Engadget lies about Charge battery life - Verizon Droid Charge

I purchased the Droid Charge based on the Engadget review of the device. In particular, I wanted a device that could get on the LTE network AND have great battery life. This excerpt sold me:
When it comes to battery life, there's no competition. The Charge blitzed through a full day of what we'd consider typical use, coming off the charger at about 9am and not getting slotted back in again until 9pm the next night. Yes, you read that right, two working days of what we'd consider average use with GPS and WiFi on, taking pictures and videos, all powered by a single 1,600mAh battery. Granted, we weren't running our performance benchmarks at the time, but we were hammering the LTE antenna to get some speed results.
I expected to get, at a minimum, a full day's charge using LTE on this device, considering I live in an area where LTE isn't hard to come by (Los Angeles). Alas, I was sorely disappointed when my battery drained within 5 hours with minimal use. 5 hours!!! How can Engadget claim it will last for two days and that "there's no competition." It's totally misleading. The Droid Charge has a serious battery issue which nobody can seem to get to the bottom of. I even tried installing the latest Gingerbread rom to ameliorate the issue, but to no avail. Has anyone gotten a full day's use out of the device when on the LTE network?

Stockmoose16 said:
Has anyone gotten a full day's use out of the device when on the LTE network?
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I just got back from a full day's use on 4G with GPS on, WiFi on and Exchange and Gmail pushing mail as needed. I did not, however, text at all. One of my pages has an IP camera app that updates three feeds (snapshots) at least every five minutes. I am in a pretty consistent 4G area except when I'm at home (Philladelphia suburbs by my home is in a geographically challenged location)!
The phone just turned off as it dropped below 2% so I can't give any battery stats; I've been following the battery recalibration procedure listed here.
Keep the faith...you may not reach two days but you should be able to get a lot more than 5 hours!

rmanaka said:
I just got back from a full day's use on 4G with GPS on, WiFi on and Exchange and Gmail pushing mail as needed. I did not, however, text at all. One of my pages has an IP camera app that updates three feeds (snapshots) at least every five minutes. I am in a pretty consistent 4G area except when I'm at home (Philladelphia suburbs by my home is in a geographically challenged location)!
The phone just turned off as it dropped below 2% so I can't give any battery stats; I've been following the battery recalibration procedure listed here.
Keep the faith...you may not reach two days but you should be able to get a lot more than 5 hours!
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Out of curiosity, which ROM are you using to get this kind of battery life? I just installed the latest Gingerbread leak and my phone is leaking battery at a rate of 15-20% per hour. I saw that re-calibration post, but I'm wondering if I can simply charge my phone to 100% and place the same ROM on top of the one I already installed. Just want to make sure I don't brick my phone.
Any thoughts?

If you wondering if you can just replace your current COM with the same one you are using by just replacing the files on the SD card then yes you can. If you're asking about re-flashing the same ROM over it again without wiping during the calibration then you can. It shouldn't harm anything.

Schneeder said:
If you wondering if you can just replace your current COM with the same one you are using by just replacing the files on the SD card then yes you can. If you're asking about re-flashing the same ROM over it again without wiping during the calibration then you can. It shouldn't harm anything.
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I've already installed the latest Gingerbread ROM and updated all my apps and widgets on the device. Can I now charge the device to 100%, bump charge a couple of times (per the instructions in another post on the board), and then restart and wipe the battery stats in recovery mode? Or, do I have to charge to 100% and then completely reinstall the same exact ROM on top of the one I just installed?

Stockmoose.
5 hours? That's questionable that you only got 5 hours with minimal use. No Engadget did not lie, and until the 1700 mah phones are released the end of the month, there is no comparison.
Only with Altered Beast and heavy use was I able to kill the battery in under 8 hours. So I would chalk it up to a bad battery. Not everything is perfect.
Gingerbread is a leak, so trying to compare it to the stock rom does you no good.

You can wipe the battery cache without having to re-flash everything again.

Agreed, I was heavily influenced by the Engadget review and was seriously disappointed when I struggle to get a day's worth of usage out of the stock ROM on 4G.
The Gingerbread leaks have some serious battery issues. I reccomend flashing Humble v1.3 (Froyo) and undervolting. Best battery life by far. I can hammer the LTE radio for a few hours straight.
As a side note, all of Verizon's current 4G Android offerings have awful battery life due to having the dual CDMA and LTE radios. That being said, the Charge evidently has the best life out of the three of them. Future phones (when Verizon dumps CDMA altogether in favor of LTE) will have way better life.
Sent from my Droid Charge

kvswim said:
Agreed, I was heavily influenced by the Engadget review and was seriously disappointed when I struggle to get a day's worth of usage out of the stock ROM on 4G.
The Gingerbread leaks have some serious battery issues. I reccomend flashing Humble v1.3 (Froyo) and undervolting. Best battery life by far. I can hammer the LTE radio for a few hours straight.
As a side note, all of Verizon's current 4G Android offerings have awful battery life due to having the dual CDMA and LTE radios. That being said, the Charge evidently has the best life out of the three of them. Future phones (when Verizon dumps CDMA altogether in favor of LTE) will have way better life.
Sent from my Droid Charge
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Curious while running Humble v1.3 and undervolting which kernel are you running atm. And second what undervoltage settings are your using atm currently so yo uare getting random reboots. Reaosn I ask is I just flashed v1.3 this am and updated to Imnut's newest OC kernel but have left it alone right now without touching any voltage settings. So any input would be great and I'd like to set mine nad check it out to see if I can get even better battery life out of it. Thanks

Pro tip: Never buy anything based solely on one review.
Sent from my SCH-I500 using XDA App

will2live said:
Curious while running Humble v1.3 and undervolting which kernel are you running atm. And second what undervoltage settings are your using atm currently so yo uare getting random reboots. Reaosn I ask is I just flashed v1.3 this am and updated to Imnut's newest OC kernel but have left it alone right now without touching any voltage settings. So any input would be great and I'd like to set mine nad check it out to see if I can get even better battery life out of it. Thanks
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This should help.

