Spint Hero Battery Issues known fix Fix.. charges faster lasts longer

[Mrniceguy]

Indeed HTC is working on a fix for these issues, but here is what You can do to fix the application in the mean time.
I was getting 2 hours "Heavy" (texting,data,wifi,high brightness) use before.
I read somewhere that there it is a battery issue caused by the defaul HTC (or android, idk) application.
The work around is for sms to something other than the included app as the default action for text messaging.
This is accomplished installing another handcent sms or various other apps that you may find by going to the market and searching SMS.
after installation go to the contacts list and send a text to a contact.
A screen should pop up and ask which messaging app you would like to use.
If i does not ask you, then you should go to Settings> Applications> Manage Applications> It will take a minute while your phone computes the space taken up by each app.
Click Messages> and Tick Clear defaults if it is available.
Viola! substantial battery boost and faster charges.
you can verify that your phone is now using less power by rebooting
then shut of your screen by pressing the end key wait for 1-5 mins mins without touching it...
now quickly
settings> about phone> status all the way at the bottom your phones "Awake Time" (not up time) should be below %40 (mine is between 10-40%) day to day
if this is not the case your phone has other issues and I will try my best to help you out
I have also heard that by letting you device go to sleep immidiately after turning it on it enters a weird device state that causes %100 cpu usage.
though i cannot confirm this i always flip to the next screen and back a few times and check my twitter and what not to make sure... hope this helps
I am so glad for android to be on sprint. Maybe HTC will actually provides updates and make my $279 woth it.
they certainly F-'d up the touch pro bad enough... lol i wonder if i can get my $400 back for it xD

 

[marctronixx]

so your saying delete the factory installed SMS app and use another app found thru the marketplace?

 

[Mrniceguy]

so your saying delete the factory installed SMS app and use another app found thru the marketplace?

No need. and I don't think you can anyhow.
Just install Handcent SMS from market (or other app if prefered) and follow the instructions to make it your default app
as detailed above or you can pm me if that doesnt work for you

oops lol i just realized there is another thread on this topic already open...


http://androidforums.com/sprint-htc-hero/11230-source-poor-battery-life-not-lets-fix.html

however i will still watch this thread and continue to help anyone who needs it to the best of my ability

Im a ppcgeeks.com member and thats just how we roll xD

 

[HardKore]

Click on mrniceguy's link to the other thread then on that thread near the top is a link to the sprint foums where he explains this process in perfect detail! This IS the source for poor battery life and allthough it sucks we have to download another sms to fix it. I am very very happy its an easy fix! This WILL improve your battery life 10 fold!!!

 

[phone*guy]

Just gave it a shot...Got my fingers crossed!

 

[childoftheko4n]

Several people along with myself have seen the "fix" stop working after a few days however (with no addition to any other apps).

Ontop of that some people that have been using default SMS and leaving it 100% have noticed the battery gets strong after a few drains/charges anyways...

My fix stopped working last night again, and im giong to leave it now until an official fix. Unplugged my phone at 8:30 this morning, so lets see how batter last throughout the day

 

[Michel Dover]

I do not see that problem in my phone. The explanations are very confusing; if you want to compare results, you should need to measure twice in the same conditions and usage, while only one setup is changed.

 

[Mrniceguy]

I do not see that problem in my phone. The explanations are very confusing; if you want to compare results, you should need to measure twice in the same conditions and usage, while only one setup is changed.

I have compared both ways and this clearly works and is being fixed by HTC what is confusing u my friend

 

[childoftheko4n]

I have compared both ways and this clearly works and is being fixed by HTC what is confusing u my friend

My phone has been uplugged for roughly 9 hours and is at 70%ish battery life. That is with it not sleeping. How can you say it clearly works if the fix has stopped working for some people includding myself? and stopped fixing w/o doing anything to directly cause it (ie download apps)

 

[rckozma]

My phone has been uplugged for roughly 9 hours and is at 70%ish battery life. That is with it not sleeping. How can you say it clearly works if the fix has stopped working for some people includding myself? and stopped fixing w/o doing anything to directly cause it (ie download apps)

If you don't send a text message the message app never turns on and you won't experience the battery loss. This is the first day I have actually gone without have to re-charge my battery at least once. Although I did notice that when using ChompSMS once I send a message the message app turns back on. I think I am going to try the Handcent, as the ChompSMS still utilizes the built in SMS service and I have to go into Taskiller to kill that service after I send a text. Anyone know if Handcent also uses the built in SMS to send the messages?

