Database Users

Short battery life on HTC, is this what you are seeing?

I've read a few posts on HTC Wizard battery life and I'm trying to quantify what I'm seeing (which is hard given varying conditions under which the device can be used and what features are active but I'll attempt that here). I'd really like to hear what other pepole are experiencing under similar conditoins.
I’m getting about two days worth of battery life before the unit is warning that the device needs to be recharged. Here’s what I’ve done with it over the past 2 days:
· 47 minutes time spent using the phone. I get the full 4 signal bars just about everywhere I go, including and the office and at home. I have not used the speakerphone at all.
· About 1 hour of PDA use
· Bluetooth and WiFi have been off. There was no GPRS use during this time.
· The screen brightness is set to the lowest level possible, one setting above the backlight being completely off.
· When on battery power, the backlight automatically shuts itself off after 30 seconds and the device turns itself off completely after one minute.
· I’m running Windows Mobile 5.0
The battery currently reads 18% after 2 days.
Is this in line with what other people are seeing?

I used to drain my wizard to about 50-60% in one day (from morning to evening), when I still let it go to standby, so that seems about right. It goes down a bit faster now because I always leave it on (just let the backlight go off of course) so agile messenger will stay online...
I'm pretty sure this battery life is pretty good for a pda phone though, you can't compare this to a regular phone.
I always connect it to the charger at night so it's no problem for me, and I bring a very small usb cable (like 15 cm) when I don't sleep at home. Usually there's an opportunity to connect the wizard to a computer somewhere so it'll charge, the computer doesn't need to recognize the wizard for that.

I need to charge my Wizard evry night, if it's friday with party etc alot of calls i need to have my samsung d600 with me becuase the qtek goes empty around 23.oo :/

Just done a typical "intensive" day, and I'm really pleased of that thing. Here's what I've done:
~50 min on the phone
~2h30 MP3 playing with TCPMP, LCD off of course
~30min e-mail and internet through wireless
obviously a bit more PDA use, cause uptime meter says 4h39 :wink:
I still have 54% battery at the moment.
Useful to mention, forgot to turn off wireless after browsing, so it stayed on for like 1hr with device off, and that still drains juice.
Backlight is set at the middle.
Once again, my BA would be dead by now. I had ~4h PDA use at standard clock settings, 2hr with wireless on. The Wizard just doubles both these figures. I definitely understand why they've dropped that guzzling XScale... wish there could be an optimised version of TCPMP soon though, video playback is the only thing where i see a real difference in speed, haven't managed to have a video playing smooth without hangups yet.
Skype doesn't run well, but it didn't either with the BA without overclocking it at the maximum it would hold, giving a stunning 1h30 battery life (with wireless on obviously). The device was really hot while doing this, and the standard charger would not give enough current even to power the device, battery was still going down when connected. Had to use a 2A Axim adapter to charge while skyping :shock:
So definitively a GREAT improvement.

I used my MDA Vario the other day and it went down to 18% in approx 4 1/2 hours.
Screen was at max brightness and on for the whole time,
Tom Tom running.
Bluetooth on
About what I'd expect. I don't think my Treo 650 would be much better in similar circumstances.

I just updated the other thread about the battery that up till now its been fine but two days ago the dreaded issue started with me too
I've just lost 20% in 3 hours without doing anything (its been off since)

AKU2 rom gives a definite improvement, I can have 85% left after a day of normal use.

meschle said:
AKU2 rom gives a definite improvement, I can have 85% left after a day of normal use.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Which AKU2 rom. T mobile hasn't released one for my phone yet, to my knowledge.

The qtek rom, many vario users are using this rom out of frustration for t-mobile not releasing theirs.

meschle said:
The qtek rom, many vario users are using this rom out of frustration for t-mobile not releasing theirs.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks

Hey if you upgrade the ROM you should run some tests before installing any applications. It would be a definite advantage to make sure it's not some buggy app that's causing your battery drain.

agreed... I think that is my issue too that it could be a memory leak somewhere in one of the programs
can only put it down to registrywizard, uptime, or resco, the latter i doubt very much though

I upgraded my vario to the newest imate rom and would totally recommend doing so.. my battery life is about double what it used to be now (may have installed something dodgy that was draining it though)
Its also much faster in operation and seems to be a lot more stable too (I suffered a lot from the random reboot problem previously)

what did you upgrade from?
and what rom version are you running? the ones on the ftp for kjam are numbered a bit strange and can be confusing

The numbers are confusing for me as a noob to WM5/wizard.
What is the difference between the Qtek & the Imate roms?

kilrah said:
... Useful to mention, forgot to turn off wireless after browsing, so it stayed on for like 1hr with device off, and that still drains juice.
Backlight is set at the middle. ...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
WiFi doesn't drain battery when the device is turned off, cause the WiFi module will also be turned off automatically - just test it: leave WiFi on and press the power button - after a few hours look at the effect on the battery... :wink:
I usually recharge my Vario every 3-4 days. Although I don't use WiFi and I also don't make many long calls I usually use GPRS always on to receive my mails. I also use BT quite often to listen to music over my A2DP headset - maybe one hour per day on average...
So there must be something wrong with the devices of some of the people posting here... :!:

Bluetooth battery drain on JASJAM?

