x220: Need help with Win 7 battery life

[neo21]

I am a x220 user since it was available. Used it with Ubuntu until very recently. Had to switch to Windows 7 Ultimate 64bit for work.

Win 7 is alright but I am somehow disappointed with the battery life. Under Ubuntu I had around 5h of real usage battery life (wifi, 65% display brightness, openoffice, chrome)...now I am getting roughly 4h...which is rather disappointing. In the old days Linux used to have a way worse battery life than Windows.

I downloaded all the Think-ware stuff from Lenovo (Power Manager 6.07, drivers, not using the Wifi Software)...using Bitlocker to encrypt the hard drive (and fingerprint reader to login). Did some setting tweaking on Power Manager (source optimized)...WWAN is turned off.

My x220 model is : 4290W1B (i5, WWAN, IPS, no OS, 6cell battery full charge 44wh 227 cylces)

Hope some Windows 7 power user can help me getting back to 5h (or whatever you can get under Win 7)...THANKS !!

...a little research on Google showed that Windows & x220 are not able to utilize ASPM pci power saving?? is there a fix for that?

[GomJabbar]

Lowering the display brightness can increase battery life somewhat.

Also look at the "Battery Stretch" settings in Power Manager (Power Plan tab - bottom left corner).

[dxps26]

227 cylces

That battery has seen some action.

there's a number of factors to consider here - first off, linux really cannot (as of now) fully utilize ACPI/USB/Expresscard/Optical drive and of course, CPU power saving techniques. Combined with Linux's less-than-optimal Power controls, I'd be willing to wager your computer was running warmer too all this while. Heat affects battery life greatly, and even though the firmware may be reporting 227 cycles, I guess the state of the battery may be worse for wear.

Bitlocker's power consumption (or lack thereof) is a debatable topic. From My end, I'm using two SSD units (one for OS, one for Data) and i'm running cooler, quieter and a little bit longer than ever before. Depending on what you do with you computer, bitlocker could use some power if you use a lot of disk-intensive programs-how much is something nobody has really measured so far. A SSD will definitely make things not only quicker but also save you some battery power and generate less heat.

I would disable Aero and all visual effects, select a dark, plain desktop background to lower power use. you can also look at the WLAN card's settings in Device manager (under the Advanced tab, and reduce Transmit power and roaming aggressiveness, if you sit close to your wireless access point. The Power manager has some options for disabling USB charging (if available), Expresscard Power, reducing brightness during bootup and shutdown, and more. try playing with those and see what you can eke out, but I think a new battery might be required a little down the road.

[neo21]

thanks for the feedback so far. it is probably true that Ubuntu stressed the battery because there is still no support for charging thresholds in Ubuntu 11.04 or newer (kernel issue).

BUT according to Joulemeter (power measuring tool for Win 7 by Microsoft) my x220 uses 14w per hour with Wifi enabled, screen brightness at 9/15 NO bitlocker and minimal visual effects (shadows, no transparency, aero snap enabled)...this compares to 9w per hour in Ubuntu (with similar visual effects)...that's really astonishing and lines up to my real battery experience (3h vs 4h in Ubuntu).

I find 14w way to high and even with a fully healthy battery (64wh) this would not add up to the reported 6h battery life for the 6cell. I do have Power Manager features like turn off backlight on startup and shutdown, usb & cpu powersaving etc enabled...and sadly ASPM powersaving (supported by the x220 hardware) is NOT possible in Windows 7 (but enabled and working in Ubuntu).

Any other suggestions? Right now I am still stuck with disappointing power consumption...