Something has to be done about the horrible battery life

[blaidan]

Since 1.3.5.1 my battery life (like many others on this forum) has been atrocious. It hasn't improved and in fact, seems to be getting worse. I'm very hopeful that 1.4 will improve this issue but I fear that I may be disappointed.

[errade]

You will be disappointed - invest in a second battery and an external battery charger (or an extended battery). It's the only way to get by if you're a heavy user.

[cowgirlupkelly]

What are you doing to kill your batteries folks? I'm just wondering because my battery last USUALLY all day. My husband and I text back and forth all day (we can't use e-mail to chit chat or IM on work computers) and I play on the internet, I make about 3 or 4 calls a day too. Evne yesterday I wad downloading apps for about an hour on top of my normal stuff.

I keep my blue tooth on (not the wifi only place to connect wifi is at home) too.

[oddlou]

Battery life is hugely dependent on signal strength. If you're in a bad area of coverage, your battery life will be bad. If you're not using your Pre much and the battery drains, you likely have a problem with either the battery or some software. If you're getting e-mail every minute, your battery will drain quickly. If you're on im all day, you're not going to have great battery life. Also, there are a few apparent bugs people have discussed, including wi-fi being a huge drain on some phones.

Other than that, some people have really unreasonable expectations of how long the batteries of a small device can last when they use it to stream internet radio/watch movies/surf the internet/etc. If you're going to use your phone that extensively, carry an extra battery or a charger. I have a car charger and can charge my pre at work, too, if necessary. Palm may improve the battery somewhat, but there is only so much they can do. The Pre is small and does a lot.

[jwinn35]

then your very lucky cause if i done half that i would be sitting on a charger for sure as well as 90% of everyone else. I dont know if maybe these people who say how their battery life is awesome, really know what heavy use is. Compared to even he touch pro the palm pre is horrible on battery life, so trust me it sucks.

and i am in the middle of phoenix so i have excellent coverage all the time.

and as far expectations being to high. Thats the problem some companies have great batteries they use for their phones. Samsung for one. The omnia and omnia 2 have excellent battery life when compared to other smartphones. Why, because their stock battery is basically an extended life battery the pre has available. Its the fact we have accepted the cost cutting methods of some companies that makes some things stink for the market.

[xome1983]

Originally Posted by jwinn35

then your very lucky cause if i done half that i would be sitting on a charger for sure as well as 90% of everyone else. I dont know if maybe these people who say how their battery life is awesome, really know what heavy use is. Compared to even he touch pro the palm pre is horrible on battery life, so trust me it sucks.

The battery in Pre lasts longer than I could ever get out of my iphone or the Hero I played with for all of two weeks. I am a heavy user, I've constantly got several apps open, browsing, streaming music/video and I still get better life than either of those devices. I can't speak for the Touch Pro but I can say that battery life for the Pre is about on par for every other high end smart phone. Don't believe me? Google it. Those "The battery life sucks on my _______!" posts are pretty much on every forum dedicated to any kind of modern portable electronics, specifically phones.

[oddlou]

Originally Posted by jwinn35

then your very lucky cause if i done half that i would be sitting on a charger for sure as well as 90% of everyone else. I dont know if maybe these people who say how their battery life is awesome, really know what heavy use is. Compared to even he touch pro the palm pre is horrible on battery life, so trust me it sucks.

and i am in the middle of phoenix so i have excellent coverage all the time.

I disagree on the touch pro. I had it, then my wife had it, and it's way worse than the Pre for battery life. Also, cowgirlupkelly's use isn't super heavy. I can use my Pre that way and make it the entire day, almost assuredly.

[cowgirlupkelly]

I'm in Tucson and I guarantee I text all day long to my husband (probably 6-10 texts per hour).

I do carry a spare with me because on rare occasion I do drain the battery (like if I'm going out after work and not going home) and need my spare.

[wunderbar]

Yea, I too am under no delusions about battery life. Look at it this way. There are some situations where even when the pre is on the charger, the battery is still draining. That means that the pre is using over 1,000 mAH of power. I get this if I'm streaming video over 3G through a bluetooth headset. The Pre is simply a powerful device, as most smpartphones are. Until we have a breakthrough in battery technology, it's going to be the same way. Even the stalwart of Battery life in phones, RIM, is having trouble keeping up. on my old BlackBerry Curve, I could easily get 3 days of battery life out of it. My Father has a BlackBerry tour and usually has to charge it every night if he's listening to music on it.

We're getting into the age of 1GHz processors in phones. That is more powerful than most desktop computers from 2001. Battery technology has advanced very little in that time, and it desperately needs to catch up.

[cowgirlupkelly]

Originally Posted by oddlou

Also, cowgirlupkelly's use isn't super heavy.

for me that is heavy.. What is heavy then

[jwinn35]

Originally Posted by xome1983

The battery in Pre lasts longer than I could ever get out of my iphone or the Hero I played with for all of two weeks. I am a heavy user, I've constantly got several apps open, browsing, streaming music/video and I still get better life than either of those devices. I can't speak for the Touch Pro but I can say that battery life for the Pre is about on par for every other high end smart phone. Don't believe me? Google it. Those "The battery life sucks on my _______!" posts are pretty much on every forum dedicated to any kind of modern portable electronics, specifically phones.

that was the point of the post. Apple knows they can get away with it as well as most other companies because substandard has become the norm. So if its the norm what can you complain about. Bottom line is there are battery options out there that could be used to get a few more hours out of your phone but the companies will cut corners for more profit especially when it is the norm for the industry. Our expectations are too low and thats the issue.

