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Why Does Windows Have Terrible Battery Life?

Posted by Soulskill on from the optimized-for-profit dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Jeff Atwood at Coding Horror is trying to figure out why the battery life for devices running Windows is so much worse than similar (or identical) devices running other operating systems. For example, the Surface Pro 2 made great strides over the original Surface Pro, increasing web-browsing battery life by 42%, but it still lags far behind Android and iOS tablets. The deficit doesn't get any better when Windows is run on Apple hardware. Atwood says, 'Microsoft positions Windows 8 as an operating system that's great for tablets, which are designed for casual web browsing and light app use – but how can that possibly be true when Windows idle power management is so much worse than the competition's desktop operating system in OS X – much less their tablet and phone operating system, iOS?' Anand Lal Shimpi is perplexed, too. Atwood is now reaching out to the community for answers: 'None of the PC vendors he spoke to could justify it, or produce a Windows box that managed similar battery life to OS X. And that battery life gap is worse today – even when using Microsoft's own hardware, designed in Microsoft's labs, running Microsoft's latest operating system released this week. Microsoft can no longer hand wave this vast difference away based on vague references to "poorly optimized third party drivers." ... I just wish somebody could explain to me and Anand why Windows is so awful at managing idle power.'"

12 of 558 comments (clear)

  1. Found yer problem by jeffmeden · · Score: 5, Funny

    Ah ha: "I just wish somebody could explain to me and Anand why Windows is so awful at managing idle power."

    You make the mistake of thinking that just because the device isn't doing something at the user's direction, that it is idle. How do you think the NSA is getting all of their number crunching done while they shake the bugs out of their Utah data center?

    1. Re:Found yer problem by teg · · Score: 4, Funny

      Well Windows Phone 7 seems to be great when it comes to power management.

      Android is awful. (Suppose WP8 will be as bad as the rest).

      You're right, my WP7 phone (a Lumia 900) lasts way longer than my Galaxy S3... Never mind that WP7 can't run any apps in the history of ever (most notably it cant run a microsoft account-capable version of Skype, a microsoft product) but hey the battery will be there when I NEED it...

      Windows Phone has optimized the battery lifetime by analyzing typical usage patterns - by far the most power on iPhones and android phone is spent on running apps. By realizing this, and making sure that Windows Phone have on few, and rather bad, apps, battery lifetime on the phone goes sky high.

  2. Re:Power management is HARD. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    But... but.... but.... Apple doesn't do anything but change the color of their product and sell it as new. Samsung and Google are the only innovators.

  3. Re:Power management is HARD. by Minwee · · Score: 4, Funny

    Math is hard.

    Let's go shopping!

  4. It's that damn "idle" process! by sootman · · Score: 5, Funny

    Chewing up all your CPU.

    (Yes, this post is a joke. It's an (in)famous old article from everyone's favorite tech writer -- who was, in fact, being serious.)

    --
    Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
  5. Re:Easy one... by Wonko+the+Sane · · Score: 5, Funny

    Opening up a covert connection to Fort Meade and transmitting all the user's actions via that channel takes a lot of extra power.

  6. I you were Windows 8 something by kawabago · · Score: 1, Funny

    Wouldn't you want to be shut down? The shame of it all.

  7. Re:Easy one... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Yes, but they're doing *neat* things that we like them to be doing.

    Windows is just doing ... "things" ....

  8. Re:Easy one... by Meneth · · Score: 4, Funny

    Every program that is created must have a purpose. If it does not, it is deleted... except for the exiles. ;)

  9. Re:Easy one... by ColdWetDog · · Score: 5, Funny

    You do what for a living? Wake up and go back to sleep?

    Sounds like fun to me.

    --
    Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
  10. Re:Easy one... by Gilmoure · · Score: 5, Funny

    Just look at the source code, comment out what you don't like and compile.

    --
    I drank what? -- Socrates
  11. Re:Easy one... by ackthpt · · Score: 3, Funny

    12:01:01: Check for Windows updates...

    12:01:02: Check for Windows updates...

    12:01:03: Check for Windows updates...

    12:01:04: Check for Windows updates...

    12:01:05: Check for Windows updates...

    12:01:06: Check for Windows updates...

    12:01:07: Check for Windows updates...
    ...

    --

    A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar