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So after noticing how much of a difference people get in their battery lives, I've decided to do some research and make a guide-line that will give us all we need to know about properly using our batteries. First part is a general information and usage techniques for LIBs, second part is taken from Google materials on Android-powered devices (G1, Magic, Droid, Nexus One, etc).
Sources:
Wikipedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium-ion_battery
BatteryUniversity - http://www.batteryuniversity.com/parttwo-34.htm
Google IO Conference 2009 - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OUemfrKe65c
Electropaedia - http://www.mpoweruk.com/life.htm
General Lithium-Ion Battery (LIB) Usage:
• Discharging your LIB fully (or less than 2.4 Volt per cell) is bad for the battery. Every time you do that, it can be said that small part of your battery (some cells) dies (they forever lose their charge). Do not store your batteries depleted, there's a high chance they will die completely or will become very "weak".
• You cannot restore bad LIBs by overloading/heating/praying. You gotta go buy a new one. They DO degrade overtime, some cells naturally lose the ability to gain/give electricity.
• Although it is said that LIBs do not have memory, it's not entirely true. LIBs have gauges that monitor performance of cells, and if you do a lot of small charges, it won't let those gauges to monitor a full battery potential, causing an invalid indication of charge level. A complete charge/discharge should be made when battery capacity seems reduced, that will calibrate gauges and they will provide your phone with correct charge level status. A full charge/discharge cycle should be done every 30 (or so) partial charges.
• LIBs have a shelf-life. Do not buy them to store them. Use them early, use them often, they will die whether you use them or not. Do not buy LIBs to use them in 6 months/year/etc, buy them right before actually using them.
• LIBs have short lives (in comparison to NiCa batteries, etc). You should expect to buy a new battery in 2-3 years after being manufactured. It is caused by internal oxidation and there's nothing you can do to stop or prevent that.
• Worst LIB treatment is to keep it at 100% charge level at high temperature (think laptop/phone under direct sunlight, like car dashboard).
• Best LIB treatment, or LIBs "favorite" charge level - 40%. That's also the usual charge level you buy them with.
• LIBs don't like heat. For example, while always at 100%, typical LIB in a laptop, at temperatures of 25C (77F) will lose 20% (twenty percent!) of full capacity per year. That capacity loss is reduced to 6% (six percent) at 0C (32F), and increased to 35% loss at 40C (104F). So, keep them cool (LIBs like fridges), don't let your devices sit in the sun or overheat at charge. Also, keep in mind that while in use, battery will be significantly hotter than phone/outside environment
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• LIBs like frequent partial charges/discharges more than they like full charges/discharges.
General Android power usage advice from google:
• Although this part is somewhat controversial, they do recommend having a complete, full FIRST charge to be made. If time allows, a preferred time for the first charge is 12 hours. This may have more to do with the OS than the battery.
• Battery on a Android device, in average, will last about a full day with normal use (some videos, mail, calls). That's what you should kind-of expect.
• Speaking in averages, "idling" 3G/EDGE connection (when phone is sleeping and no data is transferred through 3G), drains almost no energy. Just a little more than having 3G/EDGE radio off completely. So when no apps are using 3G, you don't need to keep it off.
• Same goes to WiFi connection - although it's on, if there is no data flowing through it, it uses almost no energy.
• At full throughput (100% data flow), EDGE is using more energy than 3G. In average, 3G is more energy-efficient than EDGE.
• WiFi is using more energy than 3G (when both are at 100% use), but since it transfers files much faster and then goes to "sleep", it's actually recommended to use WiFi whenever possible. Since it'll "sleep" more often than 3G, overall it will use much less battery than using 3G.
• Some bad apps or widgets can use android's "WakeLock", keeping CPU at 100%, screen always-on, or both. I myself have encountered such widget (I won't mention the name, it's in the market) that used a WakeLock to keep CPU spun-up at 100% all the time. That makes a huge impact on battery life. My advice - use a CPU profiling app to monitor the CPU - make sure that CPU slows down by itself when it's not used. So, beware of such widgets/apps. To check for CPU cycles, many recommend OSMonitor (free from market, install it, go to options, sort by "Load" in descending order. It'll give you "busiest" processes at the top). At rest you should be getting about 10-20% for OSMonitor itself, and 1-10% Android System. At rest, everything else should be 0-1%.
• Android slows down CPU when not in use by itself, as a built-in feature. Apps that throttle/change CPU frequency, are not necessarily needed.
All this info comes from those reputable resources I mentioned above, I didn't make any of it up.
Great info, thanks!
I'm curious where you get the 10-15% discharge warning. The articles frequently mention that the cells can die if they go below 2.4V, but they also mention that the circuitry in the batteries prevents the batteries from getting anywhere near that threshold. When the battery meter on the phone says 10-15% it is very likely not indicating "within 10 to 15% of causing serious harm", but actually indicating "within 10 to 15% of the lowest safe level that I will allow you to reach".
When you hit "0%" on the phone's meter which you must do to properly calibrate the battery, you should still be safely above the danger point, as long as you recharge the battery soon and do not let it sit for a few days or weeks. It is only when you get to 0% on the meter and then let it sit where the self-discharge can then cause it to approach the true danger levels.
Or, at least that is the way I have been reading the Battery University article for the past couple of years that I have been helping people with their Lithium Ion batteries, so please point out the text that might show a misunderstanding here as I don't want to be giving bad advice.
I typically tell people not to do regular deep discharges anyway as recharging from such a state causes more heat than a shallower recharge and the heat is one of the biggest enemies of these batteries.
Another source for Lithium Ion recharging tips from the Battery University:
http://www.batteryuniversity.com/partone-12.htm
That page focuses more on charging concerns and provides some additional recommendations...
