Activity stops recording (or is inaccurate) when riding very low watts and watching Netflix

I’m recovering from surgery for ruptured Achilles - literally got given the go-ahead to do some very light exercise on the bike, so back onto the turbo trainer for me.

Since I’m only tipping along, not doing any actual sessions or workouts, I just want to record the effort and watch some netflix or similar to while away the time. So I hit record (have tried both quickstart or select a recovery spin, doesn’t make a difference) then flick over to watch streamed content and off I go. I also record it on Garmin head unit.

3 times now I’ve done so, and while the garmin records the ride in full, the TR recording is far shorter than that recorded by garmin (which is accurate to wall-clock time).

Is it because I’m only putting out ~30-40 watts and it thinks I’ve stopped? I have power meter pedal, and a speed sensor on the rear wheel. Or is it because I switch over to the other app to watch the movie, it thinks I’ve stopped (but it still records a reasonable chunk of the session, not just a few seconds - e.g. 31st march garmin/strava has 30mins/6.66km , TR has 20mins/5.26 km)

App version 5.2.2 on android

I would make sure you have our app set not to reduce power when it is in the background. I don’t think it has to do with your power output, just your phone is putting our app into more of a sleep mode. It’s possible having the phone plugged in will help with this this also.

Thanks, I’ll try a power bank with it to see if that helps. Though I thought I did have it set to not reduce power in BG, will check

Not listed in the list of “Never sleep these apps”, but unticked the ‘Pause app activity if unused’ on the app permissions for this app, see how it goes

happened again last night, set to not sleep when in background. wasn’t using power bank, will try that next time

with power bank today, it stayed recording ok. bit annoying that thats the cause but at least haveva workaround.

Yes our app uses a lot of resources and so if your phone/tablet is taxed beyond what our app and the one in front can handle it can slow down, usually it does not stop… that is strange.

it might be that it doesn’t “stop”, but slows down as you say.
not sure how to tell if it stops and starts and stops and starts, or if it just records at a reduced rate, so that 30 mins of wall time is recorded as 20ish mins - a bit like a timelapse video.

but surely any performance issue should be should be cpu and ram, rather than battery constrained no?

These devices actually save resources when the battery is low to conserve the battery (reduce processing power)… I don’t know how it really works but for sure being plugged in helps many people with performance issues.