Current consumption too high while advertising (running the Blinky demo on the nRF52 DK)

[Frederic]

Hello,

First, the current of the advertising frame was too high (around factor 2) and I have switched on the DC-DC to correct for that by inserting sd_power_dcdc_mode_set(...) after the conn_params_init(); in the main.

Question:

- Why is the DC-DC not always on on this demo? (the nRF52 DK has the components for the DC-DC anyway)

The problem that I still have is the current between two advertisings. From what I understand, it should be around 2µA and it is around 200µA (not at all low power).

Questions:

- Why should I have to add in the code and where to make the component go down to 2µA between two advertisement?

- Why is it not "per default" in a demo application where, most of the people, want to see the low power characteristic of the chip?

Best regards,

Frédéric

[Stian Røed Hafskjold]

Since not everyone are using HW with DCDC components we choose to not enable DCDC by default so that the examples will run on all designs. If DCDC was enabled by default we would get a ton of support cases from people with "bricked" chips ;)

200uA between advertising is probably because of debug logging. Go to sdk_config.h and turn of logging by setting NRF_LOG_ENABLED to 0.

Debug logging is turned on by default in most example applications. In the power profiling example (ble_app_pwr_profiling) logging is not turned on by default because of the power consumption.

 

[Frederic]

Thanks very much, it works!!! I have now around 2µA, a real low power application.

I have another problem which is very close to the one I have describe here. In my company, we have a product using a nRF51822. I have noticed the same "problems" as with the Blinky app on the nRF52:

- The advertising is, in my opinion, taking too much current, showing pulses of 12mA for the TX (at 0 dbm ?) and 17mA for the RX. My feeling is that the DC-DC has not been turned on (like on the nRF52). Can you give me your feeling?

- The current between two advertising is 36µA. I think it should be between 3 and 4µA. Do you have an idea of what has not been turned off? (Debug log, like the nRF52? something else?...)

Best regards,

Frédéric

[Stian Røed Hafskjold]

Hi, sorry for the late reply. If you post your hex file I can analyze it here to see what consumes current.

[Frederic]

This problem is no more a concern. Thanks.