I get about 12 hours with minimal to moderate usage throughout the day 4G, wifi/gps off for the majority. I might have to try this bump charging, though. Would be incredible to get a solid day out of this thing.

9 hours of using my phone to check XDA post, playing bubble buster, and texting and my phone is at 77%. Only thing different on my phone is i'm using SetCPU to undervolt. But even with that. if you are only getting 6 hours with minor use. There is something wrong.

I just did a solid 36 hours by staying on my home Wifi almost the whole time. I'm using Gummy Charged 1.8. Before everyone starts calling bull----, I probably used the phone a total of 1 hour over that period of time.
Normally, it lasts 14-18 hours with only Exchange mail and an hour of gaming (no facebook, social networks, etc.)
If I recall correctly, battery life was an issue with the gingerbread leaks.

I did the battery charging cycles as mentioned above and erased the battery stats last night. Now I'm down to 20% after 6 hours of light use. That's pretty much the same way as before. What did I do wrong?

robstamack said:
I just did a solid 36 hours by staying on my home Wifi almost the whole time. I'm using Gummy Charged 1.8. Before everyone starts calling bull----, I probably used the phone a total of 1 hour over that period of time.
Normally, it lasts 14-18 hours with only Exchange mail and an hour of gaming (no facebook, social networks, etc.)
If I recall correctly, battery life was an issue with the gingerbread leaks.
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Click to collapse
Not a chance I'll say bull**** that is for sure. When leaving the device on Wifi battery life will DRASTICALLY increase. The radio in the device is what is eating it up. If you want to conserve even more battery I've found and don't ask me why if you actually turn off Mobile data and then turn Wifi on it will help even more.
Ran a test last night and with over 7hrs on Wifi it dropped on 5%

robstamack said:
I just did a solid 36 hours by staying on my home Wifi almost the whole time. I'm using Gummy Charged 1.8. Before everyone starts calling bull----, I probably used the phone a total of 1 hour over that period of time.
Normally, it lasts 14-18 hours with only Exchange mail and an hour of gaming (no facebook, social networks, etc.)
If I recall correctly, battery life was an issue with the gingerbread leaks.
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Click to collapse
I've gotten 24 hours with about 20% to spare going in and out of Wifi and 4G. I had 3 gmail accounts sync'd to the phone and I probably streamed about 20 minutes worth of music using Google Music. But, I probably used the phone for a combined total of 1.5 hours over that period, and it was a slow day, so I actually didn't get many emails.
I think I was using one of the Froyo Gummy ROMs.

I don't think it's very fair to use custom ROMs and then complain about battery life. Was your battery life lower than 5 hours on the stock ROM? Did you even use the stock ROM?

06ms6 said:
I don't think it's very fair to use custom ROMs and then complain about battery life. Was your battery life lower than 5 hours on the stock ROM? Did you even use the stock ROM?
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Try reading more than skimming the OP. He implied that he started stock there, and about 3 posts down said that it was ridiculous that even the stock ROM couldn't get 5 hours.

doodlebro said:
Try reading more than skimming the OP. He implied that he started stock there, and about 3 posts down said that it was ridiculous that even the stock ROM couldn't get 5 hours.
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My apologies, I misread his second to last sentence in the OP.
Either way, 5 hours is not normal and I wouldn't blame the Charge just yet. Not sure if you guys have official 2.3 yet (I'm a Thunderbolt owner myself), but I know the Froyo ROMs on the TB have a very noticeable increase in battery life compared to the Gingerbread leak builds.
I get about 6-8 hours of heavy use on my 2.3 ROM on the TB. Probably closer to 13+ with Froyo.

Related

Show off your battery life!

