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
    2016-07-19T23:11:25+00:00

    Not sure if this helps anyone, but I did get the following email when I was trying to get Microsoft to change my battery FOC.

    Dear Mr.Papworth

    Once again, many thanks for your call this afternoon.

    As discussed, after a thorough discusion and assesment by our team, we have determined that there is a hardware related issue with your Surface device.

    Based on our assesment there is an issue with the battery in your device.

    We have tried troubleshooting the devices' drivers to no avail. Along with the battery report you have provided we have determined that the device will need to be exchanged to remedy the issue.

    For your records, the reference number for your case is 1342112915.

    If you do have any further queries on this please do not hesitate to let us know.

    Have a nice day from the Surface Team.

    Kind Regards

    Luke

    Surface Support

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  2. Anonymous
    2016-07-19T22:49:40+00:00

    We have rethought our policy - 9 surface books not purchased in the past 3 months here.

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  3. Anonymous
    2016-07-19T22:42:27+00:00

    We've seen this problem on our only Surface Pro 3 in my office and it started happening 2 weeks after the hardware warranty expired.  And yes, it has a Simplo battery installed.  We purchased a new Surface Pro 4 as a replacement and we held on to the old SP3 unit just in case it turned out to be a widespread problem.  Lo and behold, it seems that it is.  I hope Microsoft decides to make this right by their customers.  If they don't, we would seriously need to rethink our decision to furnish our field employees with Surface Pro devices in the future.  Trust and reliability is really key here.

    The report below is truncated due to attempting to troubleshoot the problem with a full factory reset, which deleted some historical data:

    Battery report

    COMPUTER NAME BROKEN-SURFACE
    SYSTEM PRODUCT NAME Microsoft Corporation Surface Pro 3
    BIOS 3.11.1150 12/09/2015
    OS BUILD 9600.17085.amd64fre.winblue_gdr.140330-1035
    PLATFORM ROLE Slate
    CONNECTED STANDBY Supported
    REPORT TIME 2016-07-19 16:38:37

    Installed batteries

    Information about each currently installed battery

    NAME X898289
    MANUFACTURER SIMPLO
    SERIAL NUMBER 1167006212
    CHEMISTRY LION
    DESIGN CAPACITY 42,157 mWh
    FULL CHARGE CAPACITY 144 mWh
    CYCLE COUNT 110

    Recent usage

    Power states over the last 3 days

    2016-07-19 16:36:30 Active AC 53 % 76 mWh
    16:38:00 Report generated AC 90 % 129 mWh

    Battery usage

    Battery drains over the last 3 days

    - - - - -

    Usage history

    History of system usage on AC and battery

    2016-05-23 - 2016-05-30 - - 0:00:47 167:53:34
    2016-05-30 - 2016-06-06 - - 0:00:35 167:57:18
    2016-06-06 - 2016-06-13 - - - 167:57:36
    2016-06-13 - 2016-06-20 - - - 167:57:31
    2016-06-20 - 2016-06-27 - - 0:00:16 47:55:44
    2016-06-27 - 2016-07-04 - - - -
    2016-07-04 - 2016-07-11 - - - -
    2016-07-12 - - - -
    2016-07-13 - - - -
    2016-07-14 - - - -
    2016-07-15 - - - -
    2016-07-16 - - - -
    2016-07-17 - - - -
    2016-07-18 - - - -

    Battery capacity history

    Charge capacity history of the system's batteries

    2016-05-23 - 2016-05-30 555 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-05-30 - 2016-06-06 555 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-06-06 - 2016-06-13 555 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-06-13 - 2016-06-20 555 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-06-20 - 2016-06-27 555 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-06-27 - 2016-07-04 555 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-04 - 2016-07-11 555 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-12 555 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-13 555 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-14 555 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-15 555 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-16 555 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-17 555 mWh 42,157 mWh
    2016-07-18 555 mWh 42,157 mWh

    Battery life estimates

    Battery life estimates based on observed drains

    2016-05-23 - 2016-05-30 - - - -
    2016-05-30 - 2016-06-06 - - - -
    2016-06-06 - 2016-06-13 - - - -
    2016-06-13 - 2016-06-20 - - - -
    2016-06-20 - 2016-06-27 - - - -
    2016-06-27 - 2016-07-04 - - - -
    2016-07-04 - 2016-07-11 - - - -
    2016-07-12 - - - -
    2016-07-13 - - - -
    2016-07-14 - - - -
    2016-07-15 - - - -
    2016-07-16 - - - -
    2016-07-17 - - - -
    2016-07-18 - - - -

    Current estimate of battery life based on all observed drains since OS install

    Since OS install - - - -

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  4. Anonymous
    2016-07-19T22:24:32+00:00

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