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9

protect battery on thinkpad T490 - Ubuntu 18.04

rated 0 times [ 9] [ 0] / answers: 1 / hits: 5403 / 2 Years ago, sun, october 2, 2022, 2:34:40

I have a thinkpad T490 on Ubuntu 18.04. I want to protect my battery (the tlp stuff with max charge 80 and start charge 75).

However, it looks like I have some problems:

~$ sudo tlp setcharge START_CHARGE 70

Error: ThinkPad battery features not available.

I think this is due to problems with tp-sampi and / or tpacpi-bat:

~$ sudo tlp stat

...

+++ ThinkPad Battery Features

tp-smapi   = inactive (kernel module 'tp_smapi' load error)

tpacpi-bat = inactive (kernel module 'acpi_call' load error)

After googling, it seems that tp-smapi does not work on thinkpads from versions *30 and over and tpacpi-bat should be the solution to use instead. I cannot find more help about if / how I should set up tpacpi-bat. Any tips / instructions? :)

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answered 2 Years ago repend · Accepted Answer

After a discussion with the package author and maintainer (many thanks to him for his patience with my n00bness), the solution was to update to the PPA version 1.2.2 (I guess newer may work as well):

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:linrunner/tlp

sudo apt-get update 

sudo apt-get upgrade

sudo apt-get install tp-smapi-dkms acpi-call-dkms tlp

After that things start to work:

~$ sudo tlp-stat

--- TLP 1.2.2 --------------------------------------------

...



+++ Battery Features: Charge Thresholds and Recalibrate

natacpi    = active (data, thresholds)

tpacpi-bat = inactive (kernel module 'acpi_call' load error)

tp-smapi   = inactive (ThinkPad not supported)

...

and the battery levels can be updated:

~$ sudo tlp setcharge 70 80

Setting temporary charge thresholds for BAT0:

  start =  70 (no change)

  stop  =  80 (no change)

leading to:

~$ sudo tlp-stat

...

/sys/class/power_supply/BAT0/charge_start_threshold         =     70 [%]

/sys/class/power_supply/BAT0/charge_stop_threshold          =     80 [%]

...

Note that if you want the update to survive reboot, you need to update the configuration file at /etc/default/tlp by uncommenting / modifying the lines 355-356 (you will need to open as root and overwrite readonly protection, for example in vim you need :w! ):

350 # Battery charge thresholds (ThinkPad only, tp-smapi or acpi-call kernel module

351 # required). Charging starts when the remaining capacity falls below the

352 # START_CHARGE_THRESH value and stops when exceeding the STOP_CHARGE_THRESH value.

353 # Main / Internal battery (values in %)

354 # Default: <none>

355 START_CHARGE_THRESH_BAT0=70                                                                                         

356 STOP_CHARGE_THRESH_BAT0=80

357 # Ultrabay / Slice / Replaceable battery (values in %)

358 # Default: <none>

359 #START_CHARGE_THRESH_BAT1=75

360 #STOP_CHARGE_THRESH_BAT1=80

For more details:

https://linrunner.de/en/tlp/docs/tlp-configuration.html#chargethresholds