30 days with the G-Pad - G Tablet General

First off, my hat goes off to the guys that have taken this tablet under their wings!
Out of the box what a peice of dung beetle food.
Pros:
Battery 15 hours with me on it (fully charged ipad dead in 9.5 hours)
Screen viewing angle, it is narrow. I deal with so so sensitive info at work
Speed the tablet moves
Full multitasking, (doing this post, chatting on Facebook and Pandora)
Awesome wifi, even at no bars I can get data
Cons:
I am counting on XDA for support, (don't mean that in a bad way to XDA)
Sleep support, tablet just makes up it's own mind and shuts off, not to mention lag wake up
Junk tapntap
Again thanks for making this great tablet
-Bobby

Related

[Q] New GS 4G user. Help with battery problems.

Love the phone. Only complaint that I have is the battery life. I only get about 10 hours of normal use before it dies.
I have it rooted and I have installed Juice defender and setCPU. I have no idea really how to use either of these apps though.
Can anyone please help me to install and set up the apps that I need to get the best power/battery life ratio for this phone?
Thanks.
A really helpful tip is to use black backgrounds. This reduces the amount of pixels on the screen requiring power on the Super AMOLED display, and will improve battery life significantly. Tower reception is also a big one, just turn off mobile data when you get to a low signal area.
I suggest turning down the brightness to the lowest indoors and then bringing it up a little outdoors. 10 hours is really good compared to the 4 hours I got on my old 4g.
Sent from my SGH-T959V using XDA App
I second the black background.
I also installed widgetoid, created a widget with a shortcut to the mobile network settings.
I have Network Mode set to GSM only (Edge Network) throughout the day. This is fine to keep my email syncing and for phone calls. If I know I'm going to start browsing the internet/ streaming music/ etc then I go and set the network mode to Auto to allow 4G connections.
With a few phone calls and a little bit of internet usage I still had about 60% battery life left after 12 hours off the charger.
juice defender works wonders. Set profile to extreme. Choose carefully and let app do this rest. It auto shuts off data when not using 4 apps. I have been off charge 9:40 mitutes with 79% battery remaining. I've been on the market made a few phone calls, browsed the internet and getting and receiving text + emails coming in. Have settings GSM only until I need 4G speed. I don't need a charger because I get through the day easily.
Thanks
I just wanted to say thanks everyone for the tips! I know more is coming from other users but i'm new to android i switched from Windows Mobile 6.5 and android is better so far or atleast for the week i have had this device. i was getting upset with the battery life and always taking my charger with me(i never had to do that with my custom Rhodium. the black backround idea does work very well. I have also found if you set your backlight timeout to 1 min it helps a lot.
Kafluke said:
Love the phone. Only complaint that I have is the battery life. I only get about 10 hours of normal use before it dies.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
you call 10 hrs a problem??
I can tether my Xoom for 2 hrs and listine to pandora over bluetooth for another 3 before it dies... my last phone could berly stand 45mins of pandora over bluetooth before crapping out
Always hated the idea of black backgrounds on beautiful 800x480 screens. Anyhows I had the very same quick battery death too and fixed it. One get Juice Defender, very worth while, second run device in portrait mode [I was an old n900 user so I had it in landscape mode, it did not like staying in that mode]. If things get really bad turn off the WiFi when not in use and change the autosync features to off or disabled. ALOT of power is comsumed by adware communicating with various entities while your away from the device. Genuinely suprused by the sheer amount of adware on the device, nearly ever "free" app is adware [meaning you pay with your usage pattern's etc]. YMV but that all I had to do to get the battery under control.
Im a moderate user and my battery is still going strong
Sent from my SGH-T959V using XDA App
orionshock said:
you call 10 hrs a problem??
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yep, I'm more than happy getting 10-12 hours of at-office use with WiFi on constantly (including M$ push and personal email) and a moderate amount of browsing during the day. I keep the brightness at "0" as much as possible.
Beats the pants off my N900 which would die in under 4 hours under the same at-office usage patterns.
OEM battery and charger is ~$25 or a Zagg Sparq2 (4 Ah, I believe) for watching hours of video and Angry Birds on those trans-Pacific flights.
You are doing something wrong guys. . .
