"SOLVED" Laptop Battery life

They say that "If you want the Ultimate - you have to be willing to pay the Ultimate price" - Point Break.

I am beginning to feel that I am paying the ultimate price for my Zorin 12 Ultimate edition dreams. Also, I am prepared to do this.


I have using Zorin 9 for several years now, been very happy and never experienced any issues.

Zorin 12 Ultimate? - well, as you can see from the number of times I have contacted you, I have found a few issues. Thanks to your help, however, they are being progressively resolved. Keep up the good work - everything will be perfect soon!


My latest problem, which in fact started as soon as I started running Zorin 12 Ultimate, is battery life.

In anticipation of Zorin 12's release, I purchased an expensive (£700), Linux specific laptop - an Entroware Kratos 1000

Specification:

Entroware Notebook (Laptop); Model: Kratos 1000; CPU: Intel Core i5 6300HQ 2.3 GHz (4 cores); (RAM): 8GB DDR3 1600MHz; Hard Drive partitioning - automatic; Graphics: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 940M 2GB; WiFi: Intel AC-8260 WiFi; No Zorin 12 Ultimate Live first - checked first by Entroware running Ubuntu 16.04 LTS; Running Zorin 12 Ultimate O/S.

I charged the battery fully before installing Zorin 12 Ultimate.

What I have found, from day one - even if I ran the session on mains power (full battery) and then disconnected the mains power after shutdown - if I leave my session by closing the laptop lid, - just as I do on my cheap Toshiba laptop, running Zorin 9 - the Kratos laptop battery is flat when I return in two days or so (my Toshiba laptop would last 5-7 days, now it is several years old).


Therefore:

A. What mode is the laptop put into when I close the lid? - I have not altered any settings.

B. What alternate modes are there?

C. What is running to create this substantial drain of power?

D. How can I get the sort of closed lid battery life I have experienced with Zorin 9?


Thanks for your help, F.P.

I think I posted this elsewhere already:

http://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2016/04/impr ... life-linux

Thanks for the suggestions, Swarf, I will try them as necessary.


Since my original posts, I have conducted some back to back tests:

Using the mains chargers, I fully charged my Kratos 1000, running Zorin 12 Ultimate and Toshiba Satellite-C50-A laptop running Zorin 9, then closed the lids on both - it was in the evening.

I forgot to check next evening, but on the morning after (i.e. 1 1/2 days later) the Kratos 1000 blinking light had gone (flat battery), but the Toshiba Satellite's light was still flashing.

When I opened the lid on the Toshiba Satellite half a day later (i.e. after two days) the battery charge was shown as 70% remaining.

As my Kratos 1000 battery is far bigger than on my three year old Toshiba, on the surface it seems as though Zorin 12 Ultimate uses considerably more juice - even when nominally in suspend.


I thought that for reference, in case there is some explanation obvious to others, I should note my Zorin 12 Ultimate power and other settings first in case they are relevant. They are (after charging up my new laptop, which had shut down due to low battery) :

Power:

Screen brightness 70%

Dim screen when inactive ON

Blank screen Never

WiFi OFF

Mobile broadband OFF

Bluetooth ON

Automatic suspend On


Privacy

Screen Lock OFF (N.B. it still comes on - you have offered a workaround)

Usage and history On

Purge wastebasket & temp files On

Location services OFF


Mouse and touchpad

Primary button Left

Double click Middle of range


Mouse

Pointer speed Middle of range


Touchpad ON

0 Two finger scroll 0 Natural scrolling


In the meantime, I have been recommended by my laptop supplier, Entroware, to find the closed lid battery life running first Zorin 12 and then UltimateUbuntu16.04 live.

I now trying find out if the problem lies with Zorin 12 Ultimate or Ubuntu 16.04 - of course you would expect them both to be the same.

I tried running Ubuntu Live on the Kratos 1000 and repeating the lid closed test on the Kratos 1000 alone:

I downloaded Ubuntu 16.04 and put it onto a USB stick using startup disc creator on my Zorin 9 laptop.

I powered off Ubuntu 12 Ultimate, inserted the Ubuntu 16.04 live into the USB port, pressed the power button (expecting Ubuntu 16.04 Live to run) and found Zorin 12 Ultimate still running.

For reference, I loaded Zorin 12 Ultimate from a USB stick and every time that I have started the new Kratos 1000 laptop, running Zorin 12 Ultimate from a full power off with a USB stick in the USB port, the system Bios has been expecting an executable on the USB stick.

How do I get Ubuntu 16.04 Live to run, please, to continue my tests?


Best Wishes


Finston Pickle

Hi, I noticed you have Bluetooth on - that is one of the biggest issues and I would advise that you remove it from startup applications if present - it mentions bluetooth in that article I pointed you to. In respect of getting Ubuntu to run live, does this not work even if you make the usb stick the first bootable device either as one-time boot or change in BIOS?

Will switch off Bluetooth, thanks - can it really take so much power even when suspended?

Yes, I think that the laptop is set to boot off the USB before the hard disc - i.e. standard set up for an Entroware Laptop.

Alleluia! - the final straw of my Zorin 12 Ultimate install came when some dude broke into Slimjet, my browser, offering to make me a millionaire (uncommanded by me and something that Linux was supposed to protect me from) - I decided to ditch the build and throw away all the hours spent carefully making the changes that you have helped me with.

I was on the point of reverting everything back to Zorin 9, as set up on my older Toshiba laptop, by using my Zorin 9 install DVD and then using backup to install my settings (Would this have worked, I still wonder?).

On impulse, I tried my third install of Zorin 12 Ultimate - using a DVD prepared on my Toshiba laptop (the first install, by DVD, had failed on install and the second, via USB stick, was the one I have had trouble with.

Hey Presto! After install and restart, my new Entroware, Kratos 1000 laptop suspended on lid close - just like it always should have done, flashing light and all! I have still got to resolve my issue with my networked printer and will follow this up in the thread I raised to resolve my printer issues.

So, thanks for all the help and suggestions that have been made to help me and I take back all my comments about Zorin 12 Ultimate power management.

I still have to work carefully through setting the Kratos up to suit my needs, but I did want to use the latest Linux kernel and Zorin 12 and that is what I am doing. Please mark this thread closed.