Battery Questions

[Skittlez]

FTR, Incredible and Evo batteries do NOT fit this phone

 

[EKG]

So back on topic....those of you who bought the 1600mAh batteries, how do they compare to the stock batteries?

 

[slinky]

So back on topic....those of you who bought the 1600mAh batteries, how do they compare to the stock batteries?

Am curious too but there is absolutely no point in buying them, IMHO. Supposedly it gives you a boost of only 15% -- if you believe that these batteries hold their own at that rating against OEM, which they never do. I don't know why anyone would spend $40-50 just to get what might be a 5% increase, at best.

I bought the extended battery, as much as I'm not thrilled by potentially using it. I'm surprised they didn't come out with a slightly less bulky solution although it might have to do with the way the cells are arranged. At this point for casing I might buy one which I can cut out the back and the result will be that the case might be closer to flush to the extended battery around the sides where it doesn't go.

 

[Yellow Snowman]

why do people keep saying turn off 4G when you cant???

 

[odiej34]

Yes you can. Keeps the phone from searching for 4 G and sets it to 3G

 

[Magnus_CA]

why do people keep saying turn off 4G when you cant???

If you bothered to read the entire thread you'd see that you can turn off LTE. Not easily as I would like but it's possible.

 

[slinky]

HTC blew it. If I didn't get this phone with a 1 year contract for an incredibly great price I would have waited. If HTC already saw Moto putting out a phone such as the Droid X and the Atrix with an appropriate battery, they should have done the same.

The battery may not be as bad as people say. But this phone suffers from the same problem as the Incredible - there is no way on earth you can use the phone as expected for your work day without the extended battery and/or places to charge your phone. Let's assume my phone will barely make it through the work day by turning off all the unnecessary items - I still can't use it as my music player for my daily commute without making sure I can find some place to plug in the phone when I arrive at my destination. In cities like New York, many coffee shops no longer have plugs so people won't spend hours sitting and charge phones/laptops while getting one $5 cup of coffee.

HTC really screwed themselves. No wonder they were losing it with the delays. The phone has a very short shelf life because the Bionic will kill it - not because of speed but because of the battery. Just like the Incredible and the Droid X except the extended battery solution for the Thunderbolt has a rather ludicrous design IMHO.

 

[odnerd]

Guess I've gotten really lucky. Off the charger at 7:30am. A 5 minute phone call, 25ish texts, 20 minutes web, installed a few apps, a tango test call, 7 emails, 4g on the whole time and its 8:17pm and i still have 55% battery.

 

[ChiTownJim]

Here's the way I look at the Battery in this phone.... If you use it as a phone and pda you'll easily make it 12hrs with some juice left hell I think using it like this I could get 20hrs

If you're using this as a Phone/PDA/Camera/PSP/GPS Navigator /mp3 player and netbook you're gonna kill it off in under 8hrs more then likely .... When I knew I was gonna be doing extreme heavy use on my Incredible I had a spare battery or a charger .. It's too be expected ... Heck the battery on my laptop now only lasts about 20minutes before it dies haha

Now I know there are phones that get slightly better battery life doing the same things but honestly if you're using it as a replacement for every electronic device you own . You better plan on having spare batteries

I just used my 4g hotspot to stream a NCAA Hockey game for over 2 hrs to my Gtab while in a car . When I started doing this I was at 80% battery by the end I was at 38% . But I knew this was abnormal use so I brought my spare battery . I ended up not needing it but I thought I might. I'm actually pleasantly surprised I didn't need it

 

[UBRocked]

And you are referring to which posts? Seems to me that a lot people are doing an awful lot of complaining. Most of whom do not know what's causing their issue.

I'm at 30% battery left after now 17 hours off the charger...have not been using 4G except to and from work. So I'm guessing the problem is with HTC's 4G radio/power management. If that's the issue...its most likely a software issue.

HTC has a decent reputation with supporting their devices...so I think you're a little premature with the pitchforks and torches!

Okay, so today I left WiFi off all day long...getting between 2-3 bars signal strength of 4G all day. My use was slightly increased today because of not being at work...but here's what I got.

After 10 hours of moderate use, I had 10% battery life left and threw the phone back on the charger. I spent a lot of time using the following apps: Browser, Phandroid, GTalk, Bracket Bound, and ESPN. I also watched a couple of YouTube videos. I was seeing a little less than 10% battery loss, per hour (on average throughout the day).

This is better than the first day I had 4G on. The biggest difference is that I didn't stream Pandora for an hour but I spent more time with the screen on today.

While the battery life on this device isn't going to wow you...I don't think it is really that bad after having 3 days to evaluate it. If you want to or have to be on 4G all day vs. WiFi, just expect about 50% less battery life.

As I usually use WiFi about 75% of the time on most days, I think getting 15+ hours per day is a reasonable expectation...and that's good enough for me.

Battery life should improve with OTA official updates or via our Dev community. So what I'm seeing now is what I'm considering the worst battery life I'll experience with this phone. I see no reason that battery life would be worse as time goes on...but I do see that it could possibly be improved.

4G kills the battery faster than 3G...no question about it. A 4G toggle switch is something that really needs to be added. If WiFi is available, use it.

10 hours on 4G only...20 hours on WiFi only (with slightly less usage). Anyone else have real numbers to report?

 

[slinky]

Guess I've gotten really lucky. Off the charger at 7:30am. A 5 minute phone call, 25ish texts, 20 minutes web, installed a few apps, a tango test call, 7 emails, 4g on the whole time and its 8:17pm and i still have 55% battery.

No offense, but that is a very sad battery rating. This means your battery will do, at most that can be expected in a work day:

20 emails
25 minutes of phone calls
50 minutes of web surfing

This is assuming you were using it longer than you anticipated. At around 5% your phone will shut down.

 

[UBRocked]

Guess I've gotten really lucky. Off the charger at 7:30am. A 5 minute phone call, 25ish texts, 20 minutes web, installed a few apps, a tango test call, 7 emails, 4g on the whole time and its 8:17pm and i still have 55% battery.

No offense, but that is a very sad battery rating. This means your battery will do, at most that can be expected in a work day:

20 emails
25 minutes of phone calls
50 minutes of web surfing

This is assuming you were using it longer than you anticipated. At around 5% your phone will shut down.

I don't know...almost 13 hours and 55% left. Seems pretty decent to me!

What exactly are you expecting slinky?

 

[pr0nstarz]

Hmm.. This is kind of odd. I've been using my phone off and on all day, watched a youtube video had a long off and on chat on aim, checked my email and my youtube channel a billion times ( got some homefront commentaries that are getting a lot of attention) made a couple quick calls..

anyway.. this is what I got.

7h 56m since unplugged

Battery is at 50%

Display: 48%
Cell Standby: 25%
Phone idle: 22%
Android system: 3%
Android OS: 2%

not sure why it doesn't list internet.. but w/e

I'm pretty anal about killing off processes, and I have the brightness at 27%..i'm indoors a lot, why set it to burn retina mode?

 

[jhsu123]

To turn 4G on and off, go to the marketplace apps and download Phone Info (it's free). It will allow you to turn 4G on and off really quickly without remembering all those numbers!

 

[rogue_slc_vzw_rep]

Hmm.. This is kind of odd. I've been using my phone off and on all day, watched a youtube video had a long off and on chat on aim, checked my email and my youtube channel a billion times ( got some homefront commentaries that are getting a lot of attention) made a couple quick calls..

anyway.. this is what I got.

7h 56m since unplugged

Battery is at 50%

Display: 48%
Cell Standby: 25%
Phone idle: 22%
Android system: 3%
Android OS: 2%

not sure why it doesn't list internet.. but w/e

I'm pretty anal about killing off processes, and I have the brightness at 27%..i'm indoors a lot, why set it to burn retina mode?

What app are you using to get that data?

 

[pr0nstarz]

for an endurance test im gonna see if the battery can survive streaming a 2 hour youtube video in HD on 4G, haven't charged it yet, started around 50% (yay for unlimited data..lol)

 

[asmb77]

+1

its a great app

 

[pr0nstarz]

What app are you using to get that data?

Settings, about, battery.

What, I need to download an app to get more accurate data?

 

[rogue_slc_vzw_rep]

Settings, about, battery.

What, I need to download an app to get more accurate data?

thanks I wasn't looking in about. I'm still getting used to HTC settings vs my settings on my x

 

[cbanning]

I dunno, but I unplugged this morning @ 8:15 -it's now 10pm, I'm @ 37% and used it all day long for phone calls, texts, Internet, etc. Coming from a rooted dx, I'm pretty happy

 

[Air Force One]

What app are you using to get that data?

You can also download spare parts from the market. It provides good info on what apps are using how much battery. It's great for identifying a rogue app sucking more battery than it should be.

 

[slinky]

I don't know...almost 13 hours and 55% left. Seems pretty decent to me!

What exactly are you expecting slinky?

Most of those 13 hours were spent on standby. He used the phone for about 40 minutes - at best - with half of that being text entry. This burns up half the battery. And other phones talk about hundreds of hours of standby too.

Let's look at average specs. The iPhone 3GS gets 5 hours of actual 3G Internet surfing. Let's say it's 4 hours and change. People thought that was just "OK." On this phone he won't even break 90 minutes - at best.

The Droid X - a less old 3G device - has a *larger* capacity battery than the Thunderbolt -1540 mAh. Rated at up to 480 minutes talk time, 220 hours standby time.

The Incredible - another 3G device with a battery about 8% smaller at 1300 mAh - Usage time: Up to 312 minutes, standby Time: Up to 146 Hours. Pitiful. Did it take a Mensa member to figure out that a 4G device would provide worse numbers?

The Thunderbolt - a 4G device- has a Droid 1 battery and supposedly does far more standby time than the Incredible (312 hours) and just a little more talk time than the Incredible with the slightly larger battery (378 minutes). So what is killing this phone?

So the only thing I can conclude from his usage patterns is that using 4G Internet on this phone, browsing or email, will surely kill the battery within 2 hours and probably earlier. That's with no calls. That's unacceptable. Let's assume this is an anomaly. Getting even 2.5 hours of "continuous" usage is not acceptable, especially not for the flagship phone and having prior experience and complaints.

 

[jaydroid88]

I woke up for work at 830am and took the phone off the charger. At 3pm it had 15% battery life left and I barely used the thing...Pandora might've been on tho

 

[UBRocked]

Most of those 13 hours were spent on standby. He used the phone for about 40 minutes - at best - with half of that being text entry. This burns up half the battery. And other phones talk about hundreds of hours of standby too.

Let's look at average specs. The iPhone 3GS gets 5 hours of actual 3G Internet surfing. Let's say it's 4 hours and change. People thought that was just "OK." On this phone he won't even break 90 minutes - at best.

The Droid X - a less old 3G device - has a *larger* capacity battery than the Thunderbolt -1540 mAh. Rated at up to 480 minutes talk time, 220 hours standby time.

The Incredible - another 3G device with a battery about 8% smaller at 1300 mAh - Usage time: Up to 312 minutes, standby Time: Up to 146 Hours. Pitiful. Did it take a Mensa member to figure out that a 4G device would provide worse numbers?

The Thunderbolt - a 4G device- has a Droid 1 battery and supposedly does far more standby time than the Incredible (312 hours) and just a little more talk time than the Incredible with the slightly larger battery (378 minutes). So what is killing this phone?

So the only thing I can conclude from his usage patterns is that using 4G Internet on this phone, browsing or email, will surely kill the battery within 2 hours and probably earlier. That's with no calls. That's unacceptable. Let's assume this is an anomaly. Getting even 2.5 hours of "continuous" usage is not acceptable, especially not for the flagship phone and having prior experience and complaints.

Standby can consume a lot of your battery. Gmail is constantly syncing, apps are syncing data, weather, newsfeeds, etc. The market searches for updates to your installed applications, polling WiFi signals, etc. Standby isn't standby like it was on old flip phones.

You think a DroidX really gets 220 hours of standby time? It doesn't. That is cellular standby time and cellular standby time only. If you had your data turned off (completely off...no 3G, no 4G, no 1X data)...no apps syncing, screen always off...then, and only then, would you see high standby times like that.

220 hours is over 9 days. Go find someone with a Droid X that gets 9 days...Scratch that, go find someone with a Droid X that gets 3 days out of one charge on a stock battery You won't...because no one with a smart uses their phone for just voice.

24 hours on a single charge has become a decent benchmark for people with a smartphone. If you can get 2 days then you are doing great. If you can get through a business day...that has become the baseline "good enough" for most people.

So do I think 13 hours and 55% battery remaining is decent...yep. Even if it is minimal use.

Edit: Oh and for continuous use...most smartphones can only watch a maxium of 2 movies (4 hours) before their phone dies. The display is THE MOST battery draining element of this and every other smartphone. So surfing the web constantly with the display always on will kill the phone quickly because the display is always on. I bet I could kill any smartphone with less than a 2000 mAh battery in less than 6 hours...it's easy to do.

 

[LoyalServant]

I really wonder what people are doing.
I have been streaming npr for the last 2 hours or so over 3G and I am at 74% now.
Been off charge for the last 4 hours.
Got me.

The first day was iffy but it's improved dramatically since then with a few bump charges.
I will probably get a day out of this, easily.