The official VAIO Z battery drain thread

So the verdict is: Before going to sleep: charge battery to 100%. Remove battery. Replace it when in need again = less/none leakage?

 

Perhaps we are just stumbling over semantics, but the ACPI spec, clearly refers to S4 as "Non-Volatile Sleep" state. This is because you can wake up the system from that state and restore the system to its prior operating context. Removing the battery does not alter the system context that is stored on the hard disk, since that is non-volatile storage. However, some devices, such as NIC's, may draw power in order to be able to wake the system.

It is true that S4 is much closer to G2/S5 (Soft Off) than to S3 (Suspend to RAM).

 

hmm, i think the battery hinges won't like this procedure. what could be the reasons for the drainage? any ideas?

 

Seriously, I visit this thread every single day and posted an experiment (similar to many others posted later) so all of us can somehow point out the problem. But nobody with a Z is testing this thing out!!! If you guys are going to waste time discussing then someone should spend time to nail down the problem. This is a discussion forums, not a public chatting place, time waster.

 

I posted in the other battery drain thread.

I shut down my z590, unplugged it, and went to sleep. roughly 24 hours later when i got back from work i turned it on and saw it had dropped from 100% to 89%.

I did the same thing last night, the only difference is i left the battery at 41% and will check to see what it will be tonight. I'm doing this to see if it's a problem because the battery was charged too much.

I plan on repeating these two methods with the battery removed from the laptop as well.

When we figure out what the exact cause of the problem is, we'll email/call sony and various blogs (engadget, gizmodo, etc.) to get the ****ing thing fixed.

 

I sent my Sony back on the 2nd day.
My hope that it can be fixed with software is rather low.

I do not believe, that Sony has not qualified their product under different conditions. Off mode is basic test, that it is mostlike in every test plan.

 

i guess it would just be the bios .. sony just need to update there bios ... battery drain issue extremely **** me off also..

 

Save your time on testing with 41% or less. The drain will be lower as the battery runs down, no doubt.

Here are my latest (and final) test results:

12 hours = 9% loss.
48 hours = 18% loss.
12 hours battery removed from Z = 3% loss

By comparison, my friends tested Lenovo T61, T400 and Dell Vostro.

T61 = 2% loss after 10 hours.
T400 = 1% loss after 10 hours.
Vostro = 2% loss after 12 hours.

So, the Z I have is defective, period.

If you have return privileges on your purchase, consider returning. Any hopes of SONY doing anything about it ever are very slim. They just recalled TZ's that could possibly burst into flames. This would be a "no big deal" to them, I am quite sure.

I agree.
This won't be a software fix, probably.
Something inside the unit is hot with the power off.

Not everything in the PC world can be fixed with a BIOS update. Maybe this can, but I doubt it. I would be happy to be wrong, however.

I started the thread, have tried to keep it on topic, and avoid discussion of hibernation, etc. and have tested the issue about as much as I care to. There is little to no issue if a charged battery is removed from the Z, there is excessive drain if the battery sits in a Z that has been fully shutdown.

 

uhm. this isn't a good news then!

 

8-10% loss of battery is understandably frustrating, yes. But Its hardly a deal-breaker on the Z.. (I mean some of you above are acting like its end of the world!)

 

We are dealing with a battery loss of 400% to 500% more than a typical laptop.
I would say that it is certainly a deal-breaker, or at least a potential one.
Your opinion is, of course, your own.

 

although i dont have a Z, i have a TZ and experience a 5% drop in battery from a turn on after a full charge

 

I tested this starting at 50%, shut down and unplugged for 10 hours. I didn't remove the battery. I turned it back on (it configured some updates at the same time) and let the percentage stabilize 5 minutes after everything loaded. My percentage read 44%.

For me, the battery drain issue is not a big deal for me as I always plug-in my laptop to charge overnight. When I power down my laptop without AC power, it's usually only for an hour or two in which the drain is not as noticeable.

I guess for people who are used to having nearly no battery drain on other laptops, it's a big deal. However, this issue has been well-documented in these forums for other models: SZ, TZ, and SR. It shouldn't be a surprise that the Z has this issue although in my case, the drain didn't seem to be as bad as the reports given here. If this is a deal-breaker, then you can return it.

 

I need to decide in next few days if this is worth living with, being a much higher drain than any other manufacturer of notebook PC.

I am on the phone to SONY, trying to get to level 2 or higher support about this.

 

For what it's worth: My 3 year old asus also has battery drain, and it's high.

Good luck with contacting Sony. I've contacted Nixon as well.

 

who is Nixon? i've seen him before. is he with sony?

 

Yes he is one of our forum members who works at Sony.

 

seems to me like you all over reacting. I suppose it's a "big" deal, but it seems like the things you would have to do to adapt to the problem are not really that major. If you going to let sit for more than 48 hours turned off, take the battery out..seems simple enough....if you are going to let its sit for 24 hours, maybe plug it in while you get ready for the day..i mean really, aren't there more significant things to be worried about than your 10% battery life loss??

