Battery Calibration? - myTouch 4G Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

I am kind of amazed with what I am seeing, and am wondering if someone on XDA can help me understand this. So I was running CM7.x on my MT4G for over an year, and this past weekend I switched to CoreDroid because I wanted to try out Sense.
I had a bad feeling about the battery usage because the ROM was "heavier" than CM7.x in terms of UI, Graphics (of course because of Sense 3.5). I went ahead and installed the ROM anyways.
Within a couple of hours, I went from being fully charged to 5% battery....it was draining faster than anything I have seen before. I read CoreDroid release notes and they had mentioned about this severely fast battery drain.
Based on their recommendation, I fully charged the phone once battery level reached 5%. This time, my battery lasted about 17-18 hours, and again I fully charged it when it reached 5%.
Now after the second recharge, its been about 24 hours and I am at 97% battery. I didn't believe CoreDroid release notes that battery life will become better after couple of recharges; I thought it was a bunch of bull to get people to install their ROM.
I am glad to say I was wrong Can someone please explain this battery calibration deal to me?

Oh boy... This is a highly controversial topic. Here we go.
Basically there are people who swear by it and people who say it does nothing. That its all in your head.
Even this lady at google who helped create Android says it does nothing.
https://plus.google.com/105051985738280261832/posts/FV3LVtdVxPT
Sent from my HTC Glacier using XDA App

estallings15 said:
Oh boy... This is a highly controversial topic. Here we go.
Basically there are people who swear by it and people who say it does nothing. That its all in your head.
Even this lady at google who helped create Android says it does nothing.
https://plus.google.com/105051985738280261832/posts/FV3LVtdVxPT
Sent from my HTC Glacier using XDA App
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Click to collapse
Best link ever; most informative.
- I think everyone loves Dianne now.
- Someone has a flying car already ...
- In the middle of the most intellectual and technical discussion of battery usage that I have seen, someone asks what is the best facebook app - brilliant!
So...
1. Battery stats are calculated differently per phone and OS version.
2. Battery stats reporting is definitely not %100 accurate.
3. Battery percentage is calculated differently per phone and OS version.
4. Battery percentage reporting is definitely not %100 accurate.
5. On some phones, you can override battery charging limitations by 'bumping'.
6. 'Bumping' is not recommended as can shorten your battery life.
They actually did not cover the OP situation where you let that battery go below 5%, although I am always guilty of skim reading. Still, extremely informative and explains a lot of previously posted battery phenomena.

estallings15 said:
Oh boy... This is a highly controversial topic. Here we go.
Basically there are people who swear by it and people who say it does nothing. That its all in your head.
Even this lady at google who helped create Android says it does nothing.
Sent from my HTC Glacier using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Wow, that made up for intense reading - thanks a lot.
It can't be something in my head for sure, If the difference was say a couple of hours I probably would have agreed with "the lady at Google" But I went from 2-3 hours to 24+ hours, so yes it's not in my head
Thanks again for your feedback.

Homerbsharp said:
Best link ever; most informative.
- I think everyone loves Dianne now.
- Someone has a flying car already ...
- In the middle of the most intellectual and technical discussion of battery usage that I have seen, someone asks what is the best facebook app - brilliant!
So...
1. Battery stats are calculated differently per phone and OS version.
2. Battery stats reporting is definitely not %100 accurate.
3. Battery percentage is calculated differently per phone and OS version.
4. Battery percentage reporting is definitely not %100 accurate.
5. On some phones, you can override battery charging limitations by 'bumping'.
6. 'Bumping' is not recommended as can shorten your battery life.
They actually did not cover the OP situation where you let that battery go below 5%, although I am always guilty of skim reading. Still, extremely informative and explains a lot of previously posted battery phenomena.
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Click to collapse
Lol....yea that FB app question was pretty brilliant I'll try to get in touch with CoreDroid folks, and see if they can answer my question.
I mean it does work, it's almost like a miracle to me.

I know. I just can't figure out WHY. Its been really bothering me.
Sent from my HTC Glacier using XDA App

Jessooca said:
Which battery calibration app are you using?
Sent from my HTC Glacier using xda premium
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None, I am just surprised to see improved battery life after couple of 'full-drain, full-charge" operations.
BTW, care to suggest a good battery calibration app? Much appreciated.

well, the best battery calibration app Ive used is Battery Calibration by NeMa, but now after reading this thread it seems that they dont really do anything

ajrulez said:
None, I am just surprised to see improved battery life after couple of 'full-drain, full-charge" operations.
BTW, care to suggest a good battery calibration app? Much appreciated.
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Click to collapse
The drain-charge cycles is just a way to calibrate the battery- takes more time to "forget" the old stats, so people either use an app or manually delete the battery statistics so one can start accumulating fresh statistics.
After a few days you get your statistics right, from then on the battery indicator will be more or less accurate.
Battery drainage has nothing to do, really, with how many times you'll calibrate or drain/ charge or whatever. It has to do with how much you use screen on, Wifi, BT, gps, partial wakelocks, apps syncing etc. In other words- use your phone and be assured battery is going to drain. Leave it alone, let it sleep- battery will last a couple of days...
Sent from my HTC Glacier using Xparent Cyan Tapatalk

just to clarify, and sorry for butting in, but there is no such thing as "calibrating your battery"... this has been debunked by many people who understand android's Linux kernel and even an android engineer at Google.
the batterystats.bin file is simply that, a bin. it does nothing more than collect dumped statistics of what exactly has been using your battery, how long, how much power those processes used, etc. it has absolutely nothing to do with your phone's ability to display correct information about how much juice you have left - that function is within the Linux kernel which monitors, and controls power throughout the device.
ask yourself this... ever flashed a ROM with say 50% power left on a charge? what happens after your first boot? does your phone suddenly have no idea how much charge is left? no. it doesn't. because the new kernel you just flashed with your ROM is picking up right where you left off.
wiping battery stats is useless. period. it.does absolutely nothing to better battery life. that is fact. that is your phone. that is your Linux platform and straight truth in how it works.
and since it is stored in the data directory, every time you flash a ROM and wipe data, you are wiping the battery stats... so why do you boot up and do it again... I know... good question.
Sent from EVO 3D using XDA premium

