Battery time

[KalCraig]

I just got my Galaxy 3 this week and I'm getting about 6 to 6.5 hours of battery time if I use it pretty much nonstop. I've seen people talking about short battery times, so I was curious if what I have is normal.

 

[bknewtype]

about 4-5 hours before i needa plug mine in :[

 

[KalCraig]

Anybody else? I can't help but think that it should last longer.

 

[koopatroopa]

about 3-3.5 hours screen time before it dies...

 

[Easilyamused]

I just got my Galaxy 3 this week and I'm getting about 6 to 6.5 hours of battery time if I use it pretty much nonstop. I've seen people talking about short battery times, so I was curious if what I have is normal.

depends on what you're doing with it.

http://androidforums.com/samsung-galaxy-s3/618583-truth-about-your-battery.html

 

[ozzzy3z]

I highly recommend an extended battery. I have an Anker 4400 mah in my phone, my wife has a QCell 4300 in hers. We easily get 2 full days of use out of our phones. The extended batteries take the S3 to another level.

 

[justaneonlol]

You think 6 hours of non stop use(I'm guessing screen on) is short, and should last longer?

Jesus christ people are more anal about their batteries than anything I've ever seen. Use it less, I mean theres 24 hours in a day, and you sleep for 8, which leaves 16 hours. Almost half the time from when you first wake up, you're on your phone.

 

[larrylvnv]

at store said keeping charger plugged in all nite would adversely affect battery. [over heat, shorten life, LOL, etc]. First android, I was iphone 1-4, though hated fanboys. Anyway, anyone got straight scoop?

 

[SUroot]

You think 6 hours of non stop use(I'm guessing screen on) is short, and should last longer?

I know right?

I got 6 hours of screen on use one weekend. I was amazed by that. Or was it 5? Either way it was amazing.

I couldn't get more than 3 hours out of My 3.7" HTC Desire. This is a 4.8" screen. Its amazing its not dead after an hour IMHO. People need to have their expectations managed and get realistic about their batteries.

 

[altox]

Try installing the Juice Defender App, increased my battery time by half. It mostly helps with battery life in idle mode though. Another thing to do is to check the sync settings of various apps and accounts, frequent syncing eats battery life.

 

[Heisenberg123]

You think 6 hours of non stop use(I'm guessing screen on) is short, and should last longer?

Jesus christ people are more anal about their batteries than anything I've ever seen. Use it less, I mean theres 24 hours in a day, and you sleep for 8, which leaves 16 hours. Almost half the time from when you first wake up, you're on your phone.

exactly when you factor in work, sleeping, eating and pooping its hard to have the phone die before you would of plugged in at night before sleepy time

I dont see a big deal in having to charge it everynight while your sleeping

 

[SUroot]

If more than 2 minutes a day are spent pooping, consider visiting a Dr

 

[Mostly Harmless]

6.5 hours of constant use is pretty damn good.

 

[spencer808]

When i first got my phone it didnt hold the battery as well i would have expected. Since then i have gotten a better idea how to control it (used to be a iphone guy) I tend to get about 12-14 hrs of heavy use before i have to charge. If you pay attention to what is running you will find that you can get incredible life out of the S3 battery. I love my phone and don't regret passing on the I5 at all.

 

[spencer808]

I also find that the battery/app apps tend to make my battery life worse. figure you what is killing you battery that u dont use and stop it.

 

[clitrenta]

I'm a moderate user and mine would last maybe 12 hours. I just bought an extended battery and that bad boy goes from the time I get up until I go to bed (about 19 hours) and still has 41% left. Yah, get the extended battery.

 

[KalCraig]

depends on what you're doing with it.

http://androidforums.com/samsung-galaxy-s3/618583-truth-about-your-battery.html

Thank you for the link. I'm still reading through it (it's definitely answered or dispelled some notions that I had).

Regarding your point about the Juice Defender, it says that it has saved my battery by 1.35 (I'm assuming that means by 35%). Is there anything misleading about that or is it actually helping?

 

[Easilyamused]

Try installing the Juice Defender App, increased my battery time by half. It mostly helps with battery life in idle mode though.

definitely not this. terrible advice.

Another thing to do is to check the sync settings of various apps and accounts, frequent syncing eats battery life.

this. good advice.

Thank you for the link. I'm still reading through it (it's definitely answered or dispelled some notions that I had).

Regarding your point about the Juice Defender, it says that it has saved my battery by 1.35 (I'm assuming that means by 35%). Is there anything misleading about that or is it actually helping?

honestly I haven't figured out (or really tried, I suppose) what that really means or how it's calculated.

I just know when measuring battery use via monitoring apps that they are not particulary useful, and often interferes with normal use (delays turning wireless or data on, etc.)

 

[KalCraig]

I highly recommend an extended battery. I have an Anker 4400 mah in my phone, my wife has a QCell 4300 in hers. We easily get 2 full days of use out of our phones. The extended batteries take the S3 to another level.

What's an extended battery?

Also, I'm a bit confused about how syncing works. I don't have another device, so what benefits would I still get from it? How am I affected if I leave it off? Does that prevent me from getting notifications, (push or regular) like say I get a message from Facebook, and I have notifications turned on, will I still get the message in my notification shade?

 

[KalCraig]

You think 6 hours of non stop use(I'm guessing screen on) is short, and should last longer?

Jesus christ people are more anal about their batteries than anything I've ever seen. Use it less, I mean theres 24 hours in a day, and you sleep for 8, which leaves 16 hours. Almost half the time from when you first wake up, you're on your phone.

I think you misunderstand me. I wasn't complaining. I merely wanted to know because the phone specs said 11 hours, though that may have been talk time.

I get not wanting to be anal about the battery, but at the same time, you want the battery to last as long as realistically possible so you don't have to charge it more when it's midway through the battery charge.

 

[davoid]

I get not wanting to be anal about the battery, but at the same time, you want the battery to last as long as realistically possible so you don't have to charge it more when it's midway through the battery charge.

Ah but the popular wisdom is that it is better for the health and life of your battery to top it up before it reaches the end of its discharge cycle.

On second thoughts, I don't think I know what you mean by "charge it more when it's midway through the battery charge"

 

[KalCraig]

What I'm trying to say :
Let's say that my battery is at, say, 50 %, and I'm done using it for a little bit, but I want to make sure it lasts when I use it again, is it ok to just go ahead and charge it up? In other words, does it not really matter how often I charge it?

Also, what's a reasonable amount of battery usage when the phone's asleep. Generally, I've seen about 3% used when in sleep mode. Today, after about 8 hours idle, I woke it up and it was at 94%. I just wanted to know if some variance is okay, that, given about the same amount of sleep time, using up 3% or up to 6% is normal. I'm wondering whether I may have changed a setting which caused it to use up more battery when in sleep mode. Thanks.

 

[Easilyamused]

What I'm trying to say :
Let's say that my battery is at, say, 50 %, and I'm done using it for a little bit, but I want to make sure it lasts when I use it again, is it ok to just go ahead and charge it up? In other words, does it not really matter how often I charge it?

Incremental charges are actually better for the battery.

Also, what's a reasonable amount of battery usage when the phone's asleep. Generally, I've seen about 3% used when in sleep mode. Today, after about 8 hours idle, I woke it up and it was at 94%. I just wanted to know if some variance is okay, that, given about the same amount of sleep time, using up 3% or up to 6% is normal. I'm wondering whether I may have changed a setting which caused it to use up more battery when in sleep mode. Thanks.

There will always be some variance as configurations are always different (different apps, different settings, etc.)

 

[KalCraig]

Today, after after waking up after an 8 hour sleep, it was at 89%. That just seems to be too much battery usage from being idle. When I check the battery usage in settings, it says it's mostly from cell radio stuff. But I'm not sure what it is specifically. I tried to set up all my apps so that they aren't sending or receiving data too often. So I'm not sure why this is. I feel like there are certain things that are making my battery's life less effective. Like, it was about 75% when I went back out at about 6 o'clock, and I only used it a bit here and there. And then when I was at a store at about 10 o'clock, the battery warning came on. It just doesn't feel like it's lasting as long as I thought it would.

On the other hand, one of the benefits of the Galaxy 3 is that you can remove the battery and I plan on getting a second one. I've seen people mention extended batteries. I was on a site (newegg.com) and in addition to standard batteries (which I guess are 2100 mAh?), they were selling extended ones for something like 4200 mAh, although I think I saw one or two thar were slightly higher or lower- not sure if that's possible. So, what do people recommend? If I decide to get a 2nd battery, what's a good site to order from? What should I be aware of? And what's a good battery charger to get? Are there any battery chargers that can also charge the phone? Do people who use an extended battery have two of them and just not use the original one, or do they use one of each?

I know it's a lot of questions, but coming over from an iPhone can be challenging, so any thoughts and suggestions are really appreciated.

 

[KalCraig]

Ok, now after only a handful of hours of sleep mode (after coming back from the bathroom in the middle of the night and seeing the phone was at 100%, I unplugged it), it was at 82%. The battery section in settings said most of it was from "cell radio." This is annoying. I wish I could know which apps were doing this or what was going on. It's frustrating.