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I am working with Soundtrap 4300s and noticed that the recording was interrupted towards the end of the deployment/recording period. The recorders were set to continuous recording at a high sample rate, and recordings were good for around 3-4 days. It then switched to 16 second files with 4 second gaps between the files.

The battery voltage for both soundtraps did not drop below 3.2 volts.

I have had this happen on two soundtraps inconsistently in both bench and field tests. I have included a figure of QAQC plots for an interrupted recording and a good recording, both from the same soundtrap on two different deployments.

The figure includes a wav file size plot, a file gap plot, and a battery/temperature plot. The drastic change in wav file sizes and gaps between files indicate when the recording was interrupted, initially I thought this may be a battery issue. Has anyone else experienced a similar issue with soundtraps? enter image description here

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    $\begingroup$ I haven't experienced this...but just brainstorming...does it happen after a large number of files has been written? Could it have something to do with the write process, like it has to read/access a long list of files to add to and that is slowing down the write process causing a gap? $\endgroup$
    – selene
    Commented Oct 21, 2022 at 13:47

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After extensive bench testing with the faulty ST4300s, we have concluded that this issue is a result of a bad battery. One instrument already had the battery replaced once, and was less than 2 years old when it started this inconsistent and unexpected duty cycling. These instruments were sent to Ocean Instruments for new batteries. Once repaired, these instruments ran for the expected duration and no longer had issues with duty cycling towards the end of the battery life.

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We have gotten similar results towards the end of the battery life of the instruments.

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