Members:
Please post any battery related issue within this thread. Pleas do not create any more additional battery related threads.
Thank you
Staff
----Original post follows ------
The spec's sound good, but I wonder about the battery life?
My daughter has a Samsung Gravity and it won't last through a single day -- even after trading it in on a new model.
So, it sounds great that the Moment has a faster processor, lighted keyboard, camera flash, and possibly more. However, is this simply a sign that Samsung isn't sensitive to battery issues or have they really figured out how to do that stuff and deliver a reasonable usage time?
Last edited by twospirits; December 21st, 2009 at 10:19 PM.
Reason: Sticked the thread and added comments.
Well, the AMOLED screen it has is much less power hungry than a normal LCD, which hopefully will counter balance some of the other more draining features. They have given figures for talk time, which I can't recall right now, but nothing for stand by time. I fully expect to be charging it daily with as much as I use my current phone.
Good thoughts about the AMOLED screen. However, I will tell you that my daughter's Gravity is rated at 360 minutes of talk time compared to 330 minutes for the Moment.
And charging it daily isn't good enough for her. She runs out of battery every day.
She almost never talks on her phone, but she is a VERY heavy text user. About 12,000 texts per month. That works out to 400 per day. On the other hand, I wouldn't think that texts are anywhere near equal to similar talk time.
With that many texts, you'd be surprised at how much juice the phone will eat up. When you're talking, the screen is off (usually) and the phone is doing very little in the background (especially on a CDMA network since you can't talk and do data at the same time). It would be interesting to see what the drain on a battery over a 60 min conversation is vs a 60 min constantly back and fourth text convo.
If your daughter has her phone at school, another thing could be draining the battery... searching for signal. When I was in college, that would kill my battery in a few hours on a phone that would normally go 2-3 days between charges. I don't think most schools employ jamming devices, but the buildings are very thick metal and concrete for the most part and the signals just can't get in well.
Is this simply a sign that Samsung isn't sensitive to battery issues or have they really figured out how to do that stuff and deliver a reasonable usage time?
Quote:
Originally Posted by emellaich
She almost never talks on her phone, but she is a VERY heavy text user. About 12,000 texts per month. That works out to 400 per day.
I think it's your daughter that isn't sensitive to battery issues, not Samsung.
Hmmm, forty2. It's probably a case of you not intending this, but I find your answer insulting. Stick to the facts instead of making fun of me or my daughter.
So you don't take this as very serious, but I'm not sold. I was using my daughter as an example, and admittedly an extreme one. However, the point is that talk time estimates do not necessarily translate directly to usage time.
I assume that if you are thinking of getting an android phone and paying data rates, you hope to do more than simply talk on the phone? Web browsing? Navigation? Email?. In fact, battery life is a known concern for Android phones in general. Do a little research on the net and you'll find that many people are debating whether the underclocked/underpowered phones are moves to cut costs by manufacturers or are attempts to control battery life.
So when Samsung comes out with a chip that is much faster than that used by others, this leads to a natural question. Is this due to them saving power elsewhere (AMOLED) or a more efficient chip architecture? Or is it simply a case of designing for pleasing spec sheets without taking into account a real world use case? Is this another Gravity in the making?
Since the phone has been in a few reviewers hands, I'm just hoping for objective experience on the battery life.
p.s. These comments are for forty2, I would like to thank you, Gremlyn1 for your thoughtful comments.
I am currently running a Sprint Hero and have issues with battery life also. I can usually make it through the day but it is often very close to running out. My solution was to pick up an inexpensive auto adapter and mini usb data cable from ebay so I can give it a little juice during the day when I'm driving or at my computer. Task Killer also helps to monitor and terminate unneeded applications running in the background taking up extra processing. With current battery technology it's hard to make a powerful smartphone that is multi-tasking capable and compact that has loads of battery life.
I am currently running a Sprint Hero and have issues with battery life also. I can usually make it through the day but it is often very close to running out. My solution was to pick up an inexpensive auto adapter and mini usb data cable from ebay so I can give it a little juice during the day when I'm driving or at my computer. Task Killer also helps to monitor and terminate unneeded applications running in the background taking up extra processing. With current battery technology it's hard to make a powerful smartphone that is multi-tasking capable and compact that has loads of battery life.
Good point. This may be the state of the art given the power of these devices and how small we want them to be. If there is no answer today, the only solution may be a change in habits.
Any thoughts on the impact on the battery of these mini-charges throughout the day? I know that Li-ion (I assume that's what these have?) batteries don't have a memory effect. However, I think most of these are 'smart batteries' have built-in microprocessors to manage the charging process.
Will the smart charging system be messed up if it sees a bunch of mini-charges instead of single long, deep charges? Or will this condition the microprocessor (not the battery) to think the battery's capacity is smaller?
From what I understand about Li-ion batteries frequent charging of the battery is not a problem and doesn't result in a memory issue within the battery. Occasionally they should be drained to almost empty but it is not necessary to cycle them from full to empty. They tend to be rated with how many full charges they will take before they start to loose their effeciency. Two 50% charges have the same effect on the battery as one 100% charge as far as the life of the battery is concerned. With these devices I don't think there should be an issue with running them during the day and topping it off once or twice with an additional charge to ensure they last through the evening.
If it has a microprocessor to help regulate charging, then it won't be subject to the same memory effect that batteries can be. It would be like thinking your CPU would get a memory from doing the same tasks over and over again, so no worries there.
I agree that there are concerns for battery life, but I guess I'm just holding out hope for it to be OK. I usually plug my current phone in over night, then again on the way to work (especially if using GPS) and on the way home again. My current phone is not as power hungry as I expect the Moment to be (Moto Q9c), so it's not a great comparison... the other thing to think about is that most of us have the ability to sit the phone on our desk for a little while, even if just over lunch, and give it a little juice like Capt recommended.
I was wondering if anyone else has noticed their Moment saying "Fully Charged" then shortly after taking it off the charger it reports at 80% left?
It's not that its draining that much battery that fast it just seems that it is not getting fully charged. The battery also isn't discharging abnormally fast like Hero pre 3rd party messaging, it just seems to report falsly that it is completely charged and stops charging. Has anyone else experienced this? Or should I go for an exchange and get a properly charging unit?
Doing some more tests to see if it will do this every time, or if I can get the bettery to take a full charge somehow.
I took the phone off charger, as I was typing the above post, checking the phone just now, about 15mins later, with almost no usage I am at 80% battery, this is a problem to say the least.
did everyone start using the phone right away without fully charging? i have the same problem. i'm going to completely drain my battery today and then charge it tonight. see if that fixes the issue.
When I start charging, it goes up to 50% pretty quickly and then takes a long time to go up to 100%.
When I take it off the charger and start using it, it goes to 80% very quickly, then down to 50% somewhat fast, and by about 8 hours into the day, down to 30%. But the lower the battery goes, the slower it seems to drain. I think it's something with the indicator rather than with the battery. I can spend all evening between 15% and 30%, it seems.
I had my phone run all the way down until it shut off last night, then charged it up over night. Took it off the charger this morning, and the battery bar at the top of the screen did not show full. I then charged it again while on my 25 min drive to work and it did not get to fully charged status that whole time, though now the indicator shows a full battery. I wouldn't think there is anything wrong with the phone, just the batteries. I'm going to complete run it down again today and then charge it up and see what happens tomorrow.
I am more to believe it is a visual bug more than a battery bug. Mine is doing the same but yet my battery seems to be getting me thru the day fine. I wonder if Sprint or Samsung is aware of this?
When I start charging, it goes up to 50% pretty quickly and then takes a long time to go up to 100%.
When I take it off the charger and start using it, it goes to 80% very quickly, then down to 50% somewhat fast, and by about 8 hours into the day, down to 30%. But the lower the battery goes, the slower it seems to drain. I think it's something with the indicator rather than with the battery. I can spend all evening between 15% and 30%, it seems.
im having this exact issue. but then again ive only had it for a couple days. could it have something to do with apps running in the background? i've tried taskiller, maybe im not doing it right or its something else. it is an issue that needs to be addressed though. after taking almost 7 hours to fnally reach 100% charge, took it off the charger at 6:30 this morning and now its down to 70%.
Last edited by droid26; November 3rd, 2009 at 11:15 AM.
Device(s): Inspire 4G, Thunderbolt, Photon, EVO 3D
Carrier: Not Provided
Thanks: 0
Thanked 1 Time in 1 Post
I'm seeing the same thing. In addition, it will sometimes drop (or jump) 20% instantly. It seems to be the display, though until I saw this thread I was wondering if it was a flakey battery in my phone.
