Engineer Dianne Hackborn from Google has debunked the myth known to all advanced Android users, which has been wandering for several years in all instructions and collections of questions and answers on this operating system.
She authoritatively and categorically stated: clearing battery usage statistics, which is stored in the batterystats.bin file and which is recommended to be deleted with each device flashing, does not extend the battery life of your Android tablet or phone.
This myth is based on approximately the following reasoning: If at some point you have not fully charged your Android tablet or phone, for example, only to 90%, it will remember this battery level, assuming that the battery is fully charged, and in the future you will use your battery only 90%, which is 10% less than its actual capacity. And if you delete the batterystats.bin file, which stores information about the battery charge, for example, from ClockWord Mod Recovery, thus recalibrating the battery, your Android device will forget about the damage to the battery charge up to 90% and will start using its full capacity again.
As Diana Hackborne explains, in other words it goes something like this:
"The batterystats.bin file, which is located in the data / system / folder, is used to obtain information about the battery level and display information about it using an indicator on the Android device's notification panel."
However, she says this is not at all true. Because the data stored in this file is used only to collect information about which process and for how long uses the battery at the moment when it is not being charged. This is the information that you can see in the settings menu of your device, in the "Battery" section. This file is not used for anything else.
Thus, it becomes clear that the Android system does not receive information about the battery level from this file and it cannot in any way affect the battery life.
Moreover, all the data on battery usage statistics that are in this file are completely cleared every time the device battery is recharged. Based on this, it is easy to guess that this is equivalent to deleting this file before every recharging of your tablet or phone, which you do almost every day.
Everything seems to be clear. It is not clear why many who have used this method of battery calibration, by deleting this file manually or using ClockWord Mod Recovery, report that their device has become longer without recharging its battery. Placebo effect or what? After all, the well-known program for calibrating the battery of Android devices, Battery Calibration works exactly on this principle, and the Market is full of positive reviews about it.
Problems of rapid battery loss, uneven charge status display, sudden discharge, and device shutdown are common. Sometimes they are the result of battery deterioration and are irreversible, but in some cases you can try to rectify the situation by calibrating the battery. It's not very difficult, you can calibrate the battery on Android in several simple ways.
It is important to remember that none of the methods are a cure-all. If there is physical degradation of the lithium battery cell, it is almost impossible to help it. Even if you try to replace the "jar", a record about the deterioration of the battery may remain in the controller's memory, which can only be reset by the programmer.
In what cases is it impossible to calibrate the battery on Android?
Battery calibration is impossible, useless, and sometimes dangerous if the lithium cell has undergone physical wear and tear. A typical sign of this can be a rapid loss of charge, even on an inactive smartphone. Usually, the charge indication is not disturbed in such cases. The percentages are melting before our eyes, but the decrease in the indicator is smooth, without jumps by a dozen or two percent (for example, immediately from 90% to 60%).
A physically worn out battery charges very quickly and can reach 100% in just half an hour. If your smartphone suffers from these symptoms, only replacing the battery with a new one will help it. Cell swelling is another sign of wear. In devices with a removable cover, it is visible to the naked eye.
In devices with a non-separable design, a sign of swelling may be a peeling of the back panel, a bulge on it, spots that have appeared in the middle of the screen. In this case, calibrating the battery using charge-discharge cycles is not only useless, but sometimes dangerous. After all, a swollen battery can overheat and self-ignite or explode.
What are the ways to calibrate the battery
The controller of a modern Android smartphone battery is a complex device with its own memory, where information about the battery is stored. It works independently and maintains service statistics without being affected by the OS. The system itself does not have access to the memory of the battery controller, and therefore there are no miracle applications that can calibrate the battery on Android in a couple of clicks.
Calibration methods such as deleting the batterystats.bin file are not very efficient. Firstly, this method requires root rights, which are difficult for an ordinary user to obtain on most modern smartphones (2015-206 and newer). Secondly, this file only stores data on battery discharge statistics at the OS level, but is not associated with the battery controller's own memory. Deleting this file can only help in some cases when it comes to a crash in the Android system. Failures at the level of the internal battery controller cannot be eliminated by deleting the batterystats.bin file.
