Battery life thread

[aweber1nj]

The 4g eats the battery. I compared 2 days with same use and activity. 1st day w/4g the 2nd day 3g. Unplugged phone from charger at 5am both days. By 9pm on 1st day only 20% left. By 10:30 pm on 2nd day 50% left. No other changes

Really good test, dude. Thanks for the info.

 

[tspeice87]

The only smart action I use is to disable cellular data and enable Wifi when I'm at home. I don't want my phone not connected to the internet when the screen is off, that seems useless to me (no offense). So far, so good. My 2nd FULL charge since the day I got it, and I'm at 60% left after 22 hours.

60% after 22 hours!!!!! I'm at 60% after 3 and a half hours.

I set up the Battery Extender smart action to turn GPS off and disable background sync when the screen is off and when there is no movement. This has not interfered with incoming text messages. I'm still not very happy with this battery life but it seems marginally better than before. I have no widgets, sync my e-mail when I want, no wi-fi, no bluetooth, no GPS but am running 4G at all times. Being that I came from the OG droid, is this what I should expect as far as battery life goes?

I brought this up in a previous post but never saw much response. Is it possible for the battery to gain life as it gets "worked in" or used and recharged? It seems to be slightly better each day but still not acceptable in my opinion.

 

[aweber1nj]

I brought this up in a previous post but never saw much response. Is it possible for the battery to gain life as it gets "worked in" or used and recharged? It seems to be slightly better each day but still not acceptable in my opinion.

I responded to this (maybe in this thread or another). I was told that the newer batteries DO break-in a bit and increase performance over the first week or so. I do not have any scientific proof of that, but it brings hope, right?

 

[DJJeffT]

Slight clarification: Any android smartphone phone. I remember crackberries going days with all that enabled and moderate usage (not 4g, granted -- wasn't around then).

Otherwise, I totally agree.

DX ran/runs like a champ with all kinds of battery left under the same terms. BT on, WIFI, on, GPS on...obviously it's not 4G.

Android OS is eating most of the battery, not BT/WIFI or GPS.

It's Android OS, then display, which I have set for 0%.

Why have a phone with all these features if you have to cripple it. UGH.

 

[tspeice87]

I responded to this (maybe in this thread or another). I was told that the newer batteries DO break-in a bit and increase performance over the first week or so. I do not have any scientific proof of that, but it brings hope, right?

Thanks for the optimistic outlook. I'm running Pandora all day long while at work (only way I can get through the day) until it completely runs out of juice and shuts down. Then I'll give it a full recharge and hope for a couple extra hours of battery life.

Current Battery Usage over 4H 16M
Display 24%
Mediaserver 24%
Pandora 19%
Android OS 17%

I'm currently at 50%

 

[bkircher]

Im getting about 16-22 hours of use on a single charge. Light to moderate usage with syncing on during the day. Display is at automatic brightness during the day.
Smart action profiles:
Home
Battery extender - kicks in and turns syncing, wifi, gps off after no movement for a few min
Night time battery saver - starts at 12am i think
low battery extender.

Still wondering why my display usage is only at 14% and the droid software is at 28% of my total usage.

 

[Skyline315]

My OS % is hovering between 40-50%. It's hard for me to be concerned, though, since I'm getting excellent battery life. I've had it off the charger for 6.5 hours now and I'm still at 80%.

Light use...mainly just checking Facebook and Twitter throughout the day.

GPS off
Wi-Fi off
4G enabled
Using Battery extender to shut down GPS, background sync, and cellular data when the phone is not in use.
Also disabling cellular data when I'm on my home wi-fi network.

One question I do have: I have wi-fi disabled at work, but everytime I launch the twitter app it tries to foce wi-fi to come on. It doesn't work since I have it disabled, and then I have to launch twitter again before it comes up. Any ideas on this?

Thanks!

 

[IncrediBry]

I’m had a mixed experience with the battery and would like to share :

On the first day with everything on and automatic brightness I received 12 HRS of battery life, which I was actually pleased with.

Today I set my 4G off and the display brightness down to 0%.

So far I’m 6.5 Hours into the day and at 70% charge with light usage

Majority breakout is at follows

29% Voice calls ( 13 mins )
24% Display ( 1 hour 5 mins )
22% Android OS ( 19 mins )

Does it seems strange that the biggest discharger of my battery is only 13 mins of voice calls?

Aren’t we supposed to have 12.5 hours of talk time on the battery??? There’s no way I would get any where close to half of that based on the breakout above.

It makes me wonder if there is something wrong with my radio?

 

[milkshed27]

I have a question for those that have high Android OS %s. Are you using Smart Actions to turn off background sync when the screen shuts off?

What might be happening is that emails, contacts, or whatever is checked in the sync settings that require background sync active, are re-syncing every time you turn the display back on.

