Rapid Battery drainage and overheating

I bought a new Acer Swift 3 SF314-55G, the day before yesterday. I dual booted it with ubuntu 20.04 LTS Desktop version. ANd started using ubuntu itself. The laptop started heating up, even with normal usage. Acer claims to have 12 hours of battery life for this model. But I was getting somewhere around 3-4 house. I asked in Acer community the same question and they said me to use windows, and see if the issue persists, as ubuntu might not have essential drivers. Turns out it did. In windows it works fine, in ubuntu, the battery drains very fast and overheating issue is there. What should I do?

Being the user of the same machine with ubuntu 20.04, I tell you the steps which will work out for you. 1. Go to the 'additional drivers' tab in software and updates in ubuntu. 2. Now check for the Nvidia driver there, you must select the version 440 at the first line. Apply that and restart your system once. 3. It would have installed a new software where you can select which GPU driver is to use. Select the on-demand Nvidia card or intel integrated one. After selecting any one of them, log out from the system and then log in again. 4. It will give you approximately the same battery life as in windows 10 because it is now using the intel integrated graphics as default one. In windows also, if you use the Nvidia graphics It will reduce the battery life significantly as it consumes a lot of energy.

P.S. The problems with ubuntu in this machine are: 1. It would not detect the fingerprint sensor. 2. The microphone issue with any Linux distro i.e., you will not be able to record or communicate using the microphone of your earphones or headphones.

I hope that I am able to answer your query.

I had the same issue, I had installed Ubuntu 20.04 LTS on my Acer Aspire 5, with Intel Iris and Nvidia mx350. I had observed two issues when I installed Ubuntu:

1. Idle mode os suspended, but laptop to heat like in regular use.
2. Overnight suspend mode used to completely devour the battery.

Both these issues where not present in windows. I checked multiple threads, did many things, and finally with Nvidia drivers setting change was finally able to get laptop to work correctly.

Before you perform any of these, just record your suspended mode and regular power usage(powertop) and then when things work out again check the wattage with powertop. Here is the list of things which I did:

1. Nvidia prime profile set to intel power saving mode
   If you dont have Nvidia prime settings this might help you install https://askubuntu.com/a/858037/1142330
2. Suspend mode tryout
   This did not work for me https://askubuntu.com/a/1088458/1142330
3. Main culprit is Nvidia graphics card https://askubuntu.com/a/387403/1142330
4. Followed this point by point till the autotune part, did not change any nvidia settings like this answer says
   https://askubuntu.com/a/1134726/1142330 I did the tlp autotune and powertop part
5. Also I have all the options configured same as per this post(I didn`t had network boot and Lan boot disabled) in bios
   https://askubuntu.com/a/630662/1142330
6. Did not do anything said in here High power usage when suspended
7. Did not do anything of bumblebee thing as mentioned here https://askubuntu.com/a/340336/1142330
8. Did this as well, installing additional drivers
   https://askubuntu.com/a/1244247/1142330 Mine is metapackage for Nvidia Driver 470(proprietary, tested)

Now, I am getting around 4-5 hours worth of continuous usage on Ubuntu. Average wattage is 6.XW, while suspend mode its was around 3.X. Overnight discharge was around 10%.

Hope this helps.