http://img100.imageshack.us/img100/3922/snap20101010220328.png
This is my moderate use. Few web here and there facebook, some calls/texts and instant messaging for a good 3hrs
I am running cog 2.2b5
Just wanted to compare battery life and post the rom you are running too
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I897 using XDA App
my battery life sucks. i get about 10% per hour....
What Rom are you using?
yeah my batt isn't too great either. 2 days on Cog V5 now. Each day has been roughly 10hrs with about 4.2hrs use. Each day I ended with maybe 1-2% left.
Is this normal? Froyo didn't help a bit. In fact it may have made it slightly worse.
When I flashed b5 ... it was great. Then I found my gps sucks on it so I flashed again and I found that the battery drains like water 1% every 5 mins! ( Idk what's going there) Then, I flashed again and the above post is my result and my gps still sucks. So maybe if you flash it again it might help. I re partitioned in odin as well.
I am using Froyo (JI6) with lagfix and I get a consistatnt 12+ hours of moderate use. I usually charge my phone every three days.
Cog 2.1.7
I have to charge my phone every night. I have used multiple roms from cog 2.1 and even cog 2.2 as well as stock and it all seems the same.
There is no way that is an accurate picture... there is no way you made phone calls or used the facebook app without it showing up in usage.... u may have gotten 40% out of 12hrs but you did nothing with your phone
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I897 using XDA App
all my calls are usually short and yes i used facebook app and facebook browser as well.
Smallsmx3 said:
There is no way that is an accurate picture... there is no way you made phone calls or used the facebook app without it showing up in usage....
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I use tons of apps on my phone and the only things the show up in my battery usage are: Display, cell standby, phone idle and voice calls.
you need to recalibrate your batteries or flash from 100% as DesignGears had mentioned earlier.
i now flash from 100% batt life when upgrading to new ROMs. or do a search for battery calibration.
Not sure how to do a screen shot but Im running 2.2 beta 5 and I thought battery life sucked but it was because I was checking it constantly and playing with GPS.
Today, after recalibrating battery stats two nights ago I have dropped 3% in 3 hrs of standby and very, very light use.
Also, to recalibrate battery stats I downloaded terminal emulator and did the following
su
rm /data/system/batterystats.bin
I had drained it fully down to 1-2%, did the above commands, plugged it in and charged to 100%. You must be rooted to do it this way I would think since Im using su for superuser.
Yea, I recalibrate the battery on my 2nd flash. the first flash my battery was draining literally 1% per minute. So I reflashed (I thought something went wrong on my 1st flash) and recalibrated now it's normal again.
gocats7: Yup cog comes rooted
Cognition is awesome. With all the features built in, the att crapware stripped out I dont see myself ever running a stock ROM again. In regards to battery though, I think its at least as good as stock if not better. I havent had 2.2 beta 5 loaded long enough to really tell.
I've never had poor battery life. I did have that "new phone syndrome" when I got it and had to charge it a lot. But now I'm going around a day and a half on a charge with moderate use. I use wifi everywhere I can and try to minimize the time the screen stays on.
miztaken1312 said:
I've never had poor battery life. I did have that "new phone syndrome" when I got it and had to charge it a lot. But now I'm going around a day and a half on a charge with moderate use. I use wifi everywhere I can and try to minimize the time the screen stays on.
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Have you found that wifi has been helping your battery life? When I have mine on I lose battery at ~5-10% an hour. With it off I lose 1-2% an hour. I have to switch it off nightly so that I don't have to charge my phone again in the morning.
Just the thread I was looking for...
I just recently bought a captivate that had the battery problems it seems so many are having with random shutdowns etc. I would get maybe 12 hours before getting the recharge notice. And that is with very little use. So, along with the advice from these forums, I had it replaced within my 30 days and immediately noticed a difference in the way the phone felt(if that even makes sense). It seemed like the screws were tighter, it was cleaner and it way out performed my previous captivate. Had me thinking I was given a display model or something.
So, to keep it short....I just plugged in after (for me) a very impressive 64 hour strech with moderate useage, some gaming and movie watching. Could not be happier with this phone right now. I cannot for the life of me figure out how such an impressive spec'd phone can use so very little power while locked. It makes me feel like a proud parent...lol.
I <3 My Captivate...
nybmx said:
Have you found that wifi has been helping your battery life? When I have mine on I lose battery at ~5-10% an hour. With it off I lose 1-2% an hour. I have to switch it off nightly so that I don't have to charge my phone again in the morning.
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I have actually found my battery lasts longer with wifi on. I only turn it off when I leave the house. For me the wifi seems to be a lot more power/data efficient then my data connection. I can use the phone all day on wifi and still have 20% left at the end of the day whereas when I've been out all day long using data I can barely make it home without it *****ing at me to charge the phone.
Sent from my Captivate
I have had the best battery life yet with Cog 2.2 Beta 5.5 and migrating my Exchange server to Google Apps Premium so I do not need to use stock corporate email app anymore. I am pretty happy with this so far although I have only used the new beta for a day so far.
As a bonus, I am even using Live Wallpaper.
27hr, just dropped below 30%. Love it

