yashsingh1/xdaforums huggingface dataset:
[HTC Sensation] steve austin:
This obviously does not apply to everyone, but the erratic nature of a majority of everyone's battery life if a bit irritating to me. I am in the camp where the on screen time of 2-3 hours will give me about 8 hours of battery life (depending in what other things i do as well like pics and heavy internet surfing).

i hate a dimmed screen, but "my" battery would only yield me 4-5 hours (if that) of life if i kept it at full brightness. that sucks. I see people here with 6hrs of on screen time and in double digit battery life, but I am not that fortunate even with the tweaks I've made.
[HTC Sensation] Element515:
i had my phone charged to 100% at work, unplugged around 10pm, came home t o plug it in and when i woke up the phone was unresponsive, had to pull the battery. then i saw i had 17% despite being plugged in so idk what just happened... but the 11 hours of standby is a new record for my new sensation.
[HTC Sensation] joslicx:
My last usage here:

Comprised of 30 min call time, few texts, 5 pics without flash (pics came out rather disappointing:(), facebook updates and browsing, about 20 mins of angry birds, playing with 4 people on wordfeud thruout the day, 2 games of soduku and some internet browsing (following cricket score Ind-WI match) on wifi. Wifi was on only in evening. On 2g connection thru the day.
[HTC Sensation] xnifex:
what are you doing where you have all that awake time but the screen is actually off?
[HTC Sensation] tigerz0202:
The biggest problem with battery life on my phone is my damn fingers , I can't keep them off the damn phone
[HTC Sensation] joslicx:
dont know why it should be like that! what do you think ? I think the battery info app might not be too accurate.
[HTC Sensation] smacman:
The trouble with these type of battery threads (I know I started it..) is the misinformation that is spread. We obviously all have entirely different usage patterns. Some will use their phone very little and consequently end up with days of battery life (most of the time spent on standby). Others will not be able to put the gadget down and therefore see much shorter time between charges. For these reasons, comparing how long people are going between charges is largely useless.

In order to find a meaningful point of comparison, we should instead focus on a variable that is consistent across different usage patterns. The best one in my opinion is the "Display On" time (not the percentage). The display is by far the largest power draw on this calibre of phone. Anyone that actually uses their phone will have no choice but to spend some amount of time with the display on.

Although a few people have reported display on times in excess of 6 hours, I am yet to see proof (It isn't that I don't believe. I just can't consider data that is not confirmed in some manner.). So far the data we have seen in this thread seems to consistently point to a battery which is capable of powering the display for 2-4 hours. The range is likely due to variables such as brightness, radio status, and other general configuration demands.

The reason I started this thread was to establish a normal range and I believe we have done that now. I think we all have a good idea of our batteries mileage now, and with that in mind, I am now moving on with a spare battery in my wallet (2-4hrs of display on time is occasionally inadequate for my needs).

Regards,
[HTC Sensation] 299792458:
How can I figure out whats waking up my phone? Any easy way to do this? The only sync enabled is goog/gmail but I see ticks every 10-15(?) Mins or so on my battery discharge graph showing phone awake.

Btw I get around 15 hours with what I call light usage before I hit 15%. My medium usage gets me 10 to 12 hrs. Battery life took about 2 weeks before things really improved over my initial 8 hour life.
[HTC Sensation] DeoreDX:
Very light usage day for me today. Just emails about 5 minutes of phone calls a few texts a few minutes of web browsing and one program downloaded. Screen time on only 42 minutes (I'm normally closer too ~1 hour a day if I don't do any gaming). After 16h 27m I was at 68% left. I'm normally @ 65% when I leave the office @ 5pm after 9 hours off the charger and ~1 hour of use. Today I was @ 85% when I left the office with 35 minutes of use. Yesterday I was at 80% with 55 minutes of use. What did I change to boost the performance?

