Aura Aura One Battery Life: Is this normal?

terendel · 06-23-2017, 07:42 PM

I know that the Aura One is not known for stellar battery life, but mine seems particularly bad.

I've been tracking reading time since my last charge and I'm at about 8 1/2 hours reading time and 37% charge. (I remember that David Rothman on Teleread reported 15 hours on his Aura One, so I've been using that as a comparison.)

WiFi is off. 12% backlighting and auto lighting is off. 5 minute auto off. I rarely use the night lighting setting (mostly because I forget about it).

The battery percentage also does some pretty impressive drops. The last one was 49% to 37% in about 15 minutes. I know that battery indicators can be dodgy, but big drops like that happen just about every discharge cycle.

Is this normal, or do you think I have a bad unit? After my last experience with Kobo Customer Support, I don't want to go down that road unless I have to.

Am I missing something on battery management?

petercreasey · 06-23-2017, 08:26 PM

t, I would suggest that you not arrive at any decisions based on one charge cycle.

My KA1 (very rarely but) occasionally goes to zero over night then is fine on the next charge cycle.

If you decide it's acting up, try a factory reset.

. . . . Pete

terendel · 06-24-2017, 06:55 PM

Thank you. I realize I wasn't clear. I wasn't basing the battery life on one charge cycle. My impression since I got the KA1 was that the battery was lasting about 10 hours or less. This charge cycle I just decided to confirm it. I do tend to forget about the factory reset, so I'll give that a try.

Kendog · 06-24-2017, 09:41 PM

I feel that mine has a short battery life too. I switched one of the settings so that it goes to sleep and then shuts off. Am much happier. Takes a bit of time to turn it on but the battery lasts much longer now.

khashayar · 06-26-2017, 02:20 PM

Hi! I received my Aura one just a few days ago and the battery lasts no longer than a day. Surely, that can't be normal?

However, I have installed KSM and koreader (I'm a heavy reader of PDF:s and koreader is indispensable for that). Does anybody know if it might be KSM sucking juice in the background? As far as I understand, KSM keeps running in the background when nickel is used. To be clear, I see the same battery drain regardless of whether I'm on nickel or koreader.

Sir Loyne · 06-26-2017, 02:32 PM

Don't forget that when people rate e-reader batteries they usually include a note about being based on "30 minutes a day". When they say the Aura One battery last "up to one month" that means 15 hours total under the best conditions. Things like ambient room temperature can have small effects, and font size as bigger fonts need more page turns. Charge it to 100%, use it daily and keep a record of how long it takes to power off.

rashkae · 06-27-2017, 09:33 AM

8 Hours reading time in less than a week (you did not specify over how long you measured this 8 hours reading time.) does sound abnormally bad. I would consistently expect approx 20 hours.

If the time measured is over a month however, that would be reasonable. Remember that a device in sleep mode still consumes *some* power for the RAM.

tshering · 06-27-2017, 03:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by khashayar

Does anybody know if it might be KSM sucking juice in the background? As far as I understand, KSM keeps running in the background when nickel is used.

No, KSM is not sucking juice in the background. However, when KSM is in the foreground, its energy consumption is much higher than that of nickel. Generally, nickel has a much better power management than KSM (or KOReader). You can find some information in the first post of this thread.
According to some reports, nickel has currently a problem with draining the battery. Maybe you should try to switch off the device when you are not reading and see whether this helps, until Kobo releases a new update of its firmware.

khashayar · 06-27-2017, 03:16 PM

tshering, thanks so much for info and pointers! After some more usage, it does indeed seem like koreader/ksm are consuming more power than nickel.

I'll be experimenting some more!

khashayar · 06-28-2017, 11:39 AM

Alright, after some more intense reading/using the Kobo I can confirm what I understand from the thread linked above. In nickel battery usage is low. In Koreader battery drains fast while reading. One full day of reading PDFs and I need to charge. I'll keep an eye on that thread, hoping it'll be sorted out!

The more I use Koreader, the more I really like all the features it offers!

davidfor · 06-28-2017, 09:00 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by khashayar

Alright, after some more intense reading/using the Kobo I can confirm what I understand from the thread linked above. In nickel battery usage is low. In Koreader battery drains fast while reading. One full day of reading PDFs and I need to charge. I'll keep an eye on that thread, hoping it'll be sorted out!

The more I use Koreader, the more I really like all the features it offers!

If KOReader is the problem and you want to use it, then this thread is not for you. You need to go to the KOReader forum and see what is happening about fixing it there.

terendel · 06-30-2017, 09:07 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rashkae

8 Hours reading time in less than a week (you did not specify over how long you measured this 8 hours reading time.) does sound abnormally bad. I would consistently expect approx 20 hours.

If the time measured is over a month however, that would be reasonable. Remember that a device in sleep mode still consumes *some* power for the RAM.

That was over the course of six days, so downtime power drain wouldn't be much of an issue.

Darn. It's sounding like I may have issues. I'll do a factory reset over the long weekend and see if that makes a difference.