Can anybody tell me how strong a drain on the battery Bluetooth will have if it's simply left on but not being used? I usually just leave Bluetooth on all the time even if I don't have my headset with me...will this kill the battery? Everything I've read in the past indicates that Bluetooth in this state isn't much of a battery drain at all.
Thanks!

Not By me.
I have BT on all the time and go throught two full days of usage.

CJNYC said:
Can anybody tell me how strong a drain on the battery Bluetooth will have if it's simply left on but not being used? I usually just leave Bluetooth on all the time even if I don't have my headset with me...will this kill the battery? Everything I've read in the past indicates that Bluetooth in this state isn't much of a battery drain at all.
Thanks!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've always made a lot of thorough battery consumption tests. In new(er) HTC devices, BT battery drain has been a non-issue.
Please also see my articles - I've published a LOT of info on all these (and similar) q's.

Thanks Menneisyys!

Also no problem here.
I also use A2DP alot when at work and usually still don't need to charge the device at all. Sometimes it will sit in it's sync cradle and get a extra battery life but I'm usually not at my desk long. If you were to leave it on discovery mode it will use a little extra but the BT chips nowadays are excellent for minimal battery consumtion/power drain.
I also use a BT carkit which I guess I'm connected to for about 1 hour each day and still see no major battery drop. My old JasJar used to have to be charged upto twice a day with all the above use.
I've had the TyTN now for over 1 month and never had to shut it down due to low battery.
Gav.

GavinN said:
If you were to leave it on discovery mode it will use a little extra
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Click to collapse
Let me disagree. I've also thoroughly tested this and found no difference. (See my power & battery consumption-related articles.)
That is, you can safely leave BT discoverability on.

Let me repeat that again,
"it will use a little extra" not LOADS extra but a little. I'm pretty sure of that but I agree with you that you will probably not see much difference in general use, just thought I'd mention it.
Just think though - you will be broadcasting/transmitting BT identity information when in discovery mode which you were not when discovery was off.
Gav.

Battery life

Am I the only one who finds it apalling?
Today my battery was on red warning by 1 o'clock.
I have 'unlimited' (FUP 1Gb) data and was just doing things - the hone can do so much - but my battery only lasts hours - not the full day I need
Love my Ameo - hate the keyboard (compared to the Universal) and the battery life!

Confucious said:
Am I the only one who finds it apalling?
Today my battery was on red warning by 1 o'clock.
I have 'unlimited' (FUP 1Gb) data and was just doing things - the hone can do so much - but my battery only lasts hours - not the full day I need
Love my Ameo - hate the keyboard (compared to the Universal) and the battery life!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have never gotten near exhausting the battery before I am exhausted -- that is 12-15 hour work days. The only time I got close was when I did several presentations using TV-out and forgot my AC power adapter. Right now my battery stands at 60%; it's nearly 7:00p local time and my day started at 4:30a. Didn't do much other than e-mail and phone, but still I have been really pleased with battery life.
As to the keybd, based on what some posted, I was thinking I might go sans keyboard using a soft keyboard like tengo or resco keyboard. In fact the keyboard hasn't bothered me at all. It nicely springs into place when I open the case and types at an OK level.
My biggest complaints are actually the lack of buttons for quick launch... along with the little joystick thingy, which I don't particularly love. The D-Pad on my Wizard seemed more usable. In these two respects my Wizard was easier to navigate. Otherwise, I'm loving the Advantage.

Me too, but ...
I have found mixed results. Some days the battery seems to nosedive and some days when I am expecting trouble its not too bad.
I believe bluetooth really drains the battery. Also when the unit is connected via activesync even though I am using a 'mains powered' dual USB synch cable it hardly seems to charge at all.
However when connected via activesync I use "Screenoff" and this helps a lot.
re keyboard - nothing to be said I just carry the device with me and use TenGO as an SIPS.
HOWEVER while reporting a bug to TenGO (very good people btw) I powered up my old Universal and remembered the old screen size and memory for installed programs - Advantage I love you after all!

Am I the only one who loves the joystick or what? Id take it any day over the D-Pads, dpads are well and good but I find the joystick alot more usable.
As for battery life ive found the biggest drain (as would be expected) is the brightness of the LCD screen. Using default settings the battery life was quite solid (2 days at least, with moderate useage and a fair bit of HSDPA'ing), however to compensate for the poor screen protector that came with it which I applied, I ratcheted up the brightness and sure enough have had to charge it every night since. Which is no big deal for me, but on a day when I have to use VGA out and BT I can see it struggling to make a full day on the highest brightness settings.
TenGo works quite well and the screen is large enough to use VGA SIPs with your finger even, but I still dont mind the hardware keyboard just takes a lil getting use too.

Using any data connection uses a bit more battery than a GSM phone conversation. So if we get 5-6 hours of GSM, then we should get about 4-5 hours of 3G and GPRS/Edge data usage.
However, I have seen that turning down the brightness to 3 steps above the lowest setting yields me a good 6 hours of Edge use. This setting works well indoors or in lower sun light conditions only.
My biggest issue with the device is that it reflects everything. The glare is horrible in high light conditions, almost making it unusable while outside on the street.
Using bluetooth isn't so bad. I've seen it might drain 10% of your battery over a period of 24 hours with no usage except keeping it on.
So, no, I don't find any strange battery patterns with my U1000, at least not yet.

I have push mail enabled so the 3g connection is always on and working. I often have bluetooth on. I still usually get pretty much a full working day without coming close to the battery dying.
However, I do keep the screen on the lowest backlight setting (i.e. one stop away from the end of the scale) and the screen turns itself off after 2 mins.

Try this while charging...
Ive found that when i charge up my Ameo using the USB adaptor to get it to actually charge I:
Turn off bluetooth
Turn off GPRS / 3G data connection
Then i activate WM5torage
This means activesync doesnt try to load up and keep the screen on. I then put the device into standby so the screen isnt on and I managed to get it to charge up to 80% throughout the day.
Otherwise even with bluetooth on and the internet permanently connected i found the battery life to be very good (altho yesterday i could of sworn i charged it up overnight, got to work, played about with the new google maps application, GPS came on, etc, etc, downloaded a few maps, then battery life said 10%! Cant of charged it up the night before. Gonna keep my eye on this)

can I suggest big power users get this
http://www.clove.co.uk/viewProduct....Category=CE3E87A6-CAEF-4504-B115-1B3AA016C2E5
U20 5400mAh external battery/charger. about the size of an ipod and comes with connections to charge device.
Mine does the trick, lives in my bag and is 2.5 times our battery life=3.5 overall.
Should even extend confucious to 5pm.......

I might end up having to get one of those external chargers - but it's yet another thing to carry! Most of the time I can charge it overnight or at the office.
I think it's using the screen that is the problem - I have BT on all the time for my headset and 3G for my push email from my server but it's when I'm I'm browsing the internet / using google maps / using TomTom that drains the battery.
TomTom drains the battery faster than my car charger charges it :|
there are so many things you can do with Athena that it seams a shame not to do them all lol - especially as I've just found the FUP on W'n'W Pro is 3Gb not 1

Confucious said:
ITomTom drains the battery faster than my car charger charges it :|
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's weird - check the ampage of your car charger.

apd said:
That's weird - check the ampage of your car charger.
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Click to collapse
It was a cheap one that has worked with ll my other PDAs and SmartPhones but i have ordered the powered Brodit holder now so I'll wait to see if that's better.

Confucious said:
It was a cheap one that has worked with ll my other PDAs and SmartPhones but i have ordered the powered Brodit holder now so I'll wait to see if that's better.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I ahve being using a Brodit one for a few weeks (albeit that it was the one from my Exec - I have only just received my Ameo Brodit holder) and it charged the battery no problem, even when using full brightness and internal GPS

My normal car charger charged my Universal OK - but fails with my Athena.
Today I didn't do a lot with my phone - listened to music on the way in with my BT headset, a few texts, push email running. Got it out at lunchtime and battery was dead - it was on red warning but turned itself off - I've been in meetings all mormning so haven't been able to charge the phone.
Something is wrong!
Could it be that the screen isn't turning itself off - I've noticed in the standard case it soesn't always when the keyboard isn't completely closed to the screen - but I am on default settings and the screen should turn itself off after a couple of mins inactivity anyway. Could WMP or something be keeping the screen lit?
Something is killing my battery anyone got any ideas?

I'm wondering if instead of the screen you have an app running in the background that doesn't go to sleep and continously taxes your CPU... could even be WMP... check with a taskmgr program to see what you have running or use another app to check your CPU load.
I haven't heard of the screen not dimming outside of Nav software, but saw plenty of misbehaving apps...

Battery saving while playing music
I have found "screenoff" an excellent help with this both for locking the screen (I now almost always leave the keyboard and case at home ) and for battery saving.
I'm beginning to think its that little screen which is soaking up the power.

Confucious said:
TomTom drains the battery faster than my car charger charges it :|
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Mine too, until...
I had an unbranded mini-USB car charger. When using TomTom, the effect was a net drain on battery power.
Today (and partly as a result of this thread), I tried the branded HTC charger that I had lying around (and that I thought would make no difference). Interestingly, I now have a net gain. (Started at 80%, drove around for an hour, charge is now 90%.)
Seems that all car chargers are not the same.
(Also the HTC charger has a natty, blue lit, logo; much better than the red LED.)

For your charging issues check out :
http://www.pocketpctechs.com/main~u...AE+cable+accessories~item~LSP%2DDUOADPT01.htm
It drastically improves the charging. I bought one then bought them for everywhere.

