I have just purchased a new HP Spectre x360 Convertible 13 laptop last week with Windows 8.1 installed as the operating system. It is the first time I have owned anything with Windows 8.1.
Anyway, I am wanting to adjust the Critical Battery Level in Power Options to something lower than the default 7% that HP has set. When I try to change the number, it will not save and it just magically jumps back to 7%. This means that my laptop will hibernate when the battery level reaches 7% and I cannot turn it back on unless I plug it into AC power. 7% equates to roughly 40 minutes of battery time and I find this setting way too conservative.
I have done some research on this issue and have found the following:
Steps I have taken to try and resolve this:
If nothing works, I wonder if completely formatting the laptop (including removing the HP recovery partition) and then reinstalling a different Windows 8.1 (or Windows 7) will let me have full customization of the Critical Battery Level?
I would really appreciate your thoughts on how to fix this. It really fustrates me that HP thinks they know better and that the user needs to have 7% battery reserved - it is such a waste not to be able to utilize a battery to its full potential.
Anyway, I am wanting to adjust the Critical Battery Level in Power Options to something lower than the default 7% that HP has set. When I try to change the number, it will not save and it just magically jumps back to 7%. This means that my laptop will hibernate when the battery level reaches 7% and I cannot turn it back on unless I plug it into AC power. 7% equates to roughly 40 minutes of battery time and I find this setting way too conservative.
I have done some research on this issue and have found the following:
- Some suggest that PC manufacturers will somehow lock this setting to an arbitrary minimum and the user cannot change it to anything below this minimum (it appears HP have set it at 7% in my instance).
- This link suggests using power.cfg and the command line to make the changes How To Lower the Critical Battery Level to 1% in Windows 7
Steps I have taken to try and resolve this:
- I have tried the powercfg.exe method described in the aforementioned link to change the critical battery level to 1% and initially it appears to work. When I open up the Power Options screen, it indeed says 1%. However, when I actually test it out by using the laptop, it will still automatically hibernate at 7% battery level - it simply ignores the 1% setting.
- I have also tried using powercfg.exe to change the Critical Battery Action to "Do Nothing" and likewise this setting is ignored and the laptop hibernates anyway.
- I have phoned HP support and the only useful information that I got from them so far, is that the PC manufacturer has set it to 7% and it cannot be changed. They said they will escalate this matter to the research team and give me a call next week.
- I phoned Microsoft support and the consultant seemed to be confident that he could fix the issue but would not divulge the answer because he said that doing so would void the HP warranty and he didn't want to be to one to do that. He suggested that I call HP and request a conference call with Microsoft and they could then fix it. He seemed to be of the belief that if HP has set the 7% minimum that they should be the one to remove the limit.
- I am now trying something out to troubleshoot this issue - I have disabled the Power service using msconfig and waiting to see if the laptop will continue operating below 7% battery level without hibernating. (My laptop has been on for hours now and it is now at 13%, so not too much longer now).
If nothing works, I wonder if completely formatting the laptop (including removing the HP recovery partition) and then reinstalling a different Windows 8.1 (or Windows 7) will let me have full customization of the Critical Battery Level?
I would really appreciate your thoughts on how to fix this. It really fustrates me that HP thinks they know better and that the user needs to have 7% battery reserved - it is such a waste not to be able to utilize a battery to its full potential.
My Computer
System One
-
- OS
- Windows 8.1
- Computer type
- Laptop
- System Manufacturer/Model
- HP Spectre x360 Convertible 13
- CPU
- Intel Core i7-5500U
- Memory
- 8GB
- Graphics Card(s)
- Intel HD Graphics 5500
- Screen Resolution
- 1920 x 1080
- Hard Drives
- 256GB Samsung SSD MZNTE256HMHP-000H1
- Internet Speed
- ADSL2+
- Browser
- Mozilla Firefox
- Antivirus
- Kaspersky Internet Security 2014