Pondering Normal Use, Battery Life and Modding

[anon(247108)]

This post is not really about battery life or modding. Plenty of those here. But my recent rush to upgrade then downgrade the radio, change mods, etc. got me to thinking about why I bought this phone and whether it meets my needs. My hope is that some of you worrying about battery life etc., will read this and pause to ask the right question, which for me was "what are my smartphone needs, and does this phone meet them?

What I don't need this phone for:
-watching videos--I have an ipad, a large screen TV and a 27" imac, and bad eyesight.
-Heavy Internet browsing--See above
==Playing music--Cannot tell you the number of devices that do this at work, in car, and at home.
--Displaying pictures==No kids to show off
--Taking pictures--see bad eyesight and crappy photography skills
--Tweeting and Facebook--See hardware in post one.

What I do need this phone for:
--Clear consistent phone signal, no dropped calls
--Occasional voice search and web browsing for location fixes
--Push E-mail and SMS to stay in touch with clients and my assistant when out of the office
--4G speed with mobile hotspot for occasional iPad use with the crappy 3G speeds so far so good
--Checking account balances and using my starbucks card without my starbucks card
--Steady bluetooth connection for handsfree use in the car
--Emergency call when I take my long bike rides
--Check facebook, linked in and twitter occasionally

So when you take all of this in, the fact that I am in an office most of the day, what I really need is a phone with a long standby time that will have juice available on demand, and not to download an hour of video. Occasionally may need the hotspot if I leave the office, but can use our internal wifi with my iPad (or your tablet of choice), which is a better user interface for quick e-mail responses, commenting on pdf, etc.

So I charged my phone with the non-extended battery yesterday morning and set it up as follows:
--Adrenylyne's 4.4.2 kernel on stock ROM and radio with most VZW and HTC apps removed, including facebook and peep (kept friendstream) and reloaded twitter and facebook from market.
--SetCPU is on demand at 245MHZ - 1036MHZ
--Screen is automatic brightness. Remember, bad eyesight.
--Bluetooth always on so that I don't have to remember when i get in one of our cars
--Wifi off although that was just to push the battery use a bit
--Location services on in case I need to use the GPS
--E-mail, SMS are all push,
--Twitter, moxier mail and google are all set on in autosync
--Oh yes, 4G is on constantly

1 day, 3 hours and 45 minutes after I unplugged it, it finally went down to 15% battery. Display was 40% of the battery use for 1h 22m 17s, which makes sense cause I am not on the phone that often.

Cell standby was 22% or 1d 3h 45m, with bluetooth, phone idle about that time.

During that time, i received about 3 MB of data which took about 6 minutes.

All this while artificially refusing to plug the phone in, which is not my normal approach.

My recollection is that my iphone 4 performed about the same with similar battery drain, but I cannot say for sure because I would have plugged it in sooner than I did here.

So as you evaluate the phone and put it through its paces, ask yourself if your current use truly is indicative of your use profile and if your evaluation is fair.

 

[I Monarch]

That sounds REALLY good. That's about what I use my devices for, except for maybe I little harder on the web browsing while I'm bored during downtime at work.

 

[Nate1861]

I can't complain because I am on my phone CONSTANTLY. How can you not expect the battery to die, my screen battery usage is like 90% on average.

 

[FrankXS]

Agree. It's fun fooling around with all the features for a while, which can definitely run any battery down. But when it comes to mundane, routine daily use (I match your usage very close) the battery does okay.

-Frank

 

[scassel]

Well said and very similar to my own usage.

It is a smartPHONE that allows us to do many other things but is ultimately a phone

 

[anon(247108)]

I had a Sprint Wimax router, and max time on a charge was about 3.25 to 35 hours. The Bolt is faster and does more. Ultimately, its fun playing around with the system software and such, but you eventually hit the point of diminishing return on it all unless it is your passion...as it surely is for the moderators and others here, and thank goodness for their help.

 

[anon(247108)]

That sounds REALLY good. That's about what I use my devices for, except for maybe I little harder on the web browsing while I'm bored during downtime at work.

I have to say, that the 4.4.2 kernel has been amazing. My wife's phone is set up identically, and we are getting about the same amount of battery life, though she is a bit heavier user than I. I will stay that out of the box after bump charging we were getting about six to seven hours of similar use before hitting the 15% mark so something definitely is up with HTX/VZW's implementation.

My last point is that if after bump charging you are not getting similar times on the standard battery for similar use then something definitely is wrong with the battery and I would return it for a new one.