 

[pdragon]

rckozma:
Even though the Messages service is still running, as long as you don't actually use it to send a message you won't have issues. If you read the other thread, people have repeatedly said you cannot permanently kill the Messages service and also repeatedly said you don't need to kill it to avoid the battery draining issue.

 

[Archon810]

The only thing stopping me from switching to those aftermarket SMS apps completely is the fact that none of them support visual voicemail it seems.

When I use my regular sms app, I think it intercepts the odd texts that have the 408 number and turns it into the visual voicemail notification. It's a really hacked up thing Sprint did but that's how it works - your visual voicemail app is just a frontend to dialing some area code 408 number and presenting you with whatever it finds there (something like that).

With aftermarket apps, whenever I get a voicemail, I get a really odd looking text and no visual voicemail notification. Need a different solution.

 

[marctronixx]

.. hmm ill wait for the official fix. im in a studio all day and am always near a power source... seems ot be mixed results with this "fix"..... i appreciate the OPs support however... im a ppc geeks user too....(i have the PRO2 also)...

 

[GoofyGirl]

I simply cannot believe the improvement after switching to handcent!! Wow! To top it off handcent is an awesome program with so many customizations! It's almost like it was made just for the Hero and it's wonderful customization capabilities!! Thanks to all for the tips!!

 

[Mrniceguy]

The only thing stopping me from switching to those aftermarket SMS apps completely is the fact that none of them support visual voicemail it seems.

When I use my regular sms app, I think it intercepts the odd texts that have the 408 number and turns it into the visual voicemail notification. It's a really hacked up thing Sprint did but that's how it works - your visual voicemail app is just a frontend to dialing some area code 408 number and presenting you with whatever it finds there (something like that).

With aftermarket apps, whenever I get a voicemail, I get a really odd looking text and no visual voicemail notification. Need a different solution.

hmmm i havent experianced this yet... im gonna try it out and get back to you on this... maybe i can figure out a hack to work around that.

 

[Mrniceguy]

.. hmm ill wait for the official fix. im in a studio all day and am always near a power source... seems ot be mixed results with this "fix"..... i appreciate the OPs support however... im a ppc geeks user too....(i have the PRO2 also)...

Lol us ppcgeeks gotta stick together I had the Tp actually and before that the mogul and before that the q9c and before that the moto q original and before that the ppc6700 so android is a big jump for me... I might return it to be honest... not quite sure yet

 

[Mrniceguy]

My phone has been uplugged for roughly 9 hours and is at 70%ish battery life. That is with it not sleeping. How can you say it clearly works if the fix has stopped working for some people includding myself? and stopped fixing w/o doing anything to directly cause it (ie download apps)

To be honest I have no clue I am only posting what worked for me and trying to help others best i can Thx for trolling me tho

 

[Mrniceguy]

I simply cannot believe the improvement after switching to handcent!! Wow! To top it off handcent is an awesome program with so many customizations! It's almost like it was made just for the Hero and it's wonderful customization capabilities!! Thanks to all for the tips!!

No problem hun.
The main reason i jumped to android (at least to check it out) was because of what android is supposed to represent.
Open source. If everyone pitches in and helps everyone we are sitting on a community more powerful than that of any other mobile platform.
Apple has its dev team and community. WinMo has its ppcgeeks.
But none of the above platforms are open source.
now all we need to do is band together as a community and become the ppc geeks of Android. If anyone ever asks me for help I will do my damndest to answer. I will also do post tips and tricks and tight hax that I find. Lastly, I would urge each and every person that happens to stumble upon this site to do the same. We have all been given the oppertunity to take a good OS and make it great. Not all of us are coders (myself included) , but we are people who want the best possible customizations.We are people who fiddle around with stuff for ours trying to make it better. If your not then you definetly purchased the wrong device.