I'm having the same issue. I just got my phone yesterday and charged it all last night. When I took it off the charger this morning it still was not fully charged. I'm going to try and run the battery down as well and charge it again to see if that makes a difference.
Noticed the same battery quirk, but after my phone gets to 60% it stays there for some time. My phone drops to 80% almost immediately from disconnecting from the charger even if it says fully charged.
same thing happens to mine... actually, left it charging all night and it was "Fully Charged" in the morning, as soon as I disconnected and then reconnected, it was charging up again for at least another hour or so...
by the way, the screen will stay on while charging unless you hit the red "End" key... don't want our displays on all night now, do we?
unplugged my phone fully charged at 2pm. i've only made one phone call that lasted about 5 min since then and it's 4pm and i'm already down to 50 percent. WTH??? i've had a ppc winmo phone with horrible battery life but this thing is worse. as soon as i unplug this thing from the charger, the battery drops to 80 percent in about 5 mins. only thing that i can think of is the gps icon that constantly sending something on the status bar. it also seems like even when the phone is on sleep, something is constantly running on the background. fyi, i also have taskill downloaded and im contantly closing application but some of the programs keep coming back to life. hopefully, this is caused by some sort of software glitch like the hero's sms issue because if it isn't there is no point of carrying a high powered/full featured phone that is only good for making a few voice calls a day.
Last edited by emcube; November 3rd, 2009 at 03:14 PM.
The GPS icon is most likely because of the Weather Channel widget. If you set it to follow your location, it's constantly checking GPS. They could probably change it to check your location on a user-configurable interval rather than constantly to save battery, but... *shrug*
The indicator is also not completely accurate. Just because your battery's at 50% doesn't mean you're 50% through the time that the phone is usable.
Many times the battery life is a "guess" based upon the current usage at that particular time. IOW, if you are in a poor coverage area, the phone has to turn up the gain on the antenna to achieve reasonable service. Your battery remaining is based upon what is going on with the phone AT THAT MOMENT.
To put it a different way.....
You know the trip computer on your car....if you floor the accelerator you will notice that your instantaneous MPG will be less than 5mpg. But when you lift off the accelerator, then it reads something more realistic. That battery icon is similar and it represents your battery life under those INSTANTANEOUS circumstances/usage. This is why you will see the battery life jump around a bit.
With all that said, I am still not seeing great battery life out of this thing.
Ok I am typing this on my moment. I am convinced the battery guage is whacked. I have surfing the forum for about 45 minutes with my battery on 5% the whole time and getting a battery warning now and then. My goal is to go until the phone dies then charge it and see how it works tomorrow.
battery life on this thing sucks ass.... mine does the exact same thing... never fully charges... goes from like 80% to 50% within an hr.... and i used the web and nfl mobile live and my battery was at 5% within 1 hr 30 minutes.... what the hell is the point of this phone the battery life is ********
i dont think its the weather channel app that's causing this issue because i've deleted the widget from the home screen and replaced it with a shortcut instead. will it still use gps in the background? anyone know if this issue has been addressed??
This is a deal breaker with this phone. The battery is not good at all. I had the touch pro and this battery is worse than that phone.
I hope something happens soon, because I only have 9 days left on my return window.
I tried the hero before. I'm loving everything about the phone, but if I can't use it for more than a few hours than it's no good.
I don't understand why they don't test these darn phones out before we get them. I can't believe they didn't realize there was a issue.
i shut the GPS off last night and from what i posted earlier, about it being at 100% charged plugged in and 80% charged when unplugged...
the phone was unplugged at 7:45am this morning and it is 7pm now.
the battery is at 50% right now with normal use all day.
(i made 6 phone calls and sent/replied to about 30 texts and took 10 pictures with auto-upload engaged and checked my email throughout the day all day).
i'll be fine with the battery if this becomes the norm.
This is a deal breaker with this phone. The battery is not good at all. I had the touch pro and this battery is worse than that phone.
I hope something happens soon, because I only have 9 days left on my return window.
I tried the hero before. I'm loving everything about the phone, but if I can't use it for more than a few hours than it's no good.
I don't understand why they don't test these darn phones out before we get them. I can't believe they didn't realize there was a issue.
i know what you mean about the touch pro's battery.
a battery cab totally helped that issue.
i'm hoping someone comes up with something like that for our issue.
Ok I am typing this on my moment. I am convinced the battery guage is whacked. I have surfing the forum for about 45 minutes with my battery on 5% the whole time and getting a battery warning now and then. My goal is to go until the phone dies then charge it and see how it works tomorrow.
Just to update this earlier post... I went about 40 more minutes with the phone at 5% battery before it finally just flat shut off. I restarted it and got another 10 minutes with the battery at 3% before the phone just shut off for good.
I don't think it's battery life as much as the way the phone is reading the battery levels. I took my phone off charger today before work and talked probably about an hour total, did a few emails (gmail as normal and email app syncs every hour). Ran GPS trying to figure out my GPS bug, probably ran it for 40 minutes or so total, browsed android market and then surfed the forums for at least and hour and 15 minutes tonight before the phone finally ran out juice.
I too had a touch pro, battery life on that was horrid at first or so it seemed. I never let the phone run down to absolutely nothing, well beyond the warnings. I seem to recall no issues though after a couple charge/discharge cycles. I do remember an issue or two after I got the expanded battery from seidio though, the phone didn't seem to calculate properly the extra capacity or however the meter is guaged for a couple days, then it seemed accurate.
Last edited by satinkzo; November 3rd, 2009 at 07:17 PM.
Same problem as everyone else. Within about 20 minutes of pulling phone off of the charger I'm down to 80%-70% with no use. Within 6-8 hrs with limited use I'm down to about 15%. I thought I had a bad battery or a bad phone so I exchanged it yesterday and had the same issue with the new phone. I thought that because sprint coverage is not very strong where I live/work that may have been the issue but I guess not since everyone else is having the same problems. I have turned off location services, removed weather.com widget, tried taskiller, tried the sms solutions that the Hero has had and nothing seems to work.
If and update doesn't come out to fix issue I will be taking it back and switching back to the trusty PRE. I REALLY like the phone/ android but this is obviously a deal killer if I can't make it through the day on a single charge. I hope it's addressed. By the way I called Sprint today to find out if it's a known issue and at this point it was not in the database as a "known issue"
Device(s): Inspire 4G, Thunderbolt, Photon, EVO 3D
Carrier: Not Provided
Thanks: 0
Thanked 1 Time in 1 Post
Quote:
Originally Posted by emcube
i dont think its the weather channel app that's causing this issue because i've deleted the widget from the home screen and replaced it with a shortcut instead. will it still use gps in the background? anyone know if this issue has been addressed??
TWC is certainly part of it. It starts at boot and starts using the GPS to locate you. I've found no way within TWC to tell it not to locate. It does this even without ever running the app or the widget (using Spare Parts to verify what's using the GPS). I tried rebooting and immediately using ATK to kill TWC, and it still wouldn't actually die until it got a GPS fix (which was very slow, since I was indoors at work).
how do we get sprint or samsung to know of this issue?
Keep calling Sprint and once they get enough complaints it becomes a known issue. Then they will put their heads together with Samsung and hopefully fix it. I'm a manager at a Best Buy Mobile and I have sent the problem up my chain which I hope will speed things along.
the battery does not seem to last very long. i wonder if this is the same problem the hero had. would not surprise me. ive installed handcent and configured it just like i had done with the hero. ill get back to you guys tom. to see how much the battery has drained over night.
i've tried to uninstall the weather channel app and i was only able to uninstall the updated part of the app. when i went back to uninstall the native app that came with the phone, there was no uninstall button available. is there anyway we can uninstall the original version of the weather channel app that came preinstalled on this phone??
For what its worth guys the Samsung Instinct HD had this exact same issue for the short time I had it. Pull it off the charger and it would read 80%. It would seem to stabilize at around 50% but it still drained very fast. Sprint fixed this with an update so maybe its a Samsung thing.......Just throwin it out there.
My guess is you have background apps running. Yes the battery life is bad. Im not questioning that one bit, but your drain seems to be way faster than what I have noticed.
__________________ You can get blood from a stone, you just have to throw it hard enough.
Sprint has just added its first full QWERTY Keyboard Android Phone to their lineup with the Samsung Moment. Initially rumored as the "InstinctQ", the Moment rocks an 800 MHz processor - what was the fastest processor in an Android phone a... Read More
Battery problems, quirks and issues: Read first.
