Battery Life

[Guest]

The Battery life on my Hero is pretty appalling, to the point where I think perhaps the battery is in some way broken. I expect to get about 12 hours out of a full charge, I've realised. Recently I've been working from home and obviously the festive period meant that I've been indoors too, only going out for a evenings with friends, etc, not really full days so it hasn't been a problem and as such I think it may have crept up on me how my battery appears to have deteriorated. I do also use my phone A LOT. Mainly to look at the internet, etc. I'll regularly use it look up stuff, anything, when talking to people about something or even just browse the net while in bed. It could be just that the phone's getting used a lot and that's that. However, I've noticed since getting the HTC battery widget that the phone will drop sometimes 5% of battery life in as many minutes while doing next to nothing. As such I thought I'd compare, if possible with you guys and see if you thought what I was getting was unreasonable.

I'm wondering if others have a similar set up to me and are experiencing much better battery life. In terms of what's running on my phone these are the widgets I've got on my homescreens:

2 x London Tube Status

Music (small, if it makes a difference)

Last.FM

Flip Clock and Weather (HTC)

BBC News x 2

Battery (HTC)

Babbler

Bookmarks

If I hit Taskiller and see what's open right now these are the things that are open:

SU

Autostarts

Babbler

Browser

Last.fm

settings

Handcent SMS

London Tube Status

Music

BBC News

On my ignore list I've got

Home

HTC Sense (TWICE)

Clock (TWICE)

Touch Input (TWICE)

WiFi Status

Google Mail

Calendar

I'm not sure why those things are listed twice.

Similarly, Autostarts has mentions of Messages twice and Handcent SMS twice but not the things listed twice in Taskiller.

If I look at the usage time in Spare Parts nothing seems untoward. Also it says the battery health is good and that it's scale is 100.

I'm going to turn it off and on now and check it's awake time after leaving it alone for a few hours.

[Guest IZIIZI]

anything which uses the internet constantly to check for updates will drain your battery

[Guest]

anything which uses the internet constantly to check for updates will drain your battery

Yeah, cheers, I've set the updates to be less frequent where I can and I've been using the BBC News ones forever so I'm not sure what else I can do.

I guess I'll probably have to remove everything, one by one until I find the culprit. Yawn.

[Guest]

Well, it was a simple answer but it looks like it was the right one, I've had it on with Data off for a couple of hours and the battery hasn't moved from 30%

[Guest ptruman]

Well, it was a simple answer but it looks like it was the right one, I've had it on with Data off for a couple of hours and the battery hasn't moved from 30%

Erm, have you looked at the specs?

http://www.htc.com/uk/product/hero/specification.html

Talktime : Up to 470 minutes for GSM

That's 7.8 hours, using ONLY the GSM radio to talk, presumably with screen off during conversation. Heavy (i.e. constant) 3G usage will see your phone dead within 5 hours, I've killed mine in 4.

Try running GPS, CoPilot 8 & BT streaming audio (to my car) - I can flat the battery in 30 minutes that way.

"Periodic" (i.e. 5 mins every 30/45 mins or so) of use should see you through a day, especially if you don't enable WiFi (which will also cripple your battery)....

(oh, and things will be on your ignore list twice as there are two parts to some apps - the app and the com.X.Y but - ShopSavvy is a prime example with com.biggu.shop......)

Also, ensure you have gone Settings> Wireless Controls > Mobile Network Settings and DISABLE "Enable Always-On Mobile" - that alone will save a LOT of power.

Edited January 9, 2010 by ptruman

[Guest]

Ah right, cheers.

I'll not be turning the 3g off just yet, online stuff is one of the things I wanted the phone for. Guess I'll just try and set the update frequency to minimal levels where possible, carry a charger when out and use the data widget when necessary.

Thanks again though. :)

[Guest Asfaloth]

You can also kill all applications that are still running before you go to bed for example.

Then the applications cannot use CPU/network/... and they aren't draining the battery.

