[Cialug] Linux on Lenovo Laptop - Battery Issue

[Sean Flattery]

I haven't used these methods before, but perhaps WinPE or Windows To Go
will work for your needs?  They're both methods of live CD/USB booting of
Windows, and perhaps one will let you use that Lenovo battery manager
program.

I wonder if using a Windows VM would expose the battery device to the guest
OS?  If so that would be another option.

For a Linux only option, TLP might work with your model.
http://linrunner.de/en/tlp/docs/tlp-linux-advanced-power-management.html


Thanks,
Sean



> Date: Tue, 12 Sep 2017 09:29:48 -0500
> From: chris rheinherren <c.rheinherren at gmail.com>
> To: Central Iowa Linux Users Group <cialug at cialug.org>
> Subject: [Cialug] Linux on Lenovo Laptop - Battery Issue
> Message-ID:
>         <CAC7WSoKmOXZqnHPjCdE63Az9H3qVBfM_2jU5O6+EN2NQihd06g at mail.
> gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8"
>
> I have a perlexing issue. I had a Windows 8.1 Lenovo laptop. It was out of
> warrenty so I decided to wipe it and install Ubuntu (17.04) on it.
>
> Since this laptop was plugged into AC power most of the time when it ran
> Windows, Lenovo had a Power Management Utility to keep the battery charged
> to 60% instead of 100% to preserve the battery life to some degree.
>
> I didn't think anything about this utility when I wiped the system thinking
> that those settings would be wiped along with everything else that was
> Windows.
>
> However, once the system came back up with Ubuntu. The battery shows at
> 59.9% of a full charge. If I take it off AC and use the battery and then
> put it back on AC the charging stops at the 59.9% level again. So it seems
> that the settings survived the complete install wipe.
>
> I've done some looking around and it appears that Lenovo has some Linux
> battery utilities to change the charging thresholds for their ThinkPad
> models but not for the regular Lenovo line. From what I can find on the
> 'net. The Windows power utility writes the threshold information to the
> battery chip itself. So even shutting down the computer and removing the
> battery doesn't reset the battery.
>
> I've posted to the Lenovo forum for help on this and to the Ubuntu forums
> as well. But gonna check here to see if anyone has any other ideas. I don't
> really want to reinstall Windows. I do have a backup of the system on an
> external USB harddrive but I wasn't able to boot from that backup either
> and I don't have a Windows 8.1 disc at all.
>
> If nothing else works I might just replace the battery.
>
>
> Thanks
> Chris
>
>