Thanks for pointing that out, that part its a general advice of when users should plugin their phones, coming from the information of trying to stick to a half-charge (or 40%) as close as possible. Besides, google decided to warn you at a 15% level, so this seems to be a good number to use.
Another source for Lithium Ion recharging tips from the Battery University:
http://www.batteryuniversity.com/partone-12.htm
That page focuses more on charging concerns and provides some additional recommendations...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks, indeed a great article. I decided not to include it in resources though, since it's a bit too technical for the purpose of this article.
DarkDvr said:
Thanks for pointing that out, that part its a general advice of when users should plugin their phones, coming from the information of trying to stick to a half-charge (or 40%) as close as possible. Besides, google decided to warn you at a 15% level, so this seems to be a good number to use.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The 40% charge is the charge level that you should "store" a battery at, not what you should keep it at when it is in use. Where do you see the 40% mark cited for any other purpose?
The 15% warning from Android is simply a warning that it is close to running out of power and may shut off if you don't go looking for a charger now. It is a practical warning to avoid the surprise of reaching 0% and shutting off when the user is not paying attention to the meter.
On the contrary, your first bullet item uses the word "BAD" in capital letters and spells doom and gloom about killing part of their battery if they go below that level. That amount of severity in that comment is completely unwarranted. It is not true and it will scare people off of using their batteries to their fullest capabilities and scare them off of doing calibration cycles when they need to do them. When the warning pops up you don't have to turn off your phone to avoid damage - just be aware that you only have 15% capacity left. And discharging to 15% and then recharging because you are scared by the advice in this thread from going lower will not recalibrate the battery meter.
Any way I look at it, your bullet item #1 is providing no value at all and could potentially scare people into non-optimal battery maintenance routines.
Alright, I guess you got a point there.
I've corrected that bullet to be less tragic =)
Excellent rewording!
flarbear said:
Excellent rewording!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for your help
Great thread man! I knew most of that stuff already but didn't know about the WiFi's effect on the battery, I always thought it drained more battery than using 3G. I also didn't know it didn't drain any battery when not in use so thanks. Guess I'll be keeping that on from now on!
jasrups said:
Great thread man! I knew most of that stuff already but didn't know about the WiFi's effect on the battery, I always thought it drained more battery than using 3G. I also didn't know it didn't drain any battery when not in use so thanks. Guess I'll be keeping that on from now on!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The Google.com/phone specs page lists 5 hours internet usage on 3G and 6.5 hours internet usage on WiFi. That doesn't necessarily make sense when looking at the graphs above because 3G idle is less than WiFi idle and 3G full is less than WiFi full, but WiFi gets data transferred much more quickly (latency is much lower and speed is much higher) so it probably spends less time in the Full state. Either way, I haven't noticed any battery life problems leaving my WiFi on all the time...
i'll never believe that wifi is worse than 3g, no matter where i read it. the last 3 years, every phone i've had lasted much longer using wifi over 3g data. 3g data just seems to annilhiate my battery. but wifi it seems to last much longer. and google's specs seem to reflect that!
RogerPodacter said:
i'll never believe that wifi is worse than 3g, no matter where i read it. the last 3 years, every phone i've had lasted much longer using wifi over 3g data. 3g data just seems to annilhiate my battery. but wifi it seems to last much longer. and google's specs seem to reflect that!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yep, the dude that spoke on the conference about battery life said that although WiFi uses more battery than 3G, it takes a lot less time for it to download/process data, and then go to "sleep" of sorts. So, over a period of time, WiFi would "sleep" more than 3G, which makes it far more efficient.
I always use WiFi whenever I can (at home for example).
jasrups said:
Great thread man! I knew most of that stuff already but didn't know about the WiFi's effect on the battery, I always thought it drained more battery than using 3G. I also didn't know it didn't drain any battery when not in use so thanks. Guess I'll be keeping that on from now on!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
+1 ... and thanx for the chart.
I didn't charge my battery all the way up before using my N1 (though I did leave it plugged in when I was using it). Was that bad for the battery?
I think of it this way, WiFi only needs enough transmit power to broadcast a couple hundred feet. 3g needs power to transmit a couple miles or more. which one seems like it would use less power? I say WiFi.
RogerPodacter said:
I think of it this way, WiFi only needs enough transmit power to broadcast a couple hundred feet. 3g needs power to transmit a couple miles or more. which one seems like it would use less power? I say WiFi.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
There's no such thing as public wifi here, I'm lucky to get a signal anyways.
Here's from thismorning, no use:
I didn't charge my battery all the way up before using my N1 (though I did leave it plugged in when I was using it). Was that bad for the battery?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Nah, not really. It is recommended, but it seems that nobody can tell for sure what kind of impact it has. In my experience, I have 2 batteries - one I broke in, one I used right away... It seems that I do get a bit better battery life with the one I've broken in..
For optimal battery performance:
If you're going to be at the same place for a long time (ie at home or work for 8 or more hours), do you leave it plugged in, or charge to 100 and immediately unplug?
If unplug, how low do you let it go before plugging back in? 90%? 80? 40?
Battery was 28% last night, the phone gained 3% overnight when It usually drains 2%, no usb connection as you can see in the graphic. What could cause this behavior? I’m just curious.
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NVMENOR said:
Battery was 28% last night, the phone gained 3% overnight when It usually drains 2%, no usb connection as you can see in the graphic. What could cause this behavior? I’m just curious.
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Click to collapse
Perhaps its an issue with your battery controller. It was projecting a certain loss of battery but when it did not after waking from sleep it assumed it had charged and displayed a higher %?
