• After 15+ years, we've made a big change: Android Forums is now Early Bird Club. Learn more here.

Incredible Battery life with simple fixes...you don't need an extended battery!

breynolds007

breynolds007

Well-Known Member
Ok, I know this battery issue on the Incredible has been covered in a ton of different threads, but I've been able to get my & my wife's phones to get great battery life through much trial and error without having to avoid using all the great features offered. I want to share what I've learned and I feel that most of this stuff has been covered in different places, but maybe not all together in an easy to use way.

Settings wise: I have the display brightness set at 25-30%, it's plenty bright enough and uses less power than the auto setting. I set the screen timeout to 30 seconds and I keep the "Enable always-on mobile data" feature ON because Pandora will timeout with it off and didn't seem to affect the battery much. I use Auto-sync for Google and FB for HTC sense (but some people have reported FB for sense issues). I connect to Wi-Fi when at home and work which saves battery because my phone isn't constantly trying to acquire data signal. (To make sure Wi-Fi doesn't auto turn itself you have to go to Advanced under Wi-Fi settings and turn the sleep policy to Never). I turn GPS on when I need to use maps, I don't use live wallpapers. I don't use a lot of widgets but do use the HTC bookmarks & weather widgets. Besides the settings, here are the biggest ways I've found to get great battery life.

1) Know your phone. Go to Settings->About Phone->Battery Use and see what's been using your battery. Everyone's situation is different due to how you use your phone and your location but if a certain Category is extremely high, it can help you diagnose why. (I never have any 1 item over 40%) Also, make sure the Awake time and Up time aren't the same number, if they are then you're phone is never sleeping...see below.

2) Remove any programs that you think are draining battery or don't use. Some cause your phone to stay awake the whole time it's on. My wife's Inc was having this issue and couldn't get more than 6-8 hrs on her battery but a factory reset easily fixed the problem. (I noticed the Weather Channel and Weather Bug to be particularly hungry) If I really don't use the app or notice side effects, I delete.

3) Don’t use a Task Killer. I know this there's been a lot of controversy, but I've found that it uses more battery than it helps. Android was meant to multi-task plus it’s annoying to constantly feel like you to need to kill your programs.

4) The bump charging method really does work!I'm sure the next software update will fix this glitch, but this makes a huge difference. I used to charge till the red light turned green and my phone would show 100% charge. However, 10 mins later it would be at 90%, then 20 mins 80%, I couldn't believe it! But, as it's been documented, charge like normal until the light turns green then turn your phone off. The light will turn red again and charge another 20-30 mins and then go green again. Then you are fully charged! I just did this over 3 hours ago and my phone's battery just hit 92% with normal use, before I would hit 90% in a matter of a few mins.

Doing all these things, I am able to use my phone to its full capability (at least for all my needs) and still get plenty of battery life. I'm not sure of how much total time I can get out of it, I'll have to run some tests, but I leave the house at 8am and usually don't get home till 7 or 8pm and don't have to worry about getting through my day. I hope this really helps some people, it's taken a while for me to get to a point I'm satisfied with the battery. I'm happy to be able to avoid the size and expense of an extended battery but still use all my phone's great features!
 
I do everything you suggested with the exception of keeping auto-brightness on and my battery lasts a full 24 hours. Rather than "bump charging" I unplug my phone when I get up, get ready for work and on the drive into work I plug the phone back in. Within 10 minutes my phone is fully charged and ready to go.
 
Not helpful...only because I'm a power user tho ;)


From my experience the #1 biggest battery drain is the sync/enable background data. If u leave both those off u will get awesome battery life! (of course u really limit functionality of phone)
 
DavidinGA said:
Not helpful...only because I'm a power user tho ;)


From my experience the #1 biggest battery drain is the sync/enable background data. If u leave both those off u will get awesome battery life! (of course u really limit functionality of phone)
Click to expand...
this is where blackberries and the push technology excel. It would be a huge boost to get more push for android OS
 
DavidinGA said:
From my experience the #1 biggest battery drain is the sync/enable background data. If u leave both those off u will get awesome battery life! (of course u really limit functionality of phone)
Click to expand...

Yeah, this is what I'm trying to show...I don't think we should have to not use our phones for what they're meant to do just to get through the day.

To give an idea of today's use, phone last plugged in 7h 30mins ago, normal use (few short phone calls, about 20 mins of internet use/FB, random texts throughout the day, emails from gmail and work account, etc). Current battery is 68%, a little over 2/3. I'm no mathematician, but at this rate I should be able to go over 22 hours on this charge. That's almost a full day and night LOL, I think that's about as good as you're going to get on any smart phone and I'm hardly making any sacrifices. Anybody who has a phone that is dying after this amount of time just needs to make some adjustments!
 
breynolds007 said:
Yeah, this is what I'm trying to show...I don't think we should have to not use our phones for what they're meant to do just to get through the day.

