Surface Pro 3 battery degradation

Anonymous
2016-05-11T07:37:37+00:00

I've been using Microsoft Surface Pro 3 for a year, and shortly after the warranty expired I noticed my Surface Pro 3 can only last about 1-2 hours after a full charge. At first I thought this was a problem with background process draining the battery so I disabled everything running in the background. It didn't helped. Then I found out about the powercfg utility and run powercfg /batteryreport on it, and this was the result:

A full charge capacity has degraded by over 80% in just few weeks and continue degrading. I tried to "recalibrate" the battery by doing full charge then full drain multiple times, and it didn't helped. Talk with Microsoft via chat support and they insist this was a software problem and reinstalled the driver and asked me to wait few days to see if things improve. Not only it didn't improved, but now my Surface can only last 30 minutes.

Few days after chat (today), I called Microsoft support and they were being extremely unhelpful. Insist that this was a software problem (which the chat support person already did) and it's "perfectly normal" for battery capacity to degrade. I insist that I've already done the software "fixes" and it didn't work and tell them this is definitely hardware problem, but the person on the phone tell me there's nothing I could do except to order the out of warranty exchange (which cost about $560 in my local currency). 

Is there anything else I should do? My country has no Microsoft Store which I could take the machine for them to take a look. Phone/online support were the only option, and none of them could understand the issue.

Surface | Surface Pro | Power and battery

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Anonymous
2016-07-26T21:31:16+00:00

Hello everyone,

Thanks for your continued patience here. We have now completed our testing of the update and it has passed our quality assurance process.

The update, “System Firmware Update - 8/29/2016”, is now available to install from Windows Update.

Before installing this update, ensure that your Surface Pro 3 is plugged directly in to AC power using the standard AC power adapter (do not use the Surface Docking Station), disconnect any USB devices or external monitors, and check that Windows shows a 40% charge or greater when you hover over the icon in the taskbar before you begin.

Once you install the update, please select Restart now (do not shutdown). After your Surface restarts, please manually restart it a second time to complete the process. For more information, please see our Surface Pro 3 Battery FAQ article.

If you’re having trouble charging your Surface, you get a low-battery error, or your Surface turns off when you unplug it, the steps in our Surface battery won’t charge article can help you pinpoint the problem. Should you need any further assistance, please contact us. 

Thanks again.

Greg

Updated 8/29/16.

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  1. Anonymous
    2016-08-02T20:24:07+00:00

    I did not follow but I have the same problem you have an idea of the patch release date ?

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  2. Anonymous
    2016-08-02T19:34:42+00:00

    When is this going to be fixed? Or, should users that are experiencing this issue attempt to go to a MSFT store for help? My machine is just a couple of months out of warranty but is all but unusable when not using the charger:

    I'm not sure this could get worse.

    FYI:

    Installed batteries

    Information about each currently installed battery

    BATTERY 1

    NAME X898289

    MANUFACTURER SIMPLO
    SERIAL NUMBER 1166219780
    CHEMISTRY LION
    DESIGN CAPACITY 42,157 mWh
    FULL CHARGE CAPACITY 7,699 mWh
    CYCLE COUNT 140

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  3. Anonymous
    2016-08-02T16:37:39+00:00

    Think mines going a bit nuts!

    2016-07-21 17,777 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-22 16,917 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-23 16,396 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-24 15,975 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-25 15,621 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-26 14,122 mWh 41,338 mWh
    2016-07-27 13,274 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-28 12,678 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-29 12,601 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-30 12,601 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-31 38,306 mWh 128,155 mWh
    2016-08-01 11,637 mWh 42,157 mWh

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  4. Anonymous
    2016-08-02T16:16:34+00:00

    Here’s a quick update to my post a week ago. As I had posted then, I have a Surface Pro 3, i7 with SIMPLO battery. My battery had gradually lost full charge capacity starting in April, and it appears to have reached a low point on 7/18. Since that date, my battery has made a painfully slow recovery. The battery report this morning shows a charge capacity of 21,758 mWh yesterday, compared to 14,748 mWh one week earlier, and 9,794 mWh on 7/18.

    2016-03-20 - 2016-03-28 41,489 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-03-28 - 2016-04-03 41,423 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-04-03 - 2016-04-11 40,724 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-04-11 - 2016-04-17 32,879 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-04-17 - 2016-04-24 29,940 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-04-24 - 2016-05-01 33,718 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-05-01 - 2016-05-09 31,620 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-05-09 - 2016-05-16 28,589 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-05-16 - 2016-05-22 24,927 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-05-22 - 2016-05-31 21,099 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-05-31 - 2016-06-07 18,266 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-06-07 - 2016-06-14 21,744 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-06-14 - 2016-06-21 26,072 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-06-21 - 2016-06-28 22,241 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-06-28 - 2016-07-05 17,388 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-05 - 2016-07-12 13,346 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-12 - 2016-07-19 10,490 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-20 11,458 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-21 12,143 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-22 12,967 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-23 13,592 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-24 14,014 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-25 14,748 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-26 15,712 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-27 16,633 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-28 17,830 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-29 18,748 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-30 19,699 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-31 20,681 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-08-01 21,758 mWh 42,157 mWh

    (The value of 9,794 mWh on 7/18 is no longer visible in today’s report, but it was visible in last week’s report.)

    This morning’s charge is slightly higher still, at 22,838 mWh.

    23:17:19 Connected standby Battery 12 % 2,744 mWh
    23:17:20 Suspended 12 % 2,744 mWh
    2016-08-02 08:39:24 Active Battery 100 % 22,838 mWh
    08:45:00 Report generated Battery 100 % 22,838 mWh

    Aside from trying several of the tips posted at several sites to update firmware and reduce battery utilization, the thing I’ve done repeatedly is run down the battery and then recharge it. I have not tried uninstalling and reinstalling the battery driver, nor have I tried running it continuously plugged in for two weeks, as suggested by others in posts on this forum. Also, my system does not show any indication of an update from Microsoft yesterday.

    The very first person who posted to this thread, and many others, have posted that they tried battery discharge and recharge as a strategy, and it did not help, while four others besides me have seen their batteries at first degrade and then improve, including one other person who mentioned discharge and recharge as his or her strategy. It appears that there are machine hardware or software differences, or usage differences, which impact the effectiveness of this approach, and there may be alternative approaches that work as well.

    The details matter, although it is not clear exactly which details. In my case, once fully charged, I run the battery down as much as possible, usually to under 7%, or even lower when I have the patience to deal with it. (As you can see from the report above, last night I only ran it down to 12%, that was an exception.) Then I plug it in to recharge. When I am able to do so, prior to recharging it, I power the tablet off first, rather than continuing to use it or sending it to sleep or hibernate. Also, if I use my surface pro 3 plugged in and it does not fully charge by the time I am done with it, I power it off to complete the recharge. Powering off is not always possible during the day of course, but I have run it down as much as possible, powered it off, and plugged it in or docked it at night, almost every night for the past couple of weeks, and when I can during the day as well.

    At this point, the battery in my Surface Pro 3 charges at just over half of its design capacity, up from less than a quarter two weeks ago, and the daily trend remains positive, with improvements coming frustratingly slowly. Based on the mix of reports on this thread, I would not expect the same approach to help everyone who has been impacted by this issue, but it might help some other Surface Pro 3 owners get better usage out of their tablets, until Microsoft delivers a real fix.

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