Pathetic battery life on Mint 14

[markownikov]

I'm getting 40-60 mins on a 100% charge on my Mint 14. On windows I easily get 2-3 hours minimum. I'm on an HP 6121tx laptop.

I tried to install Jupiter and switched to Power Saving mode, but it had no effect.
The 'aticonfig --pxl' command shows this:

Code: Select all

PowerXpress: Integrated GPU is active (Power-Saving mode).


So my discrete GPU is not active and isn't the culprit.

Please help me debug this, I need at least 90 minutes of battery for this installation to make any sense.

[meowzers]

I too, have noticed this. Did you ever figure out what was wrong with it? My battery seems to drain a whole lot faster with Linux MInt 14, than with WIndows 7.

[JarHead]

I'm with you also. I'm clueless on how to fix. Let me know if you folks find a fix.

[ve7oko]

Also experiencing very poor battery life with LM14 Mate.
Seriously considering dumping it altogether.
So sad...

[cchase88]

Also experiencing very poor battery life with LM14 Mate.
Seriously considering dumping it altogether.
So sad...

I'm also experiencing dramatic battery loss, but I'm using Cinnamon. On Linux Mint 12 I was getting a good two hours worth of battery on my HP Pavillion dv6000, after upgrading to 14, I only get an hour at most.

[hogfan]

I'm still on Mint 13 here with backports repo enabled. Jupiter is working well for me on my Dell XPS 14z with Mint 13 Maya & Cinnamon 1.6. In my opinion, Jupiter shouldn't even be necessary. Apparently from what I've read, Windows power management is still leaps & bounds above Linux power management. I don't really understand why that is with all of the mobile devices running linux-based OS these day. From what I understand the power management issues are not with the specific distro, but lie within the Linux Kernel. If a resource hog like Windows can get 3 - 4 hrs of battery life, you would think Linux would be to get at least that. Power management is an area where Linux still falls short.

-hogfan

[RobertLM78]

I'm still on Mint 13 here with backports repo enabled. Jupiter is working well for me on my Dell XPS 14z with Mint 13 Maya & Cinnamon 1.6. In my opinion, Jupiter shouldn't even be necessary. Apparently from what I've read, Windows power management is still leaps & bounds above Linux power management. I don't really understand why that is with all of the mobile devices running linux-based OS these day. From what I understand the power management issues are not with the specific distro, but lie within the Linux Kernel. If a resource hog like Windows can get 3 - 4 hrs of battery life, you would think Linux would be to get at least that. Power management is an area where Linux still falls short.

-hogfan

This is precisely my understanding as well - although it does seem weird that it hasn't caught up yet. My laptop battery is a bit sketchy regardless of the kernel's power consumption, so I don't really worry about the issue, however (at least at this point - a new battery for the machine would change that) .

[bigj231]

When I was running a hybrid GPU laptop, I also had poor battery performance. Both GPUs would always be on full power, and that was the issue. This was a few years ago though.

[ve7oko]

Glad to hear I'm not the only one with the problem.
I've decided to dump Linux Mint and give the new Fuduntu a shot...one of their claims is 30% longer battery life (over what I have no idea).
I'll still monitor the LM forums in the hopes that the mucky-mucks figure out their problems.

[geopolisch]

I am also getting very very poor battery life compared to Win7.
I have also a dual GPU laptop: Asus UX32VD (integrated intel HD, pluse NVidia GPU).
Would like to see a solution for this. Current battery life is almost unusable.

[powerhouse]

If this is an issue with Nvidia Optimus technology (dual GPU), then perhaps http://bumblebee-project.org/ together with proprietary Nvidia drivers can help?

I don't think the kernel nor the open source nouveau driver can control the power consumption of a Nvidia graphics card. This is why the closed source Nvidia driver might help. I don't know if bumplebee addresses the power consumption issue, but it might well do it in conjunction with the Nvidia driver.

[ainan]

has anybody try to upgrade the kernel and find if it helps to prolong the battery life?