Aspire A715-73G-743L battery drains faster then expected

andriii25
andriii25 Member Posts: 5 New User
edited November 2023 in 2020 Archives
Hello, I recently bought an Acer Aspire 7 A715-73G-743L and I have problems with its batteries. It only lasts around 3 hours under very light use:
watching a Youtube video in Edge or Chrome, "Better Battery" mode in Windows, 30% brightness, no other programs running besides the browser, only the integrated GPU is used)

I have read some reviews of the 73G model with the same 48 Wh battery (https://www.ultrabookreview.com/26511-acer-aspire-7-a715-73g-review/ and https://laptopmedia.com/review/acer-aspire-7-a715-73g-review-the-proto-conceptd-5-is-revealed/) and these seem to show around 7-8 hour battery life for a similar usage, and Acer itself says it has up to 7 hours of battery life. I could only get 3-3.5 hours of battery life under very similar conditions.

Now, I know that I shouldn't expect the same performance, but getting less than half of that is weird in my opinion. Did the same happen to anyone else? Is it possible that the battery is faulty? What can I do to solve this problem?

Answers

  • JackE
    JackE ACE Posts: 44,330 Trailblazer
    Sounds pretty normal to me. Try this. Go to the elevated command prompt.  Enter 'powercfg /batteryreport'. Then return to the desktop. Open file explorer. Then search for' battery-report.html' in the c:\windows\system32\ sub-folder. Double-click to open it in the browser. Compare design capacity with full charge capacity. Post screenshot if possible. Jack E/NJ 

    Jack E/NJ

  • andriii25
    andriii25 Member Posts: 5 New User
    Here is the screenshot of the battery report, and yes I see that the full charge capacity and the design capacity is nearly the same.

    I just don't understand what causes such a huge discrepancy between reviews and my personal experience. I did another test where literally nothing was running on the laptop, only the screen was turned on (again 30% brightness, "Better Battery" in Windows) and the machine lasted only a little bit more than 4 hours. I can't really use the laptop less than that. 
  • JackE
    JackE ACE Posts: 44,330 Trailblazer
    Try uninstalling, not just disabling, any non-Microsoft virus scanners. Defender and MRT is all most users need. Jack E/NJ

    Jack E/NJ

  • andriii25
    andriii25 Member Posts: 5 New User
    I do not have any non-Microsoft virus scanner installed, so I don't think that is the problem.


  • JackE
    JackE ACE Posts: 44,330 Trailblazer
    Check task manager for anything that's consuming mainily CPU or disk time when you think you should be in a low-power state. Jack E/NJ 

    Jack E/NJ

  • andriii25
    andriii25 Member Posts: 5 New User
    So, an interesting thing happened. After all this I checked the power consumption in an Ubuntu Live USB as well, and surprisingly the notebook lasted way more in Ubuntu ~ 5 hours of video 1080p video streaming in 30% brightness.
    After that I rebooted into Windows and suddenly the power consumption was much much lower than before. It consumed around ~6 W under same conditions, with 1080p video streaming. That meant ~8 hours of battery life. And a lot more in idle, when nothing was running in the background.
    Maybe some drivers got updated in the meantime, or some other Windows update happened? 

    Anyway the problem seems solved, for some reason and I'm now happy with the battery life. If somebody else stumbles across this thread and the problem doesn't solve itself as magically as it did for me, you can check out this guide, maybe it'll help you.

    Thank you so much for your help!
  • JackE
    JackE ACE Posts: 44,330 Trailblazer
    Thanks for report. Magic sometimes happens.   :)   Jack E/NJ

    Jack E/NJ

  • cmthoreau
    cmthoreau Member Posts: 2 New User
    Would love to see a bit more insight here if anyone has any!

    I am running the A715-75G-71RD and have the same issue. Battery life is so bad I returned my first purchase because I was sure the battery was faulty (despite device manager showing no issues) but the replacement is just the same. I have been using Acer for years - very much because of the great battery life - and chose this model because of the great battery reviews. But I can get no more than 3-1/2 hours on very battery-friendly settings. I can easily get 5-6 hours on my A515 running the same programs. Battery report came back fine.

    In the system settings it shows Chrome as the major battery user. I am already aware of Chrome's battery drain and adjusted some Chrome settings to address this - though I am running even heavier Chrome use on my 515 without battery issue. Other than battery the computer is great but without good battery life it will not meet my needs.

    Please help me avoid another return!
  • JackE
    JackE ACE Posts: 44,330 Trailblazer
    >>> Battery report came back fine.>>>

    What battery report are you relying on? Also do you have any non-Microsoft virus scanners running in the background. Jack E/NJ

    Jack E/NJ

  • cmthoreau
    cmthoreau Member Posts: 2 New User
    The battery report referenced earlier in this thread.

    No scanners running in background.

    Looks to me that Chrome is the main culprit in battery drainage but it runs fine on my other Acer with little battery impact so not sure why this machine is so affected by it. I did change chrome settings suggested elsewhere to reduce battery impact but saw no change
  • JackE
    JackE ACE Posts: 44,330 Trailblazer
    Try reducing screen brightness. Jack E/NJ

    Jack E/NJ

  • andriii25
    andriii25 Member Posts: 5 New User
    cmthoreau said:
    Would love to see a bit more insight here if anyone has any!

    I am running the A715-75G-71RD and have the same issue. Battery life is so bad I returned my first purchase because I was sure the battery was faulty (despite device manager showing no issues) but the replacement is just the same. I have been using Acer for years - very much because of the great battery life - and chose this model because of the great battery reviews. But I can get no more than 3-1/2 hours on very battery-friendly settings. I can easily get 5-6 hours on my A515 running the same programs. Battery report came back fine.

    In the system settings it shows Chrome as the major battery user. I am already aware of Chrome's battery drain and adjusted some Chrome settings to address this - though I am running even heavier Chrome use on my 515 without battery issue. Other than battery the computer is great but without good battery life it will not meet my needs.

    Please help me avoid another return!
    Hi! I would recommend doing the same as I did e.g. checking if it does the same in another OS (you can try just using a live linux USB, it's easy to create one), and perhaps try following the long guide I linked in my last post . It's extensive and long but I think it's worth going through it.