700w Battery Life

[dogman]

Does this sound normal?

I finished charging (100%) at around midnight, and when I checked
the phone at 7 am it was down to 82% Bluetooth is OFF, and
I'm polling for e-mail every 30 minutes. Seems like its draining too fast.

[norm911]

No voice calls in that time period? No other data calls other than the sync activity?

It does sound a little fast on the discharge, but 7 hrs and 18% discharge is not that far off of what I'm seeing. I poll for mail using ActiveSync over the air every 5 minutes and talk on my phone all day long for work. I also send 15-20 txt messages during that time period, spend at least 15 minutes browsing websites, and send somewhere around 20-30 emails every day. Added together, that's a significant amount of time with the backlight on and the data service active.

With that activity, I can make it from 7AM when I take it off the charger until about mid-morning the next day before it goes dead.

Norm

[dogman]

no calls during that period (i'm asleep).

just now i learned of the activesync fix where you set up
a fake exchange server in order to switch scheduling
to manual. maybe this will help?

i'll do another test tonight.

[norm911]

I forgot to mention to stay away from the "up-to-date notification" feature of ActiveSync in this version of Windows Mobile 5. This is where you click on "Set up device to sync when new items arrive" in the ActiveSync schedule screen and then enter the text messaging address for the device so that it can receive out of band notifications from the server when changes are made to the Exchange mailbox. We've got 6 or 7 Treo 700w's total and I've seen some of them go down to zero battery in just a few hours with this feature enabled. It does depend on how much your Exchange Inbox changes, but it's still a big battery drain.

When the AKU2 release comes out in a few months you'll get real server-side push features without having to use SMS as a back channel. This will yield much better battery life, so wait until then to enable this feature.

Norm

[Joe Wells]

What would you ecpect with wireless sync set to "push enabled"? I only got about 6 hrs. Changed it to manual today and after 10 hrs i'm down to 33%. about 10 calls 5min or less. sync'd maybe 10 times (20 emails) web for may 15 minutes total.

[treythompson]

Originally Posted by norm911

I forgot to mention to stay away from the "up-to-date notification" feature of ActiveSync in this version of Windows Mobile 5. This is where you click on "Set up device to sync when new items arrive" in the ActiveSync schedule screen and then enter the text messaging address for the device so that it can receive out of band notifications from the server when changes are made to the Exchange mailbox. We've got 6 or 7 Treo 700w's total and I've seen some of them go down to zero battery in just a few hours with this feature enabled. It does depend on how much your Exchange Inbox changes, but it's still a big battery drain.

Norm,
How does this equate to major battery drain? The phone just sitting there waiting for a text message would not mean any more battery use than if the phone is just sitting there with ActiveSync NOT running... The new release will make contact back to the server via https every "X" minutes, and then the server will connect to the device when it has items to send...

So, in the current version, the phone just sits there, waiting for an SMS message. But in the new version the phone will actually contact the server as it's IP address changes, etc... I'm betting on more battery consumption with the new version...

Also, tell me about your car!

[dogman]

Shutting down activeSync solved my battery issue. I finished charging around midnight and at 7am I had 98% !

This is from another forum. It says "Axim" but also applies to a 700w

** I should add that this was posted as a fix for the Treo 700w
occasionally not waking up, but it also applies to battery drain

---------------------------

The all important Solution
This 'server trick' was discovered by another Aximsite forum member known as Invid a little while ago. This information is courtesy of him originally, and copied many times throughout the Aximsite forum, but I am re-writing in easy to follow laymans terms to hopefully make this a sticky, and stop the multiple posting regarding the same old problems. Here we go!

1. Turn on your Axim
2. Go to Start > Programs > Activesync. This will open the Activesync program.
3. Tap Menu at the bottom right hand corner of the screen. This will bring up the Options Menu. Notice the option Schedule... is greyed out? This is the all-critical option we need to get access to. But as it's disabled we can't change Activesync's default synchronisation schedule.

Ok, so how do we enable the Schedule option? Easy!!! Fool Activesync into thinking there is an Exchange Server to sync with:

1. From Activesync's Menu tap on Add Server Source.
2. In the following screens you can enter any old garbage. It does not matter, but just in case your unsure, just type the following in the indicated boxes:

Server Address: fake
Tap Next
User name: fake
Password: fake
Domain: fake
(Ticking save password or going into the Advanced menu makes no difference, so no need to bother).
Tap Next
Untick all of the 'Data you want to synchronise' options
Tap Finish

3. Ok, we're done creating the server. You should now see in Activesync's main screen your normal Activesync connection(s), and a new connection called Exchange Server.
4. Go back into the Menu, and lo and behold the Schedule option is now enabled! Go ahead and tap it!
5. You will see that both options in the Schedule screen are set to Every 5 Minutes (A01 Rom), or Every 10 Minutes (A06 Rom). This simply will not do! ( * Advanced users - please see my note below * )
6. Using the drop downs, change both the Peak times and Off-peak times boxes to Manually.
7. Press the OK button at the top right of the screen.

Congratulations! Activesync is now gagged from opening on it's own and ruining your life! Your work is not done just yet though - time to clean up and get rid of the now unwanted fake Exchange Server.

1. Go back into Activesync's Menu, then Tap Options.
2. Highlight Exchange Server, then tap Delete. A warning message will appear about removing files etc, but as you have no files associated with the fake Exchange Server, it's nothing to worry about - just tap Ok.
3. The list will now only show your remaining PC Sync connection(s). Obviously do not delete these!

So there you go, your Axim will now be happy to lead a normal and fulfilling life serving your organisational needs.

You may now put your Axim on Standby safe in the knowledge it will turn back on when you need it to. You can be sure that your CF and SD cards are no longer going to go walkabout. You can be safe in the knowledge that your battery should no longer lose it's charge. Etc etc.

[norm911]

I know it doesn't sound like it, but the move to the new protocol has very significant positive impacts on battery life, performance, and features. There's alot of stuff going on behind the scenes on the device and in the protocol that needs to be taken into consideration to fully understand why. Here are some high-level things that contribute to the big difference:

- The radios in the phones have been designed to be insanely efficient when listening. In comparison, they consume a huge amount of power when transmitting. The new protocol uses sessions that are initiated by the device but held open for a very long time, so that the server can just send data to the device within that session whenever there is something new to sync. This way, the device listens most of the time and transmits very little.

- In comparison, the current method either 1) syncs on a time schedule - whether or not there is anything new to sync or not, or 2) receives an SMS message when there is something new and then sets up a new connection to the server to go get it. Both of these methods require the device to do a ton more transmitting, setting up and tearing down communication sessions, running and SMS listener, parsing SMS messages, etc.

- In the new protocol, you maintain one connection for an entire sync session which lasts a long time. In the current implementation, there are multiple connections involved in EVERY single sync update process.

I can't go into alot more detail because much of what we do is under NDA and governed by strict partnership guidelines. But we've been testing this stuff in our lab for some time now, and it works really well

Hope that helps,
Norm

[monie.yang]

Here's the link to buy Seidio's new extended battery for the Treo 650/700w. It is a 2400mAh battery (500mAh more than the standard battery) for $39.95

http://store.everythingtreo.com/cont.../8-37--580.htm

This ought to extend everybody's battery life! Good luck.