aznprodgy said:
well, the best battery calibration app Ive used is , but now after reading this thread it seems that they dont really do anything
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Hehe, yes I doubt if these battery calibration do anything.
estallings15 posted a very informative link in 2nd or 3rd post (of this thread)....all these battery calibration apps simply delete the battery stats file at least thats what one from NeMA does anyways

cobraboy85 said:
just to clarify, and sorry for butting in, but there is no such thing as "calibrating your battery"... this has been debunked by many people who understand android's Linux kernel and even an android engineer at Google.
the batterystats.bin file is simply that, a bin. it does nothing more than collect dumped statistics of what exactly has been using your battery, how long, how much power those processes used, etc. it has absolutely nothing to do with your phone's ability to display correct information about how much juice you have left - that function is within the Linux kernel which monitors, and controls power throughout the device.
ask yourself this... ever flashed a ROM with say 50% power left on a charge? what happens after your first boot? does your phone suddenly have no idea how much charge is left? no. it doesn't. because the new kernel you just flashed with your ROM is picking up right where you left off.
wiping battery stats is useless. period. it.does absolutely nothing to better battery life. that is fact. that is your phone. that is your Linux platform and straight truth in how it works.
and since it is stored in the data directory, every time you flash a ROM and wipe data, you are wiping the battery stats... so why do you boot up and do it again... I know... good question.
Sent from EVO 3D using XDA premium
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Yep, agree with your comments 100%. After reading the link posted by estallings15 earlier in this thread, the myth of battery calibration was busted

I agree with most that Battery Calibration is a joke, and doesn't mean anything. However, batteries in many devices (not just our Cell Phones) seem to benefit from proper discharge/full charge cycles. In fact, it's usually recommended in things like electric RC cars that you completely run down the battery as far as you can go (realistically of course!) prior to charging; also to prolong battery life. I always notice at least slightly longer use times if I don't always pop the thing on a charger at 75%. But go with what works for ya, and of course some roms DO drain faster than others. And less screen haha

Related

I'm just gonna say...(Batt issues)

Before I was a behavioral therapist I worked for a small (lol) company called Applied Materials. And there I worked as a project manager. And what I learned there was the importance of following procedure, something most here seem to fail doing. I know I'm not the only one tired of seeing at least 2-3 threads a day pop up complaining how adryns or blah blahs rom is giving you horrible battery life. Have you stopped and thought for a second that it may have something to do on your part? Let me rephrase that, it is something to do with you. There are procedures before flashing...for example, flashing on a full charge is ALWAYS recommended. Second, wipe wipe and wipe again. I hope you don't wipe your ass the same way you do your phone. You stop to think for a second that flashing two themes a day isn't going to f things up with your battery if you're not following proper protocol? Why is it some people don't have issues and some do? It's simple, you f'd it up.
And for the record, the reason I posted this is to stress the importance of following the rules, bc when there really is an issue, it's like "the boy who cried wolf". We don't know which is legit and the other is just some kid too hyped to get that blackhole or superclean and cuts corners.
This thread drained my battery real bad.
Sent from my SCH-I500 using XDA App
It could just be the fact that the Fascinate gets crap battery life in general. I get crappy battery life no matter what. Thanks for the useless post tho. Hopefully mine is just as wothless.
mob87 said:
It could just be the fact that the Fascinate gets crap battery life in general. I get crappy battery life no matter what. Thanks for the useless post tho. Hopefully mine is just as wothless.
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The fascinate is proven to get better battery life then the droid amoung many other androids. I get maybe 16 hours of heavy use. I've been on this forum all day running superclean 2.1 with voodoo and still have 37% left...yeah that's some ****ty battery life for ya lol
Edit: maybe the majority of us getting around 15+ hours are just on some really good dope.
Droid? Which droid? Certainly not the Droid X, I had one and battery life was way better. I dont know anybody that gets more than 10 hours on heavy use. Sure you can get more if you dont actually use your phone as a phone.
mob87 said:
Droid? Which droid? Certainly not the Droid X, I had one and battery life was way better. I dont know anybody that gets more than 10 hours on heavy use. Sure you can get more if you dont actually use your phone as a phone.
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Lmfao...really? Then why is my cousin who has an x charging his phone while im sitting here on his couch still posting. Before you post again take a peek...i've been trollon this forum for 12 hours now.
I followed everything to a T the second time around. My first time flashing superclean I was getting less than stellar battery life. Second time around I wiped data, cache, dalvik, and battery stats multiple times while on a full charge.
