High power consumption of softdevice

RE: High power consumption of softdevice

Axel.A — Mon, 02 Dec 2019 15:22:08 GMT

In addition to the FPU and SAADC interrupt-issues Elias Löwe mentions further down, I ran into another issue:

sd_app_evt_wait();
returns immidiately the first time it is called (it is also reported here) and power consumption is many milliamps. You probably used WFE in SDK15 instead because you ran into this bug/issue that seems to be intermiettent..

It works for me if I duplicate a second call

#ifdef SOFTDEVICE_PRESENT
            if (nrf_sdh_is_enabled())
            {
                uint32_t err_code = sd_app_evt_wait();
                APP_ERROR_CHECK(err_code);
                err_code = sd_app_evt_wait();
                APP_ERROR_CHECK(err_code);
            }
            else
#endif

If it just need to be called again, then why doesnt it work when vPortSuppressTicksAndSleep() is called again almost immidiately by the idle task?

I dont know. Whatever condition that makes sd_app_evt_wait(); return immidiately seems to be triggered again by the the exit and reentereance into vPortSuppressTicksAndSleep().

In summary, the complete checklist that made it work for me was (I dont use SAADC so it wasnt an issue for me):

Install an FPU interrupt handler that clears the FPU errors
Call sd_app_ewt_wait() twice in vPortSuppressTicksAndSleep()

RE: High power consumption of softdevice

rahmat — Thu, 21 Feb 2019 22:31:51 GMT

Got it, Thanks. Just wanted to start with the right template. Was surprised it consumed a few hundred microAmps with example codes

RE: High power consumption of softdevice

Elias Löwe — Tue, 19 Feb 2019 07:08:54 GMT

Hi Rahmat,

yes, make sure that UART and logging is switched off in your sdk_config.h and that you are not running your application with debugger.

Maybe some more information about your application could help to point you.

Cheers,

Elias

RE: High power consumption of softdevice

rahmat — Tue, 19 Feb 2019 02:29:37 GMT

Hi Elias,

Just started with this board recently, still facing the 7mA issue. Are those the only changes you did? I still could not get it down to anywhere close to 30uA like yours. Thanks.

Regards,

Rahmat

RE: High power consumption of softdevice

Eric Smith — Thu, 02 Aug 2018 21:11:48 GMT

Hi Aryan,

I had reported excessive current consumed by the hrs_freertos demo in SDK 14.2 in private ticket 201725, opened March 7 2018. Another Nordic engineer asked me to try that #if 0, which solved the problem. Presumably that led to it being put it into SDK 15.

I find that even with SDK 15.0, if I change the code back to using sd_app_evt_wait(), I get an increase of 13mA in my application (derived from hrs_freertos). Whatever the underlying problem was in SDK 14.2 or S132 5.1.0, it does not seem to be fixed in SDK 15.0 or S132 6.0.0, so the workaround is still necessary.

Eric

RE: High power consumption of softdevice

Elias Löwe — Tue, 24 Jul 2018 12:32:55 GMT

Hi David!

I can confirm, that Aryan's answer worked for me. I just changed #if 0 to #if 1

# file port_cmsis_systick.c

#if 1  // With FreeRTOS sd_app_evt_wait increases power consumption with FreeRTOS compared to _WFE (NRFFOSDK-11174)
#ifdef SOFTDEVICE_PRESENT
            if (nrf_sdh_is_enabled())
            {
                uint32_t err_code = sd_app_evt_wait();
                APP_ERROR_CHECK(err_code);
            }
            else
#endif
#endif // (NRFFOSDK-11174)

This did its job for demo project.

Also for this project I had to do few more things:

1. As far as I used floating point calculations, I had to chnage my main.c module as follows:

int main(void)
{
    NVIC_SetPriority(FPU_IRQn, APP_IRQ_PRIORITY_LOW);
    NVIC_EnableIRQ(FPU_IRQn);

    /* application code */
    ...
}

#define FPU_EXCEPTION_MASK 0x0000009F

void FPU_IRQHandler(void)
{
    uint32_t *fpscr = (uint32_t *)(FPU->FPCAR+0x40);
    (void)__get_FPSCR();

    *fpscr = *fpscr & ~(FPU_EXCEPTION_MASK);
}

2. We use SAADC module for some measurements and I had to uninitialise it after usage like this after each usage:

nrf_drv_saadc_uninit();
   
NRF_SAADC->INTENCLR = (SAADC_INTENCLR_END_Clear << SAADC_INTENCLR_END_Pos);

NVIC_ClearPendingIRQ(SAADC_IRQn);

And now average power consumption is about 30uA.

p.S. Sorry for late answer, so much work here...

RE: High power consumption of softdevice

david — Tue, 17 Jul 2018 15:29:16 GMT

Hi Elias,

I had similar issue,did you find the way to resolve the 500uA after stack is initialize (advertising not work yet) ?

RE: High power consumption of softdevice

Susheel Nuguru — Thu, 21 Jun 2018 08:28:15 GMT

is 600uA acceptable for your use case?

RE: High power consumption of softdevice

Elias Löwe — Wed, 20 Jun 2018 13:16:33 GMT

We are developing very low power device. And 900uA is too much for us.

Also information...

once I get more or less normal consumption cca 600uA (GATT + BEACON) when put nrf_pwr_mgmt_run() in one of the tasks while in port_cmsis_systick.c WFE was used.

RE: High power consumption of softdevice

Susheel Nuguru — Wed, 20 Jun 2018 08:23:47 GMT

yes, if you use sd_app_evt_wait in PCA10040 DK for some reason, the average current while advertising jumps to 7mA, but with __WFE it is 900uA. Something is fishy, but i guess for now you can use _WFE !!??

RE: High power consumption of softdevice

Elias Löwe — Wed, 20 Jun 2018 06:49:04 GMT

on Sparkfun DK with ble_app_hrs_freertos example

with _WFE -> cca 900uA

with sd_app_evt_wait -> cca 200uA

RE: High power consumption of softdevice

Susheel Nuguru — Tue, 19 Jun 2018 12:55:30 GMT

ah, I think this was the reason I commented it out and was using WFE instead. What is the power consumption on DK if you use _WFE instead of sd_app_evt_wait?

RE: High power consumption of softdevice

Elias Löwe — Tue, 19 Jun 2018 12:35:19 GMT

while advertizing

debugger off

RE: High power consumption of softdevice

Susheel Nuguru — Tue, 19 Jun 2018 12:33:37 GMT

the average power consumption with connected state? debugger on?

RE: High power consumption of softdevice

Elias Löwe — Tue, 19 Jun 2018 11:50:58 GMT

But on Sparkfun with demo app it dropped down to cca 200uA

RE: High power consumption of softdevice

Elias Löwe — Tue, 19 Jun 2018 11:42:55 GMT

I tried this actualy...

If I use sd_app_evt_wait(), then average consumption is about 7mA (without DCDC) and 5mA (with DCDC enabled).

Something is definitely wrong there.

RE: High power consumption of softdevice

Susheel Nuguru — Thu, 14 Jun 2018 07:01:56 GMT

I think i found the problem.

It is in port_cmsis_systick.c

#if 0  // With FreeRTOS sd_app_evt_wait increases power consumption with FreeRTOS compared to _WFE (NRFFOSDK-11174)
#ifdef SOFTDEVICE_PRESENT
            if (nrf_sdh_is_enabled())
            {
                uint32_t err_code = sd_app_evt_wait();
                APP_ERROR_CHECK(err_code);
            }
            else
#endif
#endif // (NRFFOSDK-11174)

I do not remember the exact way i came to a conclusion that sd_app_evt_wait was consuming more power with freertos. Hence I created an internal ticket NRFFOSDK-11174 to investigate why this happened. I remembered that i was reading more power with freertos and using sd_wait function. While using WFI it was less. This technically did not make sense, but i decided to comment out sd_app_evt_wait function until i get more results. But I am not able to reproduce this anymore. So i think this comment is the problem on SDK 15.

Please change line 231 in port_cmsis_systick.c to below

#ifdef SOFTDEVICE_PRESENT
            if (nrf_sdh_is_enabled())
            {
                uint32_t err_code = sd_app_evt_wait();
                APP_ERROR_CHECK(err_code);
            }
            else
#endif

I will try to push these changes to official SDK for the next release.

RE: High power consumption of softdevice

Elias Löwe — Thu, 14 Jun 2018 07:01:34 GMT

Unfortunately with NRF_LOG_ENABLED and NRF_LOG_UART_BACKEND_ENABLED set to 0 I still have same consumption around 900uA with ble_app_hrs_freertos_pca10040_s132 example

RE: High power consumption of softdevice

Sergiooo — Wed, 13 Jun 2018 20:21:16 GMT

I had similar issue, but after setting NRF_LOG_ENABLED and NRF_LOG_UART_BACKEND_ENABLED to 0 in sdk_config.h, my current consumption dropped exactly by 500ua after full recompilation. Maybe this would help someone.

UPD: I found out that running some TASKS_START with some peripherals causes to significantly increase current consumption of softdevice. It's beyond my understanding, but, as an example, executing this:

NRF_QDEC ->TASKS_START = 1;
nrf_delay_ms(1000);
NRF_QDEC ->TASKS_STOP = 1;

results in increased power consumption. Also, some other peripherals trigger this behavior, but current increase dosen't stack.

UPD2: My falut. adding NRF_QDEC -> ENABLE= 1; allows QDEC to stop, but i still cant get QDEC running with less that 500ua

RE: High power consumption of softdevice

Elias Löwe — Wed, 06 Jun 2018 13:01:32 GMT

Thank you very much, Aryan! Looking forward for solution. If I will have some new information regarding issue, I will also let you know.