CPA said:
can I suggest big power users get this
http://www.easydevices.co.uk/pp/HTC...HTC_ADVANTAGE_EXTERNAL_EMERGENCY_CHARGER.html
U20 5400mAh external battery/charger. about the size of an ipod and comes with connections to charge device.
Mine does the trick, lives in my bag and is 2.5 times our battery life=3.5 overall.
Should even extend confucious to 5pm.......
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm looking at this one (am spending some time in our captial city next weekend) to extend the time between charges needed. Does this device resolve the 'pin out' problem and keep the phone charged? Has anyone else got testimonials about this? Its a not insignificant £40 so I don't want to bother if it doesn't solve the charge problem mentioned here and elsewhere with the differing pin outs. TIA

hammermedia said:
For your charging issues check out :
http://www.pocketpctechs.com/main~u...AE+cable+accessories~item~LSP%2DDUOADPT01.htm
It drastically improves the charging. I bought one then bought them for everywhere.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm looking at their product but I am confused. they specify that the advantage uses an 11 pin plug to charge when it appears to be a 5 pin USB mini-b connector. I don't know where they get the 11 pin connection from. also they SPECIFY that these adaptors can only be used with their Sync & charge retractable cable (thus implying that they are different from a std USB to mini-b 5 pin cable) this may be the case as I have tried charging my Blueant Z9 BT headset using a generic USB to micro (or mini-b 4 pin) and I get an overcurrent error on my USB port. It appears that the Blueant supplied cable is different.
Any Ideas on the HTC 11 pin cinnector referenced at http://www.pocketpctechs.com/images/items/LSP-DUOPRO01.jpg ?
Joe

Are you on the right page for HTC Advantage?
http://www.pocketpctechs.com/main~u...dvantage+Lil%27+Sync%AE+Cable+Accessories.htm

Hermes Battery lasts less than 1 day

I have a T-Mobile MDA Vario II with WM 6 (Black IV Shadow). I have the following problem: When I charge it, it first shows a red light which then turns to yellow. I have read the "red light"-issue in the wiki, but that is not the same problem as mine: When it is charged, it says the battery has a 100 per cent (the light, after all, turns yellow after some time). Still, it just doesn't last more than a day.
I may add that the Hermes fell on the ground once and was slightly damaged: The power and camera buttons do not work anymore, but everything else does (at least that's what it seems to be like). Can anybody help me to pinpoint my problem:
1. Charging device: Is the charging device possibly damaged? How could I figure that out? Is it possible to use a different device with the same socket (I have got an MP3 player, Creative Zen Micro, and another mobile phone called "OGO" whose charging devices have sockets that fit). Then again, I have read in a different forum that even though the sockets are identical, charging with a different device can be dangerous.
Anyways, how can I find out if there is anything wrong with the original charging device?
2. Battery: Is there any possibility to measure the battery's capacity? I could imagine there might be a program to control it. I would rather not disassemble the device just to find out if there's sth wrong with the battery.
3. Other possible solutions: Is there anything else I could or should think of?
Many thanks in advance for your hints.
Best wishes
Michael

Less than one day with reasonably heavy use would not be uncommon. When I use GPS for example it does not last long. So to know if it's excessive we'd need to know what you are running.
Mike

Also what radio version are you running - different versions can have significant impacts on your battery life...
Smiffy.

Thank you for your replies:
1. I do not use it intensely at all. I never connect to the internet, use bluetooth, GPS, Wireless LAN or the like. I even switch the phone off whenever I can. I doubt whether this is the reason. Still, thank you for your hint.
2. I am using Radio Version 1.05.02.00. Would you suggest upgrading?

Here's a tip, going all the way back to the PocketPC 2002 days but it's still relevant now, especially in power conscious devices like phones:
Go to SETTINGS/CONNECTIONS/BEAM and deselect "Receive all incoming beams"
It was (and is) IMO completely wasteful having the IRDA port constantly transmitting/receiving and being polled by the system. It's probably the least power sapping of all of the various wireless technologies in the Tytn but I don't feel that's a good reason to leave it on all the time.
YMMV, but who the hell uses IRDA anymore these days? I've been a power WinCE user for a decade and I've only used IRDA once or twice as a curiosity.

michaelbarrero said:
Thank you for your replies:
1. I do not use it intensely at all. I never connect to the internet, use bluetooth, GPS, Wireless LAN or the like. I even switch the phone off whenever I can. I doubt whether this is the reason. Still, thank you for your hint.
2. I am using Radio Version 1.05.02.00. Would you suggest upgrading?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am not an expert by any means, but I can flash with the best of them...and yes I do recommend you flashing your radio to a more updated one. Check in the wiki for extracted radio roms, go to their respective threads and see if anyone in you geographical location and with your service tier has mentioned anything about the radios. Or (my personal fav) start with the highest number (1.47 I think it is now) and flash it...if it works better for you great, if not then maybe take a step down until satisfied. The 1.05 radio is really old. Good luck...be sure to read Mr. Vanxs guide on flashing if you have not flashed before! PS- what os/rom are you using?

I get 3-4 hours onmine unless I have a car charger. But I am ALWAYS using data.

wpbear said:
I get 3-4 hours onmine unless I have a car charger. But I am ALWAYS using data.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Are you on 3g or Edge?

ajmoncrief said:
Are you on 3g or Edge?
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Click to collapse
3G. When I am on Edge which also means not at work so I use less data, I can get 10 hours.