Programs designed to calibrate batteries and require root access are mostly designed to remove the same batterystats.bin. The only difference is that this file does not need to be searched for and deleted manually. Therefore, it is logical that most of these programs also do not give the desired effect.
How easy it is to calibrate your smartphone battery
Lithium battery cells used in smartphones do not have a memory effect. But, nevertheless, sometimes there are charge display errors caused by malfunctions in the controller, but are reversible. In such cases, the long-known procedure for performing several discharge-charge cycles can help.
Independent frog chargers can be used to calibrate removable smartphone batteries. Their advantage is that such devices charge batteries with weak currents and do not depend on OS commands. Therefore, if the battery is removable, it is better to charge it with such a device, outside the smartphone.
Step-by-step smartphone battery calibration
- Discharge the battery before the smartphone turns off automatically. It is better to discharge it with a not very high load, for example, by playing a video, at room temperature (in the cold, lithium sits down faster).
- Wait a few minutes and try to turn on your smartphone.
- If the gadget turns on and displays the remaining charge, discharge it before turning it off again.
- If the gadget does not turn on anymore, put it on charge. It is advisable to use a low-current power supply, without support for fast charging.
- Wait until the charge is replenished to 100% and the full charge signal, hold the battery on charge for another 10-20 minutes.
- Unplug the charger and plug it back in a little later.
- If the smartphone immediately reports that the charge is up to 100%, turn it on. If it reports charging again, wait for a notification of 100%, repeat step 6.
- After turning on your smartphone, discharge it with a stable average load (such as a video player).
- Repeat steps 1 - 8 2-4 more times.
If the calibration failure was reversible, repeating several soft charging and low current discharging cycles should force the battery controller back into normal operating mode. If this does not help, other methods, most likely, will also be useless.
Conclusion
Before you calibrate the battery on Android, make sure that it does not show signs of physical degradation. Do not overdo charge / discharge during calibration. If 3-5 cycles did not bring results, then there will be no use from 25. Moreover, during each cycle, the battery loses some fraction of a percent of its capacity. After all, the average life of a lithium cell is only about 1000 cycles before a serious loss of capacity. Because of this, you should not resort to the calibration procedure too often.
Among other things, it is important to avoid excessive heating during the charge-discharge process. It is desirable that the temperature of the "jar" be kept within +40 degrees. If there is more, it is dangerous, in addition, overheating can just be the cause of controller malfunctions. You should also not load your smartphone at temperatures around zero and below. In cold weather, lithium quickly loses its charge, and even a fully functional battery can suddenly turn off at 50% capacity.
Problems with your smartphone's battery are probably one of the most common occurrences and therefore we are looking for new ideas and suggestions on how best to deal with this problem. Battery consumption may not be uniform and you need to understand where the problem is. You can also try calibrating your Android's battery, which can significantly increase performance, if that's possible with your phone.
In this article, we'll take a closer look at how you can calibrate your phone's battery.
Our first suggestion for improving power consumption will be our article "Battery Saving on Different Smartphones". Even after these tips, the problem still persists and then it's time to calibrate the battery. The biggest battery problem is when it runs out very quickly or the phone just won't turn on.
Try to calibrate the battery before replacing it. This may be the only way that is used in most cases!
Every Android phone has a battery app that displays all the battery statistics you need for your phone. The app is very informative as it shows the battery percentage, battery life and consumption from various applications using your battery life.
In some cases, when your battery is not calibrated, this application may give errors in statistics. Calibrating the battery can correct this problem and hopefully improve performance.
Calibrating Your Android Battery - On Non-Rooted Phones
First, don't forget to check the battery capacity. If you're unsure, check your phone's battery specifications online. You can find detailed specifications for your phone model on your phone manufacturer's website.
