San Francisco - Battery drains VERY fast

[Guest glossywhite]

I charged my San Francisco for 8 hours last night - had the wi-fi on for about 20 mins today, and was surfing via 3G for about 20 mins... and the battery is about to die! Yellow battery icon! Also, the back is very slightly warm (not hot).

I blame the r3 ROM. Can anyone else confirm fast battery drain, as I find the batt life pathetic, right now.

Edited October 16, 2010 by glossywhite

[Guest glossywhite]

I'm sorry, but no matter what anyone says, the people who manufactured and designed the blade, ZTE, are the best qualified people to fine tune and optimise the finer details of the Android operating system for their handset. We're talking of a multi-million (maybe billion?) pound company with research labs and proper test equipment, together with highly skilled coders and engineers - what makes us think that a few people tinkering on their home computers, can make the phone perform better than it does straight from the factory?

I don't want bits added and subtracted and things modded, left out, still in Beta etc etc... I want my blade to WORK, and not die after five hours standby time!

Nice try with the ROMs, but I really don't think it makes THAT much of a difference... does it? If anyone can convince me of a reason why the MCR rom is "better" (apart from rooting), I'll eat my head.

[Guest finbaar]

I'm sorry, but no matter what anyone says, the people who manufactured and designed the blade, ZTE, are the best qualified people to fine tune and optimise the finer details of the Android operating system for their handset. We're talking of a multi-million (maybe billion?) pound company with research labs and proper test equipment, together with highly skilled coders and engineers - what makes us think that a few people tinkering on their home computers, can make the phone perform better than it does straight from the factory?

I don't want bits added and subtracted and things modded, left out, still in Beta etc etc... I want my blade to WORK, and not die after five hours standby time!

Nice try with the ROMs, but I really don't think it makes THAT much of a difference... does it? If anyone can convince me of a reason why the MCR rom is "better" (apart from rooting), I'll eat my head.

Fair enough mate but all the rom seems to be doing is removing the orange crap (for me anyway) - something that I'm sure ZTE did not spend billions designing. My battery took a few charges to settle in and now with bluetooth off it lasts a fair bit. In fact I was wanting it to run out the other day and it took ages to run out from 20%.

[Guest glossywhite]

Fair enough mate but all the rom seems to be doing is removing the orange crap (for me anyway) - something that I'm sure ZTE did not spend billions designing. My battery took a few charges to settle in and now with bluetooth off it lasts a fair bit. In fact I was wanting it to run out the other day and it took ages to run out from 20%.

I don't recall having said that ZTE spent billions on the Blade...

[Guest Simon O]

I'm sorry, but no matter what anyone says, the people who manufactured and designed the blade, ZTE, are the best qualified people to fine tune and optimise the finer details of the Android operating system for their handset. We're talking of a multi-million (maybe billion?) pound company with research labs and proper test equipment, together with highly skilled coders and engineers - what makes us think that a few people tinkering on their home computers, can make the phone perform better than it does straight from the factory?

I don't want bits added and subtracted and things modded, left out, still in Beta etc etc... I want my blade to WORK, and not die after five hours standby time!

Nice try with the ROMs, but I really don't think it makes THAT much of a difference... does it? If anyone can convince me of a reason why the MCR rom is "better" (apart from rooting), I'll eat my head.

There are thousands of Android users around the world that will not agree with your statements and, as a rom developer myself, I find your statement about "a few people tinkering on their home computers" incredibly insulting.

If you didn't bother posting your rant then people would have helped you. But I'd be surprised if anybody bothers now tbh.

[Guest PabUK]

Depending on what you do with it, the battery of the San Francisco can drain very quickly. It is nothing to do with the ROM, but just how the device is. For what it's worth, I just got a full 5 days out of R3 with 15% battery still remaining, and the last time I tested from that point I still had a day left. Granted, I didn't use it much during this time and I've had far less under heavier use, but that was the case with the stock ROM also.

[Guest paddymcn]

There is already a 3 page thread on this subject, battery drain I mean not tinkering :)

http://android.modaco.com/content/zte-blad...ning-down-fast/

[Guest androidswillkillusall]

new to android, I've not done any flashing/rooting to the phone. And I can report that the battery life is ridiculous. I dont know how PabUK got 5 days out of it, I struggle to get 10 hours without much use, or wifi/gps/3g turned on.

im calling Orange tomorrow to arrange for a return/exchange.

[Guest androidswillkillusall]

new to android, I've not done any flashing/rooting to the phone. And I can report that the battery life is ridiculous. I dont know how PabUK got 5 days out of it, I struggle to get 10 hours without much use, or wifi/gps/3g turned on.

im calling Orange tomorrow to arrange for a return/exchange.

[Guest glossywhite]

There are thousands of Android users around the world that will not agree with your statements and, as a rom developer myself, I find your statement about "a few people tinkering on their home computers" incredibly insulting.

If you didn't bother posting your rant then people would have helped you. But I'd be surprised if anybody bothers now tbh.

That wasn't a rant - it's the way it is. To be perfectly honest, I am not AFTER help. I have the right to my opinion, and you have the right to yours; they differ, end of. I am simply stating that I am unimpressed with the ROM performance - whether or not you agree with me, you may call yourself a "developer", but at the end of the day, you are just a hobbyist, tinkering on a PC - nothing more or less, and I seriously doubt you get paid for it. That is not meant to be offensive - if you take it as "incredibly insulting", then that is for you to overcome.

Don't underestimate the moniker of "hobbyist" - if you think that a hobby is an insulting name for what many millions of people do in open source, then maybe it is YOU who are insulting MANY people. A massive collection of tinkerers, is what has made GNU/Linux what it is today! :)

Edited October 16, 2010 by glossywhite

[Guest Aquilo]

I'm sorry, but no matter what anyone says, the people who manufactured and designed the blade, ZTE, are the best qualified people to fine tune and optimise the finer details of the Android operating system for their handset. We're talking of a multi-million (maybe billion?) pound company with research labs and proper test equipment, together with highly skilled coders and engineers - what makes us think that a few people tinkering on their home computers, can make the phone perform better than it does straight from the factory?

I don't want bits added and subtracted and things modded, left out, still in Beta etc etc... I want my blade to WORK, and not die after five hours standby time!

Nice try with the ROMs, but I really don't think it makes THAT much of a difference... does it? If anyone can convince me of a reason why the MCR rom is "better" (apart from rooting), I'll eat my head.

I respectfully disagree. ZTE have demonstrated that they aren't even capable of supplying the kernel source tree (as required by the Linux Kernel GPL licence). Google or Qualcomm would also be quite capable of optimising some of the finer details of this handset. On the note of the 'few people' - the majority of those churning out code and ROMs for Android devices are professional software engineers, or in associated professions. The use of their 'home computers' in no way detracts from their capabilities, talent or experience. I agree with flibblesan, in that the way you have framed this particular opinion is rather insulting.

Concerning the capabilities of modified ROMs, we're currently hamstrung by the multi-million pound ZTE's inability to meet the requirements of the GPL, so the difference currently will be significantly smaller than it will be once a working kernel source is available. That said, I find the MCR ROM to be a pleasure to use, and do not appear to suffer your battery life problems. By removing parts of the Orange pre-installed application suite, you'll notice that you gain more internal storage space, as well as a less cluttered and far less garish design.

[Guest glossywhite]

</caring>

[Guest tgomas]

I am staying stock until we get some choice with the roms, waiting for FLBlade mod!!!!!!!!

Edited October 16, 2010 by tgomas

[Guest Andysan]

There are thousands of Android users around the world that will not agree with your statements and, as a rom developer myself, I find your statement about "a few people tinkering on their home computers" incredibly insulting.

If you didn't bother posting your rant then people would have helped you. But I'd be surprised if anybody bothers now tbh.

Good call, open source movement has proved through the Apache Project amongst many other successful community driven movements that FOSS works and is here to stay. We should be thanking these people and not insulting them, even if they release software that hasnt been fully tested - thats simply how open source works. Dont like it, dont use bleeding edge releases.

[Guest finbaar]

the sf is a 99 quid phone - a very nice 99 quid phone, but cheap all the same. yes the battery can drop quickly but honestly with bluetooth of it is not sooo bad. i would like a spare battery and i am sure these will be available soon.

glossywhite - yes you are allowed your opinion, very nice for you too i'm sure. and my opinion is that you should go and procreate your good self.

[Guest Rem1x]

I'm on 1day 10hrs since last time it was unplugged, with an up time of 60hrs.

:)

[Guest androidswillkillusall]

my battery drains about 12% in 11 hours overnight in standby. Nothing on except wifi/gps intermittantly.. i used Battery Graph to track...

when i start using it the morning (reply to pingchats) it drops 10% in 20 mins..

is this normal?

