[DC-WiFi.com]

I reduced the brightness and backlight timeout. I will report in tomorrow. With the default settings the battery is only good for 8 hours of normal usage on my device. Hopefully this will do it.

[RoDan]

Yeah man GPS will suck battery. I guarantee you will see a major improvement

[tj13]

seems better after a few days. i left bluetooth on and gps on,normal call and email amounts. it went down to the last bar by 4 oclock. i still think it is not as good as the 8830, time will tell.

[Shotiime11]

Originally Posted by tj13

seems better after a few days. i left bluetooth on and gps on,normal call and email amounts. it went down to the last bar by 4 oclock. i still think it is not as good as the 8830, time will tell.

I made it until about 10:30 pm last night with my normal heavy usage, emails, texts, calls, BBM and by that time i had just gotten to 25% battery left. Battery has definitely improved as the days have gone on. Has anyone noticed that texts messages drain A LOT more power then BBM? I send 10-15 texts and it goes down 15% and I talk to someone on BBM and it stays the same. Does SMS text use more power?

[whoscalling]

What a difference! I turned GPS off (see above) and todays battery life is sooooooo much better.

[Shotiime11]

Originally Posted by whoscalling

What a difference! I turned GPS off (see above) and todays battery life is sooooooo much better.

Did you change to 1XEV as well? out of curiousity, what selections do you have setup on the GPS? Anyone have any input on SMS text messages draining more battery life then bbm?

[Donbp]

Originally Posted by Shotiime11

I send emails and texts pretty heavily throught the day and I am still at about 25% batt life. anyone else notice that even thought the battery meter might be lower on the tour, if you go into status, its actually has more then what the curve would show % wise? just a thought that maybe the tour battery meter isnt as close to the % left as the curve was which in my opinion was pretty accurate. Throughout the day I noticed the battery meter fell quickly from 100% but then got slower and slower as it went towards zero. thoughts?

That's a point. Nobody has said they actually had it go dead so it's uncertain how accurate the display or even the number in status is.

[akosnitzky]

Since this is the first OS Release for this device, nothing would surprise me

[whoscalling]

Originally Posted by Shotiime11

Did you change to 1XEV as well? out of curiousity, what selections do you have setup on the GPS? Anyone have any input on SMS text messages draining more battery life then bbm?

Global to 1XEV
GPS Services- E911 Only
Location Aiding- Disable while roaming

Screen Brightness 80%
Screen timeout 20sec

Big difference in battery life

[michael12005]

I don't see what difference it makes to change Global to 1XEV because if you are in the USA it is on 1XEV just about all of the time anyway. i always keep mine on Global, as I did with my 8830.

[2 Samuel 22]

Try performing the following actions:

• Set your BlackBerry® device to turn on and turn off automatically.
• Charge your device regularly.
• Keep your battery connections clean. Every few months, use a cotton swab or dry cloth to clean the metal contacts on the battery and the
device.
• Set backlighting to remain on for a shorter period of time and lower its brightness.
• Turn off the connection to a wireless network when you are not in a wireless coverage area.
• Switch your vibrating notifications to sound notifications or LED notifications, lower the volume of your sound notifications, or select a
shorter ring tone.
• Delete the original message when you send a reply.
• Send a message to multiple contacts using Add To, Add Cc, or Add Bcc.
• If your device has a camera flash, turn off the flash.
• Close third-party applications from the application menu when you are finished with them.
• Change your browser options for animated graphics so that they repeat less often on web pages.

[Shotiime11]

Originally Posted by whoscalling

Global to 1XEV
GPS Services- E911 Only
Location Aiding- Disable while roaming

Screen Brightness 80%
Screen timeout 20sec

Big difference in battery life

I took the tour off the charger this morning at 745am and after a few text, emails, calls and BBM by around 12 my batt was down to 80%! After reading your post and what you did around 1230 and implementing these settings, especially the 80% and 10 sec backlight turn off, WHAT A DIFFERENCE. Its now 930pm and after triple the amount of texting, emailing, calls and BBM I am now only at 60% which is about where I would be on my curve after a normal day!! The lower backlight % and shorter off time really does work. Anyone else seeing a difference like this??

[akosnitzky]

Originally Posted by whoscalling

Global to 1XEV
GPS Services- E911 Only
Location Aiding- Disable while roaming

Screen Brightness 80%
Screen timeout 20sec

Big difference in battery life

Good suggestion

[Mattywalnuts]

Originally Posted by whoscalling

Global to 1XEV
GPS Services- E911 Only
Location Aiding- Disable while roaming

Screen Brightness 80%
Screen timeout 20sec

Big difference in battery life

Have the same settings except for your note on Location Aiding. What exactly is Location Aiding?

[whoscalling]

Originally Posted by Mattywalnuts

Have the same settings except for your note on Location Aiding. What exactly is Location Aiding?

Look 15 or so posts up.

[dani190]

why dont you guys try 10% brightness? you barly notice it and it will probably save you even more battery...

[bell30012]

I guess I just look at this situation differently than most. I spent money purchasing the top of the line BlackBerry because I wanted the features that were offered. I am not going to turn off any features, dim the bright backlight or sacrifice connectivity to save battery life.

Why not just purchase an extra battery or additional chargers? Through my provider (Sprint) I purchased an extra battery for $44.99. There are wall chargers, USB chargers and 12V vehicle chargers available for the 9630.

Consider the $45 to be a bit additional on the purchase price. When comparing the battery life of the BlackBerrys that I've owned; I needed two batteries to make it through a normal day for the 7100i. The Curve usually made it on one with a recharge midday. The Tour seems to need two batteries and a recharge or two.

This phone has camera, media player, email, messaging capability and much, much more. Oh yes, it can actually make a call or two as well. Use it to the fullest. What I want to see is a charger for the battery not in device.

[jabo052]

Originally Posted by Joe1004

......played around with VZ Nav, BBMaps and Google Maps while driving......

A motorcyclist best friend.

[ItsAllVerbatim]

Originally Posted by whoscalling

Screen Brightness 80%

80%?

Mine is on 10%

[yahtzee]

Originally Posted by 2 Samuel 22

Try performing the following actions:

• Set your BlackBerry® device to turn on and turn off automatically.
• Charge your device regularly.
• Keep your battery connections clean. Every few months, use a cotton swab or dry cloth to clean the metal contacts on the battery and the
device.
• Set backlighting to remain on for a shorter period of time and lower its brightness.
• Turn off the connection to a wireless network when you are not in a wireless coverage area.
• Switch your vibrating notifications to sound notifications or LED notifications, lower the volume of your sound notifications, or select a
shorter ring tone.
• Delete the original message when you send a reply.
• Send a message to multiple contacts using Add To, Add Cc, or Add Bcc.
• If your device has a camera flash, turn off the flash.
• Close third-party applications from the application menu when you are finished with them.
• Change your browser options for animated graphics so that they repeat less often on web pages.

Are you serious with some of these? Turn on the flash? what's the point of a decent camera if you have to turn off the flash? Delete original message when sending a reply? For what? I had to add sounds to my notifications for the first time ever since the vibrate feature blows and is hardly felt.

We shouldn't have to dumb down our devices in order to get battery life that is at least on par with a previous model........someone in R&D was snoozing during the battery life sessions.