[SumthinNew]

playbook=5 days old
batt health=95%
recharge count=2
charger type=regular

[nova_8]

Hi
if i do a security wipe and install battery guru, will it show recharges after the wipe or the total since i bought the pb.

[wellard]

It's still a mystery, and I think you're the first other person to report observing something similar. Maybe with enough people aware of that, it could be tracked down.

I've experienced this too. A restart fixes it short term but within a day or so it happens again.

[peter9477]

Hi
if i do a security wipe and install battery guru, will it show recharges after the wipe or the total since i bought the pb.

I'm pretty sure (having done a wipe once myself) that the information is preserved across security wipes. I'd say I'm 95% sure of that.

Usually these sorts of batteries have small controller chips associated with them, which contain a small memory area that can store a handful of bytes. The recharge count information may be coming from there, or at least would be stored there even if it's calculated by the OS.

It's also possible that the information is just stored in the main flash in an area that is preserved across security wipes, but I really can't say.

[nova_8]

My battery health showed as 91% and 4 recharges yesterday.
TODAY it showed 93% and 5 recharges….I did not charge since yesterday. Is this app really working???? where did that extra charge count came???

I bought my pb from a friend and i have recharged like 3-4 times after a security wipe. 2 with wall charger and 2 with a usb to my mac. Am i missing something??? I'm sure my friend would have charged at least 5 times due to known issue of pb battery draining so fast.

if the app takes account all the charges it should show at least 10 recharge rite????

[peter9477]

My battery health showed as 91% and 4 recharges yesterday.
TODAY it showed 93% and 5 recharges�.I did not charge since yesterday. Is this app really working???? where did that extra charge count came???

I bought my pb from a friend and i have recharged like 3-4 times after a security wipe. 2 with wall charger and 2 with a usb to my mac. Am i missing something??? I'm sure my friend would have charged at least 5 times due to known issue of pb battery draining so fast.

if the app takes account all the charges it should show at least 10 recharge rite????

This is totally normal.

Note that the app, Battery Guru, reports only and exactly what the operating system reports.

A "recharge count" can really only be an approximation (as with many of those other values), since it's attempting to show you something that's useful, rather than merely how many times it was below 100% and you brought it back to 100%. If it counted something simplistic like that, for some users it would be counting up a few times a day, while for others it would never count up at all (some people never fully charge it).

I believe what they've done is used an algorithm that tries to approximate how many equivalent *full* discharge/recharge cycles you've done. If you discharge halfway, twice, that might count as (roughly) one cycle. If you discharge from 100% to 90% all the time, then recharge, I would expect it to take roughly 10 of those cycles before "recharge count" went up by one.

Also, because of that, the recharge count goes up at unexpected times, rather than only when you hit 100%. I've often seen it count up as I'm using the tablet down at, say, 65%.

Also, this information is poorly or not at all documented anywhere, so I've only been able to make my best guess based on experimentation and imagination... I could easily be wrong on how they do it. The fact is, it is whatever QNX decides it is, and until they document it we can only make assumptions.

The above (in shorter form) and more can be found through the app by selecting the link in the top-swipe menu, which will take you to this web page. There's a page under that one for each of our apps, with more detailed guidance, and a support email address if you have questions and want to ensure an answer (since I might not see them if posted here).

[peter9477]

@nova_8, one more thing: it occurs to me that the battery health may vary more in the early days of a battery than later on. Yours jumped from 91% to 93% on only the 5th recharge cycle... mine's been sitting fairly stable at 90-89% for several months.

I'd really appreciate having an "export" file zipped up and emailed to me from you or any other user who has been able to run Battery Guru a fair bit (or, heck, even only a few times) while their battery still had very few recharges on it. The data could be quite helpful to me in improving Battery Guru. Most helpful is if it's running all the time, so the log shows exactly when various values like recharge count and health change.

(Same request to anyone who experiences any sort of unusual jumps in any of those values. Perhaps over time I can add explanatory material in the app that will make some unusual behaviours more understandable. As it is, I simply don't have data from a wide enough user base (a half dozen devices so far) to do much in that area.)

Thanks for any data any of you can share!

[Bulldawg]

Any idea what could cause my battery health to drop 7% in two days? I've hardly used it in the past two days, and on 9/23, battery health was 89%. On 9/25, 82%. No other readings in between, just changed from 89% to 82%.

Seems like something must be wrong with the meter for it to jump so dramatically. I have had very erratic reading for the past week or so, especially overnight on standby, the battery percentage would jump around quite a bit.

[peter9477]

Any idea what could cause my battery health to drop 7% in two days? I've hardly used it in the past two days, and on 9/23, battery health was 89%. On 9/25, 82%. No other readings in between, just changed from 89% to 82%.

Seems like something must be wrong with the meter for it to jump so dramatically. I have had very erratic reading for the past week or so, especially overnight on standby, the battery percentage would jump around quite a bit.