RE: High power consumption of softdevice

Susheel Nuguru — Wed, 06 Jun 2018 12:58:22 GMT

ah., good observation, I did not realize that hrs example with and without freertos are behaving differently at ble_stack_init power consumption wise. I can reproduce this now. I will try to find why this is happening. Will get back to you soon. Until then you can go ahead in your project development and we can come to some workaround for this when i have an answer

RE: High power consumption of softdevice

Elias Löwe — Wed, 06 Jun 2018 11:43:23 GMT

Hi Aryan,

I use defaults from ble_app_hrs_freertos_pca10040_s132 example.

// <e> NRFX_RTC_ENABLED - nrfx_rtc - RTC peripheral driver
//==========================================================
#ifndef NRFX_RTC_ENABLED
#define NRFX_RTC_ENABLED 0
#endif
// <q> NRFX_RTC0_ENABLED  - Enable RTC0 instance
 

#ifndef NRFX_RTC0_ENABLED
#define NRFX_RTC0_ENABLED 0
#endif

// <q> NRFX_RTC1_ENABLED  - Enable RTC1 instance
 

#ifndef NRFX_RTC1_ENABLED
#define NRFX_RTC1_ENABLED 0
#endif

// <q> NRFX_RTC2_ENABLED  - Enable RTC2 instance
 

#ifndef NRFX_RTC2_ENABLED
#define NRFX_RTC2_ENABLED 0
#endif

// <o> NRFX_RTC_MAXIMUM_LATENCY_US - Maximum possible time[us] in highest priority interrupt 
#ifndef NRFX_RTC_MAXIMUM_LATENCY_US
#define NRFX_RTC_MAXIMUM_LATENCY_US 2000
#endif

// <o> NRFX_RTC_DEFAULT_CONFIG_FREQUENCY - Frequency  <16-32768> 


#ifndef NRFX_RTC_DEFAULT_CONFIG_FREQUENCY
#define NRFX_RTC_DEFAULT_CONFIG_FREQUENCY 32768
#endif

// <q> NRFX_RTC_DEFAULT_CONFIG_RELIABLE  - Ensures safe compare event triggering
 

#ifndef NRFX_RTC_DEFAULT_CONFIG_RELIABLE
#define NRFX_RTC_DEFAULT_CONFIG_RELIABLE 0
#endif

// <o> NRFX_RTC_DEFAULT_CONFIG_IRQ_PRIORITY  - Interrupt priority
 
// <0=> 0 (highest) 
// <1=> 1 
// <2=> 2 
// <3=> 3 
// <4=> 4 
// <5=> 5 
// <6=> 6 
// <7=> 7 

#ifndef NRFX_RTC_DEFAULT_CONFIG_IRQ_PRIORITY
#define NRFX_RTC_DEFAULT_CONFIG_IRQ_PRIORITY 7
#endif

// <e> NRFX_RTC_CONFIG_LOG_ENABLED - Enables logging in the module.
//==========================================================
#ifndef NRFX_RTC_CONFIG_LOG_ENABLED
#define NRFX_RTC_CONFIG_LOG_ENABLED 0
#endif
// <o> NRFX_RTC_CONFIG_LOG_LEVEL  - Default Severity level
 
// <0=> Off 
// <1=> Error 
// <2=> Warning 
// <3=> Info 
// <4=> Debug 

#ifndef NRFX_RTC_CONFIG_LOG_LEVEL
#define NRFX_RTC_CONFIG_LOG_LEVEL 3
#endif

// <o> NRFX_RTC_CONFIG_INFO_COLOR  - ANSI escape code prefix.
 
// <0=> Default 
// <1=> Black 
// <2=> Red 
// <3=> Green 
// <4=> Yellow 
// <5=> Blue 
// <6=> Magenta 
// <7=> Cyan 
// <8=> White 

#ifndef NRFX_RTC_CONFIG_INFO_COLOR
#define NRFX_RTC_CONFIG_INFO_COLOR 0
#endif

// <o> NRFX_RTC_CONFIG_DEBUG_COLOR  - ANSI escape code prefix.
 
// <0=> Default 
// <1=> Black 
// <2=> Red 
// <3=> Green 
// <4=> Yellow 
// <5=> Blue 
// <6=> Magenta 
// <7=> Cyan 
// <8=> White 

#ifndef NRFX_RTC_CONFIG_DEBUG_COLOR
#define NRFX_RTC_CONFIG_DEBUG_COLOR 0
#endif

Anything else I can provide?

RE: High power consumption of softdevice

Susheel Nuguru — Wed, 06 Jun 2018 11:38:37 GMT

Hi Elias,

What are the clock configurations you are using? When you enable the softdevice, it will start RTC0 as a house keeping timer. This needs LFCLK.