Ubuntu – Modify actions when battery is critically low

12.04hibernatepower-managementxfce

I am running Ubuntu (not Xubuntu) and am using Xfce4 on my laptop. When my laptop battery is critically low, Ubuntu/Xfce4 performs some action (perhaps hibernate?) which causes my laptop to shut down.

However when I start it again, it never comes up. I don't even get BIOS or anything on the screen, it is completely black. The only way to get it back up is to take it apart, remove the internal CMOS battery as well as the main battery, wait a few minutes, and put it back together.

Obviously this is not optimal.

How do I disable all actions when the battery is critically low? I would rather have it run out of power, than ending up in this error condition.

Best Answer

I have no idea how to do it for XFCE but for GNOME, you can change it by installing dconf-tools. Open dconf-editor Go to:

org > gnome > settings-daemon > plugins > power

and edit critical-battery-action value to nothing.

You can also un-check use-time-for-policy. Then your system won't use the time remaining as the criteria. It will be forced to use the percentage remaining. Takes care of a bug in ACPI.

There should be something similar for XFCE.

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When a battery reaches to the point of time to take critical action taking level , Ubuntu won't warn you about this, instead it just perform the action required (such as suspend, hibernate, shutdown etc, based on your choice). This is the setting and it can't be changed. But Ubuntu should give you a warning, when battery reach low level and critical level.

By default, Ubuntu uses time remaining as a trigger of it's pre-defined action.

You will be given a low battery warning, before 1200 seconds (20 minutes) to be empty.
You will be given a critical battery warning, when it reaches 300 seconds (5 minutes) remaining
Battery critical action is performed when only 120 seconds (2 minutes) remaining.

The power statistics from your output suggests a bad/damaged battery. In these cases, it is hard for Ubuntu to measure actual time remaining data. Also the battery drains quickly between from 300 seconds to 120 seconds, so just try to shut down the PC which is configured in the settings.

I suggest you to do this,

First change the policy of trigger from time to percentage.

gsettings set org.gnome.settings-daemon.plugins.power use-time-for-policy false

Then raise the percentage required to give you a warning, the default is 10%. Change it to 30%.
```
gsettings set org.gnome.settings-daemon.plugins.power percentage-low 30
```
Then raise the percentage required to be considered as critical to 20%, default is 3%.
```
gsettings set org.gnome.settings-daemon.plugins.power percentage-critical 20
```
Then raise the percentage required to take the critical action, it is now 2%. change it to 15%
```
gsettings set org.gnome.settings-daemon.plugins.power percentage-action 15
```
Then change the critical action to be taken to hibernate, instead of shutdown. You need to first enable the hibernate option.
- How to enable hibernation?
Then use this command to change it to hibernate.
```
gsettings set org.gnome.settings-daemon.plugins.power critical-battery-action hibernate
```

I think, this should solve your problem. If you still have problems with level, raise the levels even higher.

Ubuntu – Battery Status In Panel Does Not Change Or Give Low Battery Warning (Ubuntu 12.04)

In the terminal window giving the command:

sudo aptitude reinstall gnome-power-manager

Worked for me on the same issue, give it a try.

Best Answer

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