[blaidan]

Perhaps I wasn't clear. The issue with my battery life has occurred ever since I updated to 1.3.5.1. Prior to that my battery life was more than acceptable. My usage has not changed. My location where I use my phone each day has not changed.

I have added 1 app and 1 patch since then so I suppose that one of those could be the offending piece of software. I plan on removing and testing the things I have added to see if they have any effect on my battery life. The patch is just one to replace the carrier string with the date so I am doubtful that that is the offender. And the only app that I have added was the Gameloft football app.

[wordweaver27]

Originally Posted by cowgirlupkelly

What are you doing to kill your batteries folks? I'm just wondering because my battery last USUALLY all day. My husband and I text back and forth all day (we can't use e-mail to chit chat or IM on work computers) and I play on the internet, I make about 3 or 4 calls a day too. Evne yesterday I wad downloading apps for about an hour on top of my normal stuff.

I keep my blue tooth on (not the wifi only place to connect wifi is at home) too.

I'm wondering the same thing. I took my phone off the charger at 7:30am and now at 12:20pm I still have 85% left. I've texted, surfed and e-mailed all morning. Unless the calibration is off on mine, I don't know why everyone else is having such problems.

[wordweaver27]

Originally Posted by blaidan

Perhaps I wasn't clear. The issue with my battery life has occurred ever since I updated to 1.3.5.1. Prior to that my battery life was more than acceptable. My usage has not changed. My location where I use my phone each day has not changed.

I wonder if there was a default setting that changed with 1.3.5.1 that is effecting your battery. In other words, is the phone now looking for something, for example - only a 3g connection, that it wasn't doing before?

[spare]

Everyday I stream Pandora at work and will get to ~55% in 2 hours or so which means I could get 4-5 hrs of pandora on a full charge. I get similar numbers surfing the web, so 5 hrs of just web surfing on a full charge. Both on 3G. I have a few extra things going on the in the background, like gps and geostrings. This is off the stock battery and I'm pretty sure I'm not getting the best life out of the battery. How is everyone else's battery life? If you're getting much faster drain, that is not normal battery life for the pre.

How long can other smartphones go with pandora or web surfing in your experience? Did a quick search and apple states the following for iphone.
Apple - Batteries - iPhone

Maximum Battery Life1

iPhone 3GS offers up to 5 hours of talk time on 3G, 12 hours of talk time on 2G, 5 hours of Internet use on 3G, 9 hours of Internet use on Wi-Fi, 10 hours of video playback, or 30 hours of audio playback on a full charge at original capacity. In addition, iPhone features up to 300 hours of standby time.

[CarloJ]

agreed, battery life is not very good. i hear that 1.4 is suppose to fix some of the issue.

[xome1983]

Originally Posted by spare

How long can other smartphones go with pandora or web surfing in your experience? Did a quick search and apple states the following for iphone.
Apple - Batteries - iPhone

Palm says about the same thing about the Pre but yet users report alot less than that in real world situations. Read what the users are saying, more reliable than what a company tells you about a product IMHO.

that was the point of the post. Apple knows they can get away with it as well as most other companies because substandard has become the norm. So if its the norm what can you complain about. Bottom line is there are battery options out there that could be used to get a few more hours out of your phone but the companies will cut corners for more profit especially when it is the norm for the industry. Our expectations are too low and thats the issue.

But all the Pre extended batteries are third party, how exactly is that cutting corners for more profit? It makes more sense to increase the battery and the cost then it does to cut it. It's much more likely that extending the battery life meant extending the battery which leaves ugly fat backed Pre's like you get with any of the aftermarket batteries. To me it seems that Palm realized the shortcomings of the battery and gave us the touchstone.

[LurkerX]

You might also consider that something might be corrupt causing the drain, and doctoring the phone may help. That happened with my phone, but I use a lot of homebrew.

[oddlou]

Originally Posted by cowgirlupkelly

for me that is heavy.. What is heavy then

No offense intended. Heavy, to me, would be talking on the phone for extended periods, streaming content from the web (like Pandora), receiving e-mails all day, texting all day, using navigation and im'ing.

[oddlou]

Originally Posted by jwinn35

that was the point of the post. Apple knows they can get away with it as well as most other companies because substandard has become the norm. So if its the norm what can you complain about. Bottom line is there are battery options out there that could be used to get a few more hours out of your phone but the companies will cut corners for more profit especially when it is the norm for the industry. Our expectations are too low and thats the issue.

They may be able to put in a slightly better battery, but you're not going to get a much better battery without making the phone bigger/heavier. Palm, like other companies, made a decision based on size as well as battery life. You want great battery life, buy a bigger battery. I don't want a bigger battery, so I'll carry a spare or use a car charger.