Lots of users have experienced issues getting aftv to auto sleep. For me the workaround was to set screensaver time to "never". But now with the latest update i noticed both my aftvs are quick to sleep when its left idling. Actually this is true even if i dont force quit kodi.
I went into display settings and noticed theyve been altered --screensaver time is 5 mins.
Maybe its my imagination but it seems to sleep with less than 5 mins idle time. It now sort of acts like my phone--screen goes black if im not using it.
Im not complaining. I just think its interesting theyd find this necessary at amazon. There is no battery to conserve. Anyone have any theories on why this was fixed/modified with the latest firmware?
Some time several months back I recall reading a post from a Fire TV user in Germany, whose Fire TV wouldn't go to sleep. He was reporting that during non-sleep it was drawing excessive power. This was an issue for him because of the cost of electricity.
My best guess is that it's for energy conservation, for the Fire TV at least and in some cases for the TV. I imagine some TVs will turn off automatically after some time with a blank screen, and some TVs (such as mine) will automatically turn on when the Fire TV is woken up.
MetalMan2 said:
Some time several months back I recall reading a post from a Fire TV user in Germany, whose Fire TV wouldn't go to sleep. He was reporting that during non-sleep it was drawing excessive power. This was an issue for him because of the cost of electricity.
My best guess is that it's for energy conservation, for the Fire TV at least and in some cases for the TV. I imagine some TVs will turn off automatically after some time with a blank screen, and some TVs (such as mine) will automatically turn on when the Fire TV is woken up.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Just doing some routine maintenance today, I launched es task manager and was fiddling trying to get my wireless mouse to work (wound up needing new battery). In a very short span--no more than 5 mins, aftv went to sleep 3 times. This to me is a good thing. Its conserving power like most modern devices should. I'm just curious as to why amazon chose to address this now. Optimistically I'm hoping they just want a more power efficient product for their consumers, but wondering if there's anything that made this necessary? If maybe those long periods without sleep could potentially wear it out now that one of my aftvs is reaching its first birthday.
KLit75 said:
Just doing some routine maintenance today, I launched es task manager and was fiddling trying to get my wireless mouse to work (wound up needing new battery). In a very short span--no more than 5 mins, aftv went to sleep 3 times. This to me is a good thing. Its conserving power like most modern devices should. I'm just curious as to why amazon chose to address this now. Optimistically I'm hoping they just want a more power efficient product for their consumers, but wondering if there's anything that made this necessary? If maybe those long periods without sleep could potentially wear it out now that one of my aftvs is reaching its first birthday.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You could try an app I use on all my Android devices. It's called Screen Timeout, and it's in the Playstore. You can place a shortcut on the desktop and click whenever you want to keep the screen from timing out on you. I combined it with Pie Control and can access it from within any app by moving my mouse the side of the screen and clicking to bring up the app, then sliding over to select the Screen Timeout app. Both apps work very well, plus the Pie Control app also has a clock feature so you can see what time it is. The only downside is the clock also has a battery display you can't get rid of, but it's pretty tiny.
Related
So I have googled this and found nothing so far. I'm am wondering if there is anything that will shutdown (not restart) the fire TV if I root it. The play/ select trick just restarts the fire TV for me. Also, are there any apps that allow your phone to act as a fire TV remote?
Sprint Note II / CyanogenMod 11 / 9300 mAh ZeroLemon battery
Xtraordinair said:
So I have googled this and found nothing so far. I'm am wondering if there is anything that will shutdown (not restart) the fire TV if I root it. The play/ select trick just restarts the fire TV for me. Also, are there any apps that allow your phone to act as a fire TV remote?
Sprint Note II / CyanogenMod 11 / 9300 mAh ZeroLemon battery
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
How would you turn it back on if you were to shut it down?
rbox said:
How would you turn it back on if you were to shut it down?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Maybe shutdown isn't the right word.. I would like to have it go to sleep without going through 30 mins of screensavers.