To give an idea of today's use, phone last plugged in 7h 30mins ago, normal use (few short phone calls, about 20 mins of internet use/FB, random texts throughout the day, emails from gmail and work account, etc). Current battery is 68%, a little over 2/3. I'm no mathematician, but at this rate I should be able to go over 22 hours on this charge. That's almost a full day and night LOL, I think that's about as good as you're going to get on any smart phone and I'm hardly making any sacrifices. Anybody who has a phone that is dying after this amount of time just needs to make some adjustments!
Click to expand...
We shouldnt have to make these adjustments or sacrifices just to get 15-20 hours out of the phone IMO. Its stupid this phone only comes with a 1300 mah battery when you could have used the 1500 mah ATLEAST. Pure stupidity. Battery life for many is 10-12 hours and that is with low and moderate use even. to get 25-30 on mine with the 1750 battery i have to leave it and dont do anything but syncing and occasional email checking. That is very little web, gtalk etc. the 1500 battery stock wouldnt have cured the battery issues but im sure it would give enough people the little bump they need to make it home from work or whatever atleast
 
I totally agree, HTC skimped on the battery. The EVO got a 1500 mAH battery, why didn't this phone? They're practically identical in hardware power (yeah minus screen and other things). To use a smartphone "lightly" is just stupid to me. I got this phone to use it, not to let it sit just to get good battery life.
 
I agree with you, I wish HTC had made this phone with a bigger battery. But, there's always going to be things that could be changed or improved. The point of my post was not whether it should have a bigger battery, but to show it if u have certain settings or apps working against you a battery double the size may not help you very much. I don't feel like running my phone this way is a sacrifice, but optimization. However, I do think HTC/Verizon should have made the proper adjustments out of the box so we wouldn't have to do all this tweaking to get 20 hours of battery life. Less savvy people who never look on websites or forums to see stuff like this will just write the phone or Android off due to operating poorly cause that's their experience and that's just sad.
 
For a couple of weeks, I have been doing all of the things the OP suggested and I have seen a huge increase in battery life (except #3, I use ATK to close some programs when I'm done using them where I know they hog battery...such as The Weather Channel).

Right now, on a 1750 Seidio, I have 45% battery left and with +34 hours up time and 3 hours awake time. My phone is only awake when I need to use it and I'm still checking emails, FB, websites and getting calls/texts throughout the day. BatteryLeft says I have another 15 hours. So, even with increased use, I still would have made it through 2 work days.

Now, if I didn't have access to WiFi, I'm sure it would have been a little different with the 3G on, but not to the point where I would be concerned about making it a full day/evening with my phone.

Just wished I didn't have to do the bump charge every morning. It is clear once the phone thinks the battery is at 100% charge, it switches from AC to battery and won't charge even if you have it plugged in while using it. Seems like a simple software glitch that hopefully will be fixed in the next OTA.
 
This is pretty basic stuff. All you really need is system panel.

Over 48 hours unplugged and at around 60% with light use, occasional text and browser. Stock battery.
 
I've been doing those things all along, and still needed to carry a cable to work with me in order to get through the day.

Now that I have an extended battery, I leave the cable home. I suspect this may be a typical experience for people who spend significant amounts of time in areas of low signal.
 
Yeah, I understand about the low signal. I think that being able to stay on wi-fi a great majority of the time really helps battery life. I notice a quicker drop in life when at home or work not using wi-fi, can only imagine if you're in a poor signal area.
 
Ya that's the other big battery drain - searching for signal. Where I work I'm lucky if I can keep -101 and usually by the end of the day it says 20% of time I had no signal. So 20% of the time I'm at office my phone is searching for signal and draining the heck outta my battery. So I ordered a 2600mAh battery and hopefully that will be the end of my battery issues....
 
man, i am so tired of thinking about my damn battery, i tell ya. i've got the 1500 from bidallies, the htc one. it works well, but it still doesn't get me through some days when i am using the navigation. google nav just kills my battery, straight up.

i do the bump charge every morning, with phone off until it goes green (usually in the hour between when i almost wake up and when i wake up for good). and still, by the time i get ready and go to work, my phone is down to low 90s. that's fine, i guess, but then i send texts and keep the screen on sometimes for my drive, and then i'm down to the low 80s or high 70s by the time i get to work (about half hour commute). that's also fine, i realize i am doing things that cause the battery to drain. but of course that means that i've got to be prudent with my phone the rest of the day or else plug in. i just wish i was seeing the tremendous battery saving that so many other people see all the time on these boards. it's crazy the way some of these batteries give some of you 2 days of use. i can get that on my extended battery, but definitely not on this 1500. and i'm syncing just once per hour, and do not have apps running that are draining my battery (i monitor using system panel).

i think i will have to go back to the extended battery. i was sort of enjoying the slim size of the phone, but i'd rather just not think about my battery at all, even with the screen on at times and using the google nav. and playing word up. and sending a lot of texts. and doing a little web surfing. and basically doing all the things i got this thing for.
 
DavidinGA said:
Not helpful...only because I'm a power user tho ;)


From my experience the #1 biggest battery drain is the sync/enable background data. If u leave both those off u will get awesome battery life! (of course u really limit functionality of phone)
Click to expand...

How do you do that? Mine just syncs automatically and I don't know how to stop it.
 
this is ridiculous to be honest

i have no intention of shutting anything off, or limiting my use at all since im paying a great price for it.

and the fact i can only get 4-5 hours before needing a charge is just ridiculous.

i absolutely love the seido Active case, so i cannot get anything larger than the seido extended slim :(
 
I have one more. I usually am skeptical of all these better battery life claims (working in a lab and knowing the science behind it helps dispel a lot of junk), but this works and is rooted in science. If you are willing to root, the hydra UV kernels gave me about 4 or so extra hours of battery life (6 if lighter usage), and I am even using one that OVs at 1.15 GHz. I refuse to turn off sync, because if I did not want constant connectivity I would not have gotten a smartphone. But the Kernel requires no sacrifice. Just root.

Between this kernel, Jager ROM (I do not know what this changes, but it is theoretically a variable) and a TP2 1500mAh battery, I go 9 am to 11pm and just hit the low batt notification.

-Nkk
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom