[auart]

I have the usual seriously fast draining battery problem and have tried every single step to delete most apps, even bought the seidio battery.
All have the same results, the battery will only last 8-9 hours.
I have read about 1,000 posts on this and other forums and done everything possible.
The only thing I can see is that I could upgrade to 4.5 OS, although Alltel hasn't released their version of the upgrade... Don't know if this will help???

IF you have Alltel please tell me if my observation is coorect. Maybe this is due to Alltel's poor reception in some areas. I am no expert on this, but would like someone to give an opinion if you have an idea of maybe the problem being this BB is constantly looking for a better signal.
What I see most of the time in the top right is....
1XEV with a couple bars,.... then sometimes it shows just 1X.....
What does this mean. I think it means that the 1X is much weaker and maybe draining the battery more. We are in an area that my OLD Moto Razor phone would show digital service most of the time and analog further outside town.

HELP!
I just want to be able to help the battery last longer. My brother has the Curve for TMOBILE and his batt last for 3 days. I am looking to get my wife a curve but if I cant get a handle on this, we will switch hers to Tmobile possibly.

[penguin3107]

A poor coverage area will destroy your battery life, since your device will constantly be searching for a signal when there is none.

Might be time to switch carriers.
Coverage should always be the most important factor when choosing a mobile provider.

[hominid7]

If you are roaming a good deal of the time, that will kill your battery too. If you have the option, try setting your network settings to either "alltel/home only" or "roam only" and see if that helps.

[j_hamblin]

I have alltel and my curve will last about 24 hrs but just barely. Lately the battery hasnt been lasting as long but I think that is because they are switching the area to EVDO service.

I hear several people saying their battery lasts 2 days but i just dont believe it...

[hellsop]

Originally Posted by j_hamblin

I hear several people saying their battery lasts 2 days but i just dont believe it...

Prepare to be frustrated; I get about five days out of a charge if I don't do much radio use (that is, only the pushed email, not spending all day refreshing LiveJournal, and no phone calls). The others saying "watch your roaming" are right. Staying in your own signal area helps a lot. FWIW, this is on a battery about a year old as well. I used to get a week out of the thing.

[auart]

OK... I set the network to HOME ONLY and guess what.... The battery is lasting much longer today!
The only thing I worry about is that when I drive out of town in some rural areas, where Alltel has an agreement (Uses Verizon Network) and doesnt charge me roaming in those areas. Will this being set to Home Only mean the phone will ONLY connect to Alltel and will not even try any others, even if it is within the extended area of service?

Still may be worth it to help the battery last longer between charges, maybe while at teh office set to Home Only since the signal is good there and swith to AUTOMATIC while commuting. Any thoughts?

[Darmichar]

I have an 8330 Curve on the Alltel Network. I moved after I bought it to a non-native Alltel area and what I have seen so far confirms what you are seeing.

When I am at home I constantly switch between a Sprint tower and a Verizon tower never getting more than 2-4 bars of service showing 1X. The battery when I am at home will last about 8-9 hours.

Where I work makes heavy use of the Nextel phones. While at work I am connected to a Sprint/Nextel tower getting full signal showing 1XEV. Working a 12 hour shift my battery is rarely below 85%-90% when I leave work. This is after texting/checking email/calling the wife throughout the day.

To address your roaming concerns; from what I have seen Alltel has roaming agreements with Verizon and Sprint( possibly more, this is just what I see in my neck of the woods ). Leaving the phone in 'Home Only' will only connect to these towers, but there are very few areas that I have found that you won't be able to get a signal from at least one of these two carriers.

[hellsop]

Originally Posted by auart

OK... I set the network to HOME ONLY and guess what.... The battery is lasting much longer today!
The only thing I worry about is that when I drive out of town in some rural areas, where Alltel has an agreement (Uses Verizon Network) and doesnt charge me roaming in those areas. Will this being set to Home Only mean the phone will ONLY connect to Alltel and will not even try any others, even if it is within the extended area of service?