Xtraordinair said:
Maybe shutdown isn't the right word.. I would like to have it go to sleep without going through 30 mins of screensavers.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I don't know if anyone ever did power measurements on it... but I don't really think there is going to be that big of a difference in the firetv between it being in screensaver mode vs in sleep mode. It's still very much alive while it's sleeping.
rbox said:
I don't know if anyone ever did power measurements on it... but I don't really think there is going to be that big of a difference in the firetv between it being in screensaver mode vs in sleep mode. It's still very much alive while it's sleeping.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Posted on xbmc forums
"Just got mine today and checked power consumption of the Firetv. and during boot it consumes about 4 watts and peaked at 6 for a couple of seconds after that idled at 2.5 watts. tried playing a movie on xbmc koying's most current build and its about the same as idle. varies from 3.7 - 4 watts. this was measured with a p3 kill-a-watt.
I gotta say I am excited on the progress on this considering its only been a week."
So its about 1.5w difference between idle and playing a movie. That is one major reason I bought this gotta save $$$ lol
Shinyhead said:
Posted on xbmc forums
"Just got mine today and checked power consumption of the Firetv. and during boot it consumes about 4 watts and peaked at 6 for a couple of seconds after that idled at 2.5 watts. tried playing a movie on xbmc koying's most current build and its about the same as idle. varies from 3.7 - 4 watts. this was measured with a p3 kill-a-watt.
I gotta say I am excited on the progress on this considering its only been a week."
So its about 1.5w difference between idle and playing a movie. That is one major reason I bought this gotta save $$$ lol
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's not what is important. It's idle vs "sleeping".
If you send the shutdown command the fire tv will go to sleep immediately. I have down it with my USB keyboard and with the LANmote Deluxe app. Which is also an app that will let you control the fire tv with your phone.
Droidmote will do everything you are asking for. Install the server on the FTV and the client on your phone. You can sleep and wake the FTV via the power button in the droidmote interface.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.videomap.droidmoteclient
Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk
sublimnl said:
Droidmote will do everything you are asking for. Install the server on the FTV and the client on your phone. You can sleep and wake the FTV via the power button in the droidmote interface.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.videomap.droidmoteclient
Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Where did you get your droidmote APK from? Trying to find a source that's safe.
Nevermind.. I found the play store tutorial
anyone know if this will turn off your TV at the same time via hdmi CEC?
I tried it and it did not turn off my tv
Sprint Note II / CyanogenMod 11 / 9300 mAh ZeroLemon battery
Maybe I'm blind, but I can't find any way to prevent the Fire TV from sleeping? It stays awake if I have a sideloaded app like XBMC loaded, but if I am in an official Fire TV app, it goes to sleep after 30 minutes. This confuses guests at my house when they turn the TV on and get nothing but a black screen from the Fire TV.
Red Eye Sleep Awake seems to work fine on my Fire TV. Once running, FTV never goes to sleep.
I mainly used it for the AirPin PRO app, when FTV goes to sleep, AirPin stops working. But, after letting FTV run without sleeping for 3 to 4 days, I did find FTV much warmer to touch. It was not that important for AirPin to be available on demand for me, so I uninstalled the Red Eye app and let FTV go to sleep.
martyxng said:
Maybe I'm blind, but I can't find any way to prevent the Fire TV from sleeping? It stays awake if I have a sideloaded app like XBMC loaded, but if I am in an official Fire TV app, it goes to sleep after 30 minutes. This confuses guests at my house when they turn the TV on and get nothing but a black screen from the Fire TV.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What was your solution? I am looking for a way to disable sleep to allow the screensaver to stay active.
Thx,
riz
Screensaver.tv said:
What was your solution? I am looking for a way to disable sleep to allow the screensaver to stay active.