For example: Last night i charged my hero. Copilot Live was still running in the background.

Just after ~12hours my battery was at 60%. Normally my Hero's running a day with 10-20% battery usage, even when i browse the web or play some games.

Check out the app "spare parts", this tool will show you which apps are using CPU/networt/... so you can quickly find out what programm drains your battery :)

[Guest ptruman]

Ah right, cheers.

I'll not be turning the 3g off just yet, online stuff is one of the things I wanted the phone for. Guess I'll just try and set the update frequency to minimal levels where possible, carry a charger when out and use the data widget when necessary.

Thanks again though. :)

You don't turn off 3G with that option, it just means it's only used when necessary, rather than "always on" as the name implies - thus your radio is quieter, thus your battery stays alive longer.

Try it. You won't notice any difference, other than a longer lifespan.

[Guest ratcom]

try a day without the bbc news widget, I used to use a bbc news widget which killed my battery big time. Trust me try it without for 24 hours :)

[Guest ptruman]

On a side note, use Spare Parts, Battery History, and change CPU Usage to "Partial Wake Usage".

If you have anything with a big blue line in there, it's not letting the phone sleep, which will kill the battery.

This also shows under Settings, About, Information - at the end are two times - one is "uptime" (since boot), the other is "awake time" - which should be less than uptime...if they match (or are very close) your phone isn't sleeping...

Edited January 9, 2010 by ptruman

[Guest]

You don't turn off 3G with that option, it just means it's only used when necessary, rather than "always on" as the name implies - thus your radio is quieter, thus your battery stays alive longer.

Try it. You won't notice any difference, other than a longer lifespan.

Oh right, I presumed it meant that 3g would only connect if the screen was on. I'll give it a go, thanks.

try a day without the bbc news widget, I used to use a bbc news widget which killed my battery big time. Trust me try it without for 24 hours :)

Bugger, I thought it might be that. I might email the developer and ask him to give an update frequency option. Cheers!

[Guest ptruman]

Oh right, I presumed it meant that 3g would only connect if the screen was on. I'll give it a go, thanks.

Nope, the phone/radio will do whatever the s/w demands - if the s/w doesn't respect "sleep", then the phone won't "sleep" and you lose battery. WaveSecure did this (quite badly) around version 3.0.0.0 IIRC.

Bugger, I thought it might be that. I might email the developer and ask him to give an update frequency option. Cheers!

Check the Spare Parts like I said - you can see if any app is forcing the phone to do stuff when it's supposed to be sleeping. If it doesn't show up, it's not the culprit.

[Guest]

Nope, the phone/radio will do whatever the s/w demands - if the s/w doesn't respect "sleep", then the phone won't "sleep" and you lose battery. WaveSecure did this (quite badly) around version 3.0.0.0 IIRC.

Check the Spare Parts like I said - you can see if any app is forcing the phone to do stuff when it's supposed to be sleeping. If it doesn't show up, it's not the culprit.

I just checked and it turns out I already had Always-On Mobile Network disabled. :)

My top 5 right now on Spare parts are Browser (by some margin), Android System, Twidroid, Sense and Camera. I'll check it out once the phone's been on for a while. Perhaps it is just my relentless use of the phone!

Thankyou, and everyone else, for your posts.

[Guest sik_gerar]

did you check the time your battery was lasting in the beginning of this "life enhancing therapy" till now?

[Guest ptruman]

I just checked and it turns out I already had Always-On Mobile Network disabled. B)

My top 5 right now on Spare parts are Browser (by some margin), Android System, Twidroid, Sense and Camera. I'll check it out once the phone's been on for a while. Perhaps it is just my relentless use of the phone!

Thankyou, and everyone else, for your posts.

Are you checking "Partial Wake Usage" and not CPU Usage....it's the Partial Wake you need to check to find out if the phone isn't sleeping....I'd *expect* to see Camera/Rosie etc in the CPU usage screen, not partial wake :)