Battery Life

[jason404]

I got mine over a week ago, and I am finding that the current battery life situation quite disappointing, but it is not that bad. I have been using it much more than I will when I am less excited about it, and I hope the OS updates will make it perfectly acceptable.

What I have found to help is going to Settings > Applications > Background Tasks, regularly, and disabling apps which you really do not need to keep running while you are not using them.

Love this phone otherwise!

 

[Stig]

What I have found to help is going to Settings > Applications > Background Tasks, regularly, and disabling apps which you really do not need to keep running while you are not using them.

I don't have that Background Task option on my Samsung Omnia 7 + Mango!

By comparision, I get 2 days of use out of my phone, but I do turn 3G off as I don't get a great signal where I am.

 

[jeremyshaw]

In settings, drag the whole screen right for the 'applications' page.

Sent from my SGH-i937 using Board Express

 

[Stig]

In settings, drag the whole screen right for the 'applications' page.

You learn something everyday!

 

[Rallicat]

Last night I turned off latitude, and all other background tasks other than than the BBC News app live tile. I slow charged on USB and unplugged before going to bed.

By morning it was down to 85%. Today with light use only (just some twitter, email and news checks) its down to 50% and its not even lunchtime yet!

This is shockingly bad!

Sent from my Lumia 800 using Board Express

 

[ombadboy]

Indeed.. 5 minutes of PrimeTV use, it went down 4% :/

 

[Rallicat]

I've just reset mine to factory default, and set it up from scratch. This time I've logged into Windows Live, and Nokia - but that's /it/. I'm going to see how it fairs with NO email, NO apps of any kind ... so, no push updates, no live tiles besides the people hub - nothing.

I'll report back.

 

[SJamG]

I'm experiencing similarly poor battery life.

I charged it last night and I have push mail on the go, have not played any games, wrote a few emails, checked the people hub a few times and i'm down to 30%.

I have a problem in general turning things off to preserve the battery life....what's the point in having location services and background services if you have them turned off all the time - use the phone with all the features as it was intended to be used - IMO

I'm really hoping that these two updates coming will drastically improve the battery life. My old iphone 4 (i love saying that!) would be at around 60%+ on the same usage pattern.

 

[Pronk]

I don't seem to be having these issues. OK I don't have mail on push, but I do have location services on all the time and some live tiles.

I found that having the Me tile pinned but NOT the People tile made a fairly big difference in improving battery life for my Mozart and I've stuck to that with the Lumia, so that might be worth trying? Live tiles aren't all equal, and some clearly have more data demands (and as a result more power demands) than others.

 

[jimski]

What about when I get notifications about people tweeting at me? That seems to come whenever.

Yes, you will get toasts whenever. But the tweet won't get loaded in your People hub till you open it.

Sent from my HTC Surround using Board Express

 

[jason404]

On the Nokia forums, there are a couple of people reporting that battery life is improved by turning off the automatic date/time updating.

Nokia Support Discussions - Re: Lumia 800 poor battery life - Page 12 - Nokia Support Discussions

I'm trying this out. If anybody else wants to, we can compare results.

I have also disabled both options on the OS update notification tab.

 

[yloop]

I've been backing out of everything and noticed a massive improvement. I use the phone a fair amount for browsing and facebook etc. and it was still over 40% at 11 last night.

There's definitely an issue with background apps connecting over 3g when on standby. My data usage has shot up since I got the phone by about 50%. The constand 3g searching is killing the battery I reckon. I think freezing open apps when on standby would rectify this problem.

 

[mkr10001]

On the Nokia forums, there are a couple of people reporting that battery life is improved by turning off the automatic date/time updating.

Nokia Support Discussions - Re: Lumia 800 poor battery life - Page 12 - Nokia Support Discussions

I'm trying this out. If anybody else wants to, we can compare results.

I have also disabled both options on the OS update notification tab.

I don't even have that option so that has nothing to do with anything. Automatic time updating dosen't mean it's constantly checking the time though

 

[jason404]

I don't even have that option so that has nothing to do with anything.

How could you not have the option? Are you running some sort of pre-release build?

I have the option and I don't think the OS has been updated since I first got the phone, which arrived the day it was released for sale (7.10.7720).

Automatic time updating dosen't mean it's constantly checking the time though

Are you familiar with the concept of software bugs?

 

[mkr10001]

How could you not have the option? Are you running some sort of pre-release build?

I have the option and I don't think the OS has been updated since I first got the phone, which arrived the day it was released for sale (7.10.7720).



Are you familiar with the concept of software bugs?

I'm on the same version of you and no it's not a pre release build...........Network software variations is the more probable/sensible reason.....


..... pre release build..... give over

Yes I am but as I don't have that time option it would be impossible for a software bug with it to affect my phone..........

 

[yloop]

Some UK networks restrict the usage of auto date and time as the phone pings the network and causes unneccessary traffic on 2g, sometimes getting stuck in a session and disabling SLR migration when you go to a different area. When I was in tech at Orange there were a lot of fixes that included "Set the right date and time" so it would refresh and remove the stuck session.

 

[cgk]

What do people make of this?

, while a second update in early January introduces high voltage charging, increasing the Nokia Lumia 800’s battery power from 1300mAh to 1450mAh.

Nokia: Couple Of Updates To Improve Nokia Lumia 800 Battery Life Coming | WMPoweruser

The battery is currently only charging to 1300mAh?

 

[TheWeeBear]

Why on earth would they restrict the battery from being fully charged ?

I didn't even know you could charge a battery at less than it's max capacity.

I guess by software you can. When battery is charged to say 80% stop charging.

But why ? Hmmmm.

 

[jason404]

Why on earth would they restrict the battery from being fully charged ?

I didn't even know you could charge a battery at less than it's max capacity.

I guess by software you can. When battery is charged to say 80% stop charging.

But why ? Hmmmm.

Check out Battery University. The site looks very different to how it did when I read it around four years ago, and it looks like there is a lot of new content, so I should go through it again some time.

Basically, I think the phone is not discharging the battery to 0%, as that would dramatically reduce the life of the battery. With a sealed unit like the Lumia 800, this is a bigger problem and potential warranty cost for Nokia.

For many years ThinkPad laptops have had the ability in the ThinkVantage Power Options software to set maximum and minimum charging thresholds, to increase battery life. I set my ThinkPads to never start charging if the battery already has over 80% capacity charge and for it to never charge over 95%, from reading stuff at Battery University a long time ago, and my laptop batteries have always kept relatively close to their original charge capacities for the full two years that I keep them before upgrading. I also try my best to avoid discharging below 10%, but that is unavoidable from time to time.

 

[Rallicat]

So, reporting back since by reset on Friday.

I've actually tried using the phone a little differently and now things are better .. but still not right.

I've begun 'backing out' of applications rather than using the home button. I've also removed the People, and 'Me' live tiles from the start screen. Battery life seems much improved, but it is still erratic.

Over the weekend for example, battery life seemed to be lasting in an acceptable way. However this morning I unplugged it from the charger at 100%, and despite spending only 30 minutes listening to FM radio, by the time I'd finished my first meeting at work, the battery had plunged to 64% .... in addition, it felt suspiciously warm, despite having not been placed anywhere near a heat source, and it had been left completely untouched for a while.

FUrther, accessing Nokia's diagnostic tool reveals the battery is not shown as charged to full capacity when Windows reports 100% (So, it says something like charged to 1344mAh when the maximum capacity is 1516mAh). This could be by design to avoid over-flattening the battery, or it could be a reporting issue ... but right now I could really use that extra 172mAh!!!

In short, I've now reached the stage where only some suspicious plunges are causing me a problem. Is this a heat issue ... or is the phone doing something that causes it to heat up and chew through battery? If it's the latter then I'm hoping an update can sort this out, but Nokia are not being forthcoming with information. This might be somewhat understandable given how important this launch has been to them, but still, the mood amongst customers suffering this problem is rather stormy right now!

Anyone else noticed any particular 'plunges' in battery life coinciding with the handset getting warm?