I always had to recharge daily with the i760, even with the extended battery. I wonder if the apparently better VZW coverage over AT&T makes a difference?

Very interesting article. At times, I definitely find myself wanting to declare e-mail bankruptcy. Anybody know a good lawyer to help me with that?

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-Jay
The Fine Print:Nothing in this post (or any of my other posts) is intended to constitute legal advice or the establishment of an attorney-client relationship. For purposes of this forum, I'm just another nerd like you. :-)

This may not solve the battery longevity issue for the i760 vs the iPhone 3G but something to consider since you guys crossed over the the GSM world recently. Verizon, Sprint, Alltel use cdma technology from Qualcomm (CDMA2000). When they switched to 3G (EVDO) it actually increased battery life and allowed simultaneous voice and data. at&t GSM's 3G (UMTS/HSDPA/HSUPA) technology did the same thing (and uses cdma [not the Qualcomm brand name]) but used more energy.

I think this was one of the primary reasons that Apple decided not to go with 3G the first go around. Everything I read was that they were concerned with battery life. Somehow here in the states they got at&t to double up EDGE speeds to over 200k which was a noticeable improvement even on my Tilt. The only thing you dont get on EDGE versus HSDPA is simultaneous voice and data. I like having simultaneous voice and data as you can look things up over the Internet without hanging up. At least you have the choice to switch when you need it.

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iPhone 3G 2.0.2 Jailbroken
tilt WM 6.1 L26 KaiserDiamond v12 Throttle Launch

Yes it is very true that GSM by default design on 3G consumes a lot more power than CDMA's high-speed. I do have noticed that "most" of the 3G based GSM devices are battery hogs, as it is what it is with that technology, I still feel Apple "could have" made the battery a swapable unit instead of going for the "aesthetic look" or they really could have boosted the battery in the new 3G which would really have made it an unique device and then not so many would not complain about battery issues. This would have definitely catapulted Apple's presence with users drooling. I agree it is a kewl feature to have data and voice at the same time, but honestly I believe most users never think of that while on a call as they are focused on the conversation rather than surf at the same time, then also I myself have let the caller go to voicemail while I was surfing cause sometimes I get so involved in reading something on the net that I tell myself " oh well they will leave a message IF they want to".

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Funny it worked.....the last time!!Now I am not sure what was working before they put a hole in my head!!!!

At this point, I am wondering whether turning off 3G will help both my coverage and battery life issues. I never surfed the net that much on my i760 (probably because the screen sucked). If anything, I use the data first for e-mail and then for newsreaders. I'm curious how much of a speed difference (if any) I'll notice when I turn 3G off. Also, the lawyer in my phone who has the first iPhone (non-3G) told me this morning that she was with her mother over the weekend and looked at her mother's iPhone's signal strength (mother has a 3G iPhone). The 3G iPhone was only showing 2-3 bars whereas the non-3G iPhone was showing a full 5 bars. So, I beginning to wonder whether 3G isn't all it's cracked up to be.

I've pretty much decided that 3G will be the next test in my line of experiments. After my next full charge, I'll shut off 3G on my iPhone (and probably my wife's) just to see whether battery life and/or reception improve.

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-Jay
The Fine Print:Nothing in this post (or any of my other posts) is intended to constitute legal advice or the establishment of an attorney-client relationship. For purposes of this forum, I'm just another nerd like you. :-)

8:42 a.m.--So, yesterday I only used the iPhone a couple of times, both to check whether I had voice mail (I did not). Thus, no call time, no surfing, no pretty much anything other than e-mails being received. In fact, I didn't even read any e-mails on the iPhone. Right now I'm showing 50% (maybe a little less) battery remaining. The stats are:

• Usage since last full charge 2 hours, 18 minutes
• Standby 1 Day, 15 hours
• Call time current period 9 minutes
• Lifetime 8 hours, 51 minutes
• Data sent 279 KB
• Data received 729 KB

I'm really puzzled at the 2 hours, 18 minutes of usage. My phone finished charging at 4:48 p.m. on Saturday, August 9. Since then, I've had 9 minutes of call time but have not done anything else other than check the iPhone a few times. Something is using the iPhone without me knowing. I know all applications are supposed to truly close/exit when switching to another application, but could it be that a newsreader or weather or stock program is routinely accessing the net without any interaction by me? Or, is 2 hours and 9 minutes of the 2 hours and 18 minutes of usage simply due to e-mails being received? That would seem highly unlikely. I might have to wipe my iPhone and start over to check on this.

3:11 p.m.--I'm on my way to an appointment, and the 20% battery warning comes up. So, what do I do, I grab the closest thing in my car on which I can write, which happens to be a napkin (yes, it's clean), and jot down my usage stats, which are:

• Usage Time Since Last Full Charge 4 hours, 3 minutes
• Standby Since Last Full Charge 1 day, 22 hours
• Current Period Call Time 15 minutes
• Lifetime Call Time 8 hours, 57 minutes
• Data sent 433KB
• Data Received 1.7MB

So, I've gotten 4 hours of usage, but only 15 minutes of that is call time. Plus, as I mentioned earlier, I'm pretty sure I have not used the iPhone for 4 hours since the last charge.

4:29 p.m. (approximate)--I'm done with my appointment and am heading to the Apple Store to return the Incase sleeve I had purchased for my wife. The 10% battery remaining warning goes off. So, in less than 1/2 hour, my battery has drained 10%--and I've barely used it (21 minutes of call time). Here are the final stats:

• Usage Time Since Last Full Charge 4 hours, 37 minutes
• Standby Since Last Full Charge 2 days, 0 hours
• Current Period Call Time 36 minutes
• Lifetime Call Time 9 hours, 18 minutes
• Data sent 480KB
• Data Received 1.9MB

Although the total usage time is impressive (compared to my other results), the fact that I've only had 36 minutes of call time is very disappointing.

--While at the Apple store, I ask one of the employees whether 3 1/2 hours of usage type is normal. I am told it is not and that I should talk to one of the techs, who can test my battery. However, I need to make an appointment, and all iPhone appointments for today are taken. My problem is that I've got a crazy week and don't know when I'll be able to make it in.

5:40 p.m. (appx.)--I'm on my way home. I've got the iPhone plugged into the car charger so it doesn't die on me. I decide to switch 3G off to see whether it improves reception and battery performance. I then call my wife. Miraculously, the call does not drop while I'm in my neighborhood (the call does not drop in the two spots that have been giving me problems). Of course, this could be a fluke because I do not always drop calls in those spots, just about 50% of the time. I'll keep 3G switched off for the next couple of days and see what happens.

5:50 p.m. (appx.)--I'm home and now connect the iPhone to my MacBook so it can charge (I leave the MacBook's lid open so I can be sure it will get a full charge). FWIW, I've received 50 e-mails since my last full charge.

9:04 p.m.--My iPhone is full charged (it was probably fully charged awhile ago). I'm turning 3G off on my wife's iPhone and will charge her iPhone tonight (even though it doesn't need it) and will unplug both of them at the same time tomorrow morning.

EDIT--9:00 a.m. on 8/12/08: Yesterday, I received a total of 39 e-mails.

__________________
-Jay
The Fine Print:Nothing in this post (or any of my other posts) is intended to constitute legal advice or the establishment of an attorney-client relationship. For purposes of this forum, I'm just another nerd like you. :-)

I hate to say this Jay please don't depend on those stats, that has led me down the wrong path. TRY to hold down the HOME button while you are on a program till it goes back to the home screen and this is the only way that iPhone completely "closes" all running programs. I am sure you knew this already

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Funny it worked.....the last time!!Now I am not sure what was working before they put a hole in my head!!!!

Equus,

You are absolutely right about Apple giving the iPhone a removeable battery. Built in obsolescene though. When the battery won't take a charge anymore you are forced to get a new one. People think Apple is so "cool". Apple is doing what MS did with Windows and got in trouble for...think with non-expandable memory you are forced to buy the biggest version they have. Can't just pick up a few extra microsd cards. Nonremoveable batteries mean you have to buy a new phone in a year or two. Heck remember the big extended batteries you were able to buy for your old smartphone? Wouldnt it be nice to be able to pick a replacement cover and bigger battery for those that want it? Choice is what people tell us they would give up for something that just works. Although it doesnt completly work for me. It's a tradeoff a lot of people have made. Oh well nothing is perfect but if I get a chance to get a HTC Diamond I will take it in a heartbeat.


Let me illustrate the esoteric way I use the data connection on my phone. I normally have a bluetooth headset hooked up so that frees the phone from your face. My main reason to use the browser is my wife comes up and asks me to look for and lookup a certain POI. Yes she could call 411 and get the hookup but having unlimited Internet means not paying over $1 to the phone company. With the screen size of the iPhone this makes it even more conducive. Or someone calls me about an email and I can download it and read it (attachments)

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iPhone 3G 2.0.2 Jailbroken
tilt WM 6.1 L26 KaiserDiamond v12 Throttle Launch

I'm not sure I understand what you're saying. When I press and hold the Home button, nothing happens. Something only happens when I release the Home button (i.e., only when I release the Home button does the phone go back to the Home screen).

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-Jay
The Fine Print:Nothing in this post (or any of my other posts) is intended to constitute legal advice or the establishment of an attorney-client relationship. For purposes of this forum, I'm just another nerd like you. :-)

I had to hold it down for 6-7 seconds before it returned to the home screen. I'll try that out the next time it's sluggish.

I don't think the hold the home button was in the manual - yes, I read the dang thing. But tried it out after reading it here and found that the home screen did eventually come up - seemed to take a long time.

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It's working for me, there must not be anything wrong!

lol, so much for the manual........yeah when you hold it down for 8 secs it will force shut-down on ALL running progs and go back to Home screen. That's like a soft reset on the WM devices !!!

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Funny it worked.....the last time!!Now I am not sure what was working before they put a hole in my head!!!!

I am in the Philadelphia area- whenever I turn on the 3G my signal strength goes way down- I have surfed the web with both the 3G on and off- and I do not notice a difference. I receive about 25 emails a day, talk on the phone about 3 hours a day and text constantly- my battery has given me the 20% warning one time. I charge it every night. Just thought I would throw my 2 cents in.

Thanks, equus. I wasn't holding it down long enough. Now that I know to count (slowly) to 8, it works.

__________________
-Jay
The Fine Print:Nothing in this post (or any of my other posts) is intended to constitute legal advice or the establishment of an attorney-client relationship. For purposes of this forum, I'm just another nerd like you. :-)

7:33-34 a.m.--I unplug my iPhone and my wife's iPhone. They both have full charges. I reset the usage stats on both phones and confirm that 3G is turned off on both.

8:13 a.m.--I'm on the phone and pull into my parking spot at my office. As I back into the spot, the call drops. So much for having better service with 3G. Time to call AT&T again and complain.

6:30ish p.m.--I'm in Scottsdale for an appointment near Scottsdale Fashion Square. When the appointment is over, I decide to go to the AT&T store across the street from Scottsdale Fashion Square to look at accessories. I will tell you this much, IMHO, the folks at the AT&T stores are far more pleasant and helpful than the folks I have found at the VZW stores. I ended up speaking with two salesman. I can't recall the name of the first person who helped me, but he was very nice and honest with me about AT&T's coverage. Apparently, there are known problems in Phoenix and AT&T is working on them. He tells me that, in other major cities, coverage in solid. However, AT&T came to the Phoenix market late and ignored stuff the network during the Cingular transition. Apparently, in Phoenix, AT&T is seeing a lot of VZW users who are switching to the iPhone but then finding themselves unhappy with AT&T's coverage. The salesperson indicates that I might have better reception if I turn off 3G and that turning off 3G will also help with my battery life issue. At this point, another salesman (Sean) joins the conversation. Bottom line, both these guys seemed much more knowledgeable about PDAPhones than their counterparts at VZW. In fact, Sean ended up showing me how he has tricked out his Tilt, and the other salesman showed me his device (a Blackberry, I think). Sean, if you're reading this, thanks for all your time and patience in helping me out!

7:25 p.m.--My wife calls me. I'm on my way home from Scottsdale. We talk for 33 minutes, all the way until I park the car in our garage. No dropped call. Plus, in looking at the bars while driving in my neighborhood, they stay constant at 5 full bars other than for a brief moment when the drop to 2 or 3 bars. So, I'm hoping that switching 3G off might help me with the dropped calls.

9:20 p.m.--It looks like I've got 75-80% or so of my battery remaining. Usage stats so far are:

• Usage since last full charge 2 hours, 59 minutes
• Standby since last full charge 13 hours, 47 minutes
• Current Period call time, 54 minutes
• Lifetime call time 10 hours, 36 minutes
• Data sent 370 KB
• Data Received 1.9MB

So, I'm definitely already seeing an improvement in battery life with 3G off, and I think I might have improved reception. Mark, I know see why you're keeping 3G off. Based on my testing so far, 3G definitely seems to be the biggest drain on the battery. I want to run with 3G off for at least one more battery cycle, and I might not end up charging again until tomorrow night or even Thursday morning. So, the next variable in my experience (either turning off push or turning off Bluetooth) might not happen until early next week. Plus, I'm dying to do the 2.0.1 upgrade because I really can't stand the echo I'm getting on my BT headset.

