Li-Ion Battery Question

[mattmatterismatt]

Sorry if this has been answered before but I've searched the forums and read Apple.com/batteries but I just want some clarification.

My charging pattern right now is I charge overnight to full charge then use for the day and then recharge overnight again. Except, with power usage, sometimes the phone doesn't last me quite all day and runs out of battery around the evening, when I still want to use it.

I'm not hurting long-term battery life by charging it at 3/4, 1/2 or 1/4 capacity am I? I want to get as long of life out of my battery as I can before having to pay to replace it so I'm already thinking towards the future. Basically, since it's charge CYCLES, the life just depends on how much usage it receives not the number of times it is connected to a charger, right?

I just need some reassurance that if I charge it as much as possible I won't be hurting battery life. Is there a certain threashold (such as below half battery life) that's better?

Thanks in advance for all the help, on a sidenote, I have been following this forum for the last couple of months and it was fun to be waiting in anticipation with all of you. I'm very happy with my purchase aside from the few negatives of the phone (Mail app, no iChat, no MMS, no multiple recipient texts...but still great product for a version 1.0!) And I actually love the keyboard.

 

[DRabbit]

Sorry if this has been answered before but I've searched the forums and read Apple.com/batteries but I just want some clarification.

My charging pattern right now is I charge overnight to full charge then use for the day and then recharge overnight again. Except, with power usage, sometimes the phone doesn't last me quite all day and runs out of battery around the evening, when I still want to use it.

I'm not hurting long-term battery life by charging it at 3/4, 1/2 or 1/4 capacity am I? I want to get as long of life out of my battery as I can before having to pay to replace it so I'm already thinking towards the future. Basically, since it's charge CYCLES, the life just depends on how much usage it receives not the number of times it is connected to a charger, right?

I just need some reassurance that if I charge it as much as possible I won't be hurting battery life. Is there a certain threashold (such as below half battery life) that's better?

Thanks in advance for all the help, on a sidenote, I have been following this forum for the last couple of months and it was fun to be waiting in anticipation with all of you. I'm very happy with my purchase aside from the few negatives of the phone (Mail app, no iChat, no MMS, no multiple recipient texts...but still great product for a version 1.0!) And I actually love the keyboard.

Turn off WiFi and Bluetooth when you're not using them... WiFi most importantly.

Try it tomorrow and see if your battery life improved. Today, for the first day, I kept WiFi turned off (except for one short 10 minutes session when I needed it) and my battery life was MUCH better. I'm still at 50% after the whole day.

As for charging, you're not hurting it by charging if it's only 1/2 used up. Once it awhile though (like once a month) it's a good idea to let it run down before recharging.

 

[mattmatterismatt]

Thank you

From what I got from Apple's site, that was the case. Though they don't say anything about letting it run down once a month. But that should be no problem at all!

I have experimented with having Wi-Fi off (in Apple's tests I believe they did that) and it has helped a lot so tomorrow I'm going to try and run as little Wi-Fi as possible. That being said, my battery life has not been bad whatsoever. I have been turning it off and on a lot because people always want demos and it probably didn't help I had my screen brightness up (the display is just so amazing!)...so with all those changes I really think I will get a lot of battery life.

Thanks for your help!

 

[SF_VR6]

It is difficult to understand what is good or bad battery life so it may be a good idea to post your phone's actual stats from last full charge as so:

Current Usage since last full charge:

Usage: 5hrs 26min
Standby: 23hrs 52min
25% battery level remaining.

Settings:

Wifi = ON
Brightness = white round slider is to the far left aligned with the "r" in Auto-Brightness" below

Autolock = 1minute
Bluetooth = OFF
Gmail checks each time i launch mail
Ringer is on vibrate

D-

 

[mattmatterismatt]

My battery life has been pretty good so far, my question was more as when it was appropriate to charge because I am taking much more care with my iPhone battery than my iPod batteries because I use it so much more. I will try to put up stats in an appropriate thread when I get around to documenting it one day.

 

[SF_VR6]

My battery life has been pretty good so far, my question was more as when it was appropriate to charge because I am taking much more care with my iPhone battery than my iPod batteries because I use it so much more. I will try to put up stats in an appropriate thread when I get around to documenting it one day.

I have been babying my iPhone battery as well considering that these are to only last 300-350 charges or so. THis means your battery could be dead in less than a year if you overcharge.

I try not to constantly charge just to keep the meter at 80% or higher. Seems like this really wears down the battery.

I let it drain to 10% before I charge it to 100% and try not to keep it plugged in overnight unnecessarily. The iPhone only requires 2-4 hours to do a full charge. I kept it plugged in overnight and yes it was charged in full but the phone was very warm to the touch as if you've been using it heavily. This can't be good for the battery.

I switch my iPhone off after an evening charge (8pm -11pm) to let it sleep overnight.

D-

 

[hawaiianwargod]

Thanks for all the good input guys!

 

[SmartAlx]

Someone mentioned this, but I thought I'd reitterate. It's good to let your phone run down its battery all the way once every 30 cycles or so to recalibrate it.