Battery stats for those on custom ROMs

Im trying to convince myself to get the Inspire and sell my atrix.
The last thing that is making me reluctant is the battery. I consitantly get between 30 and 40 hours between charges on my atrix with 3 to 4 hours of screen time. I know i wont get that with an Inspire, but im wondering what kind of stats people are seeing who are running custom ROMs. With my capitvate i saw a nearly DOUBLE battery life effect between stock and a custom rom. im hoping there are similar results on the inspire.
for those on custom roms, im looking to see how many hours you get between charges. ideally, how many hours between charges, with how many hours of screen time, wifi, blue tooth, etc. and im also interested in seeing the battery life of those who are OC/UV.
Someones gotta have info for me!
Sent from my MB860 using XDA Premium App
Inspire battery usage....sucks!
If your main concern is BATTERY USAGE, then DO NOT get an Inspire.
No matter what ROM or other MODS made to an Ispire, it is accepted by all that have one, that the Inspire has very low battery uptime, especially when compared to other platforms.
Stay with your ATRIX for long battery usage and uptime. - Glenn
I just swapped my Atrix for the Inspire this past Sunday, and i can tell you first hand you're not gonna get the same battery results you did with the Atrix. Personally, I don't need to get 20-40 hours of battery life from a phone. Don't get me wrong, it is nice, but I don't need it. I just want to get at least 8 hours (while I'm at work) from a battery and I'm fine. However, I do have my charger with me just in case and i also have a car charger.
I rooted my Inspire Sunday night and flashed the stock rooted rom and couldn't be happier. I got about 13 hours out of the battery yesterday while I was at work and I used it under normal circumstances..calling, texts and lots of fb checking etc. Oh, and I didn't have any overclocking, underclocking, themes or nothing...just the rooted the stock rom.
The inspire is a lot more smooth also when compared to the Atrix. I was all for the Atrix last week. But after actually having the Inspire....its the Inspire FTW!
Its not my main concern. Just the Las thing I'm considering. A lot if other things about the inspire are appealing. Just looking for round about numbers.
Can I get 12 hours out of itwith 2 to 3 hours of screen time? That might be enough for me........If can get more than that, then I would def be sold.
Of course all this would be expected only when all aetttings on phone for Max bat life applied
Sent from my MB860 using XDA Premium App
muthabusser said:
If your main concern is BATTERY USAGE, then DO NOT get an Inspire.
No matter what ROM or other MODS made to an Ispire, it is accepted by all that have one, that the Inspire has very low battery uptime, especially when compared to other platforms.
Stay with your ATRIX for long battery usage and uptime. - Glenn
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Click to collapse
Speak for yourself. My Inspire lasts me the day with a ton of juice left over. I'm not a super heavy user, but I will have sometimes 60-70% battery life when I go to bed on light use days. On heavier use days I'm still at 30-40% when I go to bed. Unless you are watching youtube videos or something for hours on end, battery life is fine I think.
To extend battery life I adjusted my screen brightness back to 30% with no auto adjust, seemed to help battery life quite a bit and did not make much difference in how the screen looked. Today I am trying auto brightness, but using power saver to switch to lower screen brightness when the battery hits 40%--I'm at 7 hours and the battery is still at 70%. Honestly, I don't think a person could even watch a movie on a flight, for example, the screen draw on the battery is that bad. If I keep the phone, I will have to get another battery.
I get 22-24 hours with light average use, about 14 hours of moderate use. CM7, nothing special done or flashed.
HTC Inspire Clockwork Recovery * CM7(kang) * Eng S-Off
synnyster said:
Speak for yourself. My Inspire lasts me the day with a ton of juice left over. I'm not a super heavy user, but I will have sometimes 60-70% battery life when I go to bed on light use days. On heavier use days I'm still at 30-40% when I go to bed. Unless you are watching youtube videos or something for hours on end, battery life is fine I think.
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I was replying to the OP's original statment regarding his Atrix battery time in reference to the Insire's battery time:
OP said......The last thing that is making me reluctant is the battery. I consitantly get between 30 and 40 hours between charges on my atrix with 3 to 4 hours of screen time.
Even with your light usage, I am doubtful that you get anywhere close to the OP's "30 and 40 hours between charges on my atrix with 3 to 4 hours of screen time". - Glenn
well i guess i will just find out.
impulse buyer here. immediatly ran out and purchased an inspire after making this thread.
You're going to LOVE the inspire (even with the lower battery time). I have no doubt you will be throwing rocks at ATRIX users in no time!! - Glenn
Lol ur right so far. Smooth, fast, solid. Just the smoothness and screen size is enough to win me over
Sent from my Desire HD using XDA Premium App
My results are based on percentage of time versus overall time, based on an average 8h work day.
Stock rom:
at the end of 8h I had an average of 55% left
Revolution HD 4 Beta 2:
at the end of 8h I had an average of 35% left
Stock rom rooted and bloat removed, HSPDA enabled:
only have one data point and it looks good so far. I had 75% left with the same average use as the other roms above. Why this one is so much better I don't know.
Also the stock rom came with the stock Radio 06.04.06_M but with the root downgrade and then custom rom to Rev HD4 B2 I had to upgrade the Radio to one that was suggested, which is 06.03.24_M2.
Also, one thing that I noted which was also seen on my Nexus One is that when I use the GPS my car charger is not able to keep up and I will loose battery % as I drive.