After that, look for an app called "Battery Monitor". You can find the app to download on the Google Play store.
A unique feature of this app is that it will show you the charging parameter in milliamperes (MA). Of course, this is a big help when you need to charge the battery to a certain level indicated by the battery capacity. When you reach the required level, just turn off your phone, turn it off and turn it on again. If everything is done in the same way, your phone battery will be charged to 100%
A selection of powerful PowerBanks in online stores:
Alternative way to calibrate your Android battery:
fully charge your battery and once that's done, just turn off your phone.
After shutting down, plug it back into the charger and charge your phone to 100 percent again. You will know that your phone is 100 percent charged when you see a green light on your phone.
Now turn the phone back on. Go to the display settings tab and select the option - do not turn off the screen backlight. Now connect your phone to charging and charge to 100% full again.
Finally after that, unplug the phone and let the battery drain to 0% and the phone will shut off by itself. This is a long process, but it must be done this way for the calibration process to work properly.
What can drain your phone battery
It should be noted that modern phone firmwares are full-fledged mobile operating systems. This means that while the phone is running, "background" processes are required, such as: SMS messaging service, Text input service, Antiviruses, etc.
Accordingly, for the background processes to work, it is also necessary to spend on them both the power of the central processor, RAM and, of course, the battery charge.
When using the phone "actively" (for example, launching various programs: Internet Explorer, Games, Programs for accessing bank accounts, Mail programs, etc.), we recommend that you restart your mobile phone. To do this, press and hold the "Power" button of your phone and select the "Restart" item.
If all else fails
After a long service life of your phone, the battery eventually deteriorates. But even this situation has a way out, for example:
- Battery for charging the phone(PowerBank) solar powered
Pros: Low cost and solar and car charger. The disadvantages are obvious - it will increase the weight of your bag by about 200 grams. There are many Chinese versions of such devices on the market, but we stopped at this one:.
Video review of POWER BANK 20000 mAh
Important advice! In order for the phone battery to last longer and hold its charge perfectly, after purchasing a smartphone or tablet, make 5 full charge and discharge cycles of the battery. This will significantly increase the battery life.
Battery Calibration Methods for Android
- Without getting Root access
- With getting Root access
- Using programs and applications
- Using the Recovery menu
How to calibrate the battery without root access
Method 1.
First you need to find out the full capacity of your battery in milliampere-hours. To do this, you need to look under the battery, where all information about it is stored, or you can find information on the Internet, in some kind of review, where the characteristics of your model are indicated. After that, a calibration program from the Play Market should be installed on the device. There are a lot of them, but the most effective is Current Widget: Battery Monitor.
With this program, you can find out the battery charge in milliamperes (mah). From now on, you should charge the device to the maximum charge level. After that, turn off and turn on the device again. This action will tell the phone what the current and valid battery limit should be. If this method does not work, then you can try to do five charging and discharging cycles of the device and after the fifth time remove the charger and hard reset the phone or tablet. Hard reset will reset all created settings to their original state, but the command does not work on all Android operating systems.
Method 2.
The next Android battery calibration method is very similar to the first, the only difference is that you don't need to install additional apps. To do this, you need to charge the phone to the maximum value. Then disconnect the charger and turn off the phone. Then reconnect the charging cable and wait until the LED lit indicator turns green, indicating that the battery is fully charged. Then you need to turn on the phone and remove the auto screen off function. This action can be done using the settings. All this is needed in order for the phone to discharge faster. After a cycle of absolute discharge, recharge it to the maximum value. After all the operations, the android operating system should economically consume the battery and perform a full discharge cycle.
Battery calibration software for Android
You need to install a calibration program from the Play market. There are a lot of them, but the most common is Battery Calibration. After installing this application, you need to charge your phone or tablet to the maximum value, and then launch this application.
The charge values on the display and in the application will differ significantly, so you need to wait until they reach the same value. As soon as they become the same, you need to press the "battery calibration" button. Your device's battery has now been calibrated. This method is similar to the one we did without root access.
