Battery life

[tsmathews1945]

Just having gotten my Axim last week, I was very interested in how it was going to perform. As I drive a bus and occasionally do what's called "standby," meaning I sit downtown waiting for someone to break down or be so late as to need help, I might actually be sitting for a full ten to twelve hour day. Needless to say, battery life is important to me but I couldn't find one review which gave specifics...only reports that it was excellent.

So, I just completed a test for anyone else who might be wondering. I put a movie on my unit and set it to play continuously. I set my screen brightness to just above the halfway point which is, probably a touch brighter than I'd normally use. By doing my test this way, I was making sure my unit would run at it's maximum 400mHz speed and keep the screen backlit--obviously, I shut off the dimming feature for the test. I want to know what's the worst I can expect in terms of battery life. Here's how it went with the two batteries.

I started the movie running and timed it until the battery warning came--which occurs at 20% power remaining.

With the standard 1440mAh battery, I got 4 hours, 30 minutes.
With my optional 3400mAh battery, it went an astounding 9 hours!!

Needless to say, I'm ecstatic. Under normal operations doing mail, reading etc, the cpu will probably set itself to 200 mHz so my battery life will actually be somewhat longer.

I'm amazed that even if I play movies I can carry a computer in my pocket which will run for over twelve hours and, as I said, these times are only until the 20% warning came on so I probably had at least another hour on the standard and possibly another two on the optional battery.

So, while it is a little disappointing that there are a couple of minor shortcomings for the Axim, I couldn't be happier with my purchase.

Tim

yep battery life is pretty good, even for the regular 1400mah, i run my backlight usually 1 or 2 notches from the left side and i find it bright enough to read and all. my linksys card sux up battery life too fast though..

[Old Codger]

Battery life is great with my Axim also. I wish it had been on the market when I got my first PDA.

[hambalan]

The battery life of the Ax is nothing short of amazing.

See the below thread and its link for independent testing...

http://www.aximsite.com/boards/showthread.php?s=&threadid=10070

And to add to the above, I did some test myself, running the Windows Media Player continuously with screen display toggled off until the Ax give a low battery warning (at 20%) after 18 hours!!

On several occassions, I clocked up over 10 hours of continuous use and the meter still reads 40%+

Needless to say, I am more than happy with my Ax (my last PDA only manages 3 to 4 hours before it shuts down automatically).

[salilsoman]

What Power Settings does everyone use, while listening to mp3s, to achieve maximum battery life?

I set my screen intensity to a minimum (extreme left)...but is there anyway that I could turn - off the screen completely? This might not make a big difference....but whatever extra juice I can save from that battery....the better ! Also....what speed do you guys set your CPU to? Do you keep it on AUTO or on POWERSAVE?

All your help will be appreciated !

[hambalan]

While listening to audio (and not using your Ax for anything else), you can toggle off you screen to conserve energy - the single most power hungry source on the Ax is your backlight.

Almost all media player will allow you to toggle off your screen. For example, under Windows Media Player, go to tools - settings - buttons, and map one of the hardware buttons to "screen toggle".

[salilsoman]

Got it....thanks for your help ! :)