That is completely conjecture based in no fact other than those made up by me, so please take it with a grain of salt. =)
i'll keep saying this, but nobody wants to look at the nexus s battery driver code. seems the phone is based off voltage tables, which fluctuate under load, and hence when you charge to 100% and unplug, it drops to 97%. because the voltage drop.
same could apply to this situation, very often you can see your voltage drop like that. especially if you left the phone idle all night after using it hard prior. voltage drops then increases.
Yes, I was using maps very hardly (at least in comparison to the rest of the day) and that’s the reason of the fast drop in the graphic, then the phone went sleep for almost 7 hours. I’ll take a look at what you’re saying about voltage tables. Very interesting info here.
NVMENOR said:
Yes, I was using maps very hardly (at least in comparison to the rest of the day) and that’s the reason of the fast drop in the graphic, then the phone went sleep for almost 7 hours. I’ll take a look at what you’re saying about voltage tables. Very interesting info here.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
you were using maps right around the time of that drop? then yes that's the reason. i wasnt directing the "code review" to you lol, just more of a general thing that was discussed in the forum previously. sorry
but this would definitely show, in my opinion, why there is also the 100% to 97% drop when taking the phone off the charger. voltage drop always ocurrs here.
RogerPodacter said:
... i wasnt directing the "code review" to you lol, just more of a general thing that was discussed in the forum previously. sorry...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No reason to be sorry about, I didn’t take it that way; I just like to learn new stuff about how things work.
its the battery meter. you probably rebooted. the battery meter in android is known to be inaccurate. sometimes after a reboot it can gain or lose percentage. ive gained 25% before after rebooting! in reality, you didnt gain anything, its just the meter being off by a bit.
I just want to know how you get nearly 4 days of use out of a charge!
Don't you use your phone?
simms22 said:
its the battery meter. you probably rebooted. the battery meter in android is known to be inaccurate. sometimes after a reboot it can gain or lose percentage. ive gained 25% before after rebooting! in reality, you didnt gain anything, its just the meter being off by a bit.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I haven’t seen this after reboot, this happened after awake and it wasn’t sudden. Phone without signal in the graphic is the “airplane-mode” It wasn’t off. I know that battery didn’t gain any charge, of course, It’s just the weird behavior of android reading battery information.
knytphal said:
I just want to know how you get nearly 4 days of use out of a charge!
Don't you use your phone?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
lol, yeah, It was a very quiet week.
it would be awesome if you could test this if you dont mind. turn your screen brightness to max, make sure your on 3g and not wifi, open google maps and scroll in one direction for about a minute or 2, check the battery percent and voltage. then turn off the screen, leave it sit for a few minutes, then see the percent and voltage readings.
maybe try a test a few times just for fun...you wanna place as much load on the phone as possible, so maybe even turn on the camera flash?
RogerPodacter said:
it would be awesome if you could test this if you dont mind. turn your screen brightness to max, make sure your on 3g and not wifi, open google maps and scroll in one direction for about a minute or 2, check the battery percent and voltage. then turn off the screen, leave it sit for a few minutes, then see the percent and voltage readings.
maybe try a test a few times just for fun...you wanna place as much load on the phone as possible, so maybe even turn on the camera flash?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
does any body else has an easier way, or can recommend a market app to test the battery life by using full features?
Quick test here:
Beginning with 3728 mV, stress the phone a little and It drops to 3622 mV, then I let the phone sleep for couple of minutes and after wake it battery shows 3730 mV. It seems to show higher values than those that were present before sending the phone to sleep. What could be said about that?
I’ll do another test with full charge and more stress, but for the moment, my phone is charging, yeah…. Finally.
NVMENOR said:
Quick test here:
Beginning with 3728 mV, stress the phone a little and It drops to 3622 mV, then I let the phone sleep for couple of minutes and after wake it battery shows 3730 mV. It seems to show higher values than those that were present before sending the phone to sleep. What could be said about that?
I’ll do another test with full charge and more stress, but for the moment, my phone is charging, yeah…. Finally.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
its too bad my app (my sig) doesnt work for the nexus s, because i just recently added real time voltage vs current graphing, taking 2 second readings, for these exact circunstances. its fun doing these types of tests on my n1. but the battery driver and model is too different in the nexus s to use the app...
n1 doesnt use voltage at all for percent readings, but my hunch from code was the nexus s does. that's why i was so curious. check out some screens though for fun. you can really do some interesting tests with such high sample rates.
Everybody knows the problem of battery draining in our beloved Cappy
I found an oldschool solution.
Drain your Cappy's battery to the end
enable gps
no battery saving mode
enable wifi
Maxed brightness
After that let it charge for the night until it's 100%
After startup it will show you 97% but its 100%.
Im with wifi for 2hr and the battery draind only 7%
Also hope that this solution is not like "thanks captain obvious"
hope it will help's u, share your findings after using this method.
Using perception 10.4 and speedmod k13b
Sry for my bad english...
I will try you old school method
Old school method worked on old school NiCAD batteries that suffered from memory. New school LiON batteries do not.
Ok for me. I simply restart my sd gingerbread androïd. And my android consums only 6mA in sleeping mode.
Sent from my HTC HD2 Gingerbread using XDA App
I will give it a try and see how it goes.
fitao said:
Ok for me. I simply restart my sd gingerbread androïd. And my android consums only 6mA in sleeping mode.
Sent from my HTC HD2 Gingerbread using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
How is that relevant to a Captivate?
I will give this a try.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I897 using XDA App
Miami_Son said:
Old school method worked on old school NiCAD batteries that suffered from memory. New school LiON batteries do not.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you haven't done it in a while for a Li-on device it will recalibrate the charge controller, but it doesn't increase the actual chemical capacity of the battery like it would for NiCad.
GSMinCT said:
If you haven't done it in a while for a Li-on device it will recalibrate the charge controller, but it doesn't increase the actual chemical capacity of the battery like it would for NiCad.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Draining Li-On batteries completely is bad for them.