I've had my phone off the charger for 13 hours now and I am at ~60%. I haven't used it as heavy as normal, but even under heavy load I am getting much better battery than my first time around.
In "16 hours of heavy use", how much of that time was your screen active? You can look in Settings -> About -> Battery Use -> Display. "Heavy use" is a fairly imprecise term, since what one person might consider heavy use might be 'fairly light' to another.
KitsuneKnight said:
In "16 hours of heavy use", how much of that time was your screen active? You can look in Settings -> About -> Battery Use -> Display. "Heavy use" is a fairly imprecise term, since what one person might consider heavy use might be 'fairly light' to another.
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74%...just take a peek in the threads...i've been posting maybe ince every 15 min
khanable said:
I followed everything to a T the second time around. My first time flashing superclean I was getting less than stellar battery life. Second time around I wiped data, cache, dalvik, and battery stats multiple times while on a full charge.
I've had my phone off the charger for 13 hours now and I am at ~60%. I haven't used it as heavy as normal, but even under heavy load I am getting much better battery than my first time around.
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My point exactly...thanks for pointing it out.
jenisiz said:
I hope you don't wipe your ass the same way you do your phone.
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All right, I have to admit, that right there is pretty funny!
I agree with your post, thought. Every time a new rom is released, the next several days are filled with complaints about the battery life. If you follow the procedure for resyncing the battery stats, your battery life will be back.
mob87 said:
It could just be the fact that the Fascinate gets crap battery life in general. I get crappy battery life no matter what. Thanks for the useless post tho. Hopefully mine is just as wothless.
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Click to collapse
I get good battery life...so this isn't a fact for me.
The most important thing to keep in mind is battery life is SUBJECTIVE, as are the terms used to define usage (including "good" and "crap" as in the above). What one person considers "light/medium" use might be "heavy" use for someone else, and vice versa.
Sent from my SCH-I500 using XDA App
For me battery life on eb01 is great as long as gps isn't enabled in the pull down shade. When that is on the phone doesn't sleep even if gps is never showing active in the status bar.
Sent from my SCH-I500 using XDA App
nmyeti said:
For me battery life on eb01 is great as long as gps isn't enabled in the pull down shade. When that is on the phone doesn't sleep even if gps is never showing active in the status bar.
Sent from my SCH-I500 using XDA App
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I too have GPS disabled in the pull down
khanable said:
I too have GPS disabled in the pull down
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X3...imho, it's an irrelevant feature to have on at all times unless you actually need it.
Eb01 battery life is sub par - mostly to with the fact we do not have custom kernels yet. Wait for those and well see the battery life that spoiled us again.
Sent from my SCH-I500 using XDA App
jenisiz said:
74%...just take a peek in the threads...i've been posting maybe ince every 15 min
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Not percentage, but time.
My Fascinate, currently, has been unplugged for 22 hours. Light/medium/heavy use is all completely and totally relative and opinionated terms. The amount of 'Time on' for the screen is a fair bit better way to show the use than just the meaningless 'heavy' & friends terms *. I've had my screen on for 55 minutes total, during those 22 hours, and am down to 42% battery life remaining. I wouldn't call the use I'd done 'heavy use', but someone else might consider that about as much use as they've given their phone in a WEEK!
I find my battery life is decent, but by no means amazing (I generally always make it through a day, 2 with light usage).
* Even then, it's a fair bit different if the time was spent looking at a single active pixel on the screen, vs playing with an augmented reality app that keeps the GPS, camera+flash, and wifi/3G constantly going, while also burning huge amounts of cycles on both the GPU and CPU... but one step at a time.
jenisiz said:
I hope you don't wipe your ass the same way you do your phone. Why is it some people don't have issues and some do? It's simple, you f'd it up.
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Okay, I've been flashing my ass all day long and not one person has mentioned seeing a wipe button appear, so I don't see how anyone can wipe their ass the same as their phone.
Sent from my SCH-I500 while waiting in prison for my court date for flashing in public. ..Hope this ROM doesn't kill my battery like the last one did.
Bawb3 said:
Eb01 battery life is sub par - mostly to with the fact we do not have custom kernels yet. Wait for those and well see the battery life that spoiled us again.
Sent from my SCH-I500 using XDA App
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In my case it's mostly due to the fact that the phone never sleeps if GPS is enabled. When the phone doesn't sleep, it eats battery at an alarming rate even just sitting in your pocket. Once GPS is disabled in the notification shade, battery life is more in line with DL09. I'll be happy once we get some custom kernels, as a LV kernel seems to help my device a bit, but battery life isn't so bad anymore as to cause me to flash back to DL09.