Thx,
riz
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I need to look at it more, but I put a needle through the mic and into the ic under to prevent the mic from ever working. left it alone for ten hours, and when I turned on the tv next, the fire was fully up. usually it takes a few slaps in the head to wake up; I think the error thrown by testing voice may have also kept it awake. I'm hoping this doesn't kill the batteries in the remote.
roustabout said:
I need to look at it more, but I put a needle through the mic and into the ic under to prevent the mic from ever working. left it alone for ten hours, and when I turned on the tv next, the fire was fully up. usually it takes a few slaps in the head to wake up; I think the error thrown by testing voice may have also kept it awake. I'm hoping this doesn't kill the batteries in the remote.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hey guys, anyone have a solution? thx
dbdoshi said:
Red Eye Sleep Awake seems to work fine on my Fire TV. Once running, FTV never goes to sleep.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have sideloaded RedEye Sleep Awake onto my Fire TV and launched it but it does not keep my Fire TV box from going to sleep. A few seconds afterwards, the Fire TV white LED goes out.
What should I try?
Not a geek said:
I have sideloaded RedEye Sleep Awake onto my Fire TV and launched it but it does not keep my Fire TV box from going to sleep. A few seconds afterwards, the Fire TV white LED goes out.
What should I try?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Works fine for me... on both my FTVs. These are rooted FTVs (if you are not rooted, I am not sure if this app works)
My settings within the app are:
Awake Level: Fully Awake (you will need to go into that option to select it)
Start at boot: Yes
Disable when screen is turned off: No
Enable when on AC: Yes
Enable at startup: Yes
Disable on low battery: No
Disable notification Icon: No
(Yes means checked, No means not checked).
Once you have the settings verified, reboot your FTV and see if it stays up. Also, my RedEye Sleep Toggle version is 1.5.2 (free version)
Also, on my FTV under Settings, Display & Sounds, Screen Saver, the "Start Time" is set to "Never". Not sure if that makes any difference, but wanted to put it out here.
Thanks for your rapid reply, dbdoshi and for the settings detail you included.
I tried again and this time the Redeye Sleep Toggle app does indeed work.
I too have two Fire TVs and why I failed on both of 'em to get the app to work, I have no idea. Anyway, all's well that ends well...
Re the sceensaver settings, I've mine set to 5 minutes and this doesn't disturb the app behaviour at all.
Also, my Fire TVs are not rooted, merely sideloaded.
For anyone confused by the app name, at the time of writing it shows up in Google Play and on the BinaryMagi Inc website as Redeye Stay Awake, but on Android devices it shows up as Redeye Sleep Toggle.
Hi all,
I recently received an unlocked 32gb Fire Phone. I searched these forums often to see what the sub-community of Fire Phone users were up to.
Naturally, the first things I did when I received the phone were making it feel more like android by use of the tutorials provided here.
Following the step-by-step instructions for the most recent version of Fire OS, I ran into minor issues with google services.
These experiences are my own and don't reflect other users. I am providing this information for educational purposes and maybe so that someone can in fact help me out.
1 - Google Services forced me to update after I sideloaded it onto the device. Apps were locked without updating.
By doing this, every so often the device likes to alert me that my google account failed to authenticate. It's nonsense, because google play store and play music run flawlessly. In fact, I get updates via e-mail when ever I make a purchase.
2 - Gmaildoes NOT work. I'm not sure how users got it to work but it does NOT work on the device I am currently using. It tells me my name and password are incorrect and then I receive the "failed to..." message. I downloaded a decent replacement from the play store.
3 - Google maps froze after a half a block. I was forced to use Fire Phone's Maps app, which was almost perfect on an hour drive. No hiccups, lag, or freezes.
4 - Making phone calls makes the screen go black. I could not hang up or see my calls. If I unlocked the phone to get to the dialer while on the phone, it would reset to black. Quick fix was going to settings > accessibility > power button turns off call.
