look back at the battery break down, and there's Android OS sitting at the top, draining double the battery juice as the screen display. I mean this almost makes ICS useless, what good is this great cell phone if you have to be tethered to a power cord. WTF!! Point being, don't bother resetting your phone, it DOES NOT permanently help. If you haven't upgraded to ICS don't, we're all just screwed until they come out with a fix, and you see how long it took them just to get ICS.

I don't know what happened between last night and today, but my hope is some dev person will read this and it will help them pinpoint the issue.

 

[Rockdog97]

Re: DO NOT UPGRADE TO ICS: Factory Reset Does Not Fix Battery Dra

I feel your pain. I think I'm going to head back down to GB and be rid of this crappy ICS build.

And yes, I've done a factory reset...

Time to root the phone and load GB back !!!

 

[mythstery]

Re: DO NOT UPGRADE TO ICS: Factory Reset Does Not Fix Battery Dra

I took my phone to sprint yesterday and they did a reset that we cant do ourselves. They have to put some code in to do it on the phone...

I have a 3800mah bat and it usually lasts me 16 hours untill it his powersave mode.

Yesterday before i went to sprint after 5 hours off the charger i was at 50% phone was at 10% by the time i left to home..

today after sprint phone has been off the charger for 4.5 hours so far and still at 90%

 

[Tsukiyomi]

Re: DO NOT UPGRADE TO ICS: Factory Reset Does Not Fix Battery Dra

Battery drain is one thing. Android OS percentage is another thing entirely. The percentages that you see in the Battery Use breakdown are just a percentage based on overall use. For example:

If you've got a battery that usually lasts 5 hours then 'Android OS - 58%' means the OS is accountable for 58% of the battery use.

If you've got a battery that usually lasts 20 hours then 'Android OS - 58%' means the OS is STILL accountable for 58% of the battery use.

It doesn't matter how long your battery lasts, those percentages relate to how much something is using your battery compared to how much everything else is using it.

 

[packhntr]

Re: DO NOT UPGRADE TO ICS: Factory Reset Does Not Fix Battery Dra

Battery drain is one thing. Android OS percentage is another thing entirely. The percentages that you see in the Battery Use breakdown are just a percentage based on overally use. For example:

If you've got a battery that usually lasts 5 hours then 'Android OS - 58%' means the OS is accountable for 58% of the battery use.

If you've got a battery that usually lasts 20 hours then 'Android OS - 58%' means the OS is STILL accountable for 58% of the battery use.

It doesn't matter how long your battery lasts, those percentages relate to how much something is using your battery compared to how much everything else is using it.

You are correct on this. Everyone is confusing percentages with actual consumption. Even when I was on GB, Android was (usually) the highest percentage. As for battery consumption, on Sunday (I have a Sedio 3200mah battery mind you) I went through over 1900mah of battery in 24 hours. Today, I am on 20hrs on the full charge and have used less than 500mah with similar usages.
I have read somewhere that teh ICS has to "learn" the battery....whatever that means. But I do know that I did a factory reset as per DK2's instructions adn DID NOT reinstall my data from my backup, but rather reinstalled the apps I wanted and I am fine......battery aside....which seems to be getting better.

 

[Tsukiyomi]

Re: DO NOT UPGRADE TO ICS: Factory Reset Does Not Fix Battery Dra

Funny you mention ICS 'learning' the battery use, since mine appears to be improving now. This time last week I was losing maybe 10% per hour, now it's back to about 4%p.h. with identical phone use. I'm very nearly at a point where ICS is running well (touch wood)

 

[packhntr]

Re: DO NOT UPGRADE TO ICS: Factory Reset Does Not Fix Battery Dra

It is weird.....Never heard of anyone placing that type of programming into anything. It does make some sence though. My thoughts are that many people (like myself) get NON-OEM batteries with differing capacity and the OS needs to know just how big the battery really is. How does it know? It has to "learn" it by discharging it at different rates and monitering it. Once it does this, it can give you an accuract readout of the ammount of energy left in the battery. If the OS was programmed to only recognize the oem 1800mah battery, then it woudl have to be hardwired into the phone like Apples and some others.

 

[Jondroid2]

I have a friend that is having battery issues after I upgraded his phone to ICS. I can do the reset for him or just do a complete wipe but he would rather go back to GB. I don't know how to root (haven't pulled the trigger on that yet) but I do know how to do the one click Odin for UCLF5 and UCLF6. Does anyone know if there is one of these for installing GB 2.5 or 2.6 back on my friends Skyrocket? Please HELP!

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I727 using Android Central Forums

 

[LS14EVR]

Re: DO NOT UPGRADE TO ICS: Factory Reset Does Not Fix Battery Dra

You guys that don't have the battery issue will just never get it. There is no reason for my phone to drain a battery in 6 hours. With little to no use. And, like has been mentioned above that most of the time the "thing" that is using that battery is the Android OS! My phone is at almost 7 hours of use. I'm down to 19% of my battery. 67% of that is OS use. That means that the OS is what is killing the battery. Not Facebook, not Words with friends, not the screen, but the OS. Just sitting there and idling. If you do decide to use the phone, then the processor, not the battery actually starts getting hot! I've gotten rid of more apps, turned off more things that I would really like to turn off, which is making the phone useless now, and no help. I've looked at many, many, many other android phones people have running in the office on ICS and no one is even close in the % that the OS is using on my phone. Although my phone hasn't yet, it is in the process of being replaced. IF all else fails and it falls through again and it is not replaced. It will get rooted.