I'm on a Vibrant /w Froyo 2.2.1 and a 1500mah battery that is now 7 months old.
Battery left says total battery life per charge is 23 hours, 15 minutes.
Now mind you I am a relatively moderately/heavy user. I have 5 homescreens with 15 widgets total on them that refresh every 2 hours, and an intensive live wallpaper.
I use the phone a lot for reading RSS feeds, facebook, texting, and LOTS of music. Total screen-on-time per battery charge is around 3-4 hours with Automatic brightness.
Obviously you have something going on with your phones if you are only getting 10 hours. My phone is also overclocked to 1.4Ghz with overvoltages and I STILL get this good a battery life with all my usage...on an old battery mind you.
Check for rogue apps?
PS: I have Wi-Fi on 100% of the time but NEVER use 3G/HSPA for data since I don't use a data plan. The Wi-Fi is connected 90% of the time the phone is on though since I am always at places with Wi-Fi.

Getting great battery life on my TB... :)

Keepin' it clean by keepin' smooth...
Ok finally after a few days of using my phone it has finally leveled off. My phone has been off the charger since 6am and I am at about 70% charged. Couldn't ask for more out of a smart phone. This is right in line with my Nexus One so I am no longer disappointed.
There are a few tweaks I did make to get this working this way.
(1) Screen brightness set at about 20% - The TB's screen is way to bright to begin with and making this adjustment is something that is not very hard to get used to.
(2) Screen Time out at 30 seconds - Setting to low will get frustrating if you like reading the news on your phone or browsing the web, 30 seconds seems just right for me.
(3) WIFI when not in car (triggered on and off by loss of Blue Tooth Connection and Not In Dock) Using WiFi instead of relying on your data connection will help save some juice while in a WiFi enabled building since your phone will not be trying to constantly search and connect to a data connection.
(4) Blue tooth off until docked - Saves battery by not transmitting a BT signal constantly. I only use Bluetooth in the car so triggered by the dock seemed logical.
(5) Syncing Facebook every 8 hours, News every 12 hours and Stocks (Who really needs this)
(6) I love widgets on my home screens so these get updated as I found necessary to me. Im not a major facebooker that needs to be on the bleeding edge of everyones life so 8 hours is probably even too much but adequate. News doesnt really update very often and compared to a daily news paper 12 hours is more than ample. Stocks, need I say more seriously I am not an investor and could care less.
(7) Over clocking your phone is not necessary right now, 1 GHZ is definitely more than you need on this phone. I am scoring about 1700 on quadrant which is pretty good for a 1ghz phone. My phone has never lagged and has functioned as expected since birthed to my hand. Keep in mind Over clocking will increase the performance of your phone but will tear at your battery as well and may cause heating issues.
(8) Not using an animated wallpaper. Even on my nexus one this was a major contributer to poor battery and phone performance. Animated wallpapers are very often poorly programmed or simply over bloated. Not too mention on the severe end of the priority list of needs. All though cool.
I am not over clocking or installing a custom rom on my phone quite yet because honestly the roms are not stable enough as expected this close to birth, and really don't offer any additional functionality that I find very useful as of yet. I am using Tasker to accomplish a few automated switching routines to toggle WIFI and Bluetooth. I am also using Folder Organizer to keep my apps categorized in a humane manor. I am a widget-aholic and have not really found a downside to having too a lot of widgets running.
How much do you use your phone a day?
Not everyone is willing to cut out their social networking. A big part of smartphones now is always being connected. This includes social networking, sharing pictures, sharing locations... some people get into all of this and some do not.
Also, some people like weather updates, stock updates, news updates, etc. Everyone uses their device differently to fit their needs.
I think it is common sense that the more services you use which consume radio/data/processing time then the quicker you will drain your battery.
Thank you for sharing the setup that works for you and affords you such great battery life. I have been having great battery life too. I am currently not in a 4G LTE area, but the device on 3G has been great on battery. You would never know there are any "issues" if people did not post about them!
What is your uptime, display on time, and partial wake usage?