5 -From midnight to noon, the device was used on and off. Remember, Fire OS is running, but google ui and services are running as well. Google is taking over 40% of the battery life while Fire OS takes above 25%.
Midnight - 100% (Idle)
2 am - 3 am - 81% (Social Networking)
3 am - 5am - 61% (Idle)
5 am - 7 am - 59% (Idle)
7 am - 8 am - 51% (Browsing)
8am - 11 pm - 20% (Idle)
11pm - 11:20 - 18% (Streaming Tunes)
11:20am - 1 pm - 8% (Idle)
1pm - 1:57pm - 33% (Charging)
During this, light texting to and from occurred, but rarely during idling.
I text often and receive a ton of e-mails so I do worry this will be worse as time progresses and the device ages.
Reviews are unanimous in describing the battery life as mediocre, but seeing as there is a ton of tech packed in, it doesn't bother me entirely. I knew what I was getting myself into when I clicked buy, so I'm not offended as some people tend to get.
My questions to my findings are :
How do I get gmail to work?
How can I see the dialer when I require it?
Is there a method to promote battery longevity?
Do other users have similar findings when using Fire OS without google services?
I can only comment on stock Fire Phone functionality as I actually bought it for the Amazon ecosystem and UI, but battery life was an issue for me as well at first.
I haven't been able to narrow it down exactly, but it's something to do with location services. I have simply turned the location services off altogether and my battery lasts twice as long now, in fact, it lasts as long as my Nokia Lumia 735 did. I usually get up at 7 in the morning and to sleep at 11/12 in the evening. With the Fire Phone I have about 25% left at 11/12, even after watching some Netflix or Instant Video
I don't know how Microsoft does it, but I always have location services on on Windows Phone devices without noticing any battery drain whatsoever. On the Fire Phone all is fine now and when idle it doesn't drain any battery at all, or <1% per hour
I did also notice the battery drain from Fire OS, and it seems to be down to the Kinesis_service, which is an AWS stream for data. No doubt to do with linking everything to Amazon's services. Please note as well that I use auto-brightness too without issues.
MrDewitt said:
Hi all,
I recently received an unlocked 32gb Fire Phone. I searched these forums often to see what the sub-community of Fire Phone users were up to.
Naturally, the first things I did when I received the phone were making it feel more like android by use of the tutorials provided here.
Following the step-by-step instructions for the most recent version of Fire OS, I ran into minor issues with google services.
These experiences are my own and don't reflect other users. I am providing this information for educational purposes and maybe so that someone can in fact help me out.
1 - Google Services forced me to update after I sideloaded it onto the device. Apps were locked without updating.
By doing this, every so often the device likes to alert me that my google account failed to authenticate. It's nonsense, because google play store and play music run flawlessly. In fact, I get updates via e-mail when ever I make a purchase.
2 - Gmaildoes NOT work. I'm not sure how users got it to work but it does NOT work on the device I am currently using. It tells me my name and password are incorrect and then I receive the "failed to..." message. I downloaded a decent replacement from the play store.
3 - Google maps froze after a half a block. I was forced to use Fire Phone's Maps app, which was almost perfect on an hour drive. No hiccups, lag, or freezes.
4 - Making phone calls makes the screen go black. I could not hang up or see my calls. If I unlocked the phone to get to the dialer while on the phone, it would reset to black. Quick fix was going to settings > accessibility > power button turns off call.
5 -From midnight to noon, the device was used on and off. Remember, Fire OS is running, but google ui and services are running as well. Google is taking over 40% of the battery life while Fire OS takes above 25%.
Midnight - 100% (Idle)
2 am - 3 am - 81% (Social Networking)
3 am - 5am - 61% (Idle)
5 am - 7 am - 59% (Idle)
7 am - 8 am - 51% (Browsing)
8am - 11 pm - 20% (Idle)
11pm - 11:20 - 18% (Streaming Tunes)
11:20am - 1 pm - 8% (Idle)
1pm - 1:57pm - 33% (Charging)
During this, light texting to and from occurred, but rarely during idling.
I text often and receive a ton of e-mails so I do worry this will be worse as time progresses and the device ages.
Reviews are unanimous in describing the battery life as mediocre, but seeing as there is a ton of tech packed in, it doesn't bother me entirely. I knew what I was getting myself into when I clicked buy, so I'm not offended as some people tend to get.
My questions to my findings are :
How do I get gmail to work?
How can I see the dialer when I require it?
Is there a method to promote battery longevity?
Do other users have similar findings when using Fire OS without google services?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
On the screen going black on a phone call, my guess is you have a screen protector on this phone. Its blocking the proximity sensor. Take the protector off and see if that resolves your issue.
Xyth said:
On the screen going black on a phone call, my guess is you have a screen protector on this phone. Its blocking the proximity sensor. Take the protector off and see if that resolves your issue.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah, I've got it but Its very hard to see where is the proximity sensor located. Normally in the other phones we will see it if we look close enough. However, it's almost invisible on the amazon fire phone.
And after a hard-looking few minute. I find it locates just about 1mm under the front facing camera (Using the sensor checking and check around haha)
However, most of the amazon fire phone screen protector now doesn't have the hole in this position. And I really want to use one to protect my screen.
How dumb are the screen protector manufacturers ? I may try to put a hole on this using the paper-hole-punch. Just don't know if it works ...
and with 3.6.8 and low motion (turn off all) my fire gives a very good battery performance !
Several things fixed
Wonderful responses everyone.
I keep location services off at all times unless GPS is being used. I am a stickler for turning it off!
At the time of my post, I was not using a screen protector. I was however using the cheap plastic that surrounded the phone, which became dirty in one day. That area was smudged enough to block the proximity sensor. When my case arrived, I put it on, and the screen is flawless during calls.
As for battery performance. I now went under 24 hours of battery life and have screenshots as evidence. There was a memory leak on my phone somewhere and that stopped! I did nothing to prevent or fix it. The apps that were consuming as much ram as they were are not any more, even under extreme use. I am impressed. Google services went from 40% usage to a miniscule 3%! I did nothing to change anything. So far, my phone has gone through three separate charges since use. After the second charge, for some reason, the phone works so well.
Still would love to know how to get gmail and maps to function correctly.
Google service runs hard at the first time to sync so many things in google account to your device, I suppose.
robocopvn said:
Google service runs hard at the first time to sync so many things in google account to your device, I suppose.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Maybe! When I install google now laucher, it also drains the battery life time so much.
Something I've discovered is closing apps through the Fire Phone Launcher. Below is a copy/paste of this section through the review I wrote up.
LilLowEK said:
2. How do I quit apps that I'm not using at the moment to extend battery life and free resources?
- If you double click the home button to access the "Quick Switch" menu you can swipe up which will close the app, remove it from the quick switch menu, along with removing it from the cluttered home carousel.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I set up my first FTV 4 months ago and recently got another. Everything went pretty smooth except I cant remember what I did to make it sleep after x number of minutes idle in xbmc/kodi. I think the first FTV might have SPMC on it while the second has elmerohueso's XBMC/Kodi.
Any ideas what I did last year? I have kids, my brain is mush.
cardboardbox said:
I set up my first FTV 4 months ago and recently got another. Everything went pretty smooth except I cant remember what I did to make it sleep after x number of minutes idle in xbmc/kodi. I think the first FTV might have SPMC on it while the second has elmerohueso's XBMC/Kodi.
Any ideas what I did last year? I have kids, my brain is mush.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Can't you just review the settings on your old AFTV and emulate the same to the new one?
But if not, go to:
System settings - Settings - Power saving -> toggle the Shutdown function timer to 5 min and Shutdown function to quit.
Then, under Appearance - Screen saver - Screensaver mode to dim and Screensaver time to 3 mins.
