12.20 + 12.10 battery consumption ~20%/hr during activity

F6X Pro - I'm having problems with severe battery consumption during an activity. Wearing it around normally, battery consumption is reasonable, but as soon as I start an activity the watch burns 15-20% PER HOUR, which continues even after the activity is stopped/saved.

no pulseox (well, only during sleep)
HR strap and foot pod are connected
WHR is off
no backlight
no bluetooth headphones connected / no music
searching for tempe sensor (halfway through the activity I turned it off so it would stop searching, in case that was the problem)
cold air, but watch internal temp sensor is reporting 70-80 F (21-26 C) under my sleeve, so battery should be warm

This issue has been happening since 12.10 RC and now continues in 12.20. I have restarted the watch several times. I deleted the GarminDevice.xml. I sent [email protected] an email (no response), and I posted in the 12.10 RC thread. Something is really wrong -- the device should be capable of recording ~60 hours and I'm getting more like 5-6 out of a full charge. Standard everyday usage is no problem most of the time, but if I start and end an activity it starts burning power like crazy. This is a really bad bug!

I'm pretty opposed to doing a reset and losing my settings for something that might not even help.

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0 Dr Phil over 4 years ago

Do you have any CIQ add-ones?

0 bluefish over 4 years ago

Perhaps the author of this thread has a tip for you. 100% all the time :)

forums.garmin.com/.../battery-drain

0 multiades over 4 years ago in reply to Dr Phil

Not many. Daylight Left, Oxygen Widget, and battery Widget. Have been using them without issue for at least 9 months.

0 Dr Phil over 4 years ago in reply to multiades

Take them off and see if the problem persists. GARMIN’s software changes have been known to affect CIQ add-ons even if they have been used for months.

Removing add-ons is always the first thing to try when experiencing problems after an update. Developers don’t always keep up with the changes.

0 susu42 over 4 years ago

6pro : I have the same problem since 12.10RC and now on 12.20.

Normal usage is OK but starting and ending an activity will have the battery depleting rapidly until going to power save mode!

And I do not have any CIQ add-on.

Soft reset (long press on "light" button) will stop the drain .... until the next activity.

0 Jano22222 over 4 years ago

Here we go again..........

0 multiades over 4 years ago in reply to Dr Phil

I removed all CIQ add-ons and tried again. Dropped 30% (56%->26%) in 1.75 hours and it's still falling abnormally fast after stopping/saving the activity. This is definitely a firmware problem.

0 mcalista over 4 years ago

The big power drain not mentioned in your post is music. To test/isolate this feature, I'd recommend creating a custom power mode with music off.

Edit: Just re-reread and you have the 6X, and not the 6X Pro, so no music.

0 multiades over 4 years ago in reply to mcalista

Sorry, it is 6X pro and I am definitely not using music

0 Dr Phil over 4 years ago in reply to multiades

If it was firmware don't you think all of us would be having the problem?

The only thing we can say for definite is that your watch appears to have a problem with the battery usage following the update. In which case you need to contact Garmin Support.