Under the wireless/ mobile networks I disabled "always on mobile data". What does this do? It kills your data connection when your phone becomes suspended. That doesn't mean it stays disconnected. Instead of getting gmails instantly when they hit my inbox it takes anywhere from 1-3 minutes instead. You will show offline on google talk and I found it was 50/50 wheter or not I would get a Gtalk my wife sent. Other than that the phone performs just like normal. As soon as you unsuspend the phone the data connection resets. Normally before I can swipe to unlock the data connection is already connected. If instant e-mails isn't a big deal or Gtalk isn't a big deal this will be a big battery saver for most everyone.
[HTC Sensation] steve austin:
good point/observation

you make my point exactly. I am glad that people are happy with 19hours up, but "usually" most of that time is in standby. That is not how "i" measure the longevity of the battery. I achieved a personal record yesterday: 16hours & 20 minutes. The interesting thing was I had about three hours on screen time with the brightness dimmed to 75%. The standby time is incredible. During the 3 hours on screen there was mostly texts, facebook and three calls. I also, to work the battery played a series of games including Stupid Zombies (which "could" have been addictive if it did not freeze twice). However, I did not take any picks or make long phone calls which I notice eats up the battery like candy (and are staples of me using the phone on a regular basis).

I'm thinking if I pushed the on screen time to a solid 4 hours i would be pushing it. If i keep the sensation (got a few days to decide) I will get another battery as well.
[HTC Sensation] pinhead:
During normal use the Sensation goes through battery just like any other Android smartphone. However, the standby time is pretty impressive. I am thrilled to have a smartphone that will let me use it reasonably AND will last until the end of the day.

Here's a shot I just took of the battery graph using my tablet's camera. I havent figured out screenshots for this one yet.
[HTC Sensation] steve austin:
what is your "on screen" time if you don't mind me asking?
[HTC Sensation] xnifex:
screw that, I want to know what you carry.
[HTC Sensation] zim2dive:
Understood.. and the flip side is that some of us (ok, maybe just me), measure by how many days we can go without a recharge.. ie. will I be hosed if I forget one night to charge, or as you hear about some phones, can I even make it thru a single day..... so for me, being able to go 2,3,4 days is fantastic, especially compared to the G1 I am coming from.. I could get 3 days on that with an extended battery, but that was with "limiting" (even by my standards) my use... here I can get that much time on the normal (no fatty) battery and use as much as I want (which admittedly is less than others).

Not arguing here.. just explaining the (or at least one) other side.

Cheers,

Mike

EDIT: and to give credit, as you do mention, the standby time is incredible..
[HTC Sensation] smacman:
I sort of hear you but what is the point of carrying the phone at all if you can't use it. If somebody told you it could standby for 3 years but the screen could only be powered for 3 hours, would that really be helpful? The only case I can see here is for someone that carries the phone purely for emergency use (not your typical smartphone user).
[HTC Sensation] zim2dive:
you misunderstand... I read email, I text, I check things on the web, and play some Angry Birds when I'm stuck waiting somewhere (or on a conference call :) ).. I do everything I want to do (with the Sensation... did not as much with the G1).. and I still have very good battery life.

... and I'm also very happy that it has great standby time.

It seems like some folks think everyone who uses the phone less than them is compromising or sacrificing.. we aren't.... really.. I never pull the phone out and think "gosh I can't do that, it will kill my battery".. I do think "hey, I never use XYZ, I should disable it b/c it will help my battery life.. and its a 2-second process to re-enable it for the rare case when I do want to use it".
[HTC Sensation] smacman:
Understood.. My point was simply that a more worthwhile point of measure is the display on time vs total time between charges. Too many variables in the latter. If everyone came on here and simply reported how many hours/days they get off a single charge, it would not be a very useful point of comparison for somebody who is concerned or curious about the Sensation's battery life.
[HTC Sensation] Dolphinwigs:
There is a battery conditioning procedure recommended by HTC - probably would work with any battery

To also help with Battery Life you can do these steps exactly:

1) Turn your device ON and Charge the device for 8 hours or more 2) Unplug the device and Turn the phone OFF and charge for 1 hour 3) Unplug the device Turn ON wait 2 minutes and Turn OFF and charge for another hour Your battery life should almost double, we have tested this on our devices and other agents have seen a major difference as well

The above is a cut-and-paste from G2x forum, also a cut-and paste...
[HTC Sensation] zim2dive:
Agreed to the extent that Display seems to be on of the biggest factors in the battery life (altho I'm admitting being ignorant enough that I could be convinced otherwise).