Sounds similar to what user wellard reported with his first unit. Search for some of his posts. I believe a few weeks ago he reported using the info from Battery Guru to assist in getting an RMA from RIM and a replacement unit, which has (I believe) worked flawlessly, without the problems of the original.

If you'd like, continue using it for a few days, being sure to run Battery Guru continuously during that time. Try to use it actively and, if possible, drain it down to near 0% once or twice, then charge fully. Do an "export" and send me the resulting CSV file and I'll look it over and see what I can tell from it. It's quite possible I'll see signs similar to what was in his data (I've got his export files for comparison), in which case your course will probably be clear.

[peter9477]

I actually just had a similar jump in battery health today.

Mine's been stable at 89% for weeks. Today I noticed it said 83%. I think it was when I first woke it up this morning, but not sure. Haven't checked my Battery Guru export data yet.

A while later, after I happened to have it on the rapid charger once or twice, it was showing 89% again.

No big deal, but clearly even a "known good" unit (mine's been basically flawless) can show such jumps. As I've said before, it seems clear the software involved in maintaining these battery properties still needs a bit of work done on it to be rock solid.

(Edit: I've done 117 recharges to date, by the way.)

[iConnor]

My PlayBook has done this aswell. When i got it back (RMA) it was on 88%, then that dropped to 83% & now its gone up to 91%. I'm on 23 recharge count.

[wellard]

Sounds similar to what user wellard reported with his first unit. Search for some of his posts. I believe a few weeks ago he reported using the info from Battery Guru to assist in getting an RMA from RIM and a replacement unit, which has (I believe) worked flawlessly, without the problems of the original.

Just to confirm, my replacement unit has been perfect. Battery Guru was the first app I installed to help keep an eye on possible issues. To date it's had 45 recharges and the health is at 90%.

Problems to look for include: Sudden voltage increase or decrease, intermittent charging i.e. Lightening bolt symbol changing to plug symbol in rapid succession, sudden battery health drop, shutting off without warning between 10-20% remaining charge. Mine would never run down to 0%, the new unit will run for approx 40 minutes at 0%, not sure if this is another issue though.

The attached image (from Battry Guru) shows the state of my original PB. Look at the fluctuating percentage and just before this happened the health was 91%. After about 2 days it worked perfectly for a week then went crazy again and eventually wouldn't work unless plugged in. Tech support excepted my word when I gave them these figures, I also sent this image with my faulty unit.

[Bulldawg]

Wow, that is nothing like what I'm seeing. Mine fluctuates about 3-5% at times. You were fluctuating like crazy.

As an update, I've drained the battery and recharged twice now. I'm back to 89% health. Chalk this up to a random event. The battery seems fine, and always has.

I always get between 20 minutes and 2 hours on 0%. I don't think 40 minutes on 0% is out of line.

[peter9477]

On the topic of the "duration on 0%" thing, by the way, I'm pretty sure it's all about what sort of load you have on it at the time, and whether there's any "spikes" in the load. Basically, if it sees the battery hit 3.4V for more than a very brief moment, I believe it says "okay, everyone out of the water!" and shuts you down to protect the battery.

I was able to run for 4-5 hours once after hitting 0%, by running my White Noise app in standby. That takes only about 0.3W or so. Another time, once it hit 0% I immediately fired up a video and cranked the sound, and I seem to recall I lasted only about 5 minutes. That sort of correlation between duration and load has been pretty consistent in my non-scientific experimentation with that phenomenon.

[koolkid15]

battery health? 92%
how long youve had the playbook? 2 days
how many recharge count? 1
use rapid charger? no
should i be worried? yes? :/

[peter9477]

battery health? 92%
how long youve had the playbook? 2 days
should i be worried? yes? :/

If you mean worried about having 92% with a basically new battery, I would say don't worry, at least not yet.

For one thing, the initial reading is based on only one or two recharge cycles, if that, so it could easily go up after a few more readings. I expect 92% is well within the 90th percentile range for new units.

For another thing, new batteries "never" have 100% health. (Quoted because some probably do, though I'd suspect it's only through inaccurate measurements. Emphasized because it's effectively not possible for the batteries to have the full capacity labelled on them... some basic physics likely prevents it.)

If your health reading drops precipitously (say, below the high 80s) in the next few weeks, and stays low or drops steadily, then I'd be worried. If it just hovers in the low 90s or high 80s, just roll with it, and maybe report back here in a month or two.

[koolkid15]

alright thanks for the reply, I will report back in a month or so.
also, is it normal that I'm losing around 15-20% per hour from constant internet browsing?

[peter9477]

alright thanks for the reply, I will report back in a month or so.
also, is it normal that I'm losing around 15-20% per hour from constant internet browsing?

