Develop Bugs

[Q] Terrible Battery Life - Hardware Fault?

I've had my new desire z about 2 weeks now, and am utterly dissapointed by a frankly dreadful battery life.
It's my second DZ, given the original was nicked, but (kicks self) wasn't insured, so was purchased from a supplier that shipped my phone from Hong Kong (I live in UK, and the new phone is an identical model, except for a slight difference in key layout - A2727 I think is model number)
The original phone would give me over two days life with very low use, which i considered to be fair for a decent smart phone.
The new phone barely gives me 10 hours with no use. I've done a couple of tests - unplugged it at 2am, but 8am it's at 30% or lower. This was done with all data connections turned off.
If i leave the new phone to go dead then that's it - it won't charge. The only way i've found to get juice back into the battery is to hold it in my old touch-pro 2 until it's charged enough to charge from the desire.
Last night was the clincher. I've gone out with some friends to the pub. I had a conversation over it, and checked my battery life - 42%. As a last dith effort i factory reset the phone at that point to rule out a mischevious app, and checked - 39%
Within 2 hours, and with no use at all that was down at 8%. In order to avoid the charge issue i cut my losses and turned it off at that point. Once home (oh, about 4 hours later maybe) I was unable to turn it back on. I then left it plugged in overnight, and was still unable to turn it on this morning until i'd done my cross-phone charging trick.
I'm now entirely convinced there's some form of hardware issue at fault here, so i'm wondering if anyone else has had the same problem with this phone before? I see lots of thread regarding poor battery life, but most seem to be solved by turning data off or some rouge app, neither of which are an issue in this case. Also, any hints for making my life easier when I phone HTC tomorrow? I've read elsewhere their support might not be all it should be.
Thanks in advance for any help! I've ready to pull my hair out as what is a fantastic phone otherwise has been completely ruined by this battery issue.

I think you should get a new battery to rule out that the battery itself isn't a problem. I had similar issues with my G1 a while back and it solved a lot of wierd, seemingly unrelated problems. Batteries are pretty cheap online, $15 or so and some are free shipping.
The way that I figured out my battery was toast was by comparing it to other batteries. it had a bulge in the center where it should have been flat. Fingers crossed it isn't hardware.

had already tried a diff battery (did you know you can chew a corner off a touch pro 2 battery and make it fit??) Which i know worked fine in the old nicked dz and imo as i was getting same issue ruled out battery problem.
anyway... phone has now been returned and i'm waiting 2-3 weeks to get it repaired under warranty (though am hoping for complete replacement obviously)

Chewing on batteries has got to get you extra xda brownie points. I'll remember that
Sent from my T-Mobile G2 using XDA App

I'd like to think there was some techincal or engineering skill in there somewhere.
but it was mostly "Well, apart form this nugget of plastic they're the same shape..."

I'm having the exact same problem... When you take you shutdown to recharge a dead battery, does it sometimes try to turn back on? I left my apartment like 30m ago with 100% battery, and I'm at 84% and declining. There's nothing running. And I've replaced the battery, same issue.
I think I might just RMA this one.. seems like an engineering issues.
Edit: I'm the 40 seconds it took me to type this, battery dropped to 82%.

Wanted to bump this post. I've since wiped / reloaded and wiped battery stats. It's still jacked. I think it's an internal electrical thing. Reason is: I'll power down to take the battery out. When I put the other one in, it'll turn back on. Or if I power down to charge, it'll turn back on - plugged in or not. I don't want to deal with the RMA process again, but I think it's my only choice. I've taken two phone calls this AM @ 100%, and it's at 96% now. Drives me insane. Ugh... I'll call TMO. Anyone know if the replacements are still rootable?

So... I had my phone replaced, and it's still doing the horrid battery thing. Flashed CM 7.1 RC3 or w/e the latest is, cycled one battery - and it drops like a stone. I have two chargers (one at work, one at home) and they both charge the phone up to 100%. But it's still losing battery life quicker than I'd like. I used to be able to get a good 18 hours out of this phone. Even with a new battery and a new phone, it's acting up. I'll try to flash an older ROM and see if it's the same thing. I updated to #130 nightly from 7/10. We'll see how it lasts today. But I do remember I had horrible luck with CM's ROM's on my G1. Battery would just drain for no reason. The main process taking up the most battery life is "Cell standby" so I changed to the latest radio - and it still drops. OP - have you figured out your problem? I've removed a ton of apps, and it's still messing up. I listen to music for... 45m in the AM, and I get down to 54%. I've formatted my SD Card as well.. it's driving me insane.