I didn't check that deep in to it, but I had it plugged in to some speakers at work for about 3.5 hours playing slacker radio from wifi so I could rock at work. I used the phone to call tech support for my wifes phone which took a while and other shorter calls through out the day. Right now my up time is about 65 hours, awake time is at 26 hours. Not sure where to get partial awake. My display on timer only says 1 min. But honestly today was not a big phone use day and it sat in the dock on the ride home so all those stats are irrelevant today. But still my battery it at 83%. A lot of people were complaining about there phones dying with no or little use half through the day. So hopefully this brings a little light to the end of the tunnel.
Dang what were your settings
Sent from Snarf with an Epic
I have basically the same things running on my phone. Only, my folder organizer keeps fc every time I attempt to edit a folders contents... Anyone have a suggestion?
Sent from my ADR6400L using XDA Premium App
I've been getting great battery life as well, got 36 hours on my last charge. Have Perfect Storm 1.0, trip's 1.5ghz oc kernel (but don't actually run it that high). I have SetCPU set at 998/245 for normal, 245/245 for screen off and use smartass governor. I was also using my phone a moderate amount but had the 4g turned off as I'm in between 3g and 4g so it just keeps dropping and switching.
Glad to see someone is getting decent life.. I'm about to set a record for battery death.. phone has been on for 1 hour and 20 minutes and down to 65%.
On the bright side I am getting 20mbps down here at school.. SDSU..
4 bars of LTE flies
Do you have it on LTE only mode?
rnot said:
Do you have it on LTE only mode?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yah.. I am surfing pretty heavily though.. down to 58% now..
Guess ill have to sit in a different seat for the rest of the classes.. I see power outlets along the walls
It sucks though because on the Droid x, I could surf during the whole 3 hr class and walk out with 50% left.. guess this is the price you pay for this kinda power and speed lol
from 6am to 2pm phone is dead
music for a hour and half while on airplane mode
3g only
gps,bluetooth,wifi off
half hour of web browsing on 4G
about 15 messages on live Profile app
about 40 text messages
auto sync and background data off
One thing I dont understand is..When my phone is idle the battery is still draining.
6am to 6pm...
3g only (off when not using it)
gps,bt, wifi - off
games for about half an hour...
a couple calls
>20 txts
screen at 15%ish
autosync and background data off...
and now i'm at...89%
I have also found that in the first couple of days (2 or 3 days) after a reset... the phone does a BUNCH of funky things. First night after a reset...VZwireless said at 3AM i had 130MB of transfer... not possible - i was sleeping. it wasn't me. but...i did wake up with >30% of the battery gone. I think the background data off is a good place to start...but definitely wait after a couple of days.
I seem to be getting about 36 hours of up time on a charge. Mostly on wifi at home/work. I have 4G turned off as its not available here yet.
Sent from my ADR6400L using XDA App
Ok.. 4 hrs .. done for ... Did make it through class.. 8% left
There will be a patch soon to help with the idle 4G battery drain. Lady on the phone told me its in the works. Either way I just got the extended battery today. I actually dont mind the extra size.
Hmm... whats the anecdotal battery life for an extended battery given these settings? I've gotten to the point of running my display at 5% when indoors ==;;;
Also, I've heard of people getting free or heavily discounted extended batteries.... Any tips for this?
I am using an app called fastbright which really helps with the display battery drain...I just use it o bright when i cant see if i am outside....post #10!!! yay!
I've used my phone a decent amount today and battery is still at 62%. Running Das bamf at 1.2 ghz and screen brightness at 100%
crazed_z06 said:
Glad to see someone is getting decent life.. I'm about to set a record for battery death.. phone has been on for 1 hour and 20 minutes and down to 65%.
On the bright side I am getting 20mbps down here at school.. SDSU..
4 bars of LTE flies
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I feel the same way... if you are playing around on the tb while it is pluged in it will take a good 4-6 hours to charge to 100%

Mythical 4 hour limit on screen display

I've heard in multiple ROM threads that you basically can only get four hours of screen display out of the captivate battery. The concept is that the screen is the single largest drain on our battery. I'm not sure that's the case, as the following screen caps show.
The first pair was run a couple days ago (wifi and data off). I charged the captivate to full, and turned the screen on permanently, set the screen filter program to 25% (darkens the screen - supposedly saves battery), ran "Desk Home", and went to sleep. I woke up, and the battery still was not drained. In the end, I was able to minimize usage until 11am or so, and took screen shots before the battery drained completely, and ended with over 12 hours of screen display on 80% of the battery (and some trivial usage).
To see if it was the screen filter program was the cause, I repeated this last night. This time, I didn't run desk home, but just turned the lit up phone upside down. Again, there was still significant battery when I woke up. I had to turn the screen off at 9am (as I was going to be away from the phone), and checked back and screen captured at 11am again. In the undimmed (but lowest brightness setting), I got 9 1/2 hours of display usage on somewhat less than 80% of the battery.
Conclusions I draw are that the screen filter program does extend the life of the battery a small amount - say, 7% per hour vs. 8% per hour with no external dimming program. In the past, I've had similar results playing games or reading ebooks (about 8-10% per hour usage). But it seems obvious that 4 hours of indoor (lowest brightness) screen display on my captivate should only be using a third of the power. Where is the rest going, and why doesn't the battery usage display show what is really drawing down the power?
I have my theories - all related to the modem functions: connecting to the data network, connecting to wifi, and connecting to cell phone towers. Perhaps when I have time to move some massive file across a good wifi connection, I'll see what kind of battery drainage that gives me.
This is on Continuum 6 RC1 with the JVQ modem and talon 0.3.1 - 1400, for reference.
Huh ? who comes up with stupid myths or why would you even believe that when review sites like gsmarena did a review and they tested media playback they got 7:25 hours of media playback with screen at 50%.
Alot of things can drain battery radio , cpu , screen.
Ya I have to agree. It is meaningless when like you did you turned brightness down l left screen on doing nothing. It in no way tests actual usage
Sent from my GT-I9000 using XDA App
The 4 hour limit is one I've hit on ever rom since 2.1. It is not based on the phone/cpu sitting idle. It's based on actual usage (browsing the internet, playing games, texting, etc.). When you are actually using it the cpu clock ramps up and that along with the display being on is what eats the battery.
ghost77 said:
Huh ? who comes up with stupid myths or why would you even believe that when review sites like gsmarena did a review and they tested media playback they got 7:25 hours of media playback with screen at 50%.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Criminy. First of all, the "four hour limit" is mentioned in multiple ROM threads, as well as by nybmx in the post above. So I'm surprised that you are inferring this is new to you.
And if you try a little reading comprehension, you'll see that I specifically tested this out because I didn't believe it.
I hadn't heard of a 7 hour test. I've heard of some roms lasting 5 hours or so, running a single task. Which, in theory, could be consistent with a "four hour display life" and a days worth of other stuff - random calls, messages, etc.
Alot of things can drain battery radio , cpu , screen.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Which, coincidentally, is how the conclusion I came up with at the end of my post. Except for the CPU. In normal phone usage (for me at least), the CPU isn't under constant strain. Does anyone have actual data about what the CPU is doing under typical tasks, like talking on the phone or listening to music? I have looked at CPU usage with the GPS test program in Froyo, and the cpu usage was always at 100 and 200 Mhz (i.e. not topped out at 1 Ghz, or more if OC'd).
crystalhand said:
Ya I have to agree. It is meaningless when like you did you turned brightness down l left screen on doing nothing. It in no way tests actual usage
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It's called the scientific method. You test each variable separately. If you know how much power the display draws per hour of use, and how much the phone draws, and how much wifi draws, etc. you should be able to figure out what kind of use you will get in any scenario.
Do you know how much battery is used when GPS tracking alone? If you don't, then you won't know if you can track constantly during a 6 hour hike or whether that will drain the whole battery. I do, because I've tested it separately. If you gave me a scenario where you said I would track GPS while listening to music, and checking my position occasionally (say an hour of screen time) over the course of four hours, I'd be able to give you a pretty good idea of what my remaining battery will be, because I've tested those variables multiple times. On my phone, that scenario would drain the phone about 64%. [I imagine I'd give it a plus or minus of 8%].
For my money, that's "actual usage". If you are trying to figure out battery drain without controlling conditions, you'll never have accurate information.
nybmx said:
The 4 hour limit is one I've hit on ever rom since 2.1. It is not based on the phone/cpu sitting idle. It's based on actual usage (browsing the internet, playing games, texting, etc.). When you are actually using it the cpu clock ramps up and that along with the display being on is what eats the battery.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
First of all, thanks for confirming to ghost77 that such a limit is "known".
Reread my post. I think it's clear that I'm not saying that I think the 4-hour limit is based on an idle phone. The point I hope I'm making (explicitly in the 3rd to last paragraph) is that, even though "the cpu clock ramps up" and is used in whatever program you are using, the battery monitor is reporting that it is the display that is using the battery. It does not seem to credit the program (messaging, phone, internet, game, etc.) with the boost in CPU needed to do whatever you are doing.
After all, if we can all agree that the display uses 8-10% of the battery per hour, then having the display on while idle or when displaying a web page shouldn't make a difference to how much energy the display is using. In reality, if your phone is good for 5 hours of surfing, it's not the shiny display that has drained your battery, it is the transfer of data and rendering of the data as you manipulate the pages - all usages that should be credited to your internet program, not your display.
And if I've got you to agree that far, then it's a short step to reiterate what we've both said - it's the actual usage on the phone, not the display time, because the phones are more than capable of more than four hours of display. In which case, the four hour display limit is really unrelated to the display, but is a proxy for how much time you've spent using your phone for other stuff.
And then we can agree that you can get maybe eight hours of doing something simple like using a book reader program like Aldiko.
And then maybe you can see why I called the four hour limit a myth.
It's not a myth... Your taking a statement out of context. And wasting a lot of white space in the process.
Soccer_Dad said:
After all, if we can all agree that the display uses 8-10% of the battery per hour, then having the display on while idle or when displaying a web page shouldn't make a difference to how much energy the display is using.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Actually it might, depending on the colors the screen has to show.
It's a well know fact that for OLED screens showing white uses up a lot more power then any other color. Most articles even say that showing white is the one area that LCD screens end up using less. Unless the screen actually contains white OLEDs (which ours does not, but whatever comes after the SuperAMOLED+ most likely will)
A second way that color matters is that for our SuperAMOLED screens the number and size of the green OLEDs is different then the blue/red. Without the specs on them no one can say just how much electricity is being used, but it is a factor.
Also, I recall reading that red LED/OLED use the least amount of electricity then any other color (given that all other details of comparison are equal) So there may very well be a difference between a screen that is using mainly red then blue, even tho they are the same in size and number.
Since the vast majority of web sites are a white background and black text, or a similar bright screen and dark txt, they are gonna use up a good deal of power (in comparison to any showing any other screens). This is also why there are no white, light gray or other such bright themes made for our phone.
I'm pretty sure that "Screen" includes the Display, multi-touch sensors, tilt sensors, GPS, compass, and all other sensors/input devices.
Hey, this is to anyone, but i saw Soccer_dad's graphs/ battery usage, and I noticed my battery stats dont reset when i plug in to charge and unplug. Even if i reboot my phone it still keeps past charges and discharges. Right now it says my phone has been on battery for 4 Days and 7 hours, when clearly Ive been charging every night. Is this a bug?
noside12123 said:
Hey, this is to anyone, but i saw Soccer_dad's graphs/ battery usage, and I noticed my battery stats dont reset when i plug in to charge and unplug. Even if i reboot my phone it still keeps past charges and discharges. Right now it says my phone has been on battery for 4 Days and 7 hours, when clearly Ive been charging every night. Is this a bug?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Looks like TasKilla is abusing it's launch on startup power. You should remove that app. No app should be using that much over a 4 day period unless you had it running for that long.
Yes it's a bug.
Four hours of use is not the same as four hours of screen time.
Sent from my Infuse 4G
AdamOutler said:
Looks like TasKilla is abusing it's launch on startup power. You should remove that app. No app should be using that much over a 4 day period unless you had it running for that long.
Yes it's a bug.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
sent from a piece of plastic and glass It says CPU usage is 1 hour
sent from a piece of plastic and glass
noside12123 said:
sent from a piece of plastic and glass It says CPU usage is 1 hour
sent from a piece of plastic and glass
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
out of a total of 11 hours of processor usage. Just sayin... As a rule of thumb, good android software spends 99% of it's time dormant. That thing is using more processor then it should.

[Q] Microsoft Surface Pro - How is the battery?

Hi,
I was wondering how was the battery of the Microsoft Surface Pro? I currently have the Surface RT which I find really amazing but I have an occasion to switch to Pro, should I ? The only thing that keep me against switching is the battery life.
So..
- How long can a Microsoft Surface Pro stay in sleep mode before the battery gets empty?
- How long can it handle the screen ON at 'Auto Brightness'
- How long can you use the device with normal use ? (Browsing, Facebook, etc..)
- How long can you play basic game (ie Chess, Minesweeper, etc..)
- How long can you play hard game (ie Fruit Ninja, Angry Bird, Call of Duty)
Huge thanks for those who will answer and please no lie, I want the real time
3-6 hours of use dependant on scenario.
What you use it for and what others use it for will be different so any answers you get should only be taken as a ball park, same with phone batteries, the number of users I've seen over the years say they can only get half a day of use vs others that charge every other day..
The battery is poor at best... I hope they implement the 'new' battery into our tech soon.
Alright and how long can it stay on in sleep ?
If I use a power saving profile with low brightness and CPU throttled to 50%, I can get between 5 and 6 hours if just using Word, Excel and web. That is with a BT mouse and Type cover.
If I don't throttle the CPU and use the pen a lot (eg. marking up a pdf, using one note, or using the pen instead of a mouse in tablet mode), then the battery can last less than 3 hours. The pen seems to use a lot more power than just typing or using capacitive touch.
Sent from my GT-N7100 using xda app-developers app
richlum said:
If I use a power saving profile with low brightness and CPU throttled to 50%, I can get between 5 and 6 hours if just using Word, Excel and web. That is with a BT mouse and Type cover.
If I don't throttle the CPU and use the pen a lot (eg. marking up a pdf, using one note, or using the pen instead of a mouse in tablet mode), then the battery can last less than 3 hours. The pen seems to use a lot more power than just typing or using capacitive touch.
Sent from my GT-N7100 using xda app-developers app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hmm weird that the pen seems to take a lot of battery, the best would be that you compare with the test with the CPU locked Probably gonna exchange my RT by tomorow or so
The pen uses more power regardless of the power setting.
I also notice that it gets hotter if using the pen a lot, than if not using the pen.
It seems that the pen requires more cpu power than just using a BT mouse, hence the higher heat and power drain.
Battery life is just like any other ultrabook with a 42Whr battery. When I disable Turbo and use 'Power Saver' profile for less a less aggressive SpeedStep, under my usual mixed Internet browsing, penning OneNote, and annotating PDFs I get 5-5.5hrs of usage.
Use it like an ultrabook, treat it like an ultrabook. The content consuming tablet side of it is just a nice bonus. It received it's "Pro" moniker for a good reason, not for you to d*ck around wasting time. You want to do that? Go pick up a Surface RT, Android tablet instead.
wuzy said:
Battery life is just like any other ultrabook with a 42Whr battery. When I disable Turbo and use 'Power Saver' profile for less a less aggressive SpeedStep, under my usual mixed Internet browsing, penning OneNote, and annotating PDFs I get 5-5.5hrs of usage.
Use it like an ultrabook, treat it like an ultrabook. The content consuming tablet side of it is just a nice bonus. It received it's "Pro" moniker for a good reason, not for you to d*ck around wasting time. You want to do that? Go pick up a Surface RT, Android tablet instead.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have the Microsoft Surface RT, I'm thinking to return it for the pro
Hi sleep mode lasts at least 10 hours. Probably much longer though as I have not been able to leave it alone longer than that. But if I have a full charge and set it alone over night. I wake up with almost a full charge (8 to 10 hours)
Oh, it'll last many times 10 hours. Sleep mode on laptops from 2000 - machines that got 2.5 hours on battery if you were lucky - could frequently hit a week if fully charged. My Core i7 work laptop (5 hours battery life in typical usage) will lose less than 10% of its battery life / day of sleep mode. Surface Pro has a smaller battery, but may also use more efficient RAM modules/connections (keeping RAM alive is pretty much the only significant drain for a sleeping PC) and should still last at least a week.
Thanks for all the replies ! I finally switched Let's see how it goes

Hows your battery life?

