Help About to return

[djkeller3]

I will never understand why people go out and buy a device the first day it comes out. You've waited this long for it, why go and be the "guinea pig" when you could just wait let's say, a week, and see the reviews for it? Blowing $200+ on a device that nobody knows that much about seems stupid, frankly. Maybe I'm just a tightwad, who knows.

I said that to say this, you knew there was going to be problems with the battery, why did you go out and get it on the first day when you could've waited (like me) to see if people complained about it? (What people are doing now.)

Yeah, you must be the tightwad you say you are because my Thunderbolt, short of being rooted and running CM7 RC2, is an Android enthusiast's dream phone. There is nothing wrong with this phone. In fact, everything is right about it. There are no guinea pigs here. The OP should either swap out the defective battery for a good one, or buy an extended battery or two. If it still drains, then he knows he has a lemon phone, and I would exchange it - not send it back and get something else. Even if he has a lemon, it doesn't mean squat for the rest of us.

 

[craighwk]

HTC strikes again. Don't listen to anyone that says battery life will improve. It won't. Options are get the humpback battery, keep and and deal with it or get out while the gettin is good.

I pretty much agree with this.

This is the way stock is going to be. The only battery enhancements will come through ROMs / Apps / and or an extended battery.

Plan and decide now.

 

[UBRocked]

Another thing I've noticed is that when charging the phone, it will show 100% when fully charged. But unplug your phone and then plug it back in. Now what is it reading? Mine has dropped as low as 94% and took an additional hour to charge.

I've had some battery calibration issues with the Fascinate after loading some new ROMs. Needed to recalibrate the battery. Not doing any of that yet...cause I want to wait and see what happens with normal use...but I think the initial battery life will definitely be the worst battery life you'll see.

 

[Eleer]

What a moronic statement. If everyone waited like you there would be no one to complain about it and you'd still be stuck up a creek without a paddle.

False. There's a thing called money-management in case you haven't heard. You either have more money or less sense (probably the latter) than I do, obviously.

I'm sorry about the negativity, just thought I'd share my thoughts of jumping the gun and buying on the first day. (End rant)

 

[craighwk]

Another thing I've noticed is that when charging the phone, it will show 100% when fully charged. But unplug your phone and then plug it back in. Now what is it reading? Mine has dropped as low as 94% and took an additional hour to charge.

I've had some battery calibration issues with the Fascinate after loading some new ROMs. Needed to recalibrate the battery. Not doing any of that yet...cause I want to wait and see what happens with normal use...but I think the initial battery life will definitely be the worst battery life you'll see.

The Incredible did this on day 1 and it continues to this very minute. That's the way it works. Bump charging would fix that, but I refuse to go out of my way to make sure the battery doesn't go to crap in the first 10 mins.

It doesn't get better, even with ROMs n Such. I even bought an extended battery and it still loses 10% of its charge in minutes.

 

[TheXFactor]

I bought the humpback battery for my Dinc because as mentioned above HTC is more concerned about form over function. And from my experience using the Dinc, it really didn't seem to be enough. HTC figures you will buy more stuff. Batteries, chargers, etc.

 

[UBRocked]

The Incredible did this on day 1 and it continues to this very minute. That's the way it works. Bump charging would fix that, but I refuse to go out of my way to make sure the battery doesn't go to crap in the first 10 mins.

It doesn't get better, even with ROMs n Such. I even bought an extended battery and it still loses 10% of its charge in minutes.

Good to know. I figured you'd be able to recalibrate it like the other Android devices I've owned.

We'll see what happens. We all knew this was not going to be the longest lasting device when they added LTE and a 1400mAh battery

 

[Bramsy]

we'll see in 13 days worth of use.....

 

[Bramsy]

Good to know. I figured you'd be able to recalibrate it like the other Android devices I've owned.

We'll see what happens. We all knew this was not going to be the longest lasting device when they added LTE and a 1400mAh battery

agreed!

 

[Eleer]

Yeah, you must be the tightwad you say you are because my Thunderbolt, short of being rooted and running CM7 RC2, is an Android enthusiast's dream phone. There is nothing wrong with this phone. In fact, everything is right about it. There are no guinea pigs here. The OP should either swap out the defective battery for a good one, or buy an extended battery or two. If it still drains, then he knows he has a lemon phone, and I would exchange it - not send it back and get something else. Even if he has a lemon, it doesn't mean squat for the rest of us.

When I made my post I was not speaking about the community as a whole. It gets annoying seeing individuals gripe about their purchase when they should've waited for more reviews of the device to come in before purchasing. As far as your rooted Android goes, good for you. Okay, I'm done here haha.

 

[Proph]

i will chime in here, thinking of gettng the wife a thunderbolt so i have been poking my head around. i have an incredible and i don't understand what alot of people are referencing. now my incredible lasts the day pretty easily (6am-10pm) no matter how hard i use it, i don't do facebook but i do sync gmail and some pop3 accounts etc..
i did however run into some weird problems that absolutly murdered my incredible's battery so that it wouldn't last past lunch. that was syncing mail other than gmail. if you turn the time down to sync it, lets say 5min, and have the mail size limit high or unlimited it would get caught in a loop and leave the 3g radio cranked. what would happen is you get email, lets say it is 3meg in size. you don't have the worlds greatest 3g reception because you are inside a building, htc mail will start downloading the mail item, then in another five minutes (email still not downloaded) it will check the sever again, see the email and start the process over and cancelling the progress already made the first time around. this loop would continue until the battery dies. but in your battery report you don't see "mail" as eating up the batter because it isn't the 3g radio it is calling to download the email is and that doesn't show up.
there are other things inside of sense (which are great btw best launcher on android) which will get in similar loops and kill the battery.

just so you know i have about 20 or so apps installed on my incredible, still use the battery that came with it and at 10pm every day i have about 40% left now adays no matter how much i use it.

point being to the long story,,, just like the incredible if you are seeing the phone die in the middle of the day something is causing it and it isn't 4g being on. it is something transmitting data constantly that is making the 4g radio stay on and working all the time (btw don't know if the thunderbolt has it but the amazon bloatware that comes pre-installed on alot of phones did something similar, had to install an update to it, open it up and check a box telling it to shut up and quit using the 3g radio)

 

[Stevessvt]

Charged mine to 100% at 10pm last night. Played with it for a few minutes, dropped to 98%. Went to bed, off the charger, woke up at 84%. Wifi on. Been playing with it a decent amount so far today, at 51% now.

 

[lamoglinsgal]

HTC strikes again. Don't listen to anyone that says battery life will improve. It won't. Options are get the humpback battery, keep and and deal with it or get out while the gettin is good.

I disagree. The battery life in my Incredible DID increase after keeping a consistent charging schedule. The first one to two weeks had me thinking twice, but after that it was smooth sailing. No extended battery, constant syncing. Minor tweaks that didn't both me a bit like turning off haptic feedback, having my screen time out at 30 seconds and/or locking the phone when I was done with it, turning the screen brightness down. I didn't need it on full blast anyway.

ETA: I took mine off the charger at 8:00 a.m. It's now 10:30 a.m. and my battery bar is still completely full. I've made three phone calls, emails, a few app downloads. Not too shabby. My Incredible still would've lost like 10 percent at this point.

 

[jbh00jh]

It's funny to hear someone complain about battery life the first day they have the phone . All HTC phones have a problem getting a full charge unless you bump charge or use an external charger , and those are well documented facts
that can be found in most htc android phone forums.

 

[lamoglinsgal]

I also think it's hard to judge any phone the first day. You're downloading a ton of apps, playing with it constantly, tweaking and all that business. So you're not really able to gauge normal usage.

 

[theacoustician]

Another thing I've noticed is that when charging the phone, it will show 100% when fully charged. But unplug your phone and then plug it back in. Now what is it reading? Mine has dropped as low as 94% and took an additional hour to charge.

I've had some battery calibration issues with the Fascinate after loading some new ROMs. Needed to recalibrate the battery. Not doing any of that yet...cause I want to wait and see what happens with normal use...but I think the initial battery life will definitely be the worst battery life you'll see.

Bump charge it like you would a Nexus One.

 

[rushmore]

A few people were able to toggle that in another thread here: http://androidforums.com/htc-thunderbolt/299340-there-way-disable-4g.html

So it appears root is not actually needed, but I'm sure root would make it a lot simpler.

