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New power consumption tests (incl. HTC Wizard and Universal) - General Topics

New power consumption tests (Dell x51v, HP hx4700, PLoox720,HTC Universal and Wizard)
I’ve constantly been receiving requests (see for example this thread) to publish more and more power consumption measurements of current Pocket PC devices. Here you are
First, please read at least this article (if you haven’t already done so) to understand what this article is all about. I also highly recommend the other articles I’ve linked in from the Recommended links section.
HTC Wizard (a.k.a. imate K-Jam, T-Mobile MDA Vario, Qtek 9100, MDA Vario, XDA mini S, SPV M3000, VPA Compact II, Dopod 838) radio power consumption
As promised, I’ve run some long-lasting tests to find out more about the power consumption of the radio unit itself. It’s about 7.5% a day (I’ve measured it for two days; not counting in the ~2.5%/day battery life depletion needed to refresh the dynamic RAM memory) in inactive (no SIM is inserted but the radio is online and is ready to initiate emergency calls) mode. Again and again, these figures, along with the ~9% (there, not counting in the ~2%/day RAM refreshing-related depletion either) of Universal, are relative (show how the power consumption of these devices’ radio compares) and only show how they fare at a given geographical location. That is, they can ONLY be used to compare each device’s being power-hungry, NOT as an absolute result as “your device will consume that much power a day in YOUR home”.
Wizard’s 7.5% a day is an excellent result and is slightly better than the ~9% of Universal, particularly taken into account the bigger battery size of the latter.
Standard power consumption test suite: now, for the Universal and the hx4700!
I’ve also re-run my standard test suite including the HTC Universal (a.k.a. i-mate JasJar, Qtek 9000, O2 XDA Exec, SPV M5000, MDA IV/Pro) and the HP iPAQ hx4700 (with WM5 version 2.01 – see FAQ here on this particular ROM version) now to find out how they behave.
The test suite I’ve tested:
Backlight tests: (all with no wireless units (GSM radio, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, IrDA) switched on, no CPU usage. This finds out the absolute minimum power your device at least will consume when it’s switched on, runs at the default (automatic) CPU speed.)
No backlight at all (Note that in this scenario these devices are far from being usable, particularly the Axim x51v, which has an, in my opinion, slightly less visible screen in external light than the other three devices (which all have a screen using the same Sony technology and, therefore, behaving in a very similar fashion)
(Absolutely) minimal backlight
Maximal backlight (may be useful to know for example when watching videos on Sony screens because of the very high contrast and saturation of these screens (the x51v's not-really-saturated, not-contrasty screen has a definite advantage here) or in outdoor circumstances when you need to use the maximal backlight level available to see anything)
Wi-Fi searching for networks (also testing possible power saving modes to find out whether they’re of any help)
CPU usage vs. power consumption tests with Resco Audio Recorder (recording in q:3 32 kHz 19 kbps Speex mode (my favourite one with the best size/quality ratio but, unfortunately, with pretty high, about 60% CPU usage) - please see Everything you may need to know about sound recording on the Pocket PC for more information.)
Note that, this time, I’m also stating the original charge level at the start of the test. As is also stated for example in this pretty nice article by Brighthand forum member tanbam, there may be slight (not much) differences in power usage depending on the charge level of the battery because of the proportional Voltage level decrease as the battery is discharged. (Note that the Voltage decrease with Li-Ion batteries is in no way as visible as with other kinds of batteries. That is, a Li-Ion battery that only holds little charge will still have only a bit less Voltage than a battery full of charge. This is why there aren’t major differences in the low-charge and the fully-charged cases, Amperage-wise).
As can clearly be seen, what I’ve stated in my first battery consumption-related articles and tests is still topical:
when there is some remarkable CPU usage (see the Resco test), the power consumption figures skyrocket, particularly with the iPAQ and the x51v, particularly because both are 624 MHz devices, as opposed to the 520 MHz Universal and the PL720 (the latter consume decidedly less power in these cases). It’s, therefore, essential that you use some kind of CPU underclocking, especially on 624 MHz devices, when you run an application that constantly uses the CPU.
Fortunately, CPU underclocking is already supported by the x51v (in the Processor tab in the Settings/System/Power applet) but, unfortunately, not in the hx4700. Note that the Resco results are almost the same in the 624 and the 520 MHz modes; it’s only in a heavily (on the verge of usability underclocked) 208 MHz case that it’s visible decreasing. The case is a bit different with games – please see my former articles on the power consumption of the x51v and on my remark on what applications / games run OK when you (radically) underclock the device.
the Pocket Loox 720 is by far the best device, power consumption-wise
the lowest backlight level (with the – this is very important! – automatic backlight mode enabled as can be seen in here – it’s not enabled by default!) with the hx4700 consumes very little, as opposed to the other devices
when idling (without backlight – again, the hx4700’s backlight is far more battery-friendly than that of the other devices when used sparingly), the PL720 consumes the less; then comes the Universal, the x51v and, finally, the worst-behaving hx4700.
the various Wi-Fi power saving modes aren’t worth anything (at least when the device is actively searching for networks). In Wi-Fi, it’s again the PL720 that turns out the most power-saving (in my personal tests, it consumes about 25% an hour with BT enabled – connected to a StowAway BT keyboard -, in Web browsing mode, with the lowest backlight and connected to a Wi-Fi network).
BT and IrDA: Note that the chart doesn’t contain Bluetooth and IrDA beam activation power consumption data because I’ve already published them all. In a nutshell: you can freely activate and, with Bluetooth, actively use them (it’ll only result in an additional 1-2 mA power consumption, except on the PL720 in BT PAN mode, where you have taken into account what I’ve stated here), except for the hx4700, where it adds another 80-90 mA power consumption.)
finally, the Universal has turned out to be pretty good surprise: I’ve expected far worse, based on real-life usage. (Read: I need to recharge it on a daily basis with even moderate Web browsing – no hard-core gaming or stuff at all! – and mail reading while, using it in entirely the same way, the HTC Wizard doesn’t need recharging for days. Compared to the Wizard, it really sucks battery life-wise; compared to other VGA devices, it fares pretty well.) It fares decidedly better than the x51v and the hx4700 in almost every respect, particularly in the CPU usage and the Wi-Fi tests.
The comparison / result chart is available here (CLICK THE LINK!)
(All values are given in milliAmpers (mA).)
Recommended links
Maximize Battery Life by Minimizing Power Consumption!
Extend your battery life – never before published tips and comparative benchmarks!
Power consumption measurements of the HTC Universal (a.k.a. i-mate JasJar, Qtek 9000, O2 XDA Exec, SPV M5000, MDA IV/Pro)
Further power consumption tests on the HTC Wizard
Ever wanted to know how much power your HP iPAQ hx4700’s wireless units consume? Here’s what you’ve been waiting for. Also, a VERY BAD BUG discovered in the WM5 2.01 hx4700 BT module!
Updates to the “Windows Mobile Team on the Power Consumption issues of Pocket PC's; new power consumption measurements published!” articles – first long-lasting power consumption measurement results on the HTC Wizard
Windows Mobile Team on the Power Consumption issues of Pocket PC's; new power consumption measurements published!

Related

I upgrade to WM6 for my S200
the application (Pocket Mechanic) shows that WM6 use 100% CPU time.
btw:API function GetIdleTime: Cardinal; external 'CoreDll'; is used detect CPU loaded, the result is the same 100% CPU usage
so the battery life becomes such short.
Is there any way to fix this problem?

Dell Axim X50V / X51V have "Mirrror Mode" that enables VGA output at PDA connector.
When in Mirror Mode PDA behaves very slow because graphics chip Intel 2700g must drive 2 displays. Driving PDA display can be turned off by pressing POWER + RECORD buttons at a time, this way PDA returns to its normal speed because 2700g drives only external display.
How can I do it from soft-keys, batch file, shortcut, writing my own application or whatever else software way?
NOTE:
Stantdar method to turn off PDA screen does not work. It just turn off PDA LCD but 2700g is still driving 2 displays.

Finally I downloaded Intel 2700g SDK and I could write my own application.
Here you have it (with source code):
http://www.aximsite.com/boards/x50-x51-forums/217144-external-display-only-without-hard-keys.html

I have a Dell X51v and a HTC universal, both of them have been upgraded to wm6. When I use the universal(I removed the sim card and disabled the phone function), I connect it to a Nokia mobilephone E61 through bluetooth and let the E61 as a bluetooth modem. And when the universal turn into standby mode after several minutes I don't use it, the connection is still keep alive. But when I use the X51v instead of the universal by the same method, there is a problem,that is when the X51v turn into standby mode,the bluetooth of X51v automatically turned off,and it disconnect with Nokia E61,and the internet connect is lost.
It's really drive me mad. As I want to use X51v to get windows live messenger online all the day.But the problem makes it impossible.But why the universal is OK?Can the X51v perform just as universal?Just not to disable the bluetooth funtion when in standby mode?
wait for a method,Thank you.