I got my HTC One Mini yesterday and I'm getting pretty good battery life so far, how is it for you guys?
I'm using jmz's Stock Rooted Odex WWE Rom and Jmz M4 Kernel 9-04-13. I unplugged my phone around 9 AM this morning and it's now 1:45 AM and I'm at 48%.
I installed 12 apps, torrented a 315MB file using uTorrent @ about 600 kb/s, watched 23 minutes of 720p video using MX Player with hardware decoding, watched about 15 minutes of YouTube videos, went on Facebook for about 20 minutes, browsed the internet for about 5 minutes, browsed a forum using Tapatalk for about 15 minutes, made about 5 minutes of calls, sent/received about 20 texts, read a manga chapter, used it as a flashlight for about a minute, used it as a remote for XBMC for about 2 hours, flashed a kernel, and took a couple of pictures, a 30 second 1080p video, and a Zoe to test out the Camera. All of this was over Wi-Fi.
I think I could easily get 2 days out of the battery as my typical usage would be lighter. How is the battery life for you and what Rom/Kernal are you using?
Stock UK Vodafone Rom recently updated with the it's package.
Well...I am sadly unimpressed by the battery. I've had mine now for just under a month and don't get a day.
I use it to surf the BBC website (in mobile mode) over 3g and at other tines WiFi.
I make calls about 30-60mins a day and play a version of bubble breaker.
I can literally see the power drain when surfing the web. This us the single most draining activity...much worse than when I used my desire.
I have configured all power save options, disabled all non essential apps, and ensured the phone is not burning background or unnecessary apps.
Still it goes rapidly. It's a shame but I like the phone so will live with it.
2 days...yes if all you do is make calls. Anything more demanding not a chance I'm afraid. I have tried, a lot.
So it is now 1.10pm and I have 52% and at 9 am I had 100%. No video no gaming but a mix of BBC on WiFi and 3g (i have a femtocell so no burning power while looking for a signal).
Nice phone in so many ways but battery life, in call quality and control, are very poor.
All the best,
Sam
I am planning to buy HTC one mini, Wanted to get real idea of battery life, so this was helpful. Could you laso tell me if that 1GB RAM is a problem maybe once you have 60-70 apps ? I thinking of 2 years life at least so was concerned?
zopeon said:
I am planning to buy HTC one mini, Wanted to get real idea of battery life, so this was helpful. Could you laso tell me if that 1GB RAM is a problem maybe once you have 60-70 apps ? I thinking of 2 years life at least so was concerned?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
For me it isn't too much of an issue, but they really should have equipped it with 2 GB of memory, 1 GB has been the standard for about 2 years. I have 42 user apps installed and most of the time I can have multiple apps open without any slow downs. Occasionally if I have multiple heavy apps running (Maps, Facebook, Pandora, Chrome ect.) it can slow down due to the lack of memory, but if I close one it speeds right back up. If you read any reviews you'll hear something along the lines of it's stupid that they only gave this phone 1GB of memory, but for most people it won't be a problem which I agree with. I'd suggest trying it out at a local store before buying it. Different people will see things differently, to some the HTC One Mini and S4 Mini will seem slow compared to the regular One and the S4, to others it will seem very fast.
ok guys please keep in mind that your mobile connection eats your power rly ****ing bad. I did a lot of tests with the mini and i'm was even able to get 5days with 25% left. Camera or wachting videos coast a lot of power as well but music is ok that does not need that much power.
Its all about your connections and how good the signal is, so if you want a longer battery life only use wifi.
The device has smaller screen size, lower resolution, half the number of cores, lower clock speed, lower powered GPU, half the RAM, no NFC or OIS. It should get *better* battery life than the full-sized one all things considered, though the smaller battery will definitely even this out somewhat. I wouldn't be surprised if under typical moderate-high usage involving CPU and screen this device should hold out similarly to the HTC One but in standby, etc it will be a bit lower.
Notebookcheck and GSMArena have done thorough battery testing, though notebookcheck doesn't test standby time and GSMArena's standby time testing method is a bit suspect.
Anandtech haven't published a review of the Mini yet but in their review of the Galaxy Note 3 you can see some battery tests they did of the HTC One Mini and it holds out pretty well considering it's not a phablet.
