Can't disable Statistical Time Estimation calculation

[Lukeonia1]

Ever since I upgraded BatteryBar Pro to version 3.3.1 (from 3.1 Build fiftysomething), checking or unchecking the "Use Statistical Time estimation" checkbox doesn't do anything: the Time Remaining and Full Lifetime don't change either way. I also installed BatteryBar on two other laptops, with the same results. Has anyone else reported this problem?

[Chris]

I have had one other report of that issue. I'll have to look into it.

[Chris]

I think I know what's going on. If you have a battery that does not report the discharge or charge rate in the popup, then there is no way to report the time remaining except by using statistical time prediction.

Most netbooks and a lot of HP laptops, for example, only report the percentage remaining, not the actual discharge rate. Windows will then only report percent remaining because it's unable to calculate time remaining (capacity / discharge rate).

[Lukeonia1]

No good. My Dell reports its battery charge & discharge rates very accurately, and I never had any problem with it before I upgraded the other day. The same goes for my friend's Gateway. Like I said, the Simple Time Estimation worked fine until I installed the latest version.

Below are a pair of screenshots taken a few minutes ago, showing BatteryBar's time estimation, and the Windows time estimation:

   

   

In case you're wondering, I use the simple time estimation because my battery times vary widely depending on what I'm doing on my laptop. Sitting typing a document, it might draw 12W, but watching a DVD or playing a game with the screen brightness turned up it might draw as much as 35W. Therefore, the statistical time estimation is almost always off by an hour or two either way. Maybe if I simply uninstalled and reinstalled BatteryBar?

[Chris]

Thanks for the info, that helps.

The Statistical Time Prediction works in two ways,
1. It records the average number of seconds it takes to move from one percentage point to the next. It averages this over 10 samples. This creates a profile that reflects your average computer use. So when it says "4:23" with 87% remaining, that means "When your battery has 87% remaining, your battery averages 4 hours and 23 minutes of usable lifetime." If your battery is over-estimating the time remaining, then I would go to Preferences, Tools, and "Reset battery profile data."

2. While discharging, BatteryBar keeps track of the difference between the estimate amount of time your battery will last versus the ACTUAL time that it has lasted. For example, if your battery has run down from 100% to 90% in 22 minutes, but BatteryBar estimates that it should last 30 minutes over the same time frame, it determines that your battery discharged 35% faster than normal. It then takes the time remaining estimate (let's say 4:23) and reduces that to 3 hours and 21 minutes. The ratio between actual and estimated time is checked every 1% change in battery.

If you really want me to check out what's going on, you can enable debug logging which will show me all the details of the data, including the actual/estimated ratios.

1. Hold down SHIFT and right-click on BatteryBar
2. Click on "Enable debug logging"
3. Run you computer though various scenarios like idle, browsing, watching a DVD, etc, whatever you would normally do
4. Repeat 1-2 to disable logging
5. Fill out the feedback form to send me the log

In the meantime, I will be looking into why turning off the time prediction option isn't working for you.

[Lukeonia1]

Hey, not sure if you've made any progress on this, but I found a workaround: I uninstalled the version of BatteryBar I had (leaving the profiles and settings), and installed the copy of BatteryBar v3.1 Build 59 that I had. It's not registered, but the settings from the registered version seem to have stuck. I can't change any of them, but at least it's displaying the raw time remaining properly now.