Lima7 · 07-14-2018, 10:03 PM

Hey! I know this is an old thread but I'm having the same problems with my H20 edition 2. Did you figure it out?

06-23-2017, 07:42 PM	#1
terendel Enthusiast Posts: 48 Karma: 248498 Join Date: May 2008 Device: Kobo Sage, Oasis 2	Aura One Battery Life: Is this normal? I know that the Aura One is not known for stellar battery life, but mine seems particularly bad. I've been tracking reading time since my last charge and I'm at about 8 1/2 hours reading time and 37% charge. (I remember that David Rothman on Teleread reported 15 hours on his Aura One, so I've been using that as a comparison.) WiFi is off. 12% backlighting and auto lighting is off. 5 minute auto off. I rarely use the night lighting setting (mostly because I forget about it). The battery percentage also does some pretty impressive drops. The last one was 49% to 37% in about 15 minutes. I know that battery indicators can be dodgy, but big drops like that happen just about every discharge cycle. Is this normal, or do you think I have a bad unit? After my last experience with Kobo Customer Support, I don't want to go down that road unless I have to. Am I missing something on battery management?

06-26-2017, 02:32 PM	#6
Sir Loyne Connoisseur Posts: 82 Karma: 5392 Join Date: Oct 2016 Device: Kobo Glo HD, Likebook Mars, Mobiscribe Wave B&W	Don't forget that when people rate e-reader batteries they usually include a note about being based on "30 minutes a day". When they say the Aura One battery last "up to one month" that means 15 hours total under the best conditions. Things like ambient room temperature can have small effects, and font size as bigger fonts need more page turns. Charge it to 100%, use it daily and keep a record of how long it takes to power off. Last edited by Sir Loyne; 06-26-2017 at 02:42 PM.

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06-23-2017, 08:26 PM	#2
petercreasey Wizard Posts: 1,188 Karma: 1119516 Join Date: Aug 2009 Device: Sony: PRS 950 & T1, Kobo: Aura One & Forma	t, I would suggest that you not arrive at any decisions based on one charge cycle. My KA1 (very rarely but) occasionally goes to zero over night then is fine on the next charge cycle. If you decide it's acting up, try a factory reset. . . . . Pete

06-24-2017, 06:55 PM	#3
terendel Enthusiast Posts: 48 Karma: 248498 Join Date: May 2008 Device: Kobo Sage, Oasis 2	Thank you. I realize I wasn't clear. I wasn't basing the battery life on one charge cycle. My impression since I got the KA1 was that the battery was lasting about 10 hours or less. This charge cycle I just decided to confirm it. I do tend to forget about the factory reset, so I'll give that a try.

06-24-2017, 09:41 PM	#4
Kendog Junior Member Posts: 1 Karma: 10 Join Date: Oct 2016 Device: Kobo Aura One	I feel that mine has a short battery life too. I switched one of the settings so that it goes to sleep and then shuts off. Am much happier. Takes a bit of time to turn it on but the battery lasts much longer now.

06-26-2017, 02:20 PM	#5
khashayar Junior Member Posts: 5 Karma: 10 Join Date: Jun 2017 Device: Kobo Aura One	Hi! I received my Aura one just a few days ago and the battery lasts no longer than a day. Surely, that can't be normal? However, I have installed KSM and koreader (I'm a heavy reader of PDF:s and koreader is indispensable for that). Does anybody know if it might be KSM sucking juice in the background? As far as I understand, KSM keeps running in the background when nickel is used. To be clear, I see the same battery drain regardless of whether I'm on nickel or koreader.

06-27-2017, 09:33 AM	#7
rashkae Wizard Posts: 1,274 Karma: 5935030 Join Date: Jun 2011 Location: Ontario, Canada Device: Kobo Aura HD	8 Hours reading time in less than a week (you did not specify over how long you measured this 8 hours reading time.) does sound abnormally bad. I would consistently expect approx 20 hours. If the time measured is over a month however, that would be reasonable. Remember that a device in sleep mode still consumes some power for the RAM.

06-27-2017, 03:16 PM	#9
khashayar Junior Member Posts: 5 Karma: 10 Join Date: Jun 2017 Device: Kobo Aura One	tshering, thanks so much for info and pointers! After some more usage, it does indeed seem like koreader/ksm are consuming more power than nickel. I'll be experimenting some more!

06-28-2017, 11:39 AM	#10
khashayar Junior Member Posts: 5 Karma: 10 Join Date: Jun 2017 Device: Kobo Aura One	Alright, after some more intense reading/using the Kobo I can confirm what I understand from the thread linked above. In nickel battery usage is low. In Koreader battery drains fast while reading. One full day of reading PDFs and I need to charge. I'll keep an eye on that thread, hoping it'll be sorted out! The more I use Koreader, the more I really like all the features it offers!

07-14-2018, 10:03 PM	#13
Lima7 Connoisseur Posts: 88 Karma: 90986 Join Date: Jun 2014 Device: Aura	Hey! I know this is an old thread but I'm having the same problems with my H20 edition 2. Did you figure it out?

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