I just flashed CM 7.1 a few days ago and while the ROM is great, it does seem to be a litter harder on my battery than 6.1 was. With light/moderate usage yesterday, I got about 16 hours and that was running the battery almost completely dead. With heavy usage, I get about 10 hours and need a bump charge in the afternoon.
You might want to look into getting a Mugen 1800mah battery. You can get them on Ebay from 35-40 dollars. The seller 'nakedcellphone' is based out of Southern California and another user has confirmed ordering from them and getting a legitimate battery (lots of fakes on Ebay). Either that, or carry a charger with you...
Have you tried using Watchdog to see if there are any 'rogue' apps that are causing the drain by running in the background? What about going to spare parts > battery history > Partial Wake usage? There it will show apps that are draining your battery when you're not 'actively' using your phone. For me, the Android System is the highest drain in that menu. Good luck! Hope some of this helps!

I just checked spare parts, and there's nothing too odd in there. Just my music app. And I've changed that too - thought Winamp was killing me. I'll check Watchdog. This is a brand new OEM battery along with an RMA'd G2. It has to be the OS / Radio or something. I've stripped like every non-essential app too.

battery isue with JB

strange thing is going on. my battery dropped form 50 to 17 %, than from 30 to 9% ect. before that i took out battery because i wanted to see something.
after that. battery life is getting worse. usually i could get about 4-4.5 hours of screen time. but now only 2-3 hours.
what is going on with my battery

Check your apps and install BetterBatterStats. It could be rogue apps not letting the phone go to sleep or making it work more than it should.

chlehqls said:
Check your apps and install BetterBatterStats. It could be rogue apps not letting the phone go to sleep or making it work more than it should.
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i have watchdog for two days and it doesnt shows any problem.

milets said:
i have watchdog for two days and it doesnt shows any problem.
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Click to collapse
I am having similar issues (Jellybean Vicious Jellybean4.1.1 AOSP, faux kernal). I can literally see the battery percentage go down a percent every 30 seconds or so when i am using my phone / surfing web / streaming music.
Cant post in the main forum now - any suggestions would be appreciated.

UBNAS81 said:
I am having similar issues (Jellybean Vicious Jellybean4.1.1 AOSP, faux kernal). I can literally see the battery percentage go down a percent every 30 seconds or so when i am using my phone / surfing web / streaming music.
Cant post in the main forum now - any suggestions would be appreciated.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It is often the kernal with the new JB roms. In an older build of Franco's kernal if you opened the camera when you first started the phone it would fix battery drain. I suggest a new kernal! (Franco's runs great on mine! ). If this doesn't work you might want to recalibrate your battery. This app works great, search "batterycalibration" on the play store. It will delete your battery data so your phone will charge to an actual 100%. Hope this helps!

seffland said:
It is often the kernal with the new JB roms. In an older build of Franco's kernal if you opened the camera when you first started the phone it would fix battery drain. I suggest a new kernal! (Franco's runs great on mine! ). If this doesn't work you might want to recalibrate your battery. This app works great, search "batterycalibration" on the play store. It will delete your battery data so your phone will charge to an actual 100%. Hope this helps!
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Click to collapse
There is so much wrong about this post its not even funny.
All kernels are pretty much equal. It all depends on how you tune it. You cannot calibrate your battery... all that does is delete battery stats. Which again DOES NOTHING.
Sent From My Toro+ via SkyBlue Tapatalk

My N7 running JB gets great battery life, but the GNex on JB is crap when it comes to battery. I'm often out of battery by 3-4pm in the afternoon.