I think the blog sites (ie. engadget, etc), tend to do a "standard" test where they will

a) set the display to always-on, at max brightness

b) start a media player and leave it running

see how long the battery lasts... that eliminates many of the variables...

what is clear from this thread so far is that people see significantly different battery life...what is less clear how much each of multiple variables factor in to the equation, ie.

- luck of the draw on your battery

- usage pattern

- display brightness/timeout

- use of Wifi vs. cell data, etc

- I've not read, but noticed a thread on there being 2 screens manuf in use, could one be more power efficient vs. the other.. dunno

- etc.

based on the reports I saw on the thunderbolt, evo 3d, etc, I think we Sensation owners are at least better off than some others... or at least that is my impression.

I guess that is a different question.. for the folks who are disappointed in the battery life.. is that disappointed in comparison to some previous phone, or just disappointed in a more abstract sense, as in a phone should be able to last XYZ hours (regardless of whether one has ever seen a phone, used the way they would like to use it, which did last that long).
[HTC Sensation] steve austin:
it is what it is....

to be honest, and i sort of hate me saying it over in different posts (but it really is eating me up) i hate that there is no real "flagship" characteristic - to me - regarding the Sensation. This is particularly evident in the capacity of the battery compared to its Evo 3D brother (regardless of 3d capabilities).

With that said, i just read a few posts. Again, having a phone that you do not have to charge for a day is great. But if you need to make several crucial calls, and your at 40%, after never using the phone for two days, and when you do it eats it down to nothing - quickly - is that real value?

to my point, a few posts back, i chronicled my 16 hour up time. I was happy. HOWEVER, i only had 3hrs and change on screen time. So today, just to make sure my hypothesis was right (regarding long charge vs. actual use) I had the screen on about the same time but I gamed, and downloaded, and facebooked, texed, changed wallpapers and a host of other things. much more intense use in that same 3 hour plus time. You know how many hours I got before i got down to 5% battery? 6 hours 40 min. Almost a 10 hour difference. That is huge!

Before anyone starts, save the crass and sardonic remarks, I know I put more stress on the battery. That is the point. The standby is great, but I use my smartphone for everything. That is why I am paying for a high end phone. God help me if I took pics today too. I am sure i would not have made it to 5 1/2 hours. There are a lot of variables that impact battery life. WITHOUT having to buy another one i have to really gauge how i plan to use the phone on a daily basis.
[HTC Sensation] Xcor3:
My phone has been up for 1 hour and 30 minutes from fully charged battery, the battery is now 98%
[HTC Sensation] smacman:
Wow Congrats!!! You have one of the magic batteries. At that rate you will go 183.75 days before needing a charge. :)
[HTC Sensation] Xcor3:
You're like a calculator, thanks:) that's almost a year :D
[HTC Sensation] n8dwgphx:
Turn background data off!!!!

The days I didn't turn this crap off my batt was dead by lunch, with it off I still had 90% on my lunch break, just sayin ;D

-I'd recommend turning his evil brother (auto sync) off all day too.
[HTC Sensation] smacman:
Good point! I find even better results if I shut down the entire phone when I leave the house. When I power back up upon returning home, the battery drain is negligible....
[HTC Sensation] Element515:
someone tell me what the hell is wrong with my charger or battery? i plug it in when i sleep, i wake up and now it's in the yellow zone even though it's plugged in... it's like the thing started playing it's own games. i looked into the usage history and at 4am it started draining and by 8:30 i wake up and it's drained... now i restart the phone and unplug/plug it in and in 20min it's up to 62% again... wtf is going on?
[HTC Sensation] zim2dive:
I might just learn something here... is there a comparable smartphone which does better? (and by how much?) .. maybe I bought the wrong phone (so far I am very happy tho)

the OEMs are going to include a battery they think is "good enough" for some "average" user to get thru the day (maybe 2.. who knows what goals marketing gave their engineering dept)..the unfortunate thing is that the battery options so far are fairly limited, and not sure if the power users will have the option to buy the mega batteries b/c of the rear being antenna and such. But the OEMs are never going to design a phone that lets you game/watch videos/ etc for 2 days.. if they ended up with one by a happy accident, they'd go back and redesign to save the cost/weight of they would view as "extra" battery.
[HTC Sensation] lysergic:
Battery from 100% to flat overnight - no use

Ok I left my sensation with 100% around midnight. Switched on, but auto-sync to the minimum: no facebook, flickr once/day, no news, no htc sense sync... wifi on, but obviously virtually unused.