Don't wipe battery stats

http://www.sdx-developers.com/sdx/the-truth-behind-battery-re-calibration/

So it seems like your battery isn’t lasting very long. You search the Forum at SDX Developers and hear about this thing called “Battery Re-Calibration” and how its supposed to be great for increasing your battery life. Well, sorry to burst your bubble, but the guides for “Battery Calibration” lead you through some steps that actually do more harm than good!
And here’s the reason why:
The batteries in your mobile forms are high-capacity lithium-ion batteries. This kind of battery technology cannot be simply reset and “re-calibrated.” When you follow the steps to recalibrate your battery and delete the batterystats.bin file from your phone, you are getting rid of more than what you think… Stored inside that batterystats.bin file, your phone keeps detailed logs of the capacity of your battery and uses it on how it can be utilized more efficiently. By deleting this file, it basically wipes the phone’s memory on what the battery can really do. This actually does damage to your battery by using up valuable charging cycles, all while giving a fraction of battery life and performance.
Now, you might be saying uh-oh, I’ve already re-calibrated my battery! What do I do?!
Well here’s your answer. Use your phone like normal. Yes, your battery and phone wont perform as good as it can for a while, but after a few days, you will notice that it starts doing better and better. Give it time, its trying to rebuild all those logs that you just deleted
I hope this helps and clears up this argument once and for all!
Figured as much...
I've always had horrible life after deleting battery stats.
- Ron
What happens to the stats and how they are used if I use multiple batteries?
Sent from my Transformer TF101 using XDA Premium App
I would've thought that after flashing a new rom, this would be better, cuz then the phone wouldn't think it has less power than it has
nebrando said:
What happens to the stats and how they are used if I use multiple batteries?
Sent from my Transformer TF101 using XDA Premium App
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I'm wondering the same thing. I usually have a spare battery and swap them out
Sent from my SPH-D700 using XDA App
nebrando said:
What happens to the stats and how they are used if I use multiple batteries?
Sent from my Transformer TF101 using XDA Premium App
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Smarter batteries expose information (ie: serial number) to the device they power. Then again smarter batteries also store the charge history/life experience/charge cycle logs on the battery themselves. No clue what our batteries are capable of.
xboxfanj said:
I would've thought that after flashing a new rom, this would be better, cuz then the phone wouldn't think it has less power than it has
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Click to collapse
Considering the fact that flashing often overwrites all system files (depending on what you're flashing), and an Odin flash completely overwrites *almost* everything (device programming is retained, you'll notice that you do
NOT need to redo the cellular network setup each time), out stands to reason that that file may get deleted through several other processes in addition to wiping the stats. So I would say that this isn't as bad as the OP makes it sound.
And if you experience any sort of file corruption, the battery stats file could be affected; I don't care who you ask, no data is far better than bad data any day of the week
Sent from my SPH-D700 using XDA App
My rule of thumb was to wipe stats when ever I had a kernel change. From what iv read around xda, performing a wipe was to let your phone adjust to the new software and reteach its self how to use the battery. I never see any harm in it besides crappy battery life the frst couple of days.
Sent from my epic
sprkat85 said:
My rule of thumb was to wipe stats when ever I had a kernel change. From what iv read around xda, performing a wipe was to let your phone adjust to the new software and reteach its self how to use the battery. I never see any harm in it besides crappy battery life the frst couple of days.
Sent from my epic
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Click to collapse
You're essentially correct, the existing stats are based on the system configuration in place when the stats were recorded, so the data may not be as helpful as intended after changing components of the operating system such as the kernel.
Sent from my SPH-D700 using XDA App
styles420 said:
You're essentially correct, the existing stats are based on the system configuration in place when the stats were recorded, so the data may not be as helpful as intended after changing components of the operating system such as the kernel.
Sent from my SPH-D700 using XDA App
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Where can I find info on what data fields are in batterystats.bin?
Considering the fact that I always get substantially better battery life when I flash a new ROM, and then wipe battery info, vs flashing a new rom and never wiping, I think this post isn't necessarily accurate.
If I flash a new rom, and DON'T wipe battery, I'm always disappointed with the battery life for several days before I remember to charge all the way and wipe stats. I've never had a situation where I get poor life by doing the standard flash+wipe combo. I can see the downside of doing a full-on calibration (bump charging several times, then wiping, for no reason) but my personal experience disagrees with the overall post.
You don't just wipe battery stats and call it a day. You charge your phone to 100%, wipe battery stats, and then run the phone down to nothing. So now the ONLY information stored in the battery stats file should be the absolute full charge of the battery from 100% until the phone literally turns off because of low voltage. How is that not more efficient?
muyoso said:
You don't just wipe battery stats and call it a day. You charge your phone to 100%, wipe battery stats, and then run the phone down to nothing. So now the ONLY information stored in the battery stats file should be the absolute full charge of the battery from 100% until the phone literally turns off because of low voltage. How is that not more efficient?
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Click to collapse
Because as far as I can tell it's just conjecture... Don't get me wrong, not saying anyone hasn't observed what they think they have but this sounds simple to solve to me if two questions are answered:
1) What data is stored in batterystats.bin (correct filename?)
2) How does the Android OS use this data file related to charging/displayed remaining/etc