Me personally:
I am in the Charleston, WV (AT&T) area...I have been using radio 1.41, although I am now trying 1.47. My area uses Edge, I have configured my 8525 to always be on Media Net edge connnection, my email accounts are check every 5 minutes. I surf the web very sparingly but use email, various games w/out sound and ms office frequently throughout the day. I run roughly about 12-14 hours before the battery is somewhere around 10%-20%.
I have brightness turned down to the notch before the lighting is off.
I also have an extended battery that I picked up for about 20 bucks from ebay that very easily double or triples those results.

Wow- 12 to 14 hours using 5 minute polling of email! I'm also in an edge area running the 1.40 radio on Cingular network and am lucky to get about 8 with moderate phone usage and minor surfing but also with 5 minute polling of email - pop and Exchange 2003.
However, I do run my backlight timer at 2 minutes and power at 5 minutes...

yeah i'm pretty satisfied...I only pack along my extended battery for trips. Oops, I failed to mention that I am not a big talker...maybe 30 min a day. I use my office line at work. I have the screen timeout for something like 30 seconds and 1 minute as well.

michaelbarrero said:
Thank you for your replies:
1. I do not use it intensely at all. I never connect to the internet, use bluetooth, GPS, Wireless LAN or the like. I even switch the phone off whenever I can. I doubt whether this is the reason. Still, thank you for your hint.
2. I am using Radio Version 1.05.02.00. Would you suggest upgrading?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you've already upgraded to WM6, then yes, go for it - it's a really old radio version but if you're still on the ROM that shipped on your phone, for warranty or whatever other reason, then you might want to be a little more reticent before upgrading your radio as it will almost certainly void it.
It still sounds like something is eating you battery life up though, or your battery is duff. i remember a long time ago I used a screensaver thingy on my phone and it took me ages to realise that it was that which was halving my battery life. What else have you got on your phone?
Oh, and just in response to the beam thingy above - it also switches off your ability to receive files over bluetooth...
Smiffy.

If the battery lasts less and less, don't overlook the obvious: The battery. My Hermes was down to 2 - 3 hours a day. I decided I need a second battery to get through the day. Turned out that the new battery lasted all day. Threw away the old one.

Well I get about a day. But I have Direct Push on, 200+ e-mail, about 1hr checking news, 1hr 30min of calls average etc.

maybe try this
if you know someone else with the same phone, swap batteries for a day. that will tell you if it is your phone or battery causing the problem.

its the UMTS that eats your battery. when you get the fone its on auto and coverage changes constintly, so when you not using umts rather deactivate it by your fone settitngs

Mr_GTI said:
its the UMTS that eats your battery. when you get the fone its on auto and coverage changes constintly, so when you not using umts rather deactivate it by your fone settitngs
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ok, but that shouldn't happen since I'm in an EDGE only area right? Or should I still lock it down to EDGE? The nearest 3G/H area is 2.5 hours away...

i assume it searches for the 3g coverage all the timne, so yeah rather just leave umts on for when you need it

Wow - can't believe what a difference it made just locking it to EDGE made. Battery lasted until 10pm last night even with 1 hour of mono audio, light calling, some internet use, direct push all day and BT connected all day!

