Batteries explained

[uzetaab]

Hi - for the first ever charge is it best to charge it for the full 4 hours without using the phone or can you have a play and set it up etc whilst it's on its first charge?

TIA

Go ahead and play with it, I did.

Just got a new htc Desire and this thread helped a lot

After reading the thread I went for a stand charger plus a spare battery, it looks good and its cheap at

 

[larbac]

Hi,

I have noticed that if I remove the power cable right after charging finish then I get it right. If I leave it AC charger (normally over night) when I unplug power displays 100% but after.seconds it will show 95%. this only happens if i leave the phone connect to the plug after it get the 100%. if i unplug straigh away the battery keeps the 100% level.
but normally i would charge it overnight and i when i wake up maybe the phone stoped charging 2h ago and that causes the baterry to drain 5%. shouldnt tthe battery keep charging while its on the adapter?

any ideas?

 

[uzetaab]

Hi,

I have noticed that if I remove the power cable right after charging finish then I get it right. If I leave it AC charger (normally over night) when I unplug power displays 100% but after.seconds it will show 95%. this only happens if i leave the phone connect to the plug after it get the 100%. if i unplug straigh away the battery keeps the 100% level.
but normally i would charge it overnight and i when i wake up maybe the phone stoped charging 2h ago and that causes the baterry to drain 5%. shouldnt tthe battery keep charging while its on the adapter?

any ideas?

It's not possible to trickle charge a lithium battery & it is possible to overcharge one. So the only option is to cycle the charger on and off to keep it at about full charge.

I suspect that the problem is that the timing on this cycling has not been calibrated very well. Hopefully HTC will fix it in a firmware update.

 

[Ninsassin]

I'm not exactly sure at what % to deep cycle my battery at. Atm I bring it down to the 14% warning and then charge it to full. Am i suppose to use it until it turns itself off instead?

 

[uzetaab]

I'm not exactly sure at what % to deep cycle my battery at. Atm I bring it down to the 14% warning and then charge it to full. Am i suppose to use it until it turns itself off instead?

Yes. Use it until it turns off when deep cycling, but only about once a month.

 

[Ninsassin]

thx for the info

 

[Ninsassin]

um, what % exactly does it turn itself off at?... i drained it till 1% and it didnt ask to turn itself off, so i got scared and started charging it

 

[uzetaab]

um, what % exactly does it turn itself off at?... i drained it till 1% and it didnt ask to turn itself off, so i got scared and started charging it

0% I expect. I've never watched my phone that closely. Don't worry though, 0% does not mean there is no energy left in the battery. 0% equels something like 2.8 volts. The only thing you should not do is repeatedly try to turn the phone back on when it's flat.

 

[Ninsassin]

ok thanks again

 

[Walton1]

You may all have seen the PINES Backup Battery but just in case you haven't, I've just bought it. Mainly because it will run/charge the Desire, my wife's Sony Erricson, daughter's Samsung, son's Ipod Touch, DS Lite, TomTom etc. You can charge the Pines battery from the mains, car or usb whilst charging/running the device as well. It's not cheap at

 

[nx1977]

The phone starts shutting down at 4%.

 

[RetroDude]

I had it at 1% the last two nights?

 

[BlueDan]

The Desire doesnt seem to trickle charge. So on an overnight charge, it'll hit 100%, then turn off the charge circuit. It wont kick back in untill the phone is at 90% according to a post on this sudden drop issue on XDA developers.

For this very reason I charge mine when I get in, and take off charge at bed time. Come the morning, it's still at 97% with data and sync still left on.

Explains why I just found mine down to 93%, despite still being plugged in - thanks.

 

[Phenomenological]

I too encountered the oddly calibrated 'trickle' charge - Accidentally left the Wi-fi on overnight, and was only at 91% in the morning despite being plugged in all night. Now I guess I know why!

 

[SilverWave]

Just got a new htc Desire and this thread helped a lot

After reading the thread I went for a stand charger plus a spare battery, it looks good and its cheap at

 

[madmonk]

Just want to say thanks to all for their time in putting in suggestions etc. By following the tips my HTC lasts from an overnight charge, turning on at 9am until the next day evening around 9pm.

I'm happy with that. Means I only have to charge overnight every other night.

I turned off all syncing, all uploads, all automatic internet connection and (tried) to turn off all processes requiring internet connection. Removed the weather widget (if i want to know what the weather is like i look out of the window), turn off animation, force stop all unneccessary processes, downloaded battery widget and Astro to keep tabs on stuff.

Use Opera Mini instead of stock browser, saves battery life and data too. And much faster.

I want to control the phone, not the other way round.
Great phone.

 

[ru']

Just to add a little point to his good thread; when the phone says 0% the battery isn't totally flat, so don't panic about deep-discharging etc.

The only way to deep discharge (i.e. damage it) I guess would be to use the phone until it shuts down itself (at 0% indicated or whatever), and then leave it for a while without charging it (days/weeks). As the battery looses charge with time this could mean that it gets down to the 'damage' zone.

 

[BlueDan]

Just a thougt about recharging.

With regular (AA, etc) batteries, you can get fast chargers which recharge quicker by providing the batteries with more milliamps. The downside (apparently) is they might not last as long during use, and over time may suffer with a lowered capacity.

With that in mind: by intentionally charging over USB (500mA), instead of using the mains charger (1000mA), would the battery eventually develop a slightly higher capacity?

It'd probably be something you'd have the measure with software in controlled tests to see any difference...

 

[1208]

Heres a query i've always had, does charging from the PC take longer than charging from the wall socket?

 

[Phenomenological]

Just a thougt about recharging.

With regular (AA, etc) batteries, you can get fast chargers which recharge quicker by providing the batteries with more milliamps. The downside (apparently) is they might not last as long during use, and over time may suffer with a lowered capacity.

With that in mind: by intentionally charging over USB (500mA), instead of using the mains charger (1000mA), would the battery eventually develop a slightly higher capacity?

It'd probably be something you'd have the measure with software in controlled tests to see any difference...

You can't increase the capacity of a battery by charging it more slowly. But charging it too quickly increases the battery temperature, and high temperatures affect the chemicals inside the battery, making the cells less effective at storing charge.

Heres a query i've always had, does charging from the PC take longer than charging from the wall socket?

Yep, charging from a PC should take about twice as long as charging from the mains, as it uses half the current.

 

[uzetaab]

Some interesting news for the world of batteries. Researchers have discovered that by adding a new substance called graphene to the batteries electrodes they can significantly reduce charging times. The results so far indicate fully charging a phone battery in only 10 minutes. No indication on when these will hit the market, if they ever do, so I expect it'll be a couple of years yet.

Graphene battery electrodes enable fast recharging | News | The Engineer

 

[Phenomenological]

Some interesting news for the world of batteries. Researchers have discovered that by adding a new substance called graphene to the batteries electrodes they can significantly reduce charging times. The results so far indicate fully charging a phone battery in only 10 minutes. No indication on when these will hit the market, if they ever do, so I expect it'll be a couple of years yet.

Graphene battery electrodes enable fast recharging | News | The Engineer

The new scientist beat them to reporting that by five years.
Charge a battery in just six minutes - tech - 07 March 2005 - New Scientist

 

[beanymanuk]

On my desire on battery use it says I have used 85% using maps I only went on maps for a min and have not had the maps on 85% of the time no way near.
Its not showing maps running in advanced task killer so why is it showing 85%?
Anyone got any idea's

Thanks in advance

Pete

 

[nx1977]

It's showing 85% of the batteries drain is attributable to maps.

As time goes by, this will change until you next charge and the value is reset.

 

[twe]

Asked in the Siedeio battery thread but should have asked here.
Is there a way to measure the mA that a charger is sending to the phone? Like an Android App?
Would be good to also see what sort of mA the phone requires when using something like a Sat Nav software or game...

edit: Got JuicePlotter installed