Miami_Son said:
Draining Li-On batteries completely is bad for them.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've heard it's only bad if you leave them down for more than 12-24 hours. If you put it right back on the charger, I think it's good once in a while. That's that Apple recommends for theirs, anyways.
GSMinCT said:
I've heard it's only bad if you leave them down for more than 12-24 hours. If you put it right back on the charger, I think it's good once in a while. That's that Apple recommends for theirs, anyways.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Heat is the enemy of any battery. The lower you run it down the longer it will have to be on the charger to get back to 100% and thus the longer it will be exposed to heat. Calibrating the battery and then wiping the stats should be all you need to do. I easily get 25-30 hours out of my battery with moderate use and I rarely let it get below 30%. And if I listened to Apple I'd have an iPhone.
Miami_Son said:
Heat is the enemy of any battery. The lower you run it down the longer it will have to be on the charger to get back to 100% and thus the longer it will be exposed to heat. Calibrating the battery and then wiping the stats should be all you need to do. I easily get 25-30 hours out of my battery with moderate use and I rarely let it get below 30%. And if I listened to Apple I'd have an iPhone.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah, but these devices often get run down and charged. I think Apple's right on this. FYI, that's about the Macbook, which I have one, not the iPhone (don't have one of those).
Here's what TechRepublic had to say about it:
Lithium ion
Of the types of batteries mentioned here, lithium ion cells have some powerful advantages. They have an energy density of 150 watt-hours per kilogram. Like NiMHs, Li-ion batteries have no memory effect. That is, they don’t lose the capacity to fully charge if they aren’t fully drained. Left on the shelf, they lose the least power. Their discharge rate, at 10 percent per month, gives them a good storage life (but they must be used within two years of manufacture). This means that you can grab one that you charged up three months ago, and it will still have about 70 percent of its charge left. If you’re maintaining a number of laptops, that’s good news.
These batteries also have some important disadvantages, however. They have a volatile chemistry. Each lithium ion pack in your laptop must have its own electronic protection circuit that protects against overcharging, over-discharging, and too-high current. Each cell of the battery pack incorporates a built-in safety vent. All three battery types have a safety vent, but unlike NiCad and NiMH batteries, which can withstand some overcharging, the vent in lithium-ion batteries is designed to disconnect the battery permanently if it ever has to be used. It does not reseal. The potential danger of this type is why Li-ion batteries come as a sealed unit including safety electronics. As a helpful part of the circuitry, each Li-ion battery provides a charge indicator. Pressing a button will cause a row of lights to be lit, indicating the charge, as shown in Figure A.
I was surprised to learn that of all the batteries, lithium-ions have the worst useful life. Though they have a slow discharge rate on the shelf, all Li-ion batteries irreversibly lose capacity over time. Even after one year, they lose the ability to be charged to full capacity. Cadex tests indicated that their practical service life is only two years. According to Cadex’ document, Batteries for Mobile Computing, “Li-ion batteries should not be stored for long periods of time but consumed like a perishable food.” On the other hand, while they don’t deliver as many cycles as NiCad batteries, they do provide up to 1000 cycles if they’re used within that two-year lifespan. They are also maintenance free. Not only do they suffer no memory effects, they don’t need to be periodically discharged and topped off. Like NiMH batteries, shallow discharges actually increase the number of cycles. Unfortunately, these cells are expensive. Keep in mind that your IT department might be better off with a smaller, rotating inventory.
As you can see, there's nothing to be gained by discharging them completely. BTW, Apple laptops have circuitry that prevents the device from discharging the battery completely to prevent damage. I'm not sure our phones have this, so their advice should not apply here.
Android only lets the battery discharge to ~40%, WinMo6.5 to ~30%.
The point is (was) that there's no memory effect and therefore no valid reason to be discharging these batteries completely. The "old school" method just doesn't apply here and could actually shorten the battery's life in terms of charging cycles.
Miami_Son said:
Heat is the enemy of any battery. The lower you run it down the longer it will have to be on the charger to get back to 100% and thus the longer it will be exposed to heat. Calibrating the battery and then wiping the stats should be all you need to do. I easily get 25-30 hours out of my battery with moderate use and I rarely let it get below 30%. And if I listened to Apple I'd have an iPhone.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Define moderate use? I struggle to get over around 14 hours of use. Usual stuff includes 2 hours of music, maybe 50 to 100 text messages, up to 5 minute of calling (rarely make calls), and little to no WiFi or games. I do use the data network a bit, having Facebook and Twitter and stuff syncing every hour. But overall, my battery life sucks.
That's actually not bad for everything you describe. Remember in a smart phone the more the screen is on the faster the battery dies.
geokilla said:
Define moderate use? I struggle to get over around 14 hours of use. Usual stuff includes 2 hours of music, maybe 50 to 100 text messages, up to 5 minute of calling (rarely make calls), and little to no WiFi or games. I do use the data network a bit, having Facebook and Twitter and stuff syncing every hour. But overall, my battery life sucks.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I897 using XDA App
And if you're syncing in a mediocre (1-2 bars) network coverage area it takes even more power than when you have 4-5 bars. I generally have about 2-3 hours of screen on-time between charges, several phone calls and texts, e-mail pushing every hour, some game playing, some BT on while in the car, some Market/web surfing and every other day I track my MTB rides with GPS while listening to music via BT. I put the phone on the charger every night, but I do carry a spare battery just in case. I wasn't getting this kind of battery performance on Eclair, though.
Miami_Son said:
And if you're syncing in a mediocre (1-2 bars) network coverage area it takes even more power than when you have 4-5 bars. I generally have about 2-3 hours of screen on-time between charges, several phone calls and texts, e-mail pushing every hour, some game playing, some BT on while in the car, some Market/web surfing and every other day I track my MTB rides with GPS while listening to music via BT. I put the phone on the charger every night, but I do carry a spare battery just in case. I wasn't getting this kind of battery performance on Eclair, though.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
How? Did you do something to your phone for this?
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I897 using XDA App
Caliesv said:
How? Did you do something to your phone for this?
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I897 using XDA App
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Click to collapse
Yeah, I flashed to Andromeda 1.2. I also have the screen dimmed down, no active wallpaper, few widgets and I turn off wifi when I don't need it.
And to prove I'm not lying...
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Many people have argued that since the thunderbolt has not been updated with gingerbread that it will die out and be worthless. I'm here to tell you that is not the case at all.
Those with the bolt will tell you that their main problem is the battery life. This is exactly right but I have setup my phone that allows my phone to last for days without a charge. Also this does not require you to root your phone, so this will work for everyone and silence all the retarded people who keep posting that its dead. The two biggest factors is of course 4G and the display that eat the battery most.
Make no mistake about it tho, HTC implementations along with the hardware on this baby still takes the cake for flagship of Verizon.Don't be fooled by the dual core hardware, good in theory but let's face it phones aren't their yet, apps don't need two cores but more RAM would be nice.
Read this if you want your phone to live. I have reached 60+ hours unplugged, I am an IT network manager, I know stuff so leh dew it.
1. Get the extended battery. No matter what type of Android phone you have you are going to need it, especially without gingerbread. This is 4GLTE inside a laptop, do those last more than a few hours? ill answer for you, NO.
2. Disable what you don't use. This is why widgets were made to disable data, WiFi, Bluetooth, GPS, etc. when not in use. Get a new brightness widget by curvefish set it to 25% and as well as turn off the animations if you really want more improvement. Disable always-on mobile data, as well as roaming, and manage your email accounts so they sync manually. As far as location goes just use Google services, GPS standalone is a drainer.
3. Create setting shortcuts on the home screen. Add accounts and sync so you can disable auto sync and background data. Background data is only used for the market learn to disable it fools. Add a shortcut to running services as well to keep the RAM usage to a minimum.
4. A main issue always discussed is the bloatware app of blockbuster. Make sure you enter the program and disable automatic movie updates. Then go to running services and disable both instances of PVMtpservicestart and PVWmdrmService. You will have to do this every time you REBOOT but not fast boot.
5. For gods sake, don't be a fool any longer! HTC gave you some of the best widgets but use them wisely...just because you have 6 screens doesn't mean use them all. One widget app that will be loved by all is widgetsoid, extremely useful. Even the HTC clock has separate animations that can be disabled if needed.
6. NEVER by any means should you use any type of juice defender or task killer. It does more harm than good even with Android Froyo 2.2 can still manage this. Download apps such as battery indicator tht shows your battery in increments of 1% and doesn't use any resources in the background. Don't be the fool that gets apps cus they are cute and have no use, you are better than that, atleast I'd hope so..
7. Apps that will ultimately benefit you are things like GO SMS Pro ( since the stock messaging constantly lags and freezes), Astro file manager, Androidzip, LTE On and Off in order to make sure your always using your 4G data only. And of course Uninstaller by rhythm software, Poynt one of the best find anything anywhere app and definitely Documents to Go from which I'm typing on now.
8. Sounds and keyboard is up next. Many like to use haptic feedback or sounds when you click things or type. However, use one or the other it may drain a bit of battery but its not a killer. Whatever floats your boat in that one but as far sounds go try and use either sound notifications or vibrate not both at the same time. Disable all LED notifications and allow yourself the satisfaction of being free of the annoying blinking light.
9. Charging the battery. Who would have thought that it would be important, but yea fools it is. The best way is to let your battery drain down to 5%, restart, then go for a full charge. But once that green light shows up you need to unplug it or else the battery gets angry at you and will decrease the power of the charge and ultimately ruin your battery faster.
10. As far as using different themes and wallpapers it honestly doesnt matter just stay away from the live wallpapers. We all know that touching the pond and making it seem like we just threw a rock in the water can be amusing but completely pointless. It has been reported that gingerbread is coming in Q3 of this year either this month or next, but we all know that could be bs.
When all said and done you will love the improvements and the fact that you didn't have to root your phone will put your mind at ease. I just wanted to share my knowledge of this phone to others to show and prove the fact that this phone is capable you just need to be proactive. Android is a perfect OS for smartphones, Linux like qualities, and strong structures that could really last. Any questions or concerns you can always message me. I just hope some one reads this and actually tries what I have successfully configured.
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Well then I regret that 20 mins it took to write
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Save your pennies and buy an extended battery. No question. Bought one two days ago. Never even come close to this on any ROM. Finally I no longer have to carry a charger in my pocket.
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mathers53 said:
Well then I regret that 20 mins it took to write
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Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Don't get me wrong. I appreciate the effort but there are so many threads that say the same thing.
The methods are not new. There are countless videos on YouTube that say this.
In theory if you're on XDA, you know a thing or two about kernels. I can get a full twelve hours on my standard battery with the right kernel with moderate use and nothing turned off.
If people want a phone to last for days, they're being ridiculous. That's why they have home and car chargers.
Sent from Synergized Thunderbolt via the XDA Premium App
tl;dr
But according to other posts, I'm guessing it is about battery life...
As stated before, get the extended OEM 2750, I constantly pull 40+ hours out of it.
Everyone has their own version so your right its just repetition but it seems like others need a reminder. On my stock battery I can get 32 hours outta this phone. For IT guys like me its what I need from a phone like this.
Sent via a bolt of lightning using Tapatalk
OP's rant has all been said before (maybe not in one post) and will be said again before the last Thunderbolt user leaves the forum. I guess it needs said every so often so someone doesn't forget, I suppose.