whatisreal7 said:
My N7 running JB gets great battery life, but the GNex on JB is crap when it comes to battery. I'm often out of battery by 3-4pm in the afternoon.
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Click to collapse
The GNex has a 1850 mAh battery while the N7 has a 4326 giant mAh battery. That's more than twice the juice. What did you expect?

harveydent said:
The GNex has a 1850 mAh battery while the N7 has a 4326 giant mAh battery. That's more than twice the juice. What did you expect?
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Click to collapse
I've experienced crap battery since moving moving to JB as well. Same kernel and I can only manage 3.5 hours of display over like 8 hours. On Wi-Fi. Whereas on ICS same kernel as JB I was getting 5 hours. Its not just this guy.
Sent From My Toro+ via SkyBlue Tapatalk

I picked up a spare battery over the weekend (identical 1750mAh Samsung batteries), and today I ran the first one from 100% down to below 30%, and swapped. When I arrived home, I popped in the first one to charge it, only to find it is at 58%. I guess the principle is to not pay too much attention to the exact number, and to keep all my batteries as highly charged as possible...
I don't seem to have any rogue apps. The phone appears to sleep very well when I'm not actively using it.

leppo said:
I picked up a spare battery over the weekend (identical 1750mAh Samsung batteries), and today I ran the first one from 100% down to below 30%, and swapped. When I arrived home, I popped in the first one to charge it, only to find it is at 58%. I guess the principle is to not pay too much attention to the exact number, and to keep all my batteries as highly charged as possible...
I don't seem to have any rogue apps. The phone appears to sleep very well when I'm not actively using it.
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Click to collapse
If your battery randomly drops when you reboot your phone do this :
Let it die completely until it turns off, keep it turned off and then charge it completely (usually overnight ) and then turn it back on and it'll show you a very accurate battery percentage
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2

isinisterx said:
If your battery randomly drops when you reboot your phone do this :
Let it die completely until it turns off, keep it turned off and then charge it completely (usually overnight ) and then turn it back on and it'll show you a very accurate battery percentage
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
that is my problem.
i hope my phone wont die after i try that like you said.

[Q] battery drops as soon as i unplug

I just got my gs3 2 weeks ago. Since last week, whenever i unplug it from a night of charging, the battery immediately drops to 98%. I had rooted my phone, but i restored it to like out of the box this past weekend. Is this a known bug?
Thanks.

I don't think the batteries charge past 98% as a fail safe mechanism.
Sent from my SGH-I747 using xda premium

So the 100% is a lie?
also, what's odd is that if i unplug it initially, it drops to 98%. if i plug it back in for a few minutes and then unplug it again, it's up at 100 and seems to drain relatively normally.

The battery life on this phone is a bit of a mystery..I have had mine replaced due to just horrible batt life. It would drop 10% with about 10 mins of browsing. The replacement has been marginally better. I have no idea how people are getting 4 hrs screen on time with 20% left. I just flashed the MIUI JB4.1 Rom and its still not any better. Makes me think I have purchase another batt...

bnw99 said:
The battery life on this phone is a bit of a mystery..I have had mine replaced due to just horrible batt life. It would drop 10% with about 10 mins of browsing. The replacement has been marginally better. I have no idea how people are getting 4 hrs screen on time with 20% left. I just flashed the MIUI JB4.1 Rom and its still not any better. Makes me think I have purchase another batt...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
A common problem with the battery life is an error with account synching. Every few phones will have this issue, and it is easily fixed with a factory reset. Basically the phone will try every 3 seconds or so to synch your accounts only to fail, and try again. Causes the phone to drain in less than a half hour.

Bolexle said:
A common problem with the battery life is an error with account synching. Every few phones will have this issue, and it is easily fixed with a factory reset. Basically the phone will try every 3 seconds or so to synch your accounts only to fail, and try again. Causes the phone to drain in less than a half hour.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If i flashed a custom rom, I would've already factory reset though...

bnw99 said:
If i flashed a custom rom, I would've already factory reset though...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I retract my previous statement, I obviously don't know how to read.
Still, doesn't hurt to check. Go into your settings and check your accounts. If any of them have a red error symbol when you click on them then you may be having this issue.