Keeping in mind that by default AFTV takes 30 mins before it actually goes to sleep.
These are my settings on my AFTV and works like a charm.
Good luck!
Macpatto said:
Can't you just review the settings on your old AFTV and emulate the same to the new one?
But if not, go to:
System settings - Settings - Power saving -> toggle the Shutdown function timer to 5 min and Shutdown function to quit.
Then, under Appearance - Screen saver - Screensaver mode to dim and Screensaver time to 3 mins.
Keeping in mind that by default AFTV takes 30 mins before it actually goes to sleep.
These are my settings on my AFTV and works like a charm.
Good luck!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
thanks for the help. I did look at my other AFTV but the settings you mention are "Off" and "Quit" which is the default setting. I checked for installed apps that might do the sleep function but didnt see anything. I really have no idea how I did this and I did search the forum for quite a while. I'd never have figured it out myself so I know the answer must be here somewhere.
I'll try your recommendation, maybe it will be good enough.
I got it working by installing elmerohueso's screensaver.
i am still on a learning curve with the AFTV as come from using a Rpi after many years so know xbmc/kodi pretty well and now love being able to use the better skins
so my AFTV is pretty new and has the latest FW so i am unable to root, so anyway i side loaded SPMC 13.4.0 and after set-up very happy with it and the speed is amazing compared to the Rpi
anyway decided to also side load Kodi 14.1 (as read they can both be loaded without conflicting) again after setting up happy again (and prefer to use the Kodi set-up) SPMC is still loaded just in case tho
anyhow 1 thing i have noticed is that if SPMC was left in the menus ect or SPMC's home screen the screen saver DIM would kick in as it should after 3 mins and also after the 30 mins (approx) it would send the AFTV to sleep and once woken up it would be where i left it (this i really like)
but since using Kodi the screen saver DIM kicks in a it should but the AFTV will not sleep ( i have since set it up to quit Kodi after x mins so the AFTV will then sleep after the given 30 mins on AFTV home screen_ but upon waking its on the AFTV hoe screen
my question is why does SPMC sleep ok when its left within SPMC but Kodi not?
also due to having Kodi quit to get back to AFTV home screen to enable it to sleep. daft question i know but am i correct in saying the sceduealed auto updates and backups i set up will not work due to Kodi not running)
also great forum with loads of info
baz2011uk said:
i am still on a learning curve with the AFTV as come from using a Rpi after many years so know xbmc/kodi pretty well and now love being able to use the better skins
so my AFTV is pretty new and has the latest FW so i am unable to root, so anyway i side loaded SPMC 13.4.0 and after set-up very happy with it and the speed is amazing compared to the Rpi
anyway decided to also side load Kodi 14.1 (as read they can both be loaded without conflicting) again after setting up happy again (and prefer to use the Kodi set-up) SPMC is still loaded just in case tho
anyhow 1 thing i have noticed is that if SPMC was left in the menus ect or SPMC's home screen the screen saver DIM would kick in as it should after 3 mins and also after the 30 mins (approx) it would send the AFTV to sleep and once woken up it would be where i left it (this i really like)
but since using Kodi the screen saver DIM kicks in a it should but the AFTV will not sleep ( i have since set it up to quit Kodi after x mins so the AFTV will then sleep after the given 30 mins on AFTV home screen_ but upon waking its on the AFTV hoe screen
my question is why does SPMC sleep ok when its left within SPMC but Kodi not?
also due to having Kodi quit to get back to AFTV home screen to enable it to sleep. daft question i know but am i correct in saying the sceduealed auto updates and backups i set up will not work due to Kodi not running)
also great forum with loads of info
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm not expert, but I believe it's because SPMC is specifically designed for AFTV, while Kodi is for more general android devices. You may want to look into AFTVtweaks (for XBMC/Kodi), that are floating around as a zip files somewhere on these forums, though I am not positive if they updated for Kodi yet.