 

[BiGeMs X]

I have been following these threads on battery life hoping for another solution. I did exactly what the other guy said, I installed Handcent SMS, I removed the defaults from the HTC messaging app, restarted the phone without letting it sleep, and I use Handcent exclusively for my sms, I even got rid of the messaging shortcut so i dont use it by accident but some how I still am getting 100% wake time! Any ideas about something else that might cause this problem?

 

[Mrniceguy]

I have been following these threads on battery life hoping for another solution. I did exactly what the other guy said, I installed Handcent SMS, I removed the defaults from the HTC messaging app, restarted the phone without letting it sleep, and I use Handcent exclusively for my sms, I even got rid of the messaging shortcut so i dont use it by accident but some how I still am getting 100% wake time! Any ideas about something else that might cause this problem?

I am not 100% percent on this. however i have a feeling it has something to do woth the sleep thing and sms thing. i am gonna try always making sure my phones goes to sleep from my button press rather than a timeout.

Im not trying to talk down to you but do you know how the 100% is caculated? you have to shut your screen off for a bit when you first boot after flipping to a diff page otherwise it will always show 100% because having screen on makes the cpu active ... "in use" you will only see the number decrease from shutting it off for s time and turning it back on and checking... Percent = time on and you solve for time on by subtracting time off from total time T= T1+T0. so if you strated your device ten hours ago and you have been fiddling with it for an hour (or your screen was on for whatever reason) than

Time(100%)- Time off (9 hours) =Timeon (1Hour) which is 10%

Hope thats helpful

 

[BiGeMs X]

lolol, btw did I mention I'm a math major? yea i understand that wake time is a percentage of powered on time, but no matter what I do it never goes down from 100%, i can restart phone, manually sleep it and when i turn it back there is not even a 1 second difference between power on time and wake time, so in effect my phone is suffering from some serious insomnia

 

[Mrniceguy]

lolol, btw did I mention I'm a math major? yea i understand that wake time is a percentage of powered on time, but no matter what I do it never goes down from 100%, i can restart phone, manually sleep it and when i turn it back there is not even a 1 second difference between power on time and wake time, so in effect my phone is suffering from some serious insomnia

Hmmm well to be honest i have no idea then... All i know is it works on my HERO .
if you can try restoring to master factory settings and see if installing any perticular app breaks it. HTC is working on an official fix from what ive read.
but maybe we can find some more work arounds.

 

[marctronixx]

HERE HERE!! id "THANKS" you if i could! maybe post over at ppc and ill slide you a kudos.. ;-)

seriously, this is a great way to look at this. this is the grounds floor at sprint pcs and we can all be a part of the new direction. since i have 2 other mobile phones on my account i can test things and try to break things on the hero.. so lets do this!!!

No problem hun.
The main reason i jumped to android (at least to check it out) was because of what android is supposed to represent.
Open source. If everyone pitches in and helps everyone we are sitting on a community more powerful than that of any other mobile platform.
Apple has its dev team and community. WinMo has its ppcgeeks.
But none of the above platforms are open source.
now all we need to do is band together as a community and become the ppc geeks of Android. If anyone ever asks me for help I will do my damndest to answer. I will also do post tips and tricks and tight hax that I find. Lastly, I would urge each and every person that happens to stumble upon this site to do the same. We have all been given the oppertunity to take a good OS and make it great. Not all of us are coders (myself included) , but we are people who want the best possible customizations.We are people who fiddle around with stuff for ours trying to make it better. If your not then you definetly purchased the wrong device.

 

[phone*guy]

Didnt work for me either...Oh well it was worth a shot.

 

[g0tr00t]

Ok, so I doubted this and tried it...hmm...i went from 80% to 20%...weird and MANY THANKS!