 

Not an over-reaction at all from me, the thread starter.

I like the Z a lot, and am simply deciding whether anyone can pinpoint the cause while I still have rights to return it to where it was purchased as an initial defect, which it is.

To do a true diagnosis, someone would have to have access to the Z's mainboard with the unit shutdown and the battery in, and use a meter or other tools to see which component on the mainboard was draining the charge.

I started contacting SONY, trying to get beyond basic support to someone that could be at this level.

Such a person would undoubtedly be in Japan, so difficult to contact.

Not an over-reaction, just a discussion like all others on any forum anywhere.

 

Many of the features that makes the Z attractive is predicated on it having longer battery life than other notebooks (e.g. switchable graphics, led screen, ddr3 ram, 25w cpu, etc). Having a 10% leakage of battery overnight seriously undermines these advantages.

Sure, 10% might just mean battery life will be 270mins instead of 300mins, but I think some of you are missing the point. Z owners pay such a high premium for such a small incremental increase in features. For instance, that extra 30 minutes may separate a notebook with switchable graphics from one that doesn't. I hope you all get where I'm going with this.

 

ufogeek reported a possible fix in the SR battery drain thread.

Discharge battery to 0% by just going into bios and letting it sit and shut off, then recharge.

Maybe this will also work for the Z.

 

Can anyone try this now?
I won't be able to start a test on this before this evening.

 

i also have the Battery Care Function enabled, if it makes any difference...

 

yep !! I did it !! the same problem !!

 

as a potential buyer I am interested in this as well. I think it's unacceptable for such a high costing and supposedly well design laptop.

Although I don't see that it would affect me that much.

1. If you are home you just plug it in.
2. if you are outside you just use it until the battery until is dead, then you return home at night and plug it in.
3. On an airplane you can plug it in or just use the battery, most flights are at most 10 hours long, and you are not gonna use it all the time. When you get to the terminal you charge it.
4. I am in the house and use it unplugged, before I got to bed I plug it in.


can anybody describe a situation in which you would leave it unplugged, with the battery charged for 12+ hours?

I agree though that IT IS a problem that should be addressed by sony.

 

It's not so much about the inconvenience as it is about principle. If you pay for a product that's defective, it's not the point whether the defect will affect you much or not--it's still a defective product. But to answer your question, it doesn't take 12+ hours for it to be a nuisance. Even 8 hours unplugged could have ~10% loss.

I'm trying to drain my battery as I type this. I'll report back tomorrow with results.

 

Who said its defective?

Maybe Sony utilizes an extraordinary battery-upkeep technology to keep battery down from 100% maxed.. to prolong life, I dunno but I am going to be optimistic..

 

Don't forget you can also remove the battery from the laptop > no drain.

 

let's wait on the results then. has anybody tried to call sony? someone mentioned it in a previous post.

 

Yeah but when you are traveling for example or carry it to school everyday, you don't want the battery connectors to be unprotected, because you have to remove your battery...
Dust comes in, and it is a hassle to carry the battery separated from the laptop!

It is just annoying as hell to always remove the battery every time...
Other manufacturers don't seem to have this issue, so why doesn't Sony try to fix it?

 

I just spoke to a "Level 2" support person at SONY, a total joke.
She tried to tell me that the battery performed "certain functions" with the notebook powered off!!

I asked her if she had ever heard of CMOS batteries on the motherboard?

Surprise! She didn't know anything about them!!

So, for anyone hoping to work for a fix through SONY's support number or email, save your time. Either live with it, return it if you can or want to, or don't buy one.

I wasn't aware until just now that the new SR has the same issue.

 

Have you looked into the new Dell e4300? If battery is a big concern for you it comes with a 3 cell or 6 cell primary battery, but also you can use a battery slice on top of that. (Or the CD/DVD rom, or a blank insert to save weight.)

I've been comparing, and since the campus deal went away I am definitely going to think hard about which as once configured they end up about the same cost. (For me, Sony is winning, but ... I know I can plug in 95% of the time I'd want to it, so..)

 

Hi.

I don't have a Sony, but i was interested in this battery problem, I am getting a Toshiba A300D and in the manual it says that you can select in the BIOS whether to have the USB ports powered when the laptop is switched off to charge cell phones and the like, I suppose this will use some power but i dont think it would be much.

Have you eliminated this possibility!

 

I did notice that when my SR was in standby, that my USB DAC was still receiving power from the USB port, so that is definitely a possibility. I don't remember what happens when the SR is completely shut down. Unfortunately, if I recall the BIOS is extremely limited and I don't remember anything exciting to be found in the BIOS.

 

If I were a sony owner I would keep busting sony's balls. If a lot of people call or email they gotta do something. If it's just one guy, then it's not an issue for them.