Edit--8/13/08: Total e-mails received from 12:01 a.m. to 11:59 p.m. today: 59. I've had vibrate turned off most of the day; however, due to a couple of appointments, I did have to put the iPhone on silent mode occasionally.

__________________
-Jay
The Fine Print:Nothing in this post (or any of my other posts) is intended to constitute legal advice or the establishment of an attorney-client relationship. For purposes of this forum, I'm just another nerd like you. :-)

I'm not so sure that calls connecting or dropping has much to do with 3G. However, that being said, I did notice that I had worse coverage on my new iPhone3G than on my 1st gen iPhone. Never had a dropped call on the 1st one, and noticably high rate of dropped calls with the new one.

This past weekend, I upgraded to 2.0.1 (jailbroken, of course!) and notice that this is a lot better. Shows more signal strength in the bars, if that matters, plus calls don't drop where they did before.

In short, if you haven't upgraded to 2.0.1, I highly recommend it. There is no reason not to now. Jailbreaking/pwning is just as easy as it was before, and all apps work fine.

Also... "word on the street"... 2.1 is being readied for release in the next few weeks...

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Pastor Tim Satryan
Communicating the Good News!
Visit my website - WILMINGTON first assembly of God

Hey Jay - thought about your time per call issue and may have a solution. You can go online and see your usage with details. You'll see the phone number you called, how many minutes, date / time call was made. If you haven't signed up for it yet, check it out. I'm seeing the calls I made yesterday show up there now.

Tell you what's real cool about this on AT&T vs VZW - you can add to a "phone book" online to have the name instead of the number show up when looking at your call history. In your case, you could assign case numbers to the phone numbers common to the clients.

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It's working for me, there must not be anything wrong!

Why would you need a new phone when the battery dies? The battery is covered under warranty for the first year and can be exetended to two years for $69. If it's out of warranty it's $79 to get it replaced which takes 3 days, and you can get a loaner for $29. This is after a expected life span of 2 years to 80% capacity.

How many phones have you kept using after 2 years?

You can do it yourself for about $8 and the 3g is even easier since the battery is not soldered in and they made screw access to it. I would imagine they will do an in store battery replacement for the 3g soon because of this.

If you need an extended battery get a sleeve that has a battery in it.

No the iPhone isn't perfect but the battery hasn't been an issue for me at least with my 2.5g iPhone still running 2 days on a charge a year later.

I was wondering whether the 2.0.1 update might help battery life and/or coverage. However, I did not want to ruin my current round of testing so I figured the 2.0.1 update would be the last thing I do. Thus, today and tomorrow I'll go without 3G. Then, perhaps, I'll turn off push and/or turn off Bluetooth. We then should have some decedent comparisons to determine what draws the most power.

FWIW, I just got off the phone with AT&T. The customer service rep transferred me to Western tech support. The tech support person was extraordinarily nice and seemed very interested in helping me. After looking at detailed coverage maps, she thought that my problems could, in fact, be caused by not optimal 3G coverage and asked me to continue testing without 3G. Someone is supposed to call me back in 2 days to see whether coverage has improved. If not, they will try swapping my SIM card even though she doesn't think it will do much good. In her words, what I am experiencing is consistent with AT&T's coverage maps. She also said they are still trying to "work out the kinks" in their 3G network and they (AT&T) need more people to report coverage problems. When I asked her about the 2.0.1 update, she looked something up and said it is supposed to "improve" the back-up process and the speed of typing text messages. She could not find anything to indicate 2.0.1 helps with coverage.

What would be very nice is if 2.1 would be released before my thirty-day trial period is up so I have time to play with 2.1. This is really going to be a tough decision for me....

__________________
-Jay
The Fine Print:Nothing in this post (or any of my other posts) is intended to constitute legal advice or the establishment of an attorney-client relationship. For purposes of this forum, I'm just another nerd like you. :-)

Thanks for the tip. I still haven't registered my account online yet, but I need to do that. It's on the "to-do" list.

__________________
-Jay
The Fine Print:Nothing in this post (or any of my other posts) is intended to constitute legal advice or the establishment of an attorney-client relationship. For purposes of this forum, I'm just another nerd like you. :-)