Just a minor in put. I have to say after using the Surface 2 for the past week my biggest complaint remains battery life. As it is my previous RT appears to have a longer battery life compared to this particular Surface 2 that I am using. Yes the device is up to date with all the countless number of releases. I am not exchanging it though as I still trust that it wildly be addressed in the future if at all there is an issue. The other thing is sound quality. The Surround sound has been greatly improved but I wish the speakers were beefed up a little bit more. All that said though I truly love the speed and consistency of the S2. Not to talk of the screen, dual kickstand or over all look.
Battery Life...hmmmmm!
- Thread starter ibenzawla
- Start date
InspectHerGadget
Active Member
The battery standby time is poor and in use mostly reasonable. If you leave it for a few days with no use, it will lose most of its charge.
Is this a *new* or used Surface 2?
airwolfmanila
New Member
I have a surface rt and a 2. I always shut down when I expect not needing to access it for more than an hour. Boot time is half a minute anyway, so not much of a hassle. I do this to ensure battery charge is preserved when I am not using it. Shutting down maintains battery charge with almost no drain.
Brand new I got from the shop about a week ago.
The main issue for me is real time usage. The amount of time the battery drops when using it. It can be better. I even thought of exchanging it for the Pro 2 since its battery has been improved but the price of $800 was too much for me especially when I got the Surface 2 for $350.
Have you done a Sleep Study to see what is causing the drain while it is Connected Standby? From the Start Screen search for CMD, right click and select Run As Administrator and from the CMD Prompt type:
powercfg /sleepstudy
Then copy sleepstudy.html from the C:\Windows|System32 directory to your Documents Folder and open with IE. You are looking for the items highlighted in Red.
My guess will be the Marvell WLAN and/or Bluetooth, or if Bluetooth is disabled is actually a bigger issue on the S2 and causes Battery Drain because the system is trying to suspend and it can't. This has been a bug since the Gen 1 RT device.
If there are no real culprits from the same CMD prompt run
powercfg /energy and do the same as above, this will list additional info.
powercfg /sleepstudy
Then copy sleepstudy.html from the C:\Windows|System32 directory to your Documents Folder and open with IE. You are looking for the items highlighted in Red.
My guess will be the Marvell WLAN and/or Bluetooth, or if Bluetooth is disabled is actually a bigger issue on the S2 and causes Battery Drain because the system is trying to suspend and it can't. This has been a bug since the Gen 1 RT device.
If there are no real culprits from the same CMD prompt run
powercfg /energy and do the same as above, this will list additional info.
TheNeighbor
New Member
I do airplane mode whenever I can. I keep airplane mode for long writing sessions on battery. I almost reach 9 hours with productivity on just working with Word like this.
After reading some very helpful posts here I have decided to do some further tests to determine the actual battery performance and will post the result as requested. My previous battery monitoring might have been a bit casual.
On a different note I just finished setting up a remote connection to my desktop PC and my first impression was Wow!!! I wonder how many other tablets can do such a thing with no hassle. This alone is a valid reason to get this tablet and I wonder why MSFT doesn't capitalize on this in its publicity campaign. Imagine just pulling out your tablet in the middle of nowhere and working on your PC in your office or at home. Impressive machine really.
On a different note I just finished setting up a remote connection to my desktop PC and my first impression was Wow!!! I wonder how many other tablets can do such a thing with no hassle. This alone is a valid reason to get this tablet and I wonder why MSFT doesn't capitalize on this in its publicity campaign. Imagine just pulling out your tablet in the middle of nowhere and working on your PC in your office or at home. Impressive machine really.
