Enpass 6 unnecessarily increases Windows Platform Timer resolution / bad for battery life

[tox1c90]

Hello!

If Enpass 6 is running minimized in the background / tray icon and the vault is locked, the Windows Platform Timer resolution is increased from the default 15.6ms to 1ms by Enpass process, which causes significantly lower CPU C state usage and thus less battery life.

Steps to reproduce:

1. Let Enpass 6 start automatically with Windows, or start it and minimized it to the system tray, but do not unlock the vault yet

2. Run "powercfg /energy" within Windows PowerShell and let Microsoft power diagnostics generate an energy report

3. The report will show a warning, that Enpass.exe is requesting a non-standard Windows Platform Timer resolution that causes lower battery life (see attached screenshot). You can also confirm with tools like "ThrottleStop" that there is significantly less CPU package C state usage / power saving when Enpass is waiting for the vault to be unlocked. This almost doubles idle power draw of my CPU.

4. Unlock the Enpass vault by typing your password into Enpass window

5. Run "powercfg /energy" again

6. You will notice that when vault is unlocked, there is no Windows Platform Timer warning anymore and C state usage increases immediately.

 

It should not be necessary for Enpass to increase Windows Platform Timer resolution when just running IDLE in the background with the vault still locked! The fact that the Platform Timer resolution goes back to its default value as soon as Enpass vault is unlocked, is a clear indication for that behavior to be a bug!

Edited January 1, 2019 by tox1c90

[Hemant Kumar]

Hi

Thanks for reporting. We have fixed the issue and will be available in the next update. It was the problem with the Animation of sync icon. Please wait for the next update. 

[tox1c90]

On 1/1/2019 at 11:08 AM, Hemant Kumar said:

Hi

Thanks for reporting. We have fixed the issue and will be available in the next update. It was the problem with the Animation of sync icon. Please wait for the next update. 

@Hemant Kumar

I have to re-open that case. With the update it seems to be partially fixed. In the state when Enpass application is fully opened (see upper screenshot "Enpass main window.jpg") the problem is fixed and Platform Timer Resolution is at default now, so Windows energy report does not show a warning anymore.

In the state when Enpass is running in extension mode (see lower screenshot "Enpass taskbar.jpg"), that means when left-clicking the Enpass icon just pop-outs a small Enpass window docked to the taskbar, the Platform Timer Resolution is still increased to 1ms by Enpass and Windows is showing the warning.

Edited January 8, 2019 by tox1c90

[tox1c90]

Looks like it is only happening when Enpass is launched automatically and minimized together with Windows. I was not able to reproduce it after closing Enpass and starting it manually.

[tox1c90]

Unfortunately I have to report that this is still an issue. But I narrowed it down to a single case:

The power bug appears, when vault is locked and main window closed so it runs completely in the background and does only appear as systray icon.

So exact steps to reproduce:

1. Launch Enpass, but do not unlock vault.

2. Close Enpass main window using "x" on top right corner of the window. Thus Enpass is still running in background but only shows as system tray icon.

3. Open elevated Powershell, run: "powercfg /energy /duration 10"

4. Open energy-report.html, scroll down and notice that there is a yellow warning because Enpass is requesting raised Windows Platform Timer resolution

5. Now click on Enpass tray icon and unlock the vault

6. Run "powercfg /energy /duration 10" again and check energy-report.

7. You will see that now, Enpass does NOT request timer resolution raise anymore and the warning is gone.

8. Wait for 1 minute system idle (or whatever that leads to Enpass locking the vault automatically)

9. Recheck "powercfg /energy /duration 10", you will see that now Enpass started again this timer request and the warning reappeared.

So Enpass is doing something bad, while it's just running in background and vault is locked. It's basically requesting high-precision timer all the time while its idle. This is very bad style.

Could you please have a look on this again? Right now, Enpass is the only app on my PC that is behaving badly regarding Platform Timer. So right now I have to close it completely and prevent it from running in background instead of just locking the vault to prevent higher-than-normal battery usage.

@Hemant Kumar

@Anshu kumar

More background information for why this is important: https://randomascii.wordpress.com/2013/07/08/windows-timer-resolution-megawatts-wasted/

Edited June 25, 2019 by tox1c90

[Anshu kumar]

Hi @tox1c90,

Thanks for reporting this issue and sharing the steps to reproduce. Much appreciated .

This issue has been identified and fixed will be available in the next update.  I would like to have your feedback after the update.

Thanks!

[tox1c90]

Hi @Anshu kumar,

after running and testing the latest Enpass update 6.1.1 for several days now, I can confirm that it is not longer raising platform timer resolution! Thank you for fixing it

[tox1c90]

Hi @Anshu kumar,

for some reason the problem appears to be back. I'm pretty sure everything was fine until 6.12 (including), so I think it came back with 6.20 or one of the latest updates. Could you please check on your side?

[Anshu kumar]

Hey @tox1c90,

Thanks for bringing this to our notice.

I've notified the QA team to look into it.

Thanks!

[tox1c90]

Hi @Anshu kumar,

did you get any feedback on this issue? I ask because it's still happening on latest Enpass (Windows Store). But it's happening under slightly different conditions compared to the original issue. Right now, it is only happening when Enpass vault becomes locked and minimized to system tray, but unfortunately every time.

New steps to reproduce quite easily:

1. Launch Enpass and unlock vault in main window

2. Lock vault by pressing the "lock" icon in main window

3. Press "X" to close main window so that Enpass is minimized to system tray icon

4. Open elevated Powershell, run: "powercfg /energy /duration 3", open energy-report.html and notice the platform timer warning due to Enpass

 

If Enpass vault stays unlocked all the time, there is no issue. Issue happens only when locked + minimized to systray.

[PingZing]

I'd like to chime in to say that I'm still seeing this issue as well, in version 6.4.1, under the same circumstances as reported above (only occurs when minimized and running as systray-only).

[Pratyush Sharma]

Hi All,

Update

We have found the issue and fix we will be released in the next update.Till then, we will request you to please co-operate with us.