bnw99 said:
The battery life on this phone is a bit of a mystery..I have had mine replaced due to just horrible batt life. It would drop 10% with about 10 mins of browsing. The replacement has been marginally better. I have no idea how people are getting 4 hrs screen on time with 20% left. I just flashed the MIUI JB4.1 Rom and its still not any better. Makes me think I have purchase another batt...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It's possible. I got pretty close to that yesterday but that's being connected to wifi all day at work and at home and no videos. It's possible doing very minimalist tasks.
Sent from my SGH-I747M using Tapatalk 2

Imo, battery life on this out any around phone is not a mystery. Auto sync, auto bright, auto rotate, anything "auto" will cause more battery to be used. I can also tell you that simply hitting the home button to leave an app, instead of using the back button, will cause more battery drain. Wifi uses less battery than mobile data. Bluetooth will also cause a slightly higher battery drain. Email, or any app, set to push will devour a battery. Leaving apps open when locking the phone will cause slightly higher battery drain. Leaving wifi turned on when not connected to wifi will also cause a drain.
I know a lot of that is what people consider a smartphone to be used for. But with a little tweaking, most can get their battery life better. I personally leave auto everything off, screen timeout 1 minute, screen bright 25%, wifi/bt on only when in use, email set to poll when i open the app. I think you get the idea.

Screen timeout means nothing. Just put your phone to sleep...
Sent from my SGH-I747M using Tapatalk 2

slicetwo said:
So the 100% is a lie?
also, what's odd is that if i unplug it initially, it drops to 98%. if i plug it back in for a few minutes and then unplug it again, it's up at 100 and seems to drain relatively normally.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes the 100% is a lie. Most phone manufactures only allow the phone to charge to 96%-98%. This gives the life of the batteries longevity. When I had the galaxy nexus developers would add 100% charge into their kernels so those who wanted to fully charge their device could...
Also if you look at your phone right after you take it off the charger it will say 98% but if you let the phone sit it goes back up to 100%. Don't know why though. I am no dev just my observations.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I747 using xda premium

Battery Issues

I started running into some battery issues earlier today. I was on AOKP without any issues and one day the battery just started draining very fast. I went from about 50% to 15% in a matter of an hour. That night I slept with my phone charging and it did to get charged passd 54%. And it's charging very slow too. I thought it might be the ROM so I flashed Slim Bean. But it is not heling at all.
Anyone have anything similar going on?
What can I do?

Try calibrating the battery and go like 2-3 charge to discharge and see what its like afterwards
Sent from my SGH-I747M using xda premium

Will do. I'll post back

Yea it takes a few rundowns to get into the sweet spot, I thought I was getting horrible battery life till someone suggested that to me now I get about 32-33 hrs on a charge. Which I think is about prefect, I don't game on it I just use everything else all the time. I have ps3, xbox360 & psp for gaming
Sent from my SGH-I747M using xda premium

Well it's been charging for about 6 hours now and it won't get past 54%

I let it charge all night and when I woke up it was finally at 100%. I left for class and unplugged my phone at 7:40. 20 minutes later it was down to 47%. Then another 2 hours later, it was at 11%. Obviously it is draining far too fast. Will AT&T replace my battery? Or does it look like I'm gonna have to buy a new one?

What I normally do is charge it to 100% then boot into recovery and wipe battery stats. Reboot and don't unplug the phone until it again says that the battery is full. Then run with it and see if it helps.

Go ask them I don't see why they wouldn't replace the battery, it does sound like its shot that kind of drain isn't normal at all
Sent from my SGH-I747M using xda premium

I had the same issues with not getting to 100%. Seems like leaving it on the charger for another couple hours (overnight) got it there.

So I went to the AT&T service shop yesterday and she took my battery and put it in a different Galaxy S III and it showed the battery was charged 97%. In my phone, it showed 23%. She told me that it had somthing to do with my phone being rooted. She said the software on my phone was being "tricked" into believing that the battery is a lot less full than it actually is. She told me to unroot my phone and flash it back to stock. So I did that yesterday and it is still no better. I don't know what to try.