louyaorong said:
I have a Dell X51v and a HTC universal, both of them have been upgraded to wm6. When I use the universal(I removed the sim card and disabled the phone function), I connect it to a Nokia mobilephone E61 through bluetooth and let the E61 as a bluetooth modem. And when the universal turn into standby mode after several minutes I don't use it, the connection is still keep alive. But when I use the X51v instead of the universal by the same method, there is a problem,that is when the X51v turn into standby mode,the bluetooth of X51v automatically turned off,and it disconnect with Nokia E61,and the internet connect is lost.
It's really drive me mad. As I want to use X51v to get windows live messenger online all the day.But the problem makes it impossible.But why the universal is OK?Can the X51v perform just as universal?Just not to disable the bluetooth funtion when in standby mode?
wait for a method,Thank you.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
welcome to xda-devs
this is a fundamental difference between the "standard" Pocket PC OS and the Phone Edition one and can't be fixed. all you can do is disabling the auto-shutdown on the x51v and just use screen dimming and/or button locking

Menneisyys said:
welcome to xda-devs
this is a fundamental difference between the "standard" Pocket PC OS and the Phone Edition one and can't be fixed. all you can do is disabling the auto-shutdown on the x51v and just use screen dimming and/or button locking
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for your welcome
Oh, it really seems bad to me.keep live messenger online is very important for me, but the battery can't be used long if disabling the auto-shutdown

I've just tried transferring a file from my laptop (running Ubuntu) to my Nexus S via Bluetooth. The transfer rate started around ~10KB/s and got up to ~28Kb/s.
I've never really used Bluetooth to transfer files (other than small files from mobile to mobile). Is this rate normal? Is there anything I can do to speed this up?
Cheers

Just tried this and got a Max Transfer Rate of 18KB/s from my MacBook Pro to my Nexus S not sure what the tranfer rates are for Bluetooth.

it's slow but you should get at least around 1 Mbits in real life usage
here are details
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bluetooth
Bluetooth v2.0 + EDR
This version of the Bluetooth Core Specification was released in 2004 and is backward compatible with the previous version 1.2. The main difference is the introduction of an Enhanced Data Rate (EDR) for faster data transfer. The nominal rate of EDR is about 3 Mbit/s, although the practical data transfer rate is 2.1 Mbit/s.[23] EDR uses a combination of GFSK and Phase Shift Keying modulation (PSK) with two variants, π/4-DQPSK and 8DPSK.[25] EDR can provide a lower power consumption through a reduced duty cycle.
The specification is published as "Bluetooth v2.0 + EDR" which implies that EDR is an optional feature. Aside from EDR, there are other minor improvements to the 2.0 specification, and products may claim compliance to "Bluetooth v2.0" without supporting the higher data rate. At least one commercial device states "Bluetooth v2.0 without EDR" on its data sheet.[26]​

So you should expect around 125KB/s then?
Does anyone here get close to these rates when transferring files via Bluetooth?

At a longer file my bluetooth speed climbs to 35KB/s, but that's way too slow. My Nokia E51 was several times faster. (I've already gifted it away, so I can't measure its speed currently.)
I'm also using Ubuntu to transfer files to my Nexus S, but I don't think it's the problem, because when I've sent files directly from the Nokia to the Nexus S, it was slow, too.

OK, I've tested the speed of my old phone (Nokia E51). Interestingly, the transfer starts fast and becomes slower, but always stays above 120KB/s.
E51: Bluetooth 2.0+EDR
Nexus S: Bluetooth 2.1+EDR
Probably my USB dongle is Bluetooth 2.0, too. The Wikipedia article is not clear, but I think 2.1 must be fully compatible with 2.0. Any idea why Nexus S is so slow?

I'm working on a hardware device that will plug into the USB port of a mobile phone and transmit data from one phone to another at very high speeds. The data is being carried over visible light (so it would appear that you are plugging in an external flashlight to your phone, except that it's carrying data). Data transmission for the first prototype will be 10 Mbps, later prototypes will be able to reach 100 Mbps.
I think this opens up some interesting possibilities for new app development, since you are now providing a low latency, high speed connection between adjacent devices. The fact that the user will be able to see where the data is going also provides some potentially useful feedback. The immediately obvious apps are for things like fast file transfers (pushing a song from one phone to the next), gaming (imagine playing blackjack where a "dealer" points their phone at other phones and deals cards just as they would in real life), and mobile payments (light transfer is private).
I'd be interested to see if this is something the developer community would be interested in getting their hands on and what sort of applications come to mind.
Cheers!