By the morning battery was flat (3%) and the phone off!

By comparison the Desire would last forever if unused.

Any ideas?

//lys
[HTC Sensation] steve austin:
it varies - A LOT. choose wisely

let's be clear, i know and you know that htc is about making loot. can they, theoretically, do more, yes. will they...not so much. example. My hd2 was 4.3 inch single core. battery that shipped was 1200 something. our sensation has dual core and the battery jumps to 1520 something. REGARDLESS of what your or my pattern of use 1500 plus what the determined the phone should have. Now, the Evo 3d is at 1730 something....really? Again, the pattern of use, in theory, should be overlooked. However, the 3d capabilities are being listed as the reason...not so much. The samsung galaxy 2 has 1650 - and NO 3D, but still more than the Sensation. Hmmm. Manufactures discretion at its finest.

Now with that said you will get critics flying in here to say: yeah, samsung's battery is bigger BUT it dies quicker or the Evo 3d punishes the battery blah blah blah... Its all technology and Planned Obsolescence any way. I get that. Its that the Sensation, DESPITE, the love (and i have one) was not equipped like a true flagship phone and that is clearly represented in battery size. Not just against competition, but with its brother the evo 3d.

with all that as the backdrop, i suggest you read from the beginning of this thread again to help you decided. 20 hours of battery life (standby) vs. 5 straight hours of screen on time (true use) is something you are going to have to consider. Hey, no doubt, its nice not to have to charge for 12 hours. BUT when i go to use it on the subway for my hour and a half commute and it does on me cuz the screen is on, will i really be happy? Some people report 6 hours of on screen time WHILE being unplugged for more than 10 hours. "i" have had no such luck. Play around, see what batter saving tips work for you because no phone is perfect and they are not designed to be. But that is where rooting comes in and that is a whoooole 'nother kettle of fish HTC!!
[HTC Sensation] zim2dive:
My thought on the Evo 3D was that wimax seems to be a battery killer, hence the need for the larger battery there...

I'll ask the question again... name a phone which does better for battery life? (ignore the battery in the other phone.. it may/not need the extra juice).

EDIT: According to this benchmarking site, the Sensation battery is 1 hour better than most others... for any particular comparison, go to the bottom of the page and add the phones you want to compare against: http://www.laptopmag.com/review/cell-phones/htc-sensation-4g.aspx?mode=benchmarks&cids=2804,2800,pa
[HTC Sensation] kabuk1:
I'm getting a constant 200-300mah drain on mine no matter what I do. I've tried every trick I can find & I cannot figure out what is causing this. A lot of the time my drain app says that system_server is eating a lot of battery but I don't know what that is. I've got every auto-sync option disabled, Hub, Latitude, and everything else is disabled, I tried a hard reset, I even tried disabling 4g & nothing helps. Sometimes it will go down around 30 for a couple minutes then it spikes right back up. I don't know what to do, I love this phone but this ****ty battery life might just be a deal breaker for me.
[HTC Sensation] Trekest:
Just a quick update on my battery life - yesterday I had only little-medium amount of use (screen was on 1.5 hours) - two worlds in a row (50 levels) of Cut the Rope, few phone calls, some browsing, transferring files over my network (roughly 250MB), WIFI was on the entire time (though on the Battery graph it shows that it turned off automatically).

The results were spectacular - the device clocked 18 hours and the battery has only drained to 52%. Highly impressed!
[HTC Sensation] Beck:
9am till 6pm: 61% left.

No auto-sync, backlight 20-30%, wifi off, gps off,

40 minutes of music,

sending and receiving 10+ of messages,

manual updating of friends stream

minimal wifi

advise on my battery performance is it acceptable?
[HTC Sensation] kabuk1:
That sounds about right.