Point 9 is completely wrong. Lithium polymer batteries are nothing like nickel-cadmium batteries, and neither is the charging method. Li-on and Li-po batteries are NEVER trickle charged in an HTC device, or any device for that matter, unless they have been user-modified. It's also completely impossible to over-charge virtually all Li-on batteries because internal circuitry prevents this. An overcharged Li-on presents and extreme explosion hazard. The act over attempting to overcharge one presents an even greater risk of explosion because as the battery reaches capacity the heat generated inside the cells ramps up sharply. Some charge techniques actually use this sudden ramp up in temperature to determine a fully charged state, that's how precise it can be. But HTC devices, and cell phones in general, do not use this technique. Instead, they take advantage of another characteristic of the battery. As the battery charges, it's voltage output and resistance increase. At the fully charged point, the resistance increases sharply and this tends to be less dependent on cell temperature which makes this method more reliable. Upon reaching this point, charge current is shut off, not reduced. Charge is allowed to bleed off through discharge down to 90-95% before charge current is again applied. The only thing that really reduces the life of a battery, defined as reducing it's number of charge cycles, is storing the battery with a full or empty charge. A Li-on battery can be stored for very lengthy periods with roughly a third of a charge though.
I've jus liked the xda forums a lot cus it seemed everyone would be mature n want ideas to keep flowing. Jus tryin to help, a phone like this can't be fixed in one paragraph I thought we all knew that.
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I think it's good to know what others do to save battery life, especially on this phone. Only problem that I have is having to limit features of the phone. For example, why have such a big beautiful screen when you have to keep it dim to save juice? I'm not a fan of having to cripple your phone to get a days use out of it.
But +1 to the op for the advice. Always interested in other people's setup.
Keep this topic on track everyone, bans will be issued from now on for flaming, off topic garbage posted no exceptions
I bought the TBolt for its ability. Turning off all that ability seems counterproductive to me. So instead of turning everything off, I carry 2 extra batteries when needed. I get 5-6 hours of use out of my phone, flip batteries and continue on. No extended battery fat azz, no being tied to a charger. By the time 1 dies, the other is charged and another just in case. Works out well.
to each their own.
mathers53 said:
Many people have argued that since the thunderbolt has not been updated with gingerbread that it will die out and be worthless. I'm here to tell you that is not the case at all.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
of course were getting GB, i always new it would be towards the end of summer or fall. who ever said the phone would die out? it took the evo almost a year to get it.
While I certainly applaud and respect the OP's position, I refuse to neuter this phone by turning everything off and making it a dumb phone.
I chose this phone due to the speed and features....turning off that just seems backwards.
Battery technology needs to make a jump, it's the hold up.
These phones should have 3000mah and NOT have a fat, rounded hump on back.
sink it into the phone..
The only thing I turn on and off with a widget is bluetooth.
I don't have the time to toggle between 3/4G, turn GPS on/off, etc.
loonatik78 said:
Point 9 is completely wrong. Lithium polymer batteries are nothing like nickel-cadmium batteries, and neither is the charging method. Li-on and Li-po batteries are NEVER trickle charged in an HTC device, or any device for that matter, unless they have been user-modified. It's also completely impossible to over-charge virtually all Li-on batteries because internal circuitry prevents this. An overcharged Li-on presents and extreme explosion hazard. The act over attempting to overcharge one presents an even greater risk of explosion because as the battery reaches capacity the heat generated inside the cells ramps up sharply. Some charge techniques actually use this sudden ramp up in temperature to determine a fully charged state, that's how precise it can be. But HTC devices, and cell phones in general, do not use this technique. Instead, they take advantage of another characteristic of the battery. As the battery charges, it's voltage output and resistance increase. At the fully charged point, the resistance increases sharply and this tends to be less dependent on cell temperature which makes this method more reliable. Upon reaching this point, charge current is shut off, not reduced. Charge is allowed to bleed off through discharge down to 90-95% before charge current is again applied. The only thing that really reduces the life of a battery, defined as reducing it's number of charge cycles, is storing the battery with a full or empty charge. A Li-on battery can be stored for very lengthy periods with roughly a third of a charge though.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
+1 on this. He is absolutely correct on this point. Anyone who is into RC anything that uses Lipo's knows this as well.
The reason Toyota does not use Lipo batteries in their Prius' (even through they pack more power in a smaller package) is because of the extreme fire hazard from overheating lipo batteries by trying to "overcharge" them. They are afraid people will try and modify the charging systems to "squeeze" more juice out of them and catch fire.
loonatik78 said:
Point 9 is completely wrong. Lithium polymer batteries are nothing like nickel-cadmium batteries, and neither is the charging method. Li-on and Li-po batteries are NEVER trickle charged in an HTC device, or any device for that matter, unless they have been user-modified. It's also completely impossible to over-charge virtually all Li-on batteries because internal circuitry prevents this. An overcharged Li-on presents and extreme explosion hazard. The act over attempting to overcharge one presents an even greater risk of explosion because as the battery reaches capacity the heat generated inside the cells ramps up sharply. Some charge techniques actually use this sudden ramp up in temperature to determine a fully charged state, that's how precise it can be. But HTC devices, and cell phones in general, do not use this technique. Instead, they take advantage of another characteristic of the battery. As the battery charges, it's voltage output and resistance increase. At the fully charged point, the resistance increases sharply and this tends to be less dependent on cell temperature which makes this method more reliable. Upon reaching this point, charge current is shut off, not reduced. Charge is allowed to bleed off through discharge down to 90-95% before charge current is again applied. The only thing that really reduces the life of a battery, defined as reducing it's number of charge cycles, is storing the battery with a full or empty charge. A Li-on battery can be stored for very lengthy periods with roughly a third of a charge though.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for posting this, you saved me the time of posting something very similar.