These are answerable questions but I haven't seen them answered (not searching hard). Until they are we can all assume whatever we want based on our observations but what we see often has little to do with fact.
From what I've read in the OP, it's exactly why I wipe the stats. Yes they will have to figure themselves out but just as they do when I wipe my Market cache to avoid force closes. Bad files are bad files and if people want to clear and rebuild them, it certainly doesn't make it a bad process.
muyoso said:
You don't just wipe battery stats and call it a day. You charge your phone to 100%, wipe battery stats, and then run the phone down to nothing. So now the ONLY information stored in the battery stats file should be the absolute full charge of the battery from 100% until the phone literally turns off because of low voltage. How is that not more efficient?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Everytime I wipe battery stats, it always starts reading my battery % wrong. One sec it'll say I'm at 90%, the next at 92. The only fix is to flash a new ROM.
machx0r said:
Because as far as I can tell it's just conjecture... Don't get me wrong, not saying anyone hasn't observed what they think they have but this sounds simple to solve to me if two questions are answered:
1) What data is stored in batterystats.bin (correct filename?)
2) How does the Android OS use this data file related to charging/displayed remaining/etc
These are answerable questions but I haven't seen them answered (not searching hard). Until they are we can all assume whatever we want based on our observations but what we see often has little to do with fact.
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Would you install a sound system, tune it perfectly for the acoustics in your living room, and then expect that same tuning to work just as well in any other room in your house?
When you change to a new room and/or kernel, you completely change the environment in which the battery is operating. It makes no sense whatsoever to assume that the battery would run better with data that is irrelevant to the current setup than it would with a clean slate
Edit: another point to consider - the battery had to start at a clean slate when it was manufactured - is the OP suggesting that this is bad for the battery? What sense would that make?
Sent from my SPH-D700 using XDA App
styles420 said:
Would you install a sound system, tune it perfectly for the acoustics in your living room, and then expect that same tuning to work just as well in any other room in your house?
When you change to a new room and/or kernel, you completely change the environment in which the battery is operating. It makes no sense whatsoever to assume that the battery would run better with data that is irrelevant to the current setup than it would with a clean slate
Edit: another point to consider - the battery had to start at a clean slate when it was manufactured - is the OP suggesting that this is bad for the battery? What sense would that make?
Sent from my SPH-D700 using XDA App
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Trust me, I get what you are saying and follow the logic. It makes sense to me an personally I calibrate my battery when it starts feeling wonky. Do the same on my laptop that definitely reports serial, charge cycles, etc.
My only point was that until someone takes the time to figure out what is really going on here then arguing that one strategy is better than the other is not very useful.
Consider your sound system example... Perhaps there is an issue in the with the calibration logic of your receiver that causes the settings for your living room to provide better sound quality in your bedroom (against the results of the calibration you did there).
All I'm getting at is I wish I understood what was really going on here so I could make an objective decision rather than a subjective one.
machx0r said:
Trust me, I get what you are saying and follow the logic. It makes sense to me an personally I calibrate my battery when it starts feeling wonky. Do the same on my laptop that definitely reports serial, charge cycles, etc.
My only point was that until someone takes the time to figure out what is really going on here then arguing that one strategy is better than the other is not very useful.
Consider your sound system example... Perhaps there is an issue in the with the calibration logic of your receiver that causes the settings for your living room to provide better sound quality in your bedroom (against the results of the calibration you did there).
All I'm getting at is I wish I understood what was really going on here so I could make an objective decision rather than a subjective one.
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I get your desire for objectivism and I share it, but this ties back to the simple fact that most hacking communities are filled with superstitious habits fuelled by anecdotal evidence and users who get extremely defensive if someone comes along and raises questions about currently accepted conclusions. Sure, these are devices operating on fundamental instructions and every single tiny behavior is governed by code and measured capabilities...
But if you want to see an analysis of that file, you'll have 100x more luck figuring it out on your own than you'd ever have changing the minds of people who sprinkle pixie dust, spin in a circle, rub their earlobes, and clap twice before every flash.
Sent from my SPH-D700 using Tapatalk
josidhe said:
I get your desire for objectivism and I share it, but this ties back to the simple fact that most hacking communities are filled with superstitious habits fuelled by anecdotal evidence and users who get extremely defensive if someone comes along and raises questions about currently accepted conclusions. Sure, these are devices operating on fundamental instructions and every single tiny behavior is governed by code and measured capabilities...
But if you want to see an analysis of that file, you'll have 100x more luck figuring it out on your own than you'd ever have changing the minds of people who sprinkle pixie dust, spin in a circle, rub their earlobes, and clap twice before every flash.
Sent from my SPH-D700 using Tapatalk
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I concur!
Need analytics/metrics, controlled test environments, hard facts from vendor specs to replicable results. Too many variants and factors involved from avg. 2yr life span of a battery to coronals chicken tweaks. All just theories until proven otherwise.
I am the OP, but I just copy-pasted the article so people know that it may not be a good thing to do, because I had never heard of anything bad about it.