 

[Skyline315]

I have a question for those that have high Android OS %s. Are you using Smart Actions to turn off background sync when the screen shuts off?

What might be happening is that emails, contacts, or whatever is checked in the sync settings that require background sync active, are re-syncing every time you turn the display back on.

Yes, I do have that smart action option turned on.

So, you believe it's a trade-off, then? Better battery life, but higher percentage consumed by the OS?

 

[aweber1nj]

There are a lot of possibilities. I think a lot of "stuff" could be encompassed by the "Android OS" entry. We need something more granular. Some kind of "top" command that we could run that might give us better insight as to what is going on.

I am on the side of NOT disabling all data options at any time (except "critical battery level"). I think that many apps could check for updates or try and fetch data at various times. It could cause problems.

I think I agree with the idea that if you can setup an action that when you are connected to WiFi, you can turn off "Mobile Data" (and vice-versa: when you disconnect from WiFi, you should re-enable Mobile Data). This lets only one radio work for your data needs, which is enough.

Still too early to tell exactly what's going on, I think. But I love that everyone is cooperating and providing feedback.

 

[rickc1015]

My Android OS is the highest battery killer at about 45%.

I need background data enabled for my exchange e-mail push notification to work.

BTW, overnight 8-9 hours drops only 20%, waking hours lucky to get 8 hours with moderate use before it dies.

 

[dontlookatme]

So far today my first day of use is ok. Only had to charge it once throughout the day. And that is with medium to heavy usage. From a scale of 1-10 1 being low usage and 10 being heavy. While on tbolt i was a 8-10. Today i was a 7. And only charged it once cus it went down to 30%

Sent from my DROID RAZR using Tapatalk

 

[Rich Coralli]

WIth use for lots of phone calls, mild web surfing, lots of texts all on 4G I got 8 hours and 30 mts and the chage was down to 30%, Recharged it then. Above average for me.

 

[Agpe17]

Yes, I do have that smart action option turned on.

So, you believe it's a trade-off, then? Better battery life, but higher percentage consumed by the OS?

Background data includes phone calls/texts? Or no?

Also, what if you "wake" the device just to see the time? Will background data resume for 1 second? Or do you need to UNLOCK the device?

Debating doing this for work...

 

[dmcman73]

One question I do have: I have wi-fi disabled at work, but everytime I launch the twitter app it tries to foce wi-fi to come on. It doesn't work since I have it disabled, and then I have to launch twitter again before it comes up. Any ideas on this?

Thanks!

When this happens, check to see if your 3G/4G symbol in your notification area is white or blue. If it's white, it's connected to the network but no data is coming through and this would be the reason why it's trying to force WiFi. If it's blue then there should be no reason why it's forcing WiFi. Do you have your Data connection set to sleep or turn off until something needs a data connection like an app?

 

[Skyline315]

When this happens, check to see if your 3G/4G symbol in your notification area is white or blue. If it's white, it's connected to the network but no data is coming through and this would be the reason why it's trying to force WiFi. If it's blue then there should be no reason why it's forcing WiFi. Do you have your Data connection set to sleep or turn off until something needs a data connection like an app?

Actually, I figured out that I simply needed to turn off the "Automatically detect Wifi" setting. Kind of annoying, because that means I have to manually turn wi-fi back on when I get home at night, but it's not a huge deal.

Thanks for the feedback!

 

[o4liberty]

There is no question that battery life on a smartphone is never good and a extended battery is the fix! I got the external battery charger with my Razr plus I have chargers every where so no worries here. I do get a full 8 hours with heavy use on my razr with about 10% left at the end of the day.

Sent from my DROID RAZR using Tapatalk

 

[aweber1nj]

Guys, battery life issues for Android can be solved ONLY by using an extended battery. I'm coming from Nokia and when you can use your phone for a week with listening music, playing games, photographing etc...it's hard to cope with HTC Sensation that works for 8 hours.
There are many solutions out there: Seidio, some cheap ebay batteries etc. my personal love is Mugen Power.

You realize

1. One of the "knocks" against the RAZR is that the battery is not removable, so there is no option to keep a second battery as standby.
2. The battery that comes in the RAZR is already bigger than almost all the standard batteries coming with other smartphones, and in fact, as-big-as or bigger than most of the "extended batteries" you can buy.

 

[Bond32]

I can't stand how everyone gripes about this battery. Take the thunderbolt for example, everyone just said get the extended battery. Then when they did everyone complained it was too big and heavy. I personally kept the stock battery and it was OK, but the razr with its stock battery gets another few hours for me a day.

Even if the battery was removable and replaceable, how many people would actually get a bigger battery? Not me. It works fine. If its not enough bring a charger. Car or home. The phone charges really fast.

Sent from my DROID RAZR using Tapatalk