All in all I am very happy with this move from the Captivate. Many see it as a lateral move, but if you ever where in the need for the GPS this is definatey an upgrade since the GPS on the Inspire is spot on.
^^^^^^
thats the kind of info i was looking for. appreciate it.
my first run with the inspire resulted in 14 hours since last charge (down to 15%) with nearly 3 hours of screen on time.
granted i adjusted every possible thing to be less battery consuming, and one hour of that screen time was laying in bed in the dark with the screen on the lowest brightness setting.
i think i may be able to work with this.
oFUNGUSo said:
well i guess i will just find out.
impulse buyer here. immediatly ran out and purchased an inspire after making this thread.
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yeah i am close to an impulse buy on the inspire too, just because its such a great price. even full price at 399 is insanely cheap when most phones are 550 full price.
RogerPodacter said:
yeah i am close to an impulse buy on the inspire too, just because its such a great price. even full price at 399 is insanely cheap when most phones are 550 full price.
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the battery does suck. but everything else on the phone is so great, that i still am happy i got it
I am a pretty hardcore user and I never have any issues with battery at all. I believe a lot of these battery issues that people have are due to flashing with a low battery, which causes the battery's "memory" to get messed up. If people flashed with a full battery, or did the battery reset procedure after flashing and charging, we would stop hearing about all the horrible battery issues. User error, not an issue with the phone. If it was a phone issue, I would absolutely be experiencing the problem as well.
There are also bigger, better, higher capacity batteries up to 3500 ma/h if you REALLY need more battery time.
Sent from my Desire HD using XDA App
alright so i had a lot of issues with getting great battery life out of the phone. i'm only writing this to help people that are having similar issues. obvious, relative to teh atrix (with a ridiculously larger battery), the life is NOT that great. BUT i've gotten 24+ hours on teh phone with certain tweaks.
first off, rooting is a pain in the ass, but a necessity for any power user. My HSUPA speeds are often higher then the HSDPA speeds...and I can tether too! Anyways most important part of tihs is underclocking. I have my screen set to underclock to 3xx Mhz with screen off. I can't even tell the difference between when it is underclocked or not. I don't OC since for whatever reason I don't see the option to and don't care to force it.
I also set my brightness to 20% or less when i'm indoors, which is usually where i am. I also turn off the radios when i'm not using them, or wifi when i'm in range (i think its better than hspa), and sometimes autosync too (there are widgets for this). i also disabled facebook live feed syncing and set it to update when i open the app, and to sync contacts and htc sync and other useless stuff to once a day.
if you want something to turn off your radios when your screen is off, check otu juice defender. if you want to track your battery over time, try juice plotter. with the way i ahve it setup now, if i leave the screen off for 10 minutes. the battery drops 1% or less PER HOUR. One night, it finished charging at midnight so i took it off, and didn't put it back on a charger 1 am the next night with 10-15% left.
anyways, i hope this helps at least some new inspire owners. good luck with rooting if you haven't yet, it took me 4 hours, but itw as COMPLETELY worth it
anosis said:
My results are based on percentage of time versus overall time, based on an average 8h work day.
Stock rom:
at the end of 8h I had an average of 55% left
Revolution HD 4 Beta 2:
at the end of 8h I had an average of 35% left
Stock rom rooted and bloat removed, HSPDA enabled:
only have one data point and it looks good so far. I had 75% left with the same average use as the other roms above. Why this one is so much better I don't know.
Also the stock rom came with the stock Radio 06.04.06_M but with the root downgrade and then custom rom to Rev HD4 B2 I had to upgrade the Radio to one that was suggested, which is 06.03.24_M2.
Also, one thing that I noted which was also seen on my Nexus One is that when I use the GPS my car charger is not able to keep up and I will loose battery % as I drive.
All in all I am very happy with this move from the Captivate. Many see it as a lateral move, but if you ever where in the need for the GPS this is definatey an upgrade since the GPS on the Inspire is spot on.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Got another data point for the stock rom.
This time after the 8h my battery was at 55%, however I spend considerable time in a clean room were I have no signal at all. My other phones would usually drain much quicker in there and I believe it's because it's seeking a cell signal all the time.
So far I am very happy with the rooted stock rom, only wished it had some of the Gingerbread features.
I have consistently gotten about 9 hours usage, with 1.5 - 2 hours screen time, and left work with 40 - 60% battery. I make no effort to reduce usage, as nothing even comes close to the screens usage, except I do leave off gps when not in use. This is a general average, and I have noticed little difference between stock and 2 different versions of Android revolution, with different flashed radios. (roms always flashed at full battery) and overclocked to 1.2 with ondemand set. Overall I can say this battery is not great, but the rest of the phone is well worth it. I had the atrix for 2 weeks, and although the atrix got better benchmark scores, it was way less smooth, and a lot of market apps don't work on it, like flashlights, live wallpapers that don't support the screen, etc.
I am very glad my atrix's touchscreen failed, because if it didn't, I probably would have never tried the inspire, and I am much happier with the inspire.
Sent from my Desire HD using XDA App