 

hi, do you mean you fixed it or you have the same problem? for me, i think the drain fixed the issue but i am still not sure yet. waiting for others to try before i call sony for an official fix.

 

i mean i have the same problem !!

 

The problem is that you can't reach anyone high up enough in SONY support to really bring it to their attention. The "Level 2" person I spoke to today was a joke, and I had to really push to get transferred to her. I don't know any way to get to a higher level. Email support questions are answered by people who send you automated replies and links to online SONY documents. I am simply deciding if I want to live with the issue or not.

One user hear said it didn't help, i will know by late tomorrow morning and will post then.

As can I. The issue is if you have it charged up and packed for travel, etc. since you shouldn't have to keep it plugged in until 5 minutes before you go out the door. Even then, it will start losing its charge 4 to 5 times faster than other notebooks the minute that you do go out the door.

If it is totally shut down, there should be no USB drain. There are no BIOS settings for USB standby on the Z. Also, with a total shutdown, VISTA is in no way active.

 

could it just be that the start-up procedure for some reason drains a LOT of power?
to who has tried: what OS, is it the same behavior for vista, XP and linux?

tonight I am gonna try with my asus. I wanna have a laugh tomorrow morning
it's 2 years old.

 

I have tested one other XP notebook (Dell) and two other VISTA (Lenovo) notebooks. 10-12 hours with a 1% to 2% loss each. Nothing compared to my 9% in 7 to 8 hours, or the 18% in 48 hours. The loss will start to slow down as the battery becomes less and less charged, of course.

If you want to test without the shutdown or start-up drain, just modify the test procedure as follows:

1.) Charge the battery to 100%
2.) Shut VISTA down
3.) Immediately pull the a/c adapter when lights go off
4.) Wait at least 8 hours
5.) Plug in a/c adapter and immediately power on
6.) Check battery percentage

You will find that it is less of a percentage of loss, but still much higher than the 1% to 2% that we got with Lenovo and Dell tests, and the shutdown and start-ups that were done on these other 3 notebooks were all done without a/c adapter with the original test instructions I posted.

 

sry to ur laptop, my one is not as bad as urs, only gone 10% or less after over nite

 

Mine is 8% to 9% after 8 hours overnight. How is your 10% not as bad?

 

.............. i didnt think too much about the problem, hehehe

aamsel: do u think i should do sth to fix that? ask for RMA # or contact with sony local store? but i dnt think them will file exchange for me.

anyway, cheer up~! z is great laptop though, besides to drain alot. lol

 

To each their own, I just got my Z590 and after playing with it all day I am in so love with it, it does everything I need it for superbly and just perfect for my needs. I am always near an outlet and dont need the thing running all day long constantly anyway so the 5-10% drain (which I will notice tomorow morning) does not bother me..

Overall its form and function balance each other and it has exhilerating performance considering its size and weight (looks good, too)

 

Any comments from Nixon ?

 

I'm glad you're also enjoying your Z. I haven't (yet) noticed any battery drain issue with mine, but then I haven't been looking for one.
I think the only time I'd be annoyed was if I had left it unplugged for a week or two and came back to find it totally out of juice.

I totally agree re: performance, form and function. It's a really nice machine to work on.

 

aamsel: I was talking about testing different OS on the same laptop, the Z in this case. not on different laptops.

my asus, with a 2 year-old battery only drained 3% after the startup was completed.

 

Just a little hint for the ones looking for a way to see the actual drain over time and not the drain over time + the required boot up drain:

With the battery care function the battery will not be charged unless it gets under 80% or 50% of charge, so enable battery care, shut down, unplug it, leave it for 8hours, put the power cord back in, boot it up and control the charging level.
This also works when the laptop is shut off, because its somehow programmed into the battery or the bios I think....

 

I had to use the computer earlier today and was only able to test for 6 hours.

Zero drain so far.

I will try for 10 hours tonight.

 

I am not willing to try other OS's on the Z, because two quite new Lenovo's drained 1% and 2% with VISTA and XP in just under 12 hours as did a Dell with XP drain 2% in 12 hours. Since the lowest drain was recorded by a VISTA machine, I will conclude that OS has nothing to do with it. Also, since I have just tried ufogeek's "fix" draining the battery completely while in CMOS, then recharging to 100% without ever loading VISTA, again, the OS has been taken out of play. The fix offered by ufogeek did not make any difference in drain. I spent the past 24 hours testing it.

I agree, that is the main annoyance. You can't have it in a case ready to go with you for occasional outings without having it plugged into the wall until the minute you go out the door. I also agree, it is otherwise a great machine.

The battery care function limits the total drain, but has nothing to do with the battery leakage discussion going on here, I don't believe, it just tries to limit the worst-case scenario for loss. It would need to be tested and reported in another thread as to its value, if any.