Cobalt 2 Battery Life

[abernat]

I have a Cobalt and my wife a Cobalt 2. Her battery discharges much much faster than mine does while not diving and in sleep mode. It appears that her computer wakes up thinking it's diving (but this is based on only a few random observations). It may be related to her screen brightness being in Auto mode (but not sure of this either).

Is this an issue others have seen? Is there anything I can more carefully observe to try and pin it down?

Elsewise, these computers are a joy to use,
Andy

 

[RonR]

Andy,

We have had some isolated reports of excessive power drain in sleep mode, though we have not been able to get it to happen here- it's not the norm for Cobalt 2's. Just like the Cobalt 1, they should lose about 1-2% in 24 hours if they are in sleep. The Cobalt 2 will draw down the battery a little faster when diving, but the sleep current should be almost the same.

It's interesting that you say her computer wakes up thinking it is diving. A Cobalt waking from sleep should return to whatever screen it was in when it went to sleep, unless the wet contacts are activated. If the water contacts (the pins under the nose that also do USB and charging) are wet or bridged (as in the adapter left in place, for instance), the Cobalt won't go into full sleep, but will keep sampling rapidly as it thinks it might go diving. The display will turn off, but it will still be using more power. We strongly suspect that this issue is related to the wet contacts, and that the Cobalt is just not actually going into sleep mode.

We have an example of this coming in tomorrow for troubleshooting, I will keep you posted on what we find. I'm sending you a PM with my direct contact info. I may well have more questions, and perhaps a new firmware version for you to try.

Ron

 

[abernat]

Ron,

I can verify that I did not leave the adapter in place while this happened. As to whether the pins were bridged due to being wet, I can't answer that since I didn't check. However, it would definitely go into sleep mode and stay there for a period of time greater than just a few minutes, before going to the Post Dive screen (which I think is where it always went - again I didn't think to carefully note this).

When I went to charge both computers prior to our trip, the Cobalt 2 battery was nearly discharged while the Cobalt's was not. And they both started at 100% charged some time before (sorry but I don't remember who long).

Andy


Andy

 

[RonR]

It sounds like something is preventing the Cobalt from going fully into sleep mode (though the display might well shut off), and that is depleting the battery at a faster rate than it should. We are testing one Cobalt now that reported this to try to uncover the cause. Can you check and see if this is waking to the post dive screen consistently- it should come back up to whatever screen it was left in- unless it is diving in sleep... And can you say if this is happening consistently, or just occasionally? We will keep you posted.

Ron