I bought mine two weeks ago. On the first week, my battery just last 10 hours at least and after a few days of experimentation of various settings and process monitoring, I can last 24 hours with still 20% remaining.
My daily usage can be define as quite conservative as I'm busy at work most of the day.
Here's my activities to give you an idea:
Call - at least 3 minutes a day
SMS - least 20 messages a day
browsing via HSPA / 3G - at least 1 hour a day
browsing via wifi - at least 1 hour a day
playing games - at least 30 minutes a day
reading / composing / sending emails - I set this to manual, at least 5 times a day (when I'm at home)
Frequently Used Apps:
Chrome
stock Calendar
stock Mail
Keep
stock Music Player
Cordy
Twitter
ES Task Manager
ES File Explorer
Google Play
Youtube
System Panel
Disabled Apps:
Facebook
Linkedin
SoundHound
7 Digital
Google Search
Google+
Hangouts
Kid Mode
Maps
Plurk
Hope this can help somebody to have an idea.
No matter what the phone, you tend to see battery life tests showing 8+ hours of web browsing battery life. However, real life never matches up to this expectation, with 3 or 4 hours of web browsing much more typical. This is the case with all smartphones - even a device like the Note 2 or Note 3 (albeit with higher expectations to begin with: - a Note 2/3 may tests 11+ hours web browsing but typically get 4.5+ in real-life conditions).
Unfortunately this leads many to believe that their brand new device (or its battery) is faulty. But in most cases this is not true.
I'll attempt to explain the real reason for the discrepancy.
Most importantly, the battery life tests are exclusively limited to that activity or task. For example, fully charging the smartphone, continuously web browsing for 8+ hours until the phone dies. In reality when we use our phones, the phone will be on standby, or doing other tasks, at other times. For example, 8+ hours of web browsing from a full charge is not the same as getting 8+ hours of web browsing over a 16 hour day. Those other 8 hours, even if the phone are on standby, are going to use up some of your battery, too.
The single biggest battery drain of a device is usually going to be the screen, unless you have specifically forced the screen brightness to a low (<33%) amount. At full brightness, a smartphone may burn through battery after only 3.5 hours of web browsing even if it could last 8+ hours at 40% screen brightness (the brightness control is not usually linear in terms of power draw). Review sites tend to standardise on a particular brightness level that is relatively low (the reason for this is often that allows fair comparison with devices that just can't get as bright). The bottom line is that 8+ hours of screen on time at lowish brightness might drop to half that or lower if you let auto-brightness bring up the brightness during the daylight hours or when outdoors, or if you prefer higher brightnesses.
Often, battery life tests will be done over wifi with mobile phone reception disabled entirely. This is not realistic as with a smartphone you're usually connected to a cell tower even while you're using wifi, so that voice calls and texts can still come through. Also, cellular uses a lot more energy while idle than wifi does. So even if you set the brightness really low and do nothing else with the phone, you still shouldn't be surprised that you can't get 8+ hours of web browsing if you also have the phone connected to a cell tower in the background. Some sites will conduct battery life tests over the cellular network instead of wifi, and typically these will get much lower battery life ratings (eg. 4+ hours, even with the same brightness level as for the wifi test).
Bottom line is, don't head back to the shop if you only get 3 to 4 hours screen on time during the day with web browsing. This is entirely normal for *some* usage patterns. You can improve it by:
Disable auto-brightness and set the brightness to a low-ish value, say 30%-40% of maximum. This might be able to double your screen-on time compared to full brightness.
Avoid using the phone much in direct sunlight. For the brightness to be high enough to read in direct sunlight, you'll be burning through your battery quickly, and if you've set the brightness manually to a low level as advised above, you won't be able to read it in direct sunlight.
Connect to wifi (but of course, only if you trust the wifi network to be secure and respect your privacy).
Realise that if you ever play CPU- or GPU-intensive games (most casual games shouldn't fit in this category) then a beefier battery or external battery booster may be a good investment. There's not much you can do about their battery use.
Only after considering the above should you hunt through battery usage analysers and wakelock detectors. In many cases even a misbehaving wakelock that keeps your phone partially awake all day has a low impact compared to having the screen on full brightness for just 20 or 30 minutes.

Categories

Resources