[REF] Leo power consumption breakdown

With the HD2's pretty short battery life compared to my previous HTC phones, and also as I was a bit bored , I decided to have a look at how much the different systems drain in the HD2, and did some tests.
So for anyone interested, here are the results:
Base consumptions: (pick the one that suits your situation)
Standby, phone on, WIFI+BT off, no connections active: 5mA
Processor running idle, screen off, connections as above: 55mA
100% CPU usage (Coreplayer benchmark), connections as above: 315mA
USB connected, connections as above: 125mA
Additions: (add this to the base one depending on what you have on)
Connections:
BT on, idle: +1mA
Wifi on, idle: +5mA BUT!! If you enable wifi during standby (with BsB Tweaks or the WifiNoStandby CAB), the processor does NOT go to standby
anymore, so the base needs to be the 55mA above!
Connected to EDGE, idle: not measureable
Connected to 3G, idle: +4mA
Beware those 2 will occasionally and unpredictably send data every now and then, so this doesn't necessarily mean much.
BT transfer (file copy through ActiveSync, 120kB/s, CPU usage ~2%): +80mA
Wifi transfer (file copy with Wifi Remote access, 1MB/s, CPU usage ~3%): +200mA
EDGE/3G transfer: Pretty impossible to measure due to so many variables, but can be extreme (total current consumptions of 850-1150mA, so very approximative 500-800mA draw from the data connection during page loads are common!), and leads to most of the energy draw when using the net a lot. EDGE uses more power than 3G, consumption is higher when network coverage is lower, bad network throughput or congestion also mean lots of retries/overhead and less effective data transfer, using power for a longer time until the data is finally there.
Memory access (large file transfer):
Internal read/write through ActiveSync (speeds 2.5 / 2.1 MB/s respectively): +20mA / +130mA
Card read/write through ActiveSync (speeds 3.2 / 2.7MB/s respectively): +25mA / +40mA
Card read/write in USB disk mode (speeds 7.5 / 5MB/s respectively): +40mA / +45mA
Backlight:
10%: +65mA
20%: +78mA
30%: +90mA
40%: +105mA
50%: +121mA
60%: +136mA
70%: +154mA
80%: +170mA
90%: +190mA
100%:+210mA
GPS:
+95mA
Flashlight (with HTC Flashlight):
Level 1: +32mA
Level 2 (same as camera flash on): +107mA
Level 3 (same as camera "bright flash during shot"): +530mA
And remember the battery capacity: 1230mAh
So with this you can calculate your battery life for various activities. For example:
- Playing a video with full backlight: Let's say the video is well encoded (30% CPU use, for example 720x400 1Mbps DivX), that's about 150mA base, + 210mA backlight = 360mA, resulting in about 3h20 battery life.
- Same at night with only 40% backlight: Life goes up to about 5h!
- Wifi during standby for an 8h night, or a program that somehow prevents the phone from entering standby: 60mA or 55mA respectively, draining about 40% of the battery during that time.
- GPS program, with 70% backlight: Let's assume 150mA for the processor as it has some work to do, 90mA for the GPS, 154mA for the backlight = 394mA, or 3 hours.
- Music through wired headphones, screen off: the 55mA base plus a little 5mA as MP3 decoding is nothing for the CPU = 60mA or 20h.
- Same with a BT headset, with about half the BT bandwidth: 60+40 = 100mA or 12h
etc.
Charging
[EDIT 14.04.10]
This is now a dedicated section as I did some more thorough charging tests.
So, as some of you might know, the HD2 has 2 charging "modes".
- One is USB, that is used if the phone is connected to a PC, or an unknown device. In this mode, the current the HD2 will draw from the port/charger is limited to approx. 470mA, to stay within the maximum of 500mA a USB port can supply.
- The other is "dedicated charger", which is recognised on the original HTC charger (and some others, it's becoming a standard for a "dedicated charging USB port") by shorting of the 2 data pins of the USB connector in the charger.
USB charge
Important to know, during USB charge, the phone will NOT go to sleep, as it's supposed to be connected to a PC, and be running either ActiveSync, Disk drive mode, or modem, and in all 3 cases would be expected not to shutdown. So not only the current supplied to the HD2 is low, but the phone draws some of it for itself, leaving very little for actual charge - so expect loooong charge times.
USB charge with screen on (backlight dimmed, 10%): 285mA
USB charge with screen off (standby): 345mA (which shows the processor still runs and draws the "base USB" current)
Dedicated charger
When used with a charger that has the 2 USB data pins shorted, such as the original charger, the HD2 will draw a current that is proportional to the voltage on the USB power lines. To measure this I have used the original supplied USB cable, a variable regulated power supply, USB socket (with data pins shorted), and 2 meters for voltage/current. Voltages are measured at the "PC" end of the USB cable, so not taking account of losses in the USB cable. Will talk more about this later on.
Current vs Voltage diagrams are attached. Charge current is proportional to voltage, linearly until it reaches the max charge current, approx 830mA. This was measured so that the only draw is charge. If the phone is turned on while at max charge current, it will draw extra, until it reaches about 980mA, and will then stop to respect the 1A rating of the stock charger.
Now, to the influence of USB cables. I initially had some trouble with inconsistant numbers, phone only drawing 670mA from the stock charger, i.e matching neither the ~350mA from USB, or ~830mA from stock charger in "normal" condition. Turns out that to make it more convenient on my workplace I was using an USB extension between charger and HD2 cable. It was a $2 extension I bought on Dealextreme. Removing it solved the problem... and after making those measurements I poked with it again. Turns out that at 1A current, the voltage drop in the extension (which by the way isn't longer than the HD2's USB cable) was 1.8V! Yep, nearly 2 Ohms for a 1.5m extension! Couldn't believe it.
I have a cheap Chinese microUSB cable that wasn't as bad,but still significantly more resistive than the stock one, hence me noting I used the stock cable for my tests. So, quality of the cables, extensions, adapters IS important! Note the phone correctly reaches full charge current a little bit under the 5V USB spec, so everything is well tuned.
Now, important to know, Most 3rd party chargers will not have the 2 USB data pins shorted, and will thus result in the same behavior as mentioned under USB charge, the processor will also be running continuously drawing the "base USB" current.
It is often possible to modify 3rd party chargers by opening them and shorting the pins, speeding up charge. The voltage/current curve behavior is actually helping there, because thanks to it if the charger is overloaded its voltage will most likely fall a bit, and the HD2 will thus draw less and find a nice balance point. This DOES NOT mean there's no possiblilty of damaging the charger, but all 3 I modified did well. One that was really weak resulted in not much more current being drawn after the mod than before (i.e voltage fell very low, approx. 4.4V), however the gain from not having the processor running like in USB mode still sped up charge a little.

Thank you, that is one useful chunk of comprehensive information
Could you please explain the exact measuring method for these tests?
40% backlight at night is a tough example tho, Lumos on my device is set to 10% for 0 sensor value, and only because I can't set it to lower than 10%... nice to know battery drain goes up twice from 10% to 60%!
Also, 100% is usually really necessary under direct sunlight, in a normal lit room probably 40% backlight is more than enough to watch a video... all in all, with your superinteresting info, the battery doesn't look like lasting "too short" now, but more or less "the right amount considering the battery capacity".
My iPaq 210 has a 2200mAh battery, just to make a comparison... that's why I could go for 8 hrs during some bus trips while watching tv series, and I just needed to swap battery and used a little of the second one.

What's your estimate of the drain caused by activating push email? I've recently been doing some rather crude experiments myself, and one provisional conclusion is that push email on a hotmail account uses a lot more battery than push email on an Exchange server.

Excellent stuff, you are to be congratulated.
I have a long held theory and I wonder if you are in a position to to test it?
I believe that battery consumption is greatly increased when an app is run from mem card and would be intrigued to see a comparison between an install to this as opposed to phone mem.
Any chance?

Battery levels
I found that power consumption of the battery got even worse after I went to Rom 1.66.707.1. However, after a few days, I let it run all the way out, switched back on, it ran out after a few minutes. Then after an overnight charge I found the battery (on standby) only went down by about 10 -12 % in 24hrs. I'm hoping this performance will continue.

What did you use for the testing?

pa49 said:
Excellent stuff, you are to be congratulated.
I have a long held theory and I wonder if you are in a position to to test it?
I believe that battery consumption is greatly increased when an app is run from mem card and would be intrigued to see a comparison between an install to this as opposed to phone mem.
Any chance?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That would be reasonable as reading from an external media will need energy to access its contents... still, once the app files have been loaded into the device's RAM, it shouldn't matter much
You could also test by comparing:
1) copy say 30mb from one location to another of the internal mem
2) copy from microsd to microsd
3) copy from mem to microsd
4) copy from microsd to mem

ephestione said:
Could you please explain the exact measuring method for these tests?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Simply using the built-in current sensor, getting the reads from AEBPlus battery information screen, and methodically turning things on/off once the others are evaluated and can be subtracted from the total reading.
ephestione said:
40% backlight at night is a tough example tho, Lumos on my device is set to 10% for 0 sensor value, and only because I can't set it to lower than 10%...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Really? You should force the backlight off then
I love bright images myself, so even in my bed in total darkness if I watch a video or photos I'll force 100% backlight I have Lumos set to force 100% for Coreplayer, Resco Photo manager and HTC album
Of course not for browsing or just messing around, in that case it's 20% for me
Shasarak said:
What's your estimate of the drain caused by activating push email? I've recently been doing some rather crude experiments myself, and one provisional conclusion is that push email on a hotmail account uses a lot more battery than push email on an Exchange server.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's one thing I'd have no idea about... I've never used push email at all. And that's "standby usage", so hard to evaluate, as you never know when it kicks in.
Measuring that would need to be done on a long time. I'd say to leave your phone one night with push email off, one night with Exchange only, and one night with hotmail only, and then check the difference, preferably with a battery at about 80% charge at the start (mine seems to fall from 100% to 90% in a few minutes before becoming more regular, so I'd say the top of the scale isn't that reliable).
And I should really try push email once, that would be nice, but I *think* I have no provider that can do it for me... well I have a gmail account I never use, I should try to see if I can have it check my usual 3 mail accounts, aggregate and push... never really looked into that stuff.
pa49 said:
Excellent stuff, you are to be congratulated.
I have a long held theory and I wonder if you are in a position to to test it?
I believe that battery consumption is greatly increased when an app is run from mem card and would be intrigued to see a comparison between an install to this as opposed to phone mem.
Any chance?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks
Well I'd tend to refute that theory, because when I tested the BT and Wifi in use I tried read from internal memory, write to internal, read from card and write to card, and all 4 were identical. I should have mentioned it indeed, but I was mostly interested to seeing if reads (wifi/BT "sending") and writes (wifi/BT "receiving") would have an influence on consumption, which wasn't the case, as well as whether the throughput was different, which wasn't the case either.
But I've done a few more tests, see the updated first post
One intersting thing is firstly that when the HD2 is connected to USB, the current draw grows significantly, so I've made a new "base consumption".
Next, the card is actually faster than the internal memory both in reads and in writes, tested both through activesync for consistency. Writing to the internal memory eats a LOT more than writing to the card. Reading from the card eats a little more than reading from internal memory, probably evens out as the reads are shorter due to faster transfer rate.
I've added some charging tests as well. Apparently, even if the phone "disconnects" from USB when turned off, the processor still runs and uses about the "USB connected" base current.

kilrah said:
Simply using the built-in current sensor, getting the reads from AEBPlus battery information screen, and methodically turning things on/off once the others are evaluated and can be subtracted from the total reading.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
d'oh aebplus has a battery information screen, checking it right away In that case you'd have to take into consideration aebplus' current absorption anyway... which is not measurable as you cannot check the current intake of aebplus without aebplus being running
I have the cab on the sd already, but didn't install if after noticing that didn't work for button assignments with later versions of the rom... does it work for you on that side? I used the program all the time on my previous ipaq because it was oh so useful but never got around to notice it had a battery info subsection.
Really? You should force the backlight off then
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Wouldn't have much sense doing it in the dark would it (admitting it's possible altogether on the HD2!)
But I actually used my oooold casio cassiopeia, about 7 years ago, with backlight turned off, while reading ebooks with speed reader plus during train trips, as the neon lights created a reflection good enough on the display so that I didn't need backlight...
in the end, the backlight died altogether and until I bought a new device, I managed to use it with light turned off