Wiping battery stats doesn't help battery life... Something i learned a long time ago with my X10
Sent from my SGH-I747 using XDA Premium HD app

Here's a screenshot of my battery stats. Does Android System usually take up this much battery?

mrb1946 said:
Here's a screenshot of my battery stats. Does Android System usually take up this much battery?
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Click to collapse
My Android system is almost always under 15%. Seeing it that high is alarming. I assume you've tried full wiping and changing ROMs?
Sent from my SGH-I747 using xda app-developers app

CamFlawless said:
My Android system is almost always under 15%. Seeing it that high is alarming. I assume you've tried full wiping and changing ROMs?
Sent from my SGH-I747 using xda app-developers app
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Click to collapse
Yep. I must've flashed my phone to stock at least 10 times now. Ive tried rooting and Unrooting, clearing my flash counter, I really don't know what else to do.

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Thought I'd try installing CM10 just to see if there would be any difference. Screen Brightness shows up as my highest percentage on the battery usage and Android System is much lower on the list, but the battery is still not charging or discharging correctly.

mrb1946 said:
Thought I'd try installing CM10 just to see if there would be any difference. Screen Brightness shows up as my highest percentage on the battery usage and Android System is much lower on the list, but the battery is still not charging or discharging correctly.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I would unroot and take everything back to stock, then go back to the AT&T store you went to before and show another service rep that the phone is messed up and see if they give you another one.
Good luck

ObiWanJacoby said:
I would unroot and take everything back to stock, then go back to the AT&T store you went to before and show another service rep that the phone is messed up and see if they give you another one.
Good luck
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Looks like this is my next course of action. Thanks for your help and I'll post back with whatever happens.

mrb1946 said:
I let it charge all night and when I woke up it was finally at 100%. I left for class and unplugged my phone at 7:40. 20 minutes later it was down to 47%. Then another 2 hours later, it was at 11%. Obviously it is draining far too fast. Will AT&T replace my battery? Or does it look like I'm gonna have to buy a new one?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
mrb1946,
Even though your S3 is reporting percentage values as you stated....the PHYSICAL battery did not drain from a real 100% to a real 47% in 20 minutes. It can't actually physically drain that fast. It would be on FIRE! So, either the calibration of the rom/software or the battery itself somehow messed up.
Also, during that time...was the battery/S3 HOT? That physical evidence would account for some of the drain if it's coming from a rogue app or misbehaving rom component. Did you post a battery drain graph? And were you monitoring the cpu activity during these high drain periods? I mean...periodic checks to see if your CPU is stuck on HIGH freq and if you have any wakelocks shown under the battery graph.

If this problem is still occurring, here's a thread explaining a possible drain from android system. http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1827087&highlight=android+system

How can you troubleshoot certain parts of your phone?

Hi All,
So recently I have been having problems with my battery life. It's not lasting as long as it should. However, I do not know whether or not its my data cable, the device that plugs into the wall, my battery, or the charging port in my phone.
I got my phone from best buy, but it was more than 30 days ago, and I have no insurance on it, so I cannot get a replacement without sending it away for at least $100.
Any tips?

Well what battery life are you getting? Get into the Phone settings and then battery settings and post a snapshot of the graph here. Additionally you can also install Batterystat it will give you a full analysis of what's using up your battery power.
Sent from the Rabbit Hole

bushako said:
Well what battery life are you getting? Get into the Phone settings and then battery settings and post a snapshot of the graph here. Additionally you can also install Batterystat it will give you a full analysis of what's using up your battery power.
Sent from the Rabbit Hole
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think I may have narrowed it down to the battery itself? I have some battery apps that tell me the health is "good," but what does that really mean? My charging cable is iffy, because sometimes it works perfectly, charging to 100 just fine. However, other times it charges 20 percent in 9 hours. When I used my friend's Note II charger, it worked perfectly every-time. But the fact of the matter is, when my phone does charge to 100 from my cable, I still get not the best battery life, which leads me to believe it's my battery's fault. I am going to test out charging my phone to 100% with my friend's cable tonight, and see what happens tomorrow. I will also get batterystat and report back.
Also, this may be important. When I first got my phone, battery life was AMAZING, really quite astounding. It's just kind of dropped down, like a slope. Not a sudden, dramatic drop, but incrementally.
As for the battery info below, here is what went on today. I unplugged my phone from 100% at around 7am. It is now 6pm. Today, my phone was barely used, just sitting in my pocket with wi-fi on. When I did use it, I sent two very quick emails, played scramble with friends for about 45 minutes total, took a few photos, listened to music from the music player for about 15 minutes, and that is really all I did. I feel that my percentage should be much higher than what it is listed as.

Here's mine as you can see I'm getting almost twice your battery life. I have a few apps that i use everyday which are basically whatsapp, xda, chrome. I don't have many apps that would wake the phone constantly and if there is then I disable them from starting up when the phone is not in use. The best tool you can use for something like this would be rom toolbox pro. It's multiple system tools in one and it works great. I'm currently on Omega V10 with perseus kernel. Also I don't connect to wifi much and network here is weak and on 2G but even though I still get this battery life. In areas with good signal I get more battery life. Also I've dropped my phone twice with impact points on the corner, and just minor scuffs but that didn't effect the phones performance or battery life so I doubt it has affected yours.
Sent from the Rabbit Hole

Also I've overclocked, my processor to 1.8ghz and undervolted between - 50 and -100. So i get minimal power wastage from heat build up. Also you can set a black wall paper with a dark theme.
Sent from the Rabbit Hole

bushako said:
Also I've overclocked, my processor to 1.8ghz and undervolted between - 50 and -100. So i get minimal power wastage from heat build up. Also you can set a black wall paper with a dark theme.
Sent from the Rabbit Hole
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Unfortunately, I am not rooted, and haven't planned on doing so ever. Is there anything else I can do to fix my problem? I did download batterystats, and am waiting a few days though to see what it tells me.
Also, I used a different charger just to see what would happen today, and even though its been off the charger for 2 hours, it's already down to 94 percent. So I am thinking that there is either something wrong with the battery, the charging port, or could there be a bug in the phone's software?
I am thinking of getting a new battery, and seeing if that fixes my problem. I'm just so irritated because battery life used to be amazing, and I don't know what happened.

Maybe try a factory reset. Maybe something else has been using your battery.
Sent from my GT-N7100 using xda app-developers app

UtkarshGupta said:
Maybe try a factory reset. Maybe something else has been using your battery.
Sent from my GT-N7100 using xda app-developers app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's what I was thinking. I will probably do that and report back, before going out and buying a battery or something. Is it possible that, although not reported in the battery info, that an app could be rogue or something or taking up battery? I don't want to do a factory reset and redownload a bad app.

Update: I tried a factory reset. It seems to either be worse or just the same. It's been an hour and has dropped to 97 percent, but I have made a couple of phone calls. But compared to before I did a factory reset, it dropped to 96 percent in two hours while not doing anything.

Keep your phone on charging over night.
Then let it drain to zero no matter what.
Do this 3 to 4 times and then
Leave it for charging overnight.
Then while it is already charging use battery calibration.
Sent from my GT-N7100 using xda app-developers app

UtkarshGupta said:
Keep your phone on charging over night.
Then let it drain to zero no matter what.
Do this 3 to 4 times and then
Leave it for charging overnight.
Then while it is already charging use battery calibration.
Sent from my GT-N7100 using xda app-developers app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Quick Update:
I did another factory reset after I said the initial one didn't help. It looks like it may have helped, although I still have not gotten the battery life I used to have.
I found an application here called betterybatterystats, and have downloaded that. I will use my phone throughout today, and will post sceenshots.
If need be, I will take your advice about charging and draining and charging, and then do the battery calibration.

Here are my most reset battery stats. Screenshots are from the battery setting area, and betterbatterystats
Maybe I am just being paranoid and nothing is wrong? I can't make any sense out of these readings, but I hope someone else can.

first of all change you cable if you are having that kind of issues. Mine in my galaxy ace was having that problem, it was like connect/disconnect without any reason and it didnt charged my phone at all. I noticed it when it was too late, the continous on/off kill my battery. When I say kill i mean it just lasts 15 min in 3g with screen on and it happened to me in 2 official batteries.
good luck!
Enviat des del meu GT-N7100