Yup, that's exactly what it means. It won't use the Verizon service. There's kind of three levels of "seeking" that it'll go through:

1. Home network: phone connects once, then uses a low-power moitoring to make sure the tower is still there.
2. Roaming: medium power drain as the phone will mostly just listen to the foreign tower, but occasionally go into a high-power seek mode looking for a home tower. Phone in "Home Only" will save the power used listening for calls on foreign towers.
3. Out of network: phone spends a lot of time in high-power seek looking for any signal. Some of my earlier phones would evenutally quit trying after a couple of hours and just try again every hour or two for a few minutes to save power; I presume the Curve does so as well but haven't caught it doing it since the place that I used to spend time out of range now has carrier coverage.

Still may be worth it to help the battery last longer between charges, maybe while at teh office set to Home Only since the signal is good there and swith to AUTOMATIC while commuting. Any thoughts?

If the office is in a home network anyway, it probably won't help a whole lot. If the office is Verizon, the phone will still do the high-power seek occasionally, but will skip the periods of low-power "listening to foreign tower" stage, and won't sign onto the network (and obviously, won't do whatever background data exchange is normal) If the commute is largely out of any signal, turning the network off during the trip will probably help a lot more.

[Darmichar]

Hellsop is correct. After his post I went back and looked at my phone. It is in 'Automatic' mode, switching to 'Home Only' I lose signal and I assume it it looking for a native Alltel tower.

[auart]

Thanks for all the info.
I set the BB on Home Only today all day long and you are right.. It helps in some areas and doesnt seem to help in others. My office seemed to be in an area that the battery seemed to drain quicker.
I think tomorrow I will try the exact same thing and use my Seidio Battery that is a 1500 (slightly more battery life) and see how that holds up.(today I was using the BB original battery)
The only real answer may be to keep a desk charger handy and charge up during the day at the office.
With the 8330 from Alltel obviously needing a whole lot more charges than some of the other carriers (where people are getting 3 days in some cases on a charge) do you think it would be wise to use the desktop charger rather than the mini USB charger? I read a post that the guy claims it is better to charge with the desktop because it utilizes the contacts on the back of the phone and doesnt "Wear Out" the mini USB connection/charging port.

[j_hamblin]

Originally Posted by auart

I read a post that the guy claims it is better to charge with the desktop because it utilizes the contacts on the back of the phone and doesnt "Wear Out" the mini USB connection/charging port.

I would highly doubt that, It doesnt seem logical power is power no matter how you look at it the only difference I would think would be the charging time...

[tama2112]

I have a question along the lines of this post (I use Sprint).

I have a 2nd office located in the mountains of NC. I know for 100% certainty that there are only 2 cell phone carriers there: Carolina West & US Cellular (both CDMA).

My office is located very close to a Carolina West tower so the the service is very good - although roaming. So my question(s) is this:
1) Should i set my phone to "ROAM Only" while in this area (since i know there are no Sprint towers)?
2) Will my battery life be affected because i am roaming?

Any recommendations?

[kenjunior]

Alltel Curve. LOVE the thing! Get 3 full days. I avg about 1000 text msgs/mo, have BES and BIS setup (receiving no less than 15 emails a day to the phone). I have an Alltel tower less than 1 mile from me most of the time.

Now, I just got back from a week long trip where I was "roaming". I got a full day, meaning, off charger ~7:30am, gone all day, back to hotel room about 9pm. Battery was about 50%. Make the calls to home to talk to the wife, etc. By 10:30pm, would have about 40% battery left. I would go ahead and plug it in overnight cause I didn't want to be without communications.

I don't pay much attention to the roaming indicators, 1x EV, etc. I just use the thing.

Have you done #228 updates several times while in your home area? Its free and will do OTA roaming list updates, etc. Alot of times it will make a difference due to new roaming agreements and tower changes.

Yes, Alltel has been doing alot of EVDO updates so that is a possibility causing issues.

My 2 cents worth,
Kenjunior