My Framework arrived the other day, and I’m absolutely loving it except that I’m only getting about 4 hours of light usage out of it.
I installed the driver pack and newest BIOS right away, and really haven’t been pushing my laptop that hard, but I’m finding myself having to put it on charge way more often than I expected. I’ve left Windows in balanced power mode, haven’t touched overclocking, and I’ve followed the expansion card placement guide (two USB-C at the back, two USB-A at the front). Is there something I’m doing wrong?
My specs are: PCPartPicker Part List
| Type | Item | Price |
|---|---|---|
| Memory | Crucial CT2K16G56C46S5 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR5-5600 SODIMM CL46 Memory | Purchased For $132.42 |
| Storage | SK Hynix Gold P31 1 TB M.2-2280 PCIe 3.0 X4 NVME Solid State Drive | Purchased For $89.99 |
| Custom | Anker USB C Charger, 735 AU Plug (Nano II 65W), PPS 3-Port Fast Wall Charger | Purchased For $57.99 |
| Custom | UGREEN USB C to USB C Cable 100W Type C Charger Cable (3 M) | Purchased For $17.59 |
| Custom | Framework Laptop 13 (AMD Ryzen™ 5 7640U) | Purchased For $1369.00 |
| Custom | Framework USB-C Expansion Card (x2) | Purchased For $30.00 |
| Custom | Framework USB-A Expansion Card (x2) | Purchased For $30.00 |
| Prices include shipping, taxes, rebates, and discounts | ||
| Total | $1726.99 | |
| Generated by PCPartPicker 2023-11-22 11:41 AEDT+1100 |
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That’s concerning. I did read that the Zen 4 Ryzen chips didn’t really improve on the Zen 3 ones in terms of battery life, but 4 hours is pretty terrible even for the last gen Ryzens chips. I can do better even with my pre-Evo Intel power-sucking 16" Lenovo workstation!
Some thoughts: are you sure Windows and/or antivirus is not doing something in the background in terms of updates or scanning? What level brightness is your screen at? And what do you define as “light usage”?
I can easily get 8-10 hours on Windows 11, check the other posts / forum for advice. Maybe try using efficiency mode for a day as is and see if that makes a difference?
Other things to check are Bitlocker, Core Isolation, and Game Mode, you probably want to turn all off for optimal battery life / performance.
I’ve had a similar experience so far. My adaptive brightness hasn’t been working though, so I think it’s mostly that it’ll be on max brightness and I won’t realize. I’m not sure what battery life I should expect on max brightness, even just browsing around
Watch if it changes in a day or so. A brand new Windows install runs all sorts of updates and stuff in the background. It’s also going to make inconsistent estimates without much history of power use to factor in.
Brightness makes a big difference. Most battery tests are at like 150 nits. The framework can go a lot brighter than this and a lot of people actually like and use higher brightness. Unfortunately at 400 nits the screen starts consuming more power than the rest of the system, your battery life isn’t going to be great, and the efficiency differences between platforms is going to be less noticeable. Testing a full brightness would also punish laptops with brighter screens which is actually a nice feature to have, which is why most reviewers don’t test this way.