Wiping Battery Stats Doesn't Fix or Increase Battery Life.

Yup, I said it. Nothing. Nada. Zip. Well, deleting the .bin file does do something...it resets the battery stats. Wanna know what else resets the stats?? Charging your phone to 100%. So, whatever benefit you saw from deleting the .bin was a placebo effect. Don't get me wrong, deleting it won't hurt anything. But it doesn't help anything either, and it certainly doesn't calibrate your battery. The only thing that file contains are stats, such as:
1. info about wakelocks
2. info about partial wakelocks
3. info about screen on time
4. info about screen brightness
I'm tempted to get into how lithium ion cells work, but that is a boring subject. I will say that li-ion cells don't have a memory to them, so there really isn't a "calibration" process. I will say that if you have piss poor battery life, you should consider the following:
1. An application/process that isn't allowing the phone to sleep correctly (keeping this general)
2. Any SamSprint firmware or derivative thereof
3. Knock it off with the overclocking. If you wanna screw with frequency tables and voltages, or let someone else do it and flash their kernel, be my guest. But don't ***** about your battery life if you do
4. YOUR BATTERY!!!!
Wanna know how I fixed the ****ty battery life on my girlfriend's Epic? I bought her a new battery I nice new shiny Epic Touch 4g battery with 20% more capacity and BAM, 2 days of battery life easily instead of 4-5 hours.
Seriously though, so many things affect not only battery life, but battery lifespan e.g. age (many users have had this phone for 1.5 years), # of charge/discharge cycles, excessive heat or cold (I bet a lot of people keep their phone in their pocket or a purse, huh?), etc. And while there may be quality control standards in the battery manufacturing process, not all batteries are equal and it's very possible that a battery was well below its stated capacity even when it was brand new.
Anyway, I'm tired and I need a coffee. I'm interested to hear others chime in and add to the discussion. Flame on! jk
Ryan
Crap! This was supposed to go in general... Mods, please move
This is what I've been saying all along. You put a battery in. You charge it. End of story.
All these people wasting literally hours upon hours on "calibrating" their battery are tools who should not be members of a development forum.
http://www.androidcentral.com/wiping-battery-stats-doesnt-improve-battery-life-says-google-engineer
zeppelin481 said:
Crap! This was supposed to go in general... Mods, please move
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
lol was gonna say, the only flaming you should get for this is for being in the wrong section!
Specialksg1 said:
lol was gonna say, the only flaming you should get for this is for being in the wrong section!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It was a total accident. I had a thread I was writing and the session expired. Lost the whole thing. Rewrote and didn't pay attention to the section. I expect to be flamed for it
zeppelin481 said:
Crap! This was supposed to go in general... Mods, please move
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
maybe if you drank your coffee you wouldn't make noob mistakes!
I saw you asked to be moved to general, that was my first question as well
Many people will argue that wiping battery stats is actually WORSE for battery life while using the same battery. After cycling perhaps. I think switching batteries requires a stat wipe though.
ksmullins88 said:
maybe if you drank your coffee you wouldn't make noob mistakes!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You're probably right. And I technically had 2 cups today, just not my usual gallon! I hope a mod moves it soon because I feel like a huge tool now...
zeppelin481 said:
You're probably right. And I technically had 2 cups today, just not my usual gallon! I hope a mod moves it soon because I feel like a huge tool now...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Lol! Hey at least it wasn't a completely idiotic thread like some of the people post in developement so you get at least 1 point for that... on topic... completely agree anybody that sees better battery life after Calibrating their battery just didn't use their phone as much after doing so... now maybe everybody will quit telling the people with bad battery life to calibrate and it will fix their issues...
Sent from my SPH-D700 using Tapatalk
Here we go...
Wiping battery stats has NOTHING to do with battery 'life'. It does however effect time from a full charge if charged from the epic itself.
What the file that is removed does it tell android what the battery level is for logging and status info. When something changes like the battery strength (age) or life change from the rom/kernel/tweaks then you need to delete that file or else it will assume the older setup is used as a norm. Android uses the data to tell the battery to stop charging at a level of 95ish% and also to power down at 5ish%. If these values are incorrect the phone won't keep a charge as log or power off earlier.
zeppelin481 said:
You're probably right. And I technically had 2 cups today, just not my usual gallon! I hope a mod moves it soon because I feel like a huge tool now...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Lmao, I hope they leave it in here just because
Sent from my SPH-D700 using XDA App
marcusant said:
Here we go...
Wiping battery stats has NOTHING to do with battery 'life'. It does however effect time from a full charge if charged from the epic itself.
What the file that is removed does it tell android what the battery level is for logging and status info. When something changes like the battery strength (age) or life change from the rom/kernel/tweaks then you need to delete that file or else it will assume the older setup is used as a norm. Android uses the data to tell the battery to stop charging at a level of 95ish% and also to power down at 5ish%. If these values are incorrect the phone won't keep a charge as log or power off earlier.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
But this is right... sometimes if you don't clear your battery stats your phone still thinks you have, for example, say 75%, when you really have something less, like 50%. Thus when you charge it, it will think its charging to 100 from 75 rather than from 50. Leaving you 25% less battery or whatever and your phone will seem like its dying faster. Only because you haven't "fully" charged the battery. So in some cases, calibrating the battery by removing the file is neccessary.
Sent from my SPH-D700 using XDA App
Moved......NooB
marcusant said:
Here we go...
Wiping battery stats has NOTHING to do with battery 'life'. It does however effect time from a full charge if charged from the epic itself.
What the file that is removed does it tell android what the battery level is for logging and status info. When something changes like the battery strength (age) or life change from the rom/kernel/tweaks then you need to delete that file or else it will assume the older setup is used as a norm. Android uses the data to tell the battery to stop charging at a level of 95ish% and also to power down at 5ish%. If these values are incorrect the phone won't keep a charge as log or power off earlier.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This. End of story, wiping does help in certain cases.
Sent from my SPH-D700 using xda premium
Next time someone complains about battery life I'm gonna tell em to order an epic touch battery, its really the only way
Sent from my SPH-D700 using xda premium
Battery stats do nothing... I never charge my battery. I swap out with charged batteries. You can NOT make your power on time longer with battery stats!!! I've proved that with swapper batteries versus charging and wiping stats... It's a myth only because there is a file which tracks status. That file is rewritten to and reset everytime I swap batteries.
IT'S A MYTH!!!
Sent from my SPH-D700 using XDA App
troyolson92 said:
Battery stats do nothing... I never charge my battery. I swap out with charged batteries. You can NOT make your power on time longer with battery stats!!! I've proved that with swapper batteries versus charging and wiping stats... It's a myth only because there is a file which tracks status. That file is rewritten to and reset everytime I swap batteries.
IT'S A MYTH!!!
Sent from my SPH-D700 using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This. The battery stats contain nothing about your battery percentage. Those who think that are misinformed.
I thought the percentage is directly related to the voltage left on the battery. So how could any stats affect that?
xopher.hunter said:
Next time someone complains about battery life I'm gonna tell em to order an epic touch battery, its really the only way
Sent from my SPH-D700 using xda premium
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Look out! Here comes the Peanut Gallery! But seriously, my point was that most people don't stop and think for even a second that their battery might be the problem. If you have a 2 year old battery that you've put through the ringer and it you are getting ****ty battery life, you should quit being a cheap ass and buy a new battery. The Epic Touch battery is $18 on Amazon and a 20% increase in capacity. Kind of a no brainer. Unless you're a cheap ass. Or slow. Or you think that wiping a binary file will magically fix it. Or you're a cheap ass.

[Guide] Calibrating battery

I found a guide somewhere on the internet on the best way to calibrate battery stats on a rooted device when I had my old hero and I use it a lot to this day so I decided to share the best way to do it here. If there is in fact a thread about this already in our forums I apologize but I could not find one. So here it is.
Step 1.
First and foremost charge the phone to 100%(Even if it says 100% wait about 5 minutes or so just be sure.)
Step 2.
Once it is at 100% go into data/system (using root explorer) and delete the batterystats.bin file there.
Step 3.
Unplug the charger and reboot to recovery, wipe cache and dalvik cache and wipe battery stats once more while you're there just to make sure they're gone.
Step 4.
Power the phone down and plug it back in. Charge it to 100% while it's off (the battery bar can be deceiving so even once it shows it's full give it five more minutes or so to be sure) and then power up.
*As a side note, if you are using stock kernel, or a kernel without the 100% battery mod then your only going to be at 96%. Thanks to Glennkaonang for reminding me of this.
Once it is booted to the OS you should now see that the battery bar is at 100%. (please note that when it's going through the "Android is upgrading" thing it can take 1 or 2% off the battery if you have lots of apps)
Final step.
Wait for the phone to die completely (to where it shuts off on its own) and let it charge to 100% while the phone is off and power it back up. Do this step at least two or three times.
After that you should have a fully calibrated battery and have no more messed up battery reporting.
Photo of my average battery life just for fun.
Everybody enjoy! If this helped you please hit thanks!
*Thanks to whoever it was that wrote this up in the first place. If I knew who it was I would give proper thanks.
Sent from my Nexus S 4G using xda premium
Unless my batt % reporting goes wonky between reboots, I don't ever wipe stats. It doesn't necessarily increase your battery life, but it does appear to fix incorrect reporting.
Sent from my Nexus S
Wipe batterystats and fix permissions working well after each kernel change but I will give a try.
GideonX said:
Unless my batt % reporting goes wonky between reboots, I don't ever wipe stats. It doesn't necessarily increase your battery life, but it does appear to fix incorrect reporting.
Sent from my Nexus S
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I didn't think it would improve battery life either but it does. Maybe not a HUGE amount but it definitely does help a little. Plus it will give you the correct percentage rather than showing 100% when it's really only 95%. Lol. Anyways, to each their own.
Sent from my Nexus S 4G using xda premium
It thought someone from Google talked about this before and how it's unnecessary?
doa4ever said:
Wipe batterystats and fix permissions working well after each kernel change but I will give a try.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah this is kind of a more in depth way of doing it and it seems to help a bit more.
Sent from my Nexus S 4G using xda premium
Charge it to 100% while it's off (the battery bar can be deceiving so even once it shows it's full give it five more minutes or so to be sure) and then power up.
It's not work on my phone
tuansyaz said:
Charge it to 100% while it's off (the battery bar can be deceiving so even once it shows it's full give it five more minutes or so to be sure) and then power up.
It's not work on my phone
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Maybe it's not working on your phone because you're using the stock kernel which doesn't have a Battery Life Extender cosmetic MOD.
It's just cosmetic, actually it's still the same 96% as all other Android devices do.
CMIIW
glennkaonang said:
Maybe it's not working on your phone because you're using the stock kernel which doesn't have a Battery Life Extender cosmetic MOD.
It's just cosmetic, actually it's still the same 96% as all other Android devices do.
CMIIW
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's pretty much what I was going to say. Lol. I need to add that to the OP.
Sent from my Nexus S 4G using xda premium
This doesn't do anything other than fix incorrect battery logging, it DOES NOT increase battery life in any way.
Not even a tiny bit. Nada. Zip. Zero.
Dianne hackborne covered this on Google+ and said repeatedly that it doesn't extend battery life in the slightest. She would know as she wrote the code I believe.
Placebo effect in operation here. Plain and simple.
Thanks a bunch.
mabry said:
Thanks a bunch.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You're very welcome.
Sent from my Nexus S 4G using xda premium
Why do you insist on bumping this? No new information has been uncovered, nothing has changed.
The only reason I can think of is that you are looking to stock up on thanks.
I did this before I even found this thread, save for I use a Battery Calibration app from the market instead of deleting the .bin file. (App does it for me.)
This was the result.
Word.
Great guide! I haven't saw a calibrating guide either. I think it should be sticky!
Joshhayes801 said:
Why do you insist on trolling my stuff? Maybe you should spend your time doing something useful instead of wasting it on something that obviously doesn't matter to you. I bump it so new users can see it. If you don't like it, don't look at it. :thumbup:
Sent from my Nexus S 4G using xda premium
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I wasn't trying to troll your stuff. I appreciate that somebody created this guide (albeit now proved to be ineffective/useless) as an informative resource for others. That being said, this information is easily found everywhere, especially with search.
Please understand, if everybody bumped a thread they created every few days because they thought it was useful, nothing new would ever show up on the first page of the forum. It would be the same threads appearing over and over.
I wasn't trying to offend you, I just think that bumping dying/dead threads is counter intuitive to growing this forum community.
Thank you.
It is in a sense misinformation though. It doesn't calibrate the battery, merely wipes androids battery usage statistics, which are only for reference to the user not the system.
Although included, the only pseudo calibration is charge fully, discharge fully then charge fully. This process wipes battery stats anyway.
rhanks
Sent from my Nexus S
gear.h34d.2012 said:
I did this before I even found this thread, save for I use a Battery Calibration app from the market instead of deleting the .bin file. (App does it for me.)
This was the result.
Word.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have never calibrated my battery and get almost exactly the same battery life as what you are getting. All this does is wipe the stats.
____________________
Just Flash It !!!

How to Optimize battery drain?