A flashing LED (incoming SMS warning, e.g.) seems to add consumption of 1-3mA.
Running FlexMail in background with a push service (IMAP IDLE) adds up to 30mA.

ephestione said:
does it work for you on that side?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
AEBPlus works fine for me yes... but I don't have a "latest version" ROM AFAIK. I don't like WM6.5.x new softkey arrangement, so I'm staying with 6.5.
Anyway more about Push, I configured that through gmail yesterday, and it works just fine. I left it on during the night, and this morning I had lost 8% battery. So it's pretty much negligible. I received 2 e-mails during the night and was on 3G network.

this is a nice topic! i am interested in how much extra it uses when you are playing a MP3 with the build in HTC app?
maybe it would be a nice idea to make a program that outputs results like you pasted fast and easy (something like a benchmark app) so we can test different rom's fast? too bad i cant write anything otherwise i would try..

OK, seems MP3 uses 120mA screen off, both with Sense player and Coreplayer, so:
Processor running idle, screen off base + 65mA
But it seems to make some pretty big "jumps" once in a while. Maybe they both decode ior fetch from memory by "batches"...

my test,
HD2 rom 1.66
with BT on and BT off (configured but no connection to headset) difference in consumption is 60mA .!
BT is draining my HD2 .!
kilrah said:
OK, seems MP3 uses 120mA screen off, both with Sense player and Coreplayer, so:
Processor running idle, screen off base + 65mA
But it seems to make some pretty big "jumps" once in a while. Maybe they both decode ior fetch from memory by "batches"...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

OK, I can't confirm the BT issue. Did you observe over a long period of time? The "quiet" current for MP3 I seem to get is 185mA with screen on and backlight at 10%, but sometimes it will climb to 280-320mA for a moment and go down again, both with BT on and off. With screen off for a while it seems to stabilise at the "quiet" level.
BTW, it seems that Advanced task manager isn't reporting CPU usage levels properly. Does someone know of a CPU monitor that works correclty on the HD2?

Yup. review over multiple 6 mins. all baseline(3g/brightness) setting the same. resetting each time for off on BT.
kilrah said:
OK, I can't confirm the BT issue. Did you observe over a long period of time? The "quiet" current for MP3 I seem to get is 185mA with screen on and backlight at 10%, but sometimes it will climb to 280-320mA for a moment and go down again, both with BT on and off. With screen off for a while it seems to stabilise at the "quiet" level.
BTW, it seems that Advanced task manager isn't reporting CPU usage levels properly. Does someone know of a CPU monitor that works correclty on the HD2?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

Another consideration:
Data connection sucks power when used actively. Badly. As mentioned in the OP I haven't made comprehensive tests due to low monthly allowance, but I've had a look during normal use.
I'm pretty regularly doing 1hr train rides, during which I will be listnening to music , and browse the net at the same time. It's usually bright, so backlight will probably be at 70%. Signal is relatively low most of the time, on EDGE, inbetween small towns. When I'm on a "static" page (reading an already loaded page), current drain varies between 250 and 350mA.
But while loading a page, it will easily soar to 800mA+. Considering it takes 30-60 seconds to read a page, 20 to load a new one, and repeat... you can quickly see that this kind of usage leads to serious drain... in less than 2 hours the battery would be dead.
So be aware of how much power data connection will use. It's directly proportional to the amount of transferred data, and the worse the reception the more power it uses.
I should try using opera mini again, like I was always doing on my Kaiser. I never noticed excessive drain with it, but opera mini easily divides traffic by a factor of 10...

Just wanted to report that the new version of the superuseful BattClock has now a builtin battery current output, even if it's not really update once per second... seems more like one every 10 seconds.
I get ~240mA playing fullscreen stretched Frasier in lowest backlight (but that's with the keypad leds turned on all the time, I don't know why they don't go off, and I don't have keypadledcontrol installed... so that's a problem), and I get a total 630mA with HTC flashlight at maximum.

Good news! Bye bye Batti
Normal about the refresh time, the sensor only updates every 20 secs or so.
Some new considerations I posted somewhere else but should have put here.
After some time the HD2 seems to have better battery life, but usually it's not your battery lasting longer, it's just you not spending your day playing with the thing anymore.
It's always the same thing, the more a device can do, the more you do with it. On my first 1h train journeys after getting my HD2, I was able to kill 50% battery in 1hr. My first thought was "wow, with my Kaiser I would only use like 15%!!"
But then I took a second thought. I used 50%, but I was browsing the web, in bad reception areas, while listening to music the whole time. With my Kaiser, I'd put music on, check 3 webpages, then put it on the tray with just MSN connected and just pick it up to read/type a message once in a while.
On a next trip, I "forced myself" to do the same with the HD2. Just checked the news for 5 mins, then only listened to music and picked up msn once in a while, plus an unexpected 10min phone call. Guess what? I've only used 20% battery during the trip this time
The "problem" is that browsing with the Kaiser was just painful, so I'd just check the news and put it away. On the HD2 it's so comfortable I forget it and just spend my whole trip browsing heavy pages, which obviously kills battery in no time...

exactly my thoughts and findings