U may have helped someone out there by this
Sent from my SICKLY INFECTED VirusBolt Synergy 3.0 using XDA Premium App
RC anything battery 4 hr. Charge barely 15 min run time.
Sent from my ADR6400L using XDA App
fixxxer2008 said:
of course were getting GB, i always new it would be towards the end of summer or fall. who ever said the phone would die out? it took the evo almost a year to get it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
More like 6 months since it came out in may, but I don't think is HTC fault more like Verizon most of their all phone don't have gingerbread and sprint got the evo shift, the evo 4G and even the damn echo with gingerbread already
I still don't see how its possible to get 40+ hours even with the extended battery. I'll be lucky to get 24. I do use my phone heavily tho so that may be why idk -.-
Sent from my SICKLY INFECTED VirusBolt Synergy 3.0 using XDA Premium App
Like many others, I've scratched my head regarding why some seem to be able to get 7+ hours of screen on life while others get only around 3. I know the typical response is wakelocks but those SHOULDN'T affect screen on time much, when the CPU is already awake.
I have noticed that it seems that my device dies much faster when it gets hot, which makes sense, but I've never seen it affect a device to this extent. One time, I fully charged my battery and only got 3 hours SOT merely doing nonstop web browsing on WIFI without putting the device to sleep at all. Yesterday I even froze all apps except the stock ones after flashing PA gapps on Omnirom and my batter was worse than when I had 100+ apps and greenify. Usually I get 3-4 hours SOT a day of normal use on LTE with intermittent, cooler usage. When the device gets hot it also doesn't want to charge nearly as quickly either.
Therefore, I have a simple request: post your best or typical SOT and how often your device gets noticeably hot. I'd like to see if there's a trend between heat and SOT. Or at least vote in the poll. Both would be preferred.
Sent from my Nexus 5 using xda app-developers app
Darn XDA app.
lol, are you serious?
we see a large variance is battery life because we all use our devices completely differently. plus we all have different qualities of phone/data signals, we all use differing brightness for our screems(some auto some not), we all do differing things to set up our phones as we want.. do you want me to go on? and the temperatures, they vary throught the day, depending what you are doing, depending on the temperatures around you. sometimes they can get very hot, sometimes they stay cool with lighter use. i get 5.5-7h screen on time every day. my phone can see temperatures of 88C to 0C daily.
simms22 said:
lol, are you serious?
we see a large variance is battery life because we all use our devices completely differently. plus we all have different qualities of phone/data signals, we all use differing brightness for our screems(some auto some not), we all do differing things to set up our phones as we want.. do you want me to go on? and the temperatures, they vary throught the day, depending what you are doing, depending on the temperatures around you. sometimes they can get very hot, sometimes they stay cool with lighter use. i get 5.5-7h screen on time every day. my phone can see temperatures of 88C to 0C daily.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
And disabling all apps to take the user setup out of the equation doesn't change things? Or the fact that I only got 3 hours SOT just web browsing? Sure, there's definitely variance involved but it seems like there's more with this device than I've ever seen before. Most devices I've used have been mostly consistent among users and don't have some people complaining about 2 hours versus 7 hours SOT in a short period.
It's easy to say it's environment variables or user error when you're getting 5+ hours every day but when you're someone who's been around the block with Android and phones in general and can't break the 4 hour mark ever, you start to wonder if there's more than initially meets the eye. I don't mean this to attack you, I'm just not sure what else yo do. I've tried undervolting, underclocking, keeping brightness down, greebifying (BBS looks fine), modified location settings, stayed on WiFi, turned off WiFi, removed apps, etc, and nothing helps SOT, only sleep drain.
The bottom line is, have you noticed your battery drains faster when it's hot or is it pretty constant? I'm just wondering if some devices, due to a lower PVS value or some other property of their chip, run hotter and drain more current doing the same tasks. Trying to eliminate the possibility.
P.S. Have you noticed the XDA app modifies or quotes the post above what you press? I have, as you can tell...
Sent from my Nexus 5 using xda app-developers app
Darn XDA app...
JesusFreak316 said:
And disabling all apps to take the user setup out of the equation doesn't change things? Or the fact that I only got 3 hours SOT just web browsing? Sure, there's definitely variance involved but it seems like there's more with this device than I've ever seen before. Most devices I've used have been mostly consistent among users and don't have some people complaining about 2 hours versus 7 hours SOT in a short period.
It's easy to say it's environment variables or user error when you're getting 5+ hours every day but when you're someone who's been around the block with Android and phones in general and can't break the 4 hour mark ever, you start to wonder if there's more than initially meets the eye. I don't mean this to attack you, I'm just not sure what else yo do. I've tried undervolting, underclocking, keeping brightness down, greebifying (BBS looks fine), modified location settings, stayed on WiFi, turned off WiFi, removed apps, etc, and nothing helps SOT, only sleep drain.
P.S. Have you noticed the XDA app modifies or quotes the post above what you press? I have, as you can tell...