Calibration Using Recovery
You need to go to Recovery mode on android (Usually this is holding down the power button and the + volume button on the turned off device) and go to the additional settings section, where the "wipe battery stats" function is located.
It will delete all previously made settings and settings. After resetting all past settings, you should completely discharge the device. After that, put it back on charge and charge up to the maximum value. After reaching the maximum charge value, you need to go to the application again and perform a calibration. This action will strengthen the settings and increase the functionality of the android operating system.
Users have cases that each of the methods does not work. This is due to the fact that the battery he is using is over five years old and any calibration will not help here. When buying a new phone, it is recommended that you perform several full discharge and charge cycles at once. This action will increase the functionality of the phone and ensure long-term performance.
But we didn't mention one simple factor. Over time, any battery loses its capacity. After about one and a half to two years, the phone starts to discharge much faster - there is nothing you can do about it. All that remains is to replace the battery. You can do this yourself if the battery is removable, or by contacting a service center. You can also try to calibrate the battery. Battery calibration will not increase the battery life of a smartphone, but it can eliminate other unpleasant moments.
Any electronics can age. And if this is almost not felt on the example of some VCRs, then this cannot be said about smartphones. Previously, such devices failed due to breakdowns of the case and keyboard. Now they are created from more durable materials, in connection with which the battery and screen have become a weak point. The latter may fade over time, but the battery loses a little of its working capacity with each new recharge.
The problem is that not every power controller is able to recognize the loss of capacity in time. If this component, available in any Android smartphone, does not want to respond to a decrease in capacity, then this turns into one unpleasant moment. Gradually, the operating system begins to show incorrect information about the battery charge level. You can see 7% of the charge on the screen, but the next minute the device turns off, since in fact there is not enough energy for its operation. This problem can be solved by replacing the battery. But first you can try to calibrate it.
Attention: we do not guarantee that the following steps will help. The best way out is still to replace the battery with a brand new one.
The easiest way
If you are thinking of calibrating the battery on Android, we recommend that you do the following:
Step 1... Fully charge the smartphone battery.
Step 2... Turn off the device.
Step 3... Reconnect it to.
Step 4... Wait for the green indicator to appear - this indicates that the smartphone is charged to 100%.
Step 5 ... Turn on the device and go to " Settings", In the section" Screen».
Step 6... Select " Do not turn off the backlight". If not, then simply increase the time to enter sleep mode to the maximum possible value.
Step 7... Reconnect the device to the charger, waiting for the charge to increase to 100%.
Step 8... Disconnect the device from the charger. Let your smartphone run down to 0% so that it turns off on its own. This completes the Android battery calibration.
Another easy way
You can also calibrate the battery using a slightly different method:
Step 1... Discharge your phone completely.
Step 2... Turn on the device and connect it to the charger.
Step 3... Let it charge for eight hours.
Step 4... Turn off your phone.
Step 5... Reconnect it to the network adapter.
Step 6... It should now charge for two hours.
Step 7. Turn on your device.
Step 8... After three cons, turn it off and then charge it for one hour.
If you do everything correctly, the battery will be calibrated. But this method does not always help to calibrate the battery on Android - it all depends on the specific smartphone model. However, all this applies to the first method. The main advantage of the above two methods is that they work without root. But the next method will still require root rights. How to get them - we wrote in.
Using Battery Calibration
Of course, third-party software developers could not help but hurry. They created a program for battery calibration a long time ago. If the previous methods helped to manually calibrate the battery, then the application does everything automatically. But for its functioning, as mentioned above, you will need root rights. Download Battery Calibration you can from the site w3bsit3-dns.com. Then follow the instructions:
Step 1... Charge your smartphone to 100%.
Step 2... Do not disconnect the device from the charger within 20 minutes.
Step 3... Run Battery Calibration.
Step 4... Click the button shown in the screenshot.
Step 5... Disconnect your smartphone from the charger.
Step 6... Discharge the machine completely until it turns off. This completes the calibration process.