That though is inconvenient for folks that actually live in 4G areas, since they then have to go through that process and restart the phone whenever they want to switch back. A toggle widget would be the logical option, since as easy as turning off wifi or GPS and only using when you need it

 

[meinbeast]

I must say that I am extremely pleased with my thunderbolt purchase. Coming from an OG Droid this is on a whole other level.

I bought this phone to run 7-10 different widgets, use the screen maxed out, and always have 4g on and not worry to toggle it on/off. The battery is not going to be the best, no kidding. How hard is it to pop it on the charger at work or in the car while your not using it?

I don't know if I'm all that different from the others that are disappointed with the battery life but I didn't buy this phone because I wanted to have a battery life that lasted 2 days. If you wanted that you know you should have not purchased this phone. They still make flip phones that will last for days. End rant, happy with my purchase and the performance.

 

[Lucidot]

That though is inconvenient for folks that actually live in 4G areas, since they then have to go through that process and restart the phone whenever they want to switch back. A toggle widget would be the logical option, since as easy as turning off wifi or GPS and only using when you need it

Agree 100%

Just wanted people to know that they did have an option (although not convenient) to toggle their 4G.

I am holding off until next week, just to get a feel for what everyone thinks about the phone. The battery scares the hell out of me.

 

[Lucidot]

I must say that I am extremely pleased with my thunderbolt purchase. Coming from an OG Droid this is on a whole other level.

I bought this phone to run 7-10 different widgets, use the screen maxed out, and always have 4g on and not worry to toggle it on/off. The battery is not going to be the best, no kidding. How hard is it to pop it on the charger at work or in the car while your not using it?

I don't know if I'm all that different from the others that are disappointed with the battery life but I didn't buy this phone because I wanted to have a battery life that lasted 2 days. If you wanted that you know you should have not purchased this phone. They still make flip phones that will last for days. End rant, happy with my purchase and the performance.

Question. Does the TB use the same charger connection as the MotoDroid 1, or does it use the same one as the Eris/RAZR/BB

 

[jbh00jh]

I also think it's hard to judge any phone the first day. You're downloading a ton of apps, playing with it constantly, tweaking and all that business. So you're not really able to gauge normal usage.

Correct. It takes a couple of weeks before you know the limits and fixes for a battery.

 

[Tech Addiction]

I downloaded a Widget from the market called Brightness Level. Helped a ton to turn down the screen brightness to a level that's readable but not over lit. Made a big difference on both my Incredible and the T-Bolt. I still have 80% and it's been off the charger for 4 1/2 hours.

Edit: Not in a 4g area and only 1 to 2 bars of 3g here in my building at work.

 

[dgold82]

HTC strikes again. Don't listen to anyone that says battery life will improve. It won't. Options are get the humpback battery, keep and and deal with it or get out while the gettin is good.

I have to agree with this as well. I really think that my battery life got "better" (still horrible) with my Inc after a few weeks because I started using it a bit less after my initial customizations. Pretty much once the obsession period started dying down

I use launcherpro (love it) and not sure if that helped. My only advice for all these phones is to stock up microsd cables at monoprice. I have cables strategically placed all around my house/car/office. If I really need my phone the entire day and I know that I won't have my power lifelines then I almost turn off all data and toggle it on when I need it.

My wife has an LG Ally and the battery life is better but I think that all Smartphones pretty much suck and if you are a hardcore user then you need power sources everywhere for any phone. She even needs recharging in the middle of the day when she uses it a lot. I just think of it as a mini laptop in my pocket. Again, monoprice is your friend.

 

[bjanow]

Question. Does the TB use the same charger connection as the MotoDroid 1, or does it use the same one as the Eris/RAZR/BB

I don't have it yet, but I'll bet dollars to donuts that it's the micro vs the mini that the BB uses.

 

[brown200]

Charged mine to 100% at 10pm last night. Played with it for a few minutes, dropped to 98%. Went to bed, off the charger, woke up at 84%. Wifi on. Been playing with it a decent amount so far today, at 51% now.

I had 96% after I unplugged. Noticed it was on 3G. Got to work. Still on 3G. Was told by Vz to power down and battery pull. LTE back but battery dropped to 89% from powering down and up.

So with all of that and some modest use (internet, words with friends and a couple of phone calls) from 8:00 AM to 11:15, I have 70% left...I'll check back around 3pm with an update.