With an approximately 18Wh (at 90% health) battery capacity, 15% would mean using about 2.7W continuously, and 20% would mean using 3.6W continuously. The latter seems a bit high. To be honest, though, I haven't really monitored my own average consumption while just browsing but I suspect that value is probably typical, especially if you happen to be viewing any videos in the pages you visit.

[alekza]

Health 90%,
Recharge Count:39.
Owned since July.

[nova_8]

i bought my second pb last week. installed battery guru and it shows battery charge count at 10 when in fact it is a new unit. i had the app installed in the 1st pb as well and the last battery count was 9. i'm assuming its a continuation from the 1st pb to my 2nd as i'm using the same bb id???

and also i had battery health drop from 98% to 73% and been stable at 73% for two days. Is there anything to worry about since its a new unit? i've tried shutting it down and also restarted twice to check but the battery health still stable at 73%…checked the csv file and it shows the highest temp at 37.

also i noticed the 1st pb was flat at the logo no heating issues, the second pb has a bulge at the logo which i only noticed yesterday it squishes in when i apply little pressure

anything to worry?i'm still in time frame to do an exchange for the second pb.

[peter9477]

i bought my second pb last week. installed battery guru and it shows battery charge count at 10 when in fact it is a new unit. i had the app installed in the 1st pb as well and the last battery count was 9. i'm assuming its a continuation from the 1st pb to my 2nd as i'm using the same bb id???

No, that shouldn't affect it. The information is not associated with your BBID, but is stored in the tablet (right in the battery controller, likely) and moves with it.

Basically this suggests that your two units, or perhaps just their batteries, have been "used". This might be benign: could simply be the result of testing. It does seem a bit odd, however, and while I wouldn't return a unit merely for having an initial count greater than 0 or 1, it might be a warning sign if other things are wrong.

i had battery health drop from 98% to 73% and been stable at 73% for two days. Is there anything to worry about since its a new unit? i've tried shutting it down and also restarted twice to check but the battery health still stable at 73%�checked the csv file and it shows the highest temp at 37.

also i noticed the 1st pb was flat at the logo no heating issues, the second pb has a bulge at the logo which i only noticed yesterday it squishes in when i apply little pressure

My logo is the same, and it's never concerned me. Some people have reported here that they got RMAs and returned their devices merely because of the little bulge.

The only thing that does concern me some is the 73%. I think you should go through a full discharge (right to when it shuts itself off, under normal use) and recharge (right to when it stops showing that it is charging: Battery Guru would show power 0.00W and level 99-100%). Do that twice, with normal use if possible: don't just drain it by blasting a video with full volume, backlight, and such as that would change how effective this process is.

If after doing that a couple of times, and one or two additional days of use, it still reads 73%, I'd be concerned enough to ask for a replacement. As before, if you run Battery Guru during that entire time, I could help you analyze the results to support your request for a replacement.

At 73%, it means where I could run my unit at 2.5W (general use) for 7.2h, you could use it for 5.8h.

Just remember always that these values are merely calculations done by software, *estimates* of some real but hard-to-measure thing. What matters is not the number, but what is really going on. If your battery really gives 18Wh of use, then for now it's irrelevant what that health reading says. (I would hope that after 2.0 is installed, however, we can start to dispense with that caution, and start to trust the numbers.)

[anindoc]

battery health =91%
battery charge=11%
battery voltage=3.66 V
power=2.17 W
recharge counts= 5
days owned= 5days
charger= USB wall only


i am trying to do my second round of discharge right now, this time will drain it till complete shutoff, then do a complete recharge. will repost status again. Just wondering if you guys think the battery on my unit looks ok (have been using nonstop for the last 4 hours).... thanks.

[peter9477]

battery health =91%
recharge counts= 5
days owned= 5days

Nothing wrong there, and it's a bit soon to say anything else about it.

I did get your export file via email as well, and will look it over.

A note to you and any others who use the "export" feature: the output file generated has a filename showing the starting and ending time for the data in it. No need to keep or send multiple files if they all start with the same timestamp, as the last one will contain all the data of the earlier ones, and more.

(I realize that's not obvious... will make a note to clarify that in the docs and app some time.)

[koolkid15]

battery health =100%
recharge counts= 6
days owned= 1 day

I just bought a brand new playbook and installed battery guru right out of the box and it displayed the recharge count=6, what's wrong?

[peter9477]

@koolkid15, nothing's necessarily wrong.

It could have had that many recharges during testing.

Maybe the battery was used in one unit that was returned for an unrelated problem, and the battery was removed and used in a different unit.

The recharge count alone is not a sign of anything wrong... the health (after a few more recharge cycles) is what's really important, and whether the thing basically functions properly.

By the way, everyone who's got a new one should expect the health to drop to the low 90s within a few weeks (or days, or months). Don't be alarmed... it's fairly typical and expected for new batteries to drop a bit. If it drops, and keeps dropping, that's a different story.