ZBook Firefly G8 15 battery life

[Siddle]

I have been using a Z Book Firefly G8 15 since July 21 and feel the battery life is not what it should be.

I use the laptop as my work computer, set up to work from home with two monitors, bluetooth mouse and keyboard. I regularly have multiple Chrome tabs open plus Outlook and other MS office programmes running at the same time - I would expect this is have a significant affect on battery life, but not as much as this.

I have reduced background programmes significantly, as well as screen brightness, but testing this morning with no programmes running, just turned on, it drained 39% in less than an hour. 

Even with battery saver on I rarely get more than 2 hours of battery life from it.

It's currently running BIOS Version/Date HP T76 Ver. 01.01.32, 26/03/2021 and I have noticed a number of other posts with battery life issues which have had a BIOS update suggested to them.

What would yo suggest to solve this issue, because at present my lovely shiny laptop is only useful if plugged in.

Thanks

[Jupitero]

Hello.

While your battery could be faulty, this could also be an application in the background (or foreground) taxing the CPU. Does your laptop run hot or do the fans spin all the time? Could be the cause. CPU running hot means it is using more power to do something. And the fans are pushing the out. (and also eating into the battery power)

Windows 10 can report what applications has been using the battery during last 24 hours. It's there in Settings - System - Battery. This could point to a specific software such as Chrome or Outlook hogging the CPU.

BIOS update is simple to install, and can be downloaded from your laptop model's download page. Just run the package and follow instructions, and let it do its work. BIOS updates are cumulative, so install only the latest 01.15.02 Rev.A version. If you have the HP Support Assistant software installed, it can also be used to update the BIOS and all other pertinent software such as drivers. BIOS update takes several minutes, so leave your laptop plugged into a charger, because loss of power during update can be catastrophic.

Also download from the same page the HP Power Manager (or use the Support Assistant to download it). It should show you the battery maximum capacity. 100% is a brand new battery. As an example, my 4-year-old Elitebook 840 G6 has 82% left, while my 10-month-old Firefly G9 has 96% left. HP Firefly 15 G8 was launched over 3 years ago, so perhaps it was not new when you started using it last summer?

Your laptop has a 56Whr battery which is rated "up to 14 hours". This may be achieved with a bare bones, minimum spec'd model, but depending on your display model, discreet GPU, memory/storage/wireless options etc, it may be much lower. That "up to 14 hours" is probably an idle laptop with all radios off, peripherals disconnected and screen dimmed down...

A review of Firefly 15 G8 - not necessarily spec'd the same as your - reported web browsing battery life of over 9 hours. If you cannot achieve even half of that while just browsing the web, I suspect your battery is at fault or an errant software process is using CPU and thus causing the battery to drain faster.

Is there a reason why you are using the laptop on battery only while your monitors are (presumably) plugged in AC power? Plugged in laptops allows the CPU to work with higher power.

[Siddle]

Hi @jupitero,

Thanks for the comprehensive reply, it's really helpful and has given me a few things to work through.

Yes, the fans run a lot and it does get hot. I checked the battery usage and yes, Chrome is right at the top of the list, 39% over the last 24 hours, with Outlook a close second at 15%. Most of my work is done via the web so I have little choice with Chrome, other than changing my browser, which I'd rather not do.

I downloaded the Power Manager which was eye opening! 
Immediately after unplugging the charger it was at 100% BUT the Maximum battery capacity is 73%, so I guess this means that even at 100% of charge I only have 73% of the battery life available. The computer was brand new when I got it in July 21, that's only 2.5 years ago so I'd expect the capacity to be more at this point in time.

I'm not expecting the 14hours life, and totally understand that would be optimum testing conditions which don't give a real life comparison. 9 hours would be amazing, but again, not what I'd expect using high drain applications. 

I was running the laptop on battery whilst the monitors were plugged in to test the battery life under work conditions, but did also test it without them plugged in and got similar times.

I'm going to do the BIOS update and see if that helps, but it looks like it's the maximum battery capacity that's causing the main issue.

If anyone has anything else then please do let me know.

[Jupitero]

Hello again,

My mistake, I though July 21 meant July 21st last year. 🤣 Silly me!

Battery life depends on many things, as the Power Manager tells you. Batteries age faster the higher the ambient temperature gets, so keeping the laptop cooler also benefits the battery. Ideally the battery also should not be kept at 100%, and the Power Manager (or setting in BIOS) can change the charging logic in your laptop to only keep it at 80% - useful if you are mostly plugged in.

In any case, the battery is sufficiently easy to replace if you end up doing it. L77991-002 is the battery part number, and the procedure is well explained in the Maintenance and Service Guide.

I still recommend looking into the Chrome power usage. I'm not an expert but there probably are ways to configure it to not update inactive tabs, for example. I'm sure the web has plenty of advise on making Chrome more streamlined and efficient.

For the sake of troubleshooting, you could try also Microsoft Edge which uses the same web rendering engine. I think it can import Chrome passwords, favorites etc. Also, depending on your web activity, consider an adblocker - some web pages generate more work for your browser to render the ads rather than the main content, and they can be taxing as well.

[Siddle]

Thanks again.

My laptop is a work one and managed by the company I work for. I contacted our IT department and they got me to run a battery command: powercfg /batteryreport /output "C:\battery_report.html" which saved as a html.

That gave some really interesting battery history information and as a result they are going to take a look. The laptop is still under warranty so hopefully it'll get sorted quickly enough.

Once I've got it all done I'll definitely look at tab loading, unfortunately, the job I do requires me working on multiple tabs at once in chrome (the system is checked for chrome more than edge) and having inactive tabs not updated could be detrimental.

Whatever happens thanks for all your advice, it really helped me get my point across to my IT department.