[Guest mELIANTE]

I'm satisfied with my SanFran battery life. I've made some calls, used Wi-Fi and sent some SMSs and the last time I charged it was 36+ hours ago and still have 14%. Using sebastian404's rom.

I still expect battery lif to improve after the battery breaks in completely in a few charge cycles.

All in all, I was expecting much less from the phone, with everything I read on the "interwebs" about it and Android, but I really am liking it, it feels better than my previous phone (Nokia 5800).

Granted, when I use the phone the battery drops significantly, but still appears to manage to give me a good battery life.

And about ZTE's engeneering knowing how to tune the phone better, what a crock.

Edited October 17, 2010 by mELIANTE

[Guest libretteer]

I charged my San Francisco for 8 hours last night - had the wi-fi on for about 20 mins today, and was surfing via 3G for about 20 mins... and the battery is about to die! Yellow battery icon! Also, the back is very slightly warm (not hot).

I blame the r3 ROM. Can anyone else confirm fast battery drain, as I find the batt life pathetic, right now.

Having made that assertion (and in your next post, directly insulted the people who have put their own time into those ROMs for the benefit of the rest of us) I hope you will report back when you have done a comparison with the stock ROM.

In fact, I'll go further. I presume you have now reverted to the stock ROM on your phone rather than have it crippled any longer by Paul's amateurish efforts? Do a test using the phone in exactly the same way as previously (same WiFi/3G settings, same amount of time in active use, number of calls etc.) and if you don't see a substantial increase in battery life (I would expect to see some increase, as the phone is still quite new and it takes a few full charge/discharge cycles to reach full capacity), take back what you said and make a donation to the site as a goodwill gesture. OK?

Edited October 17, 2010 by libretteer

[Guest Andysan]

Battery life is down to a lot of things - for a start a smartphone is just that, a smartphone. YOu cant expect to have 3G, WiFi in a slim profile and then moan when the battery runs flat. Play it smart:

* Set the screen to auto brightness.

* Set the screen timeout low.

* Turn off all unnecessary services.

etc...

[Guest Sere83]

I am experiencing the exact same issue as the original poster of this thread. I charge the phone fully, within 1/ and a half or 2hrs on standby/idle it has dropped 1 bar. The back also gets slightly warm over wifi/3g.

Then I do very little, maybe 4/5 short phone calls, 20 minutes web over 3G, send a few texts, rest of the time standby and it's dead by about 5/6 O clock. Total time off charge 10-11hrs.

Surely this cannot be correct?

I am using Paul's R3. No direspect to Paul or any of the other guys here on the forum because everyone has been of great help, I really appreciate the effort and the R3 has really enhanced this phone. However I really think this may well be an issue with the R3 on certain San Francisco's as a few people have this problem.

Some people in the other thread are also recording standby times of over 18 hrs, even days. I am getting 10-11 hrs max including light use. I can't even turn sync on or it goes even faster. Mu screen brightness is low, wifi, bluetooth off most of the time as well.

[Guest coupedummy]

My battery was draining quite quickly also.Yesterday night around 11.30 i switched 3g and data roaming off.(wifi all always set to off as it drains even quicker.

Screen brightness on high still. Standard wall paper. I switched all these off when the battery was at 18 percent. At this moment after making two 5 mins phone calls this morning and changing background wallpaper the battery now is at 15 percent.Data roaming obviously kills the battery alot quicker than people think.

Im am using seb r4 rom.

[Guest con500]

My battery was draining quite quickly also.Yesterday night around 11.30 i switched 3g and data roaming off.(wifi all always set to off as it drains even quicker.

Screen brightness on high still. Standard wall paper. I switched all these off when the battery was at 18 percent. At this moment after making two 5 mins phone calls this morning and changing background wallpaper the battery now is at 15 percent.Data roaming obviously kills the battery alot quicker than people think.

Im am using seb r4 rom.

Ye turning off Data services deffinatly extends my battery life almost drawing to a halt if left on stanby.

I just made a 45 minute phone call with data switched off & the battery dropped by 1%.....Before this' a ten minute phonecall (with data ON) resulted in 11% drain, So im reckoning the 3G/GPRS is the main culprit on my SF

[Guest meinnit]

I'm sorry, but no matter what anyone says, the people who manufactured and designed the blade, ZTE, are the best qualified people to fine tune and optimise the finer details of the Android operating system for their handset.

HAHA you obviously didn't own a Pulse!

[Guest dav_dako]

Unless I'm mistaking (every chance I am) the later roms have the GPU enabled - I'm guessing there was a reason that it was disabled in the first place?