Sent from my Nexus 5 using xda app-developers app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
ive had g1, google ion, nexus one, nexus s, galaxy nexus, nexus 7, nexus 4, and the nexus 5 now. every one of them has/had great battery life. its the way i setup and use my devices. our use is a huge variable. every single person uses their device completely different. for example in setup and use, you use the crappy xda app, that uses a huge amount of battery, i use the browser, and never install those kinds of apps. many people have facebook installed, i uninstslled it more than 2.5 years ago, i use the browser for facebook. facebook is also a battery killer. i can go on and on. then theres the variances in phone and data signal. bad signals can get more battery drainage, terrible signals can be battery killers.
anyways, you said sleep drains. i bet you have a few badly behaving apps, or you are using the wrong kernel for your device. or, it could just be the way that you use your phone is the reason you don't see 4+ hours sot.
simms22 said:
ive had g1, google ion, nexus one, nexus s, galaxy nexus, nexus 7, nexus 4, and the nexus 5 now. every one of them has/had great battery life. its the way i setup and use my devices. our use is a huge variable. every single person uses their device completely different. for example in setup and use, you use the crappy xda app, that uses a huge amount of battery, i use the browser, and never install those kinds of apps. many people have facebook installed, i uninstslled it more than 2.5 years ago, i use the browser for facebook. facebook is also a battery killer. i can go on and on. then theres the variances in phone and data signal. bad signals can get more battery drainage, terrible signals can be battery killers.
anyways, you said sleep drains. i bet you have a few badly behaving apps, or you are using the wrong kernel for your device. or, it could just be the way that you use your phone is the reason you don't see 4+ hours sot.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Fair enough. I know the XDA app is bad but didn't think it was so poorly coded that it's a battery hog. The site needs a mobile version IMO.
What do you mean by "you said sleep drains"? My device sleeps quite nicely, I just mentioned that because that's usually the battery life people complain about but that's not an issue here.
I'll try doing a full wipe and not just freeze all my apps and leave just the stock stuff for a couple of days and see if that makes a difference.
Yeah, I wish there was a way to quantify how much signal is killing your battery. Sure, there's the battery page in settings but more detail would be wonderful.
I've experimented with most every kernel but it never really made a difference. I mostly stick to Franco.
Either way, I'd still like to get some crowd data on what they see. Two devices with opposite results is hardly conclusive (even though all your devices have been good, that doesn't necessarily rule out the possibility that there's a bad batch of CPU's or batteries in some Nexus 5's, unlikely as that is.). Everything you've said is valid, but I want to entertain the notion that, while that may be the problem the vast majority of the time, there could be another cause. If I find a bad behaving app on my phone or I just have crappy signal, great, but more data is never a bad thing.
Sent from my Nexus 5 using xda app-developers app
right now.
as you can see ill hit more than 4 hours sot, probably 5.5-6.5h sot. you notice my battery stats, heavy usage, but none of those silly apps eating battery, for me its mostly browser. yet earlier i was at 81C, because i was pushing my device. now cpu temps are around 44C.
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Thanks! I'll wipe my ROM tomorrow and leave the settings default and see what I get.
That looks like it rules out CPU temperature then, if temperature caused heavy drain you should see a steep slope at that time. Did your battery ever get hot?
Sent from my Nexus 5 using xda app-developers app
This is the first high-end smartphone I've owned that doesn't get hot at all. It'll get a little warm from time to time, but it's never anywhere near what I'd call "hot."
Samsung phones, on the other hand, get freaking HOT. My GS2 would get so hot at times that I could barely touch it, and my GS4 wasn't a whole lot better. My wife's GS3 will be blazing hot in its case when she's just been browsing the web or on Facebook. My N5 is never even close to as hot as Samsung phones have been in my experience.
Hmm, I dunno if I'd say it is painfully hot (thought when trying to wireless charge and use it it gets pretty bad) but certainly quite noticeable. What was the temp in degrees Celsius? I see 70s on the phone and 40s on the battery quite frequently.
Sent from my Nexus 5 using xda app-developers app
Phones that get hot to the touch are actually doing a good job dissipating the heat. Though it may become uncomfortable to be absorbing some of that heat it does have to go somewhere.
Nexus 5 uses aggressive thermal throttling to keep the phone fairly cool and according to Anand has a heat spreader between the SoC and battery unlike the Nexus 4 which caused the two to heat up quicker.
The only thing that will stop me from getting over 4hrs SoT (3.5 - 5 based off usage) is if an application decides to keep the phone awake endlessly. I've seen it happen for Google Search and a few others randomly at times. Reboot or force stop fixes that up.
My nexus 5 battery also seems really crap, and the back gets hot very quickly. Everything else on this device is 100% perfect. Ive tried everything i possibly could (Different kernel, undervolting, lower cpu freq, change governors, low brightness, most connectivity settings off, ok google off, and many more battery saving aspects) yet i still can only get around 2-3 Hours sot with light usage (XDA, web browsing, social media). Is my device somewhat faulty? Or is it supposed to be like this? And normally when i play games, it drains at a speed of a percent per 40-60 seconds.
And please dont go about bashing me, im just a bit curious on how people get around 6 hours sot.
Sent from my GN5 [D821]
I haven't really had to do this on this phone, but I used to chase Screen on battery drain issues with Cool Tool from the play store. It floats a highly configurable window on the screen that lets you monitor a lot of system parameters including current draw - which is probably what you are most interested in here. I think you can also monitor the temp of the device, the cpu utilization, etc., etc. This lets you play with different settings and what not and get more immediate feedback as to what is happening with your device. In the screenshot, I configured the floating window only to show current draw...should be the pink 182 mA.
Screenie:
justmpm said:
I haven't really had to do this on this phone, but I used to chase Screen on battery drain issues with Cool Tool from the play store. It floats a highly configurable window on the screen that lets you monitor a lot of system parameters including current draw - which is probably what you are most interested in here. I think you can also monitor the temp of the device, the cpu utilization, etc., etc. This lets you play with different settings and what not and get more immediate feedback as to what is happening with your device. In the screenshot, I configured the floating window only to show current draw...should be the pink 182 mA.
Screenie:
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for that link but am I right in assuming most of it's functionality won't work correctly in KitKat? That has been reported with most battery or CPU monitoring apps so far.
I've been looking for something to show me current draw on stock but have only had battery widgets show me the current battery voltage which I don't understand the significance of. Starts at 4300mV when 100% and drops to about 3900mV when nearing empty.