Hello,
I use Tytung's ICS 4.0.4 for my T-Mobile HTC HD2 (NAND), I've been using this ROM for months.
As such there is no problem with functioning of the ROM.
But my battery drains at a very fast rate. With 6hrs of use it drains to 20% at lowest brightness and no major applications running (2 applications in background at most).
Data enabled (2G).
What to do? Please help!!
Sent from my T-Mobile HTC HD2 using XDA Premium.
Can you download CurrentWidget from the Play store and give a value in mA? If you mean 6hrs without any usage then that's pretty poor. Try turning on airplane mode to determine whether it's an app or one of your connections that's causing the problem.
In currentwidget, the values should be approximately 4mA drain in standby with any connections enabled and 2mA in standby in airplane mode. Screen on drain varies a lot more.
OK, thanks. will revert back soon.
With screen OFF, networks ON, 2g enabled....drain is 6mA.
With screen OFF, airplane mode ...drain is 5mA.
Sent from my T-Mobile HTC HD2 using XDA Premium.
That's high but shouldn't be causing a drain of 20% in 6 hours. It's probably just draining a lot when you're using the phone, and there's not much you can do other than turning the brightness down which you've done already.
try wiping battery stats through recovery...fully charge your battery then wipe stats and let your battery to get fully discharge before you connect it to a charger for about a week...My battery never lasted more than a half day before doing this...now it lasts more than a day...Hope this works
Okz.. will try this..hope this works.
Sent from my T-Mobile HTC HD2 using XDA Premium.
eliaskammas said:
try wiping battery stats through recovery...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I wonder if this myth will ever die..
Google engineer Dianne Hackberry has talked about several myths about the Android operating system, including wiping battery stats.
The reasoning behind that piece of advice was something like this: If you, at some point, did not charge your Android device fully (for example, only to 80%), it would supposedly remember that battery level as “fully charged” – in this case, you’d only ever get to use 80% of your battery, which is of course less than optimal. So, if you wipe the battery stats, usually done in ClockWord Mod Recovery, the device would “forget” the previous level, here 80%, and instead charge to the full 100% once again, thereby re-calibrating the battery. Or, as Hackborn puts it in more technical terms:
The battery indicator in the status/notification bar is a reflection of the batterystats.bin file in the data/system/ directory.
However, as she explains, that’s not the case. Because those battery stats, stored in the batterystats.bin file, are only used to maintain information about what is using the battery when not recharging. That is, it essentially holds the information displayed in the Settings > Battery screen. Nothing more, nothing less. Thus:
It has no impact on the current battery level shown to you.
It has no impact on your battery life.
What’s more, you’ve probably noticed that the battery usage data is reset once you recharge your device anyway. From this you can correctly deduce that the battery stats are wiped as well – every time your device is recharged. More or less every day. If there was any effect, you would’ve noticed it without going into recovery and doing that stuff. Typical placebo, eh?
---
I’m as confused as a baby in a topless bar...
^Whenever someone asks 'how do I reduce my battery drain', ten people immediately jump in with 'CALIBRATE!!11oneeleven!'. No hate directed at whoever posted that advice here, I understand how easy it is to be misinformed (as I was about using SetCPU ), I just think that rumours like this are too easily presented as facts.
NYLimited said:
I wonder if this myth will ever die..
Google engineer Dianne Hackberry has talked about several myths about the Android operating system, including wiping battery stats.
The reasoning behind that piece of advice was something like this: If you, at some point, did not charge your Android device fully (for example, only to 80%), it would supposedly remember that battery level as “fully charged” – in this case, you’d only ever get to use 80% of your battery, which is of course less than optimal. So, if you wipe the battery stats, usually done in ClockWord Mod Recovery, the device would “forget” the previous level, here 80%, and instead charge to the full 100% once again, thereby re-calibrating the battery. Or, as Hackborn puts it in more technical terms:
The battery indicator in the status/notification bar is a reflection of the batterystats.bin file in the data/system/ directory.
However, as she explains, that’s not the case. Because those battery stats, stored in the batterystats.bin file, are only used to maintain information about what is using the battery when not recharging. That is, it essentially holds the information displayed in the Settings > Battery screen. Nothing more, nothing less. Thus:
It has no impact on the current battery level shown to you.
It has no impact on your battery life.
What’s more, you’ve probably noticed that the battery usage data is reset once you recharge your device anyway. From this you can correctly deduce that the battery stats are wiped as well – every time your device is recharged. More or less every day. If there was any effect, you would’ve noticed it without going into recovery and doing that stuff. Typical placebo, eh?
---
I’m as confused as a baby in a topless bar...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
LOL i was just gonna post but ya beat me to it
i will just add the link to the xda news post about it
http://www.xda-developers.com/andro...-battery-stats-does-not-improve-battery-life/
Nigeldg said:
^Whenever someone asks 'how do I reduce my battery drain', ten people immediately jump in with 'CALIBRATE!!11oneeleven!'. No hate directed at whoever posted that advice here, I understand how easy it is to be misinformed (as I was about using SetCPU ), I just think that rumours like this are too easily presented as facts.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
And I shall not tell you how many times I did erase that bloody file before I too learned the truth. :crying:
Kameirus said:
LOL i was just gonna post but ya beat me to it
i will just add the link to the xda news post about it
http://www.xda-developers.com/andro...-battery-stats-does-not-improve-battery-life/
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Want me to go back and erase it for ya? No biggie...
Lol...
When one doesn't know a thing, he can be easily fooled about it.
Anyways ...Learnt something new today... :thumbup:
Thank you everyone.
Sent from my T-Mobile HTC HD2 using XDA Premium.
NYLimited said:
Want me to go back and erase it for ya? No biggie...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
LMAO no
sonalikagaur said:
When one doesn't know a thing, he can be easily fooled about it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
As I said to Nigeldg in an earlier post:
NYLimited said:
And I shall not tell you how many times I did erase that bloody file before I too learned the truth. :crying:
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
sonalikagaur said:
Anyways ...Learnt something new today... :thumbup:
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
And that is all that's important.
to sonalikagaur....
obviously as the guys say don't bother trying my advice
to everyone...
at least now I know not to tell anyone about battery stats again...but now there is a wonder in my head...what made my battery last longer than it did before? I wasn't kidding that it lasts half a day longer than before...obviously battery stats didn't make the job...what did.? :-/
eliaskammas said:
to sonalikagaur....
obviously as the guys say don't bother trying my advice
to everyone...
at least now I know not to tell anyone about battery stats again...but now there is a wonder in my head...what made my battery last longer than it did before? I wasn't kidding that it lasts half a day longer than before...obviously battery stats didn't make the job...what did.? :-/
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I found out something.... usually I used to keep my 2G ON the whole day...but when I switched my data OFF when not in use...my 6hrs...20% battery remaining changed to 8hrs..n 75% remaining.
That's a huge difference.
Can anyone suggest a good app for this? Switching my data OFF automatically when not in use .!!
Sent from my T-Mobile HTC HD2 using XDA Premium.
I think Juice Defender has this functionality built in.
sonalikagaur said:
I found out something.... usually I used to keep my 2G ON the whole day...but when I switched my data OFF when not in use...my 6hrs...20% battery remaining changed to 8hrs..n 75% remaining.
That's a huge difference.
Can anyone suggest a good app for this? Switching my data OFF automatically when not in use .!!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I would guess that many so called "battery saver" apps might have it, not really sure.
I don't turn off data when not in use automatically but I do use Tasker to turn it off for several hours while I sleep.
NYLimited said:
I would guess that many so called "battery saver" apps might have it, not really sure.
I don't turn off data when not in use automatically but I do use Tasker to turn it off for several hours while I sleep.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah Tasker can do this but it's a paid app. Juice Defender is free and can also do the same thing in this case. I agree that Tasker is awesome but not necessarily for saving battery, more for ease of use.
Nigeldg said:
^Whenever someone asks 'how do I reduce my battery drain', ten people immediately jump in with 'CALIBRATE!!11oneeleven!'. No hate directed at whoever posted that advice here, I understand how easy it is to be misinformed (as I was about using SetCPU ), I just think that rumours like this are too easily presented as facts.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Could your go into more detail about you're previous misinformation about SetCPU?
Sent from my ZeJstersHD2 using xda premium

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