Battery Life on the Droid

[pstellato73]

I am new to android so maybe this is normal. I have just received the original Droid from a friend. It's a like new replacement from Verizon. Brand new from the box it came in. I'm not sure about the batter, probably was the original.

So, I have had it since Tuesday (3 days ago). The first night I charged it up full. I had turned the display down as far as it could go and no live wallpaper. I am using 1 Exchange e-mail account and 2 gmails accounts.

The next morning I took it off the charger at 7:30am. By noon I was down to 40% battery. Didn't use it all that much, no phone calls, just internet and data (e-mails primarily).

Is this normal for this phone? I am trying to figure out if this is a battery issue or an android issue. I can get a new battery, no problem, but its frustrating not being able to get thru 5pm as I am not always near a power source.

Any ideas? Thank in advance.

 

[Dave0373]

How often do you have apps sync'ing? My battery will last 48 hours if I'm not on it much. 24 hours on days with heavy use.

 

[pstellato73]

I have my exchange account sync automatically, so I guess push. Gmail is instant. My other 2 accounts are every 15 minutes. My. Exchange also syncs contacts and calendar. Gianna there something else that may be draining. I also have LPP and a beautiful. Widget. I think the battery may be shot but I am really not sure.

 

[Ratchet]

Sounds like there are some apps running in the background that don't need to be.

I have my D1 checking several email accounts every 15 min, weather widget (with location tracking), facebook sync, and several other apps that are GPS dependent. After 12 hrs to normal usage, I still have ~60% battery.

 

[pstellato73]

Well, today was my best day. 12 hours up and 20% battery left. still unacceptable. i ordered a new battery, just in case that is it. I am running some stuff in the background.

-lookout
-google voice
-vlingo
-simple calendar widget-update service
-simple service battery status
-weather channel-weather service
-android central alert service
-ringGuard (new)
-google messaging service
-facebook
-tweedeck
-auto app organizer (new)

I don't think any of these are real battery hogs, but I could be wrong.

 

[Sploinkin]

Do you use a live wallpaper? How long is your screen timeout?

At the end of the day, check your battery usage and see what has used the battery most. Settings>About phone>Battery use

 

[milominderbinde]

The Getting Started with Android - Tips and Tricks section on Battery Life Tips and Tricks has a step-by-step guide to finding out what is taking your battery. Many with the Droid do better than 12 hours. Looking at you list of apps, I am already thinking about the widgets and social networking syncing.

Basically take stuff off and keep adding it back until your find your villians. But ther are a lot of other things that are not obvious.

 

[GenericMessage]

Also remember the Droid has a notoriously bad battery life.

My Droid on a good day would last for maybe 6 hours of heavy use.

My D2 will last past 14

And my X will sit around 10.

Those are nearly double my Droid's numbers.

Keep in mind, you have a laptops worth of power running on a watch battery.

Don't be surprised to have bad battery life compared to your original dumb phones

 

[Jared DiPane]

Keep in mind everytime you have email pulling, it is draining your battery. So that is every 15 minutes it is pulling that is decreasing your battery. The same will go for your Twitter and Facebook applications.

I would suggest rooting your device and flashing a different kernel and rom combination to it as well. I can get 18+ hours on rather heavy use before I am at 20%, which gets me through the whole day.

Personally I am running the D1-MIUI Rom with Slayers 1GHz kernel.