Battery life on custom roms

Ok, I have been flashing for a few months trying to optimize my phone. My last rom was serendipity 6.2, with sp 59 and jl2. I restored to stock (bc I wanted to try something else and hadn't done that in a few weeks) my battery life on serendipity was atrocious.. 6 hours with medium usage. (hardly any calls or messages, looking things up or reading xda briefly) . I spent today on stock, after about 20 hours of light usage I am at 60% left. Now I did flash with a full battery serendipity, wiped battery stats and cleared cache and after several charge cycles and a few days battery life was still awful. I was about to get a new battery. Now I don't mean to single out serendipity, I've had bad battery life on paragon, dilli, and a few others (this time it just got unbearably bad), but why should battery life be so bad on custom roms? Am I alone on this? I hesitate to flash again bc I'm loving having a phone that won't die if I touch it, but I miss the functionality of the device with a custom 2.2.1 on it. Advice or opinions please.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I897 using XDA App
I'm having the same problem. Everybody keeps saying they've got excellent battery life and what not with custom roms but mine doesn't seem so good. Wifi is off, I've wiped battery stats, I've used the rom for several days letting everything get situated before I begin thinking about if its good battery life or not. Maybe I'm just expecting too much or I watch my battery a lil bit too much, idk it just seems pretty bad. If I stay on the internet for 20 minutes I've already dropped about 3%
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I897 using XDA App
The normal Batt live on this phone with normal use is between 12 to 16 hours
I'm thinking part of it may be psychological and part may be usage.
Psychological in the sense that I have an expectation of an improvement, practical in that with my stock rom I haven't reinstalled certain apps like xda and pulse where I spend a lot of time reading and thus using the screen.
That being said I was still experiencing drains of 8% or more per hour when the phone was idle, wifi and gps off.
There is a way to check the cpu's time in each state, but I can't remember where the file is. If someone can, please let me know. I'm curious if under the custom rom my phone wasn't properly scaling down.
I'll probably flash something new tomorrow morning unless I see something shiny and new in the dev forum.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I897 using XDA App
So 6 hours seems a bit low then? Could it just be a cumulative effect of flashing rom on top of rom with restoring to stock?
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I897 using XDA App
eccezarathustra said:
So 6 hours seems a bit low then? Could it just be a cumulative effect of flashing rom on top of rom with restoring to stock?
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I897 using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah 6 hrs does seem a bit low. There are many things that can contribute to it. If you are bouncing between H and 3g on a custom rom will drain it like crazy, I had to disable H and stick with 3g and that helped. could also look at OS monitor to find what is running in the background.
Ok, I did notice that recently I was jumping between h and 3g. I was experimenting with some of the new modems. Should I try finding a better modem for my location?
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I897 using XDA App
eccezarathustra said:
Ok, I did notice that recently I was jumping between h and 3g. I was experimenting with some of the new modems. Should I try finding a better modem for my location?
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I897 using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I would try others, as well as disable H in the hidden menus, and see how it fairs
@ zelendel.... so by H i assume you mean data... i see alot of back and forth when data is on. i know when data is off i'm still using wcdma from the gsm status, but it doesn't show the 3g icon.
i need my data because i'm from the states but living in australia and alot of my comunications are thru email/facebook.
when i look at battery usage i see rarely more than 5% from cell....usually 90 something from display ( i fiddle with it alot).
can't expect too much cause it's a powerhouse with a tiny battery........
for me the big Q at present is... can we top up the charge regularly or is it always best to let a full cycle run? if i knew it was fine to keep it topped i'd stay 50%+ most of the time i think................
It is not great to keep it topped off. The lithium battery will wear out faster and lose charging capacity over time. this process is sped up the more time the battery spends at a high charge
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I897 using XDA App
Visit the Samsung web site and read the battery specs for the Captivate. The stock battery is only rated for 5 hours and 50 minutes of active phone use (which means the display is active). In sleep mode (display and other features of the phone are shutdown) the battery is rated for up to 300 hours (12.5 days).
I have NEVER seen a stock Captivate last for over 3 days in sleep mode. As for active phone use (display is active) my experience with several of the custom ROMS (Cognition, Paragon, Andromeda, and now my favorite, Continuum) is that the battery life is either on par with the stock ROM, or exceeds it. The kernels on some of these custom ROMs are more efficient than that of the stock ROM due to the many tweaks and cleaning up of bloated apps and code by the developer.
I can't bring myself to keep a stock ROM now that I have used some excellent custom ROMs like those I name above.
As for flashing custom ROMs and seeing fast battery drain goes... I have had that experience with those I listed, but usually I was able to resolve the issue by ensuring my battery was at 100% (meaning showing that amount both on and off) and reflashing, or finding the cause of the high battery usage and going from there (e.g. I have had to reflash modems). Another thing I do, mainly out of habit from compiling code and deploying it in dev and test environments, is to make sure that I am working from a known good baseline ROM before flashing a custom ROM. In this case I always return to the stock ROM you can flash through Odin One Click. That way if you have battery problems after flashing a custom ROM you can have a good idea as to what is causing those problems. This is, of course, just a matter of personal preference. Some have repeatedly flashed one custom ROM over another with no issues. YMMV
fractaline said:
@ zelendel.... so by H i assume you mean data... i see alot of back and forth when data is on. i know when data is off i'm still using wcdma from the gsm status, but it doesn't show the 3g icon.
i need my data because i'm from the states but living in australia and alot of my comunications are thru email/facebook.
when i look at battery usage i see rarely more than 5% from cell....usually 90 something from display ( i fiddle with it alot).
can't expect too much cause it's a powerhouse with a tiny battery........
for me the big Q at present is... can we top up the charge regularly or is it always best to let a full cycle run? if i knew it was fine to keep it topped i'd stay 50%+ most of the time i think................
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No what I mean is disable HSDPA I think is the term lol. Sense you go back and forth I would say to disable that and just use 3g only.
If you don't know the code to get too the menu download sgstools it has the hidden menu keys.
Sorry but where can I find the hidden menus?
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I897 using XDA App
EDIT: just saw the last post thanks
I am the opposite, I got horrible battery on stock. Could not even make it through my work day without it dying on my way home unless I charged it midday. Now I am running Serendipity 6.2 and unplug at 7:30am and it is now 8:30pm my time and I have 30% remaining....
I have also tried other customs roms with noticeable improvements in battery life over stock but for me Serendipity gives me the best performance and battery.
Sent from my Galaxy S Captivate with Serendipity
try apex5.1 room with tl3 modem comb
i used about 50 phone call, 2 hour websurfing, email sending, checking.
i still have 41% left, 1day 10hour 50 min.
Could I have a faulty battery? I rooted and rommed cuz of my battery life being terrible but It still is bad
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I897 using XDA App
I had the exact same issue as you. I tried Darky's 9.3 first, then Serendipity 6.2, then Cognition 4.2.1. Each had major battery drain, meaning 6-8 hours with moderate use, and even without any usage it would drain 25% over 3 hours.
Use One-Click to flash back to stock JF6, then immediate do a Master Clear from the One-Click program after it has finished booting. Obviously move everything to an external SD or the computer prior to all of this, and make sure the external SD and SIM are out when flashing.
My battery has lasted for 14 hours today, and I'm only down to 54%. This is with about 1hr 20min screen on, ~30min voice calls, and always connected via 3G/H with background sync on, weather widget, and moderate web browsing.
Current setup: Serendipity 6.2, Speedmod K13C, JK4 Modem
Trying again
I couldnt keep myself away from custom roms, how i missed tethering, the custom theming, non marketplace apps and so much more...
Im trying Dilli's 7.1.1, bump charging at the moment...
Last night I drained my battery to 5% when i finally fell asleep... 6 hours later it was at 4%. Finally it drained and would not power on at all. Not even the backlights. Plugged it in for an hour and thought to take the sim card out so i would have a phone for the hours it would take to charge. When i plugged it back in the phone jumped from approximately 10% to 40% charged...
Oh well.
I have also been bouncing around flashing diff roms like crazy. I have to say though, I am using Continuum v4 with Hardcores speedmod Kernel K13D. I have been doing pretty good on this combo. Lasts for most the day with normal use.