My phone seems to have 'settled' a bit after a few charge/deplete cycles & I'm getting roughly the same life as you are now. I dunno why I got so huffy about the battery life when I first got it, it's not like I haven't had dozens of phones that needed breaking in :rolleyes:
[HTC Sensation] Beck:
Haha. today is my second day of full cycle and I tried to use the calibration method twice but I am afraid it will harm my phone so I am going to stop it. Going to start charging my phone around 10% to see the battery life cycle in the next few days. :D
[HTC Sensation] diosys:
Playing 45 min of angry birds with auto brightness kills about 40% battery

Normal ???
[HTC Sensation] steve austin:
i love it when a plan comes together...

to help answer your question i have to update my findings first.

i decided to put the phone through the ringer. Or use it like I intend to use it on an extreme day - by taking a lot of pics and internet use.

5 hrs 12 minutes on battery

2hrs 46 minutes ON SCREEN

105 pics taken

screen brightness 75%

12% battery left

I went from 16 to 6/7 to 5 hours after I started using the phone - like a smartphone. I can handle 5 hours because I won't be taking pics like that all the time. I will probably get about 7-9 hours with the use I plan on giving it.

For those getting great "standby time" as stated before, its great if you want to not have to have a charger handy. However, if you are going to use the phone your screen brightness, how long the screen is on and what activity you choose are really going to vary the battery life.

Your battery life seems to be in line with light to minimal use and no extra sync processes IMO. More to my point, this guy got 18thrs of battery time but on screen time was only like an hour and change. But that suits him. On screen time is "my" big thing in judging a battery.

http://xdaforums.com/showpost.php?p=15332237&postcount=108
[HTC Sensation] kpjimmy:
IMO the mulitipl synching is what uses the most battery. I have turned off the friend sync and other syncs I do not use/want.

My battery from 8am to 10pm with changes from 4g, to 2g to roaming and back to 2g with a air wifi connection which I just ignored but kept the wifi toggle on.

Through the day, I checked my emails, browsed a few pages, and checked twitter. When I returned home, the phone was about 30% left on the batt.

Pretty great for a stock battery IMO. A bit better than my old N1.
[HTC Sensation] DeoreDX:
Wifi + internet isn't a fully inclusive battery test. I have no problems with doing basic phone things like internet or email or taking pictures. But when I play a game, or use something GPS intensive like google nav or Skydroid my phone will drain at 1%/minute which is far worse than any other phone I have ever owned. G2. HD2. Vibrant. Galaxy S 4G. G1. I would play 30 minutes of PLants v. Zombies on my G2 on my way to work and get to work with 80%+ left. With my sensation I am @ 70% with a 300mah larger battery.
[HTC Sensation] Beck:
Update on my normal usage (light / minimal) :

~100 messages (sent & received)

~ 5 calls

~ 2 hours of music listening

~ manual syncing of weather, friends stream, email (once in the day & once at night)

On standby 12mn - 8.30am: drop 3%

Yesterday 9 - till: Left 6%, 1d 1h 40m on battery

- Display: 65%, Time on: 2h

- Cell standby: 17%

- Phone idle: 15%

- Voice calls: 3%
[HTC Sensation] kabuk1:
I tried bump charging & that seemed to help a bit. It's not so much the battery that needs calibrating, but the phone itself. It's always been my experience that the phone needs to kind of "learn" how to use the battery to its full potential.
[HTC Sensation] lokhor:
Can you guys get PowerTutor (free from Market) and use it to monitor how much power your Sensation uses. When comparing the Sensation to my SGS the Sensation uses a lot more power on average.

My average atm is:

Sensation: 649mW

SGS: 395mW
[HTC Sensation] ingekeith:
I got 16 hours with 50% battery remaining I was flipping my **** out.
[HTC Sensation] cashyftw:
JUICEDEFENDER ;]

10char.
[HD2 General] Gadgetkid1:
hi everybody, i just wanted to know if you guys can port the iPhone OS over onto magldr (as you guys are very talented) because i saw this video on utube so it must be possible

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gw80suCPB1U

so it can be done

Cheers Gadgetkid1