 

[packhntr]

Re: DO NOT UPGRADE TO ICS: Factory Reset Does Not Fix Battery Dra

I have a friend that is having battery issues after I upgraded his phone to ICS. I can do the reset for him or just do a complete wipe but he would rather go back to GB. I don't know how to root (haven't pulled the trigger on that yet) but I do know how to do the one click Odin for UCLF5 and UCLF6. Does anyone know if there is one of these for installing GB 2.5 or 2.6 back on my friends Skyrocket? Please HELP!

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I727 using Android Central Forums

Do a factory reset. Don't bother doing a backup of your Apps or their data. DO backup the phone numbers and contacts though. Once you do the reset, set up the email stuff, sync up with the contacts and go to the PLAY store to get the apps. Give it a couple days to get teh battery figured out and you should be good to go.

 

[patrao_n]

Android os using a lot could be a wake lock from a rogue app. Use better battery stats and find it. Mine is running smooth with no battery problems at all.

sent from my BAD A$$ Epic touch

 

[packhntr]

Re: DO NOT UPGRADE TO ICS: Factory Reset Does Not Fix Battery Dra

Android os using a lot could be a wake lock from a rogue app. Use better battery stats and find it. Mine is running smooth with no battery problems at all.

sent from my BAD A$$ Epic touch

That is why you need to do a factory reset....it will get rid of everything.

 

[mas27295]

Re: DO NOT UPGRADE TO ICS: Factory Reset Does Not Fix Battery Dra

as I said days ago TURN OFF WIFI when you dont use it or phone is in standby mode and also 4g this WILL Work

 

[LS14EVR]

Re: DO NOT UPGRADE TO ICS: Factory Reset Does Not Fix Battery Dra

as I said days ago TURN OFF WIFI when you dont use it or phone is in standby mode and also 4g this WILL Work

Been doing this since day one. Always have. Factory resets will get rid of rouge apps.
It's not an app. It's just the OS won't sleep.

 

[wkufan92]

Re: DO NOT UPGRADE TO ICS: Factory Reset Does Not Fix Battery Dra

Unfortunately, I have to agree with the majority here. I did the factory reset last week and thought the battery was behaving better. I have noticed the last 2 days, the battery is definitely draining faster.

VERY DISAPPOINTING.

 

[Dark_Knight2]

Need I say more. This update has been a god sent for me. Gingerbread was laggy and glitchy for me. FF18 is far far far less buggy.

 

[mstenshi]

Re: DO NOT UPGRADE TO ICS: Factory Reset Does Not Fix Battery Dra

I have the same problem as above - my battery, after the update and a factory reset (without restoring data) was draining in 8-10 hours, with about 30 mins of actual use during that time. I've been playing around with settings a bunch in the last few days, and I've come up with the following (I hope they help Sprint fix the problem, or some of you with the same issue):

1. My battery drains really quickly while traveling. On the train, I was going from 35% to 5% in about a half hour just by having the phone on (reading email). I put the phone into airplane mode now on the train, and the battery doesn't drain much at all. - Must be the cellular radios constantly searching for signal...
2. My battery also drains really quickly when I'm at work (where I don't have wifi access). I've been experimenting here, and it seems to fix the problem if I turn off 3G data. 4G seems to be fine - it goes to sleep when the phone is not in use, but 3G seems to always search for signal for some reason.
3. No problem at home, where I'm always connected through my wifi (which I believe turns off 3G data when in use.)

So, airplane mode on the train, 4G at work, wifi at home, and my battery lasts like it is supposed to (only down 23% in 6 hours so far today - yesterday I was down 70% by now). Sucks not to have access on the train like I want, but can't stand using the whole battery in an hour...

 

[mythstery]

Re: DO NOT UPGRADE TO ICS: Factory Reset Does Not Fix Battery Dra

Like i stated above... Yesterday my phone drained itself in 5 hours 3800 mah batttery. this was after i did 2 factory resets and a cache clear on the phone.... When i reinstalled my apps they still remembered things from before the reset.

Went to sprint he did a different kind of factory reset.. One that we can not do ourselves and are instructed to do..

here is a screen shot taken a moment ago as i typed this. My phone has NEVER had this good of battery life and i been on it quite a bit today.

 

[yankees177]

Re: DO NOT UPGRADE TO ICS: Factory Reset Does Not Fix Battery Dra

Doing the math, at that usage youll have about 8 hrs of battery life. I am an android fan but thats the one thing my gf's iphone gets right. Her battery seems to last forever! I hate mid day charges to get through the day. good luck getting through a few hours if you play a game for 30 mins straight! lets all stop with the development of faster more bad ass phones and hone our collective minds into creating a useful battery and then go from there! :-$

looks like this didnt reply to dark night as I had intended. im tired.

 

[mythstery]

Re: DO NOT UPGRADE TO ICS: Factory Reset Does Not Fix Battery Dra

Doing the math, at that usage youll have about 8 hrs of battery life. I am an android fan but thats the one thing my gf's iphone gets right. Her battery seems to last forever! I hate mid day charges to get through the day. good luck getting through a few hours if you play a game for 30 mins straight! lets all stop with the development of faster more bad ass phones and hone our collective minds into creating a useful battery and then go from there! :-$

looks like this didnt reply to dark night as I had intended. im tired.

I will repost tonight and see what it looks like after i get home. I had every iphone since the first and i will tell you this... For a phone as small as it is with far less computing power i had to keep them on the charger all day. I had multiple chargers. Always kept a car and wall in my car, a wall at home, a wall at work.. It was dumb