Battery issue with newly built Corne
I’m currently getting less than a day’s usage with my Corne. Could someone advise on how to troubleshoot to identify if the issue is related to the build or a faulty component?
7 Replies
Less than a day is definitely not expected. With 110 mAh batteries you should see about a week on the left and a month on the right (with or without nice!views). Let’s narrow this down:
Quick checks
- Charge with the power switch ON. If it’s OFF, the battery won’t charge. Charge each half ~2 hours. Battery % isn’t exact; go by runtime. See Batteries: https://docs.typeractive.xyz/build-guides/corne-wireless/batteries
- Turn the board OFF when your computer is off or when transporting. If it’s left on, it will keep advertising and drain quickly.
- Limit bonded devices. Clear unused BLE bonds on the active profile to reduce overhead.
Baseline the firmware
- Flash our stock UF2s to both halves to rule out a config issue. Firmware and install steps: https://docs.typeractive.xyz/build-guides/corne-wireless/firmware
Isolate hardware
- Test halves separately: run only the left for a day, then only the right. The right should last far longer; if both die fast, suspect a short or firmware.
- If you have nice!views, pull them out for a day and re-test.
- Inspect your nice!nano/header solder joints for bridges, especially around power/ground pins and the display header. If you have a multimeter, check for unintended continuity between adjacent pins. How-to on checking for shorts: https://docs.typeractive.xyz/troubleshooting/rows-columns-not-working
If it’s still under a day after the above, please reply/tag me with:
- Approx hours of active typing vs idle
- Whether both halves drain equally
- Number of bonded devices
- Whether nice!views are installed
- Photos of your nice!nano and display header soldering
I’ll help you dig in further and figure out if this is a build issue or a faulty part.
Batteries | Typeractive.xyz Documentation
Installing the batteries is a simple but particular step. This guide will go over the positioning and installation of them.
Firmware | Typeractive.xyz Documentation
If you're not familiar, ZMK is a wireless-focused firmware, and it powers our Corne Wireless.
Row(s) or Column(s) Not Working | Typeractive.xyz Documentation
Fix row(s) or column(s) not working on your keyboard.
The recommendations from TyperAI are mostly spot on. My guess is your board is doing a ton of advertising, which will draing your battery quickly. This happens if your device is off while the keyboard is on.
Hey Nick, I switch my boards off when I’m not using them and have seen most of the drain during active use. I’ve only bonded 2 devices. I’ll keep an eye on usage time as opposed to battery life as that percentage has been its own issue (will report 62%, then jump to 100% after being plugged in for a minute) and follow up here if there are issues. Really appreciate the look
Please don’t pay too close of attention to the percentage, it’s very inaccurate
when you plug it in, the nano will jump up 0.2V which would account entirely for the battery jump
these batteries have a very flat discharge curve. The space from 20%-80% is all nearly the same voltage, so the reported percentage is very inaccurate
Gotcha — thanks again for this
Do let me know if in practice you're actually getting less than a few days to a week in battery on the left side. It could be a bad battery/nano
Will do, thanks a lot