Battery is Great on the Tunderbolt

Put it to a real test. Went to the grand prix today in st. pete.
Didnt even have a full charge around 90%. Had 4g on all day.. Brightness all the way up. Facebook , twitter, and 2 e-mail accounts running in the background. Took tons of video clips and tons of pictures, and streamed music through the bluetooth on the way home. As I type this its been 10 hours since it came off the charger and its at 50% battery with all the same items running.
At 1st I had very very bad battery life. But after using it for a few days and then doing a battery pull (read it would get better after all this) it has been working great, with the same or more use then I was doing the 1st few days of ownership. Just wanted to share a postive experience on battery life since I keep hearing and reading so many negative things.
Edit: Thunderbolt not tunderbolt LOL
Thanks for the tip.
I'm noob w battery. Do you mean just charge it full, pull it out and put it back in and it lasts you that much? I'm skeptical....The most I could have so far is 12 hours and I have 3 bars (out of 10) left.
quattr0 said:
Thanks for the tip.
I'm noob w battery. Do you mean just charge it full, pull it out and put it back in and it lasts you that much? I'm skeptical....The most I could have so far is 12 hours and I have 3 bars (out of 10) left.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The main reason people are having drain on 4g from what i heard was the software for the radio was re-written at the LAST minute (the reason for the delay) because they had to change their 700 MHz frequency just a bit higher.. something like 5 or 10 Mhz due to interference with with communication towers at airports. this sucker keeps dropping 4g like its no ones business. the new baseband which will be pushed out in the first update for the phone (hopefully in next month) should correct it.
Thats funny because i was at the gp today and my battery died before i left at 1p. Took a couple of pictures and 1 video. Used gps for like 10 mins and that was it. Stayed in my pocket for the rest of the day.
Sent from my ADR6400L using XDA App
hmm
I Disabled my 4G with dialing the *#*#(forgot the 4 numbers)*#*# and my battery has been lasting me alot longer
I'm in a 4G area so I have the phone set to LTE mode only and I get great battery life.
I probably have the worst battery life ever... 70% before putting it away and not using it. 5 hours later, I check my battery and I'm at 10%!! I didn't even use it!
Sent from my ADR6400L using XDA App
my battery was about to die on me today within 3 hours of being off the charger, granted it was with heavy use.. flashing multiple roms using titanium backup etc... but i still think that is asinine..
Powell730 said:
my battery was about to die on me today within 3 hours of being off the charger, granted it was with heavy use.. flashing multiple roms using titanium backup etc... but i still think that is asinine..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
flashing roms will eat battery...once you are on a rom it takes a cycle or 2 to settle
anourack said:
I probably have the worst battery life ever... 70% before putting it away and not using it. 5 hours later, I check my battery and I'm at 10%!! I didn't even use it!
Sent from my ADR6400L using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
U need to learn how to charge it. Search around.
Sent from my ADR6400L using XDA App
The battery life on the TB is just as good as it was on my rooted dinc with a custom kernal. I have no complaints with stock unrooted TB so far and I use the **** out of it.
I turned off 4g and am going 16 hours on 50% battery. Really, to sit in my pocket, do calls, text, and check email I don't need 4g. I too noticed the 4g radio switching on and off constantly. Hopefully the baseband update will fix this.
ZBoater said:
I turned off 4g and am going 16 hours on 50% battery. Really, to sit in my pocket, do calls, text, and check email I don't need 4g. I too noticed the 4g radio switching on and off constantly. Hopefully the baseband update will fix this.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It has more to do with where you live and how good your 4G coverage is
Sent from my ADR6400L using XDA Premium App
i get 12hrs easy with moderate use. All I've done is turn off the GPS services when not needed and disable the lock screen... hope things improve for everyone having issues... :/
quattr0 said:
U need to learn how to charge it. Search around.
Sent from my ADR6400L using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What do you mean, is there a special way to charge it now?
anourack said:
What do you mean, is there a special way to charge it now?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think he may be referring to the "bump" charge. Where you charge the phone to full, unplug it, turn it off, charge it to full again, unplug, turn it on, and charge it to full again. Not sure if this is an HTC thing or just a general lithium ion battery thing. But it helps IMO.
I get about 12 hours of battery life with moderate use. I little web surfing, lots of texting, light app usage. My phone is constantly switching from 4G to 3G when I'm indoors. Outside though I'm fine. I'm surprised about the different experiences people are having with battery life.
Since I can't get through a whole day without it dying I bought a second home charger on amazon. I'd like to get the extended battery, but it looks like it'd make this phone too big at that point. I wish there was some better battery tech coming out soon, since there hasn't been too much progression on that front.
Turn on the wifi radio. When you are home or anywhere you have access to wifi, the device will automatically turn the 4g radio off when wifi is up. That simple change has made a huge difference and I dont have to worry about turning the 4g radio on/off manually.
I've been seeing, under heavy use, at minimum 8 hours of use consistently since I've been through a few cycles, including bump charging the first few cycles. Also, a few things that greatly helped me:
Read somewhere that the stock blockbuster app, even if it has never been opened, has a service that updates the movie catalog in the background. Run the app, update it, and in settings turn off movie catalog updates. After doing this my battery didn't drain nearly as fast while in my pocket. I can't verify that this actually helps, but it did for me. I disabled the 4G radio since I live in a 3G area as well.
I also run Green Power as of this morning. My phone has been running over 12 hour with 3:30 of that being actual usage and I'm at 68% remaining. I have it set to 1 minute on and 10 off for data while it is locked in my pocket.
Beyond that, GPS is disabled unless I need it. So is WiFi. Brightness is at about 30%, with a widget to bump it to full when I'm outside in sunlight. I also noticed a big jump when I disabled HTC sense Facebook updates, and used stock Facebook instead. Every time I went to contacts it would download that contacts Facebook updates, which is pointless and uses data constantly under normal usage.
Of course your mileage may vary, but this all gets me through the day under normal usage, and over a half day under heavy usage.
I am currently at 8.5 hours with 79% left on my battery. Stock Battery. If I didn't have to work tomorrow, and be able to make phone calls and such I'd leave my phone unplugged all night to see how long it can go.
nosympathy said:
I am currently at 8.5 hours with 79% left on my battery. Stock Battery. If I didn't have to work tomorrow, and be able to make phone calls and such I'd leave my phone unplugged all night to see how long it can go.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm assuming thats with Virus Rom as it says in your sig? If so, that makes me want to try it. I'm stock unrooted right now, haven't had time to invest in rooting the ADB original method yet, don't want to rush through it. When I do, I fully intend to try that rom out.

Battery on Bamf 1.8 stripped

So, I just flashed this ROM yesterday.
Full charge over night took phone off charger around 7ish this morning. Did a quick 30 minute run/walk workout w/the Cardio Trainer recording (tracking w/GPS), all while listening to the FM radio. I have had two phone calls totaling about about 7.5 minutes. Maybe 35 text messages in and out. I'm in a strong 4G area, I do not have my phone set to automatically get email. I just turned off the facebook hourly update, just noticed I hadn't done that yet ..... my phone is already barking at me that I need to plug it in.
With the exception of my run and listening to the radio this morning I really haven't done much .... I downloaded a couple of apps and tweaked them, but seriously 3.5 hours of battery before it's telling me less than 10%.
Any suggestions?
I did not clear the battery stats, in my past experiences that really didn't do anything to help (but that was w/the Eris).
I'd love to have GREAT battery life that everybody talks about. Anybody using this ROM have stupendous battery time? Not sure what has sucked the life out of this.
Thanks
I'd say it's the GPS that killed you.
same thing for me on bamf gb 2.1. i was at 20% after 5 hours of use
migueltherocker said:
I'd say it's the GPS that killed you.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
IDK about that, I've gone out for the same 30 minute walk/run w/the battery on yellow (on stock rooted) and the radio going and it hasn't killed it. I think maybe it's part of it, but IDK it's all of it.
I've put the phone on strict 3G, going to totally KILL it tonite and turn it off while charging.
Have you tried recalibrating your battery since installing Bamf 1.8 stripped? Maybe it's not a problem with the ROM, but with the battery calibration.
Sometime at night shutdown your phone and then hold volume down and power to boot up HTC's nice bright white bootloader. Leave it alone until it dies (the phone cannot die properly while running Android, since Android will shutdown the phone when it thinks the battery is low, rather than when the battery IS ACTUALLY low). Plug in the power cord after it dies, but leave the phone turned off. It should take a few minutes for the orange light to turn on because it's so dead. Leave it alone until the green light is showing in the morning. Then start it up. This will get the proper 0% and 100% points for your battery stats. Also check what apps are killing your battery. I was having a problem with Google Maps for a while until I cleared data on it.
I have a similar problem. I will take it off the charger and after a few minutes it will be down around 97%. No big deal. I will set it down and walk away for at most 15-20 minutes and come back and it will be on like 80%.
After that though the battery life stabilizes and I get 12+ hours with moderate use
Running AOSP CM7. I have had my phone off charge since sometime around 6 am ET this morning and at 50% now at 11 pm. This has kept me kept me from getting an extended battery. You should try it.
Sent from my ThunderBolt using XDA Premium App
lu270bro said:
Running AOSP CM7. I have had my phone off charge since sometime around 6 am ET this morning and at 50% now at 11 pm. This has kept me kept me from getting an extended battery. You should try it.
Sent from my ThunderBolt using XDA Premium App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
How is the stability on this? Is it good enough for a daily ROM? (not that it's not "good", I know their work rocks) - I don't know if I want a "testing" phase ROM. Hope that makes sense?
chimpsnest said:
How is the stability on this? Is it good enough for a daily ROM? (not that it's not "good", I know their work rocks) - I don't know if I want a "testing" phase ROM. Hope that makes sense?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
3g to 4g handoff is the main complaint I hear, but I'm not in 4g area. Have driven through a 4g area and it seemed fine to me. Put it this way, this has been my daily driver for over a month now. And GPS gets near instant lock btw. I don't want to hijack the thread so I will just say that I NEED my phone to work and if too many bugs were present I wouldn't be running it.
Sent from my ThunderBolt using XDA Premium App
lu270bro said:
Running AOSP CM7. I have had my phone off charge since sometime around 6 am ET this morning and at 50% now at 11 pm. This has kept me kept me from getting an extended battery. You should try it.
Sent from my ThunderBolt using XDA Premium App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Your display is only at 5% of total usage... You hardly used your phone. Of course its going to last for 16 hours when it just sits there
athorax said:
Your display is only at 5% of total usage... You hardly used your phone. Of course its going to last for 16 hours when it just sits there
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I get awesome battery life on BAMF Remix 1.8, 20-24 hrs with normal to excessive usage. I get about half that with BAMF GingerRemix. You can see I actually use my phone, lol.
johnkc1975 said:
I get awesome battery life on BAMF Remix 1.8, 20-24 hrs with normal to excessive usage. I get about half that with BAMF GingerRemix. You can see I actually use my phone, lol.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
tell me your secrets
i just flashed 1.8 remix i get like 9-10hrs of battery with little to medium use
as ive said i must of lucked out with a solid battery as ive never had the horrid battery life most claim on the net. even with 4g on all the time i get well over 10-12hrs with medium/heavy usage.
a suggestion for a solid kernel is the 3.3.7 lean kernel, don't overclock too high either. i think that's why alot of people have the crap battery life and random reboots.
if you live in an area that doesn't get good 4g coverage id switch to 3g only mode if i were you.
lu270bro said:
3g to 4g handoff is the main complaint I hear, but I'm not in 4g area. Have driven through a 4g area and it seemed fine to me. Put it this way, this has been my daily driver for over a month now. And GPS gets near instant lock btw. I don't want to hijack the thread so I will just say that I NEED my phone to work and if too many bugs were present I wouldn't be running it.
Sent from my ThunderBolt using XDA Premium App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
appreciate the info, don't think you're hijacking at all
I've totally turned off my 4G (even though my home area is FULL 4G) and my battery life seems to have improved. I still have to do the recalibration thing, I keep forgetting.
How is the lean kernel with 1.8 stripped? Any compatibility issues?
kpfury said:
How is the lean kernel with 1.8 stripped? Any compatibility issues?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
ditto I would like to know this as well.
- is this different than what is included in the bamf toolkit?
im using bamf 1.6 and i get 20-24 hours batt life
brightness always on 25%, unless outside then i bump it up and then turn it down when im done. lower than 25% at night when the lights are out and im just watching tv
background data and auto sync both off
moblie data off
use wifi whenever possible
switch to 3g only when youre not in a 4g area and you need to use the internet
chimpsnest said:
With the exception of my run and listening to the radio this morning I really haven't done much .... I downloaded a couple of apps and tweaked them, but seriously 3.5 hours of battery before it's telling me less than 10%.
Any suggestions?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I get incredible good battery life with the Das BAMF 1.8.6 NTE so I would expect the same out of Stripped. I would consider another kernel, I am very happy with utkanos http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1025199 Are you on MR2's radio or MR2.5? 2.5 seems to do much better with GPS.
chimpsnest said:
So, I just flashed this ROM yesterday.
Full charge over night took phone off charger around 7ish this morning. Did a quick 30 minute run/walk workout w/the Cardio Trainer recording (tracking w/GPS), all while listening to the FM radio. I have had two phone calls totaling about about 7.5 minutes. Maybe 35 text messages in and out. I'm in a strong 4G area, I do not have my phone set to automatically get email. I just turned off the facebook hourly update, just noticed I hadn't done that yet ..... my phone is already barking at me that I need to plug it in.
With the exception of my run and listening to the radio this morning I really haven't done much .... I downloaded a couple of apps and tweaked them, but seriously 3.5 hours of battery before it's telling me less than 10%.
Any suggestions?
I did not clear the battery stats, in my past experiences that really didn't do anything to help (but that was w/the Eris).
I'd love to have GREAT battery life that everybody talks about. Anybody using this ROM have stupendous battery time? Not sure what has sucked the life out of this.
Thanks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What is using up your battery because if it is the Cell Standby or Phone idle I have a fix for you. I had always had great battery life until last week when it started draining as you describe in your post. I tried everything to get back to where I was but was not successful. I ended up pulling out the 4G card and reinserting it. I was instructed to do this by a Verizon tech. I though he was wasting my time but it fixed my battery issue and I am getting great battery life on BAMF 2.1 and also BAMF 1.86
mzimand said:
What is using up your battery because if it is the Cell Standby or Phone idle I have a fix for you. I had always had great battery life until last week when it started draining as you describe in your post. I tried everything to get back to where I was but was not successful. I ended up pulling out the 4G card and reinserting it. I was instructed to do this by a Verizon tech. I though he was wasting my time but it fixed my battery issue and I am getting great battery life on BAMF 2.1 and also BAMF 1.86
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's interesting, I wonder what that would do and why it would work? These phones do like to keep us on our toes, eh?
I've made the switch to CM as of yesterday so I'll be playing around w/that for a while.

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