[Desire General] bemymonkey:
Most of what I'm basing my argument on is testing I myself have done using my Desire, and a lot of information from this thread.

I'll try to make it simple:

Fact 1: There's no major difference in battery life between Sense ROMs and AOSP ROMs.

Fact 2: No matter what ROM you install, the hardware stays the same

Fact 3: In the switch from OpenDesire 3.0.5 to 3.1.0, the battery statistics changed practically over night from the original AOSP-style 50-75% to the Sense-Style 5-20%. Judging by the 3.1.0 change log and the comment from the ROM developer's right-hand-man (this part is speculation), the Battery use statistics can be manipulated easily when compiling/baking/creating a ROM, and the Sense-style measurements were implemented to satisfy uninformed users who falsely thought their display was actually drawing too much power due to the ROM.

Fact 4: Not a single Nexus One user reports Display Power Usage less than the 20-40% category, with most in the 60-80% category. See poll results here: http://xdaforums.com/poll.php?do=showresults&pollid=3035

Fact 5: Not a single HTC Sense user (I used the forum search for this part and Fact 6) reports more than 20% battery usage by the display. Feel free to check.

Fact 6: Not a single AOSP user (previous to OpenDesire 3.1.0) reports battery usage under 40%, with most reports far over 50%. Feel free to check.

Now, let's take apart your arguments:

We have a broad mix of users on XDA, mostly using their phones for day to day use. Unless the stats are seriously skewed due to Nexus and Desire AOSP users actually using the displays on their phones, and Desire Sense users keeping their phones on Standby all day, it's obvious that there's something wrong with the Display Battery Usage statistic in one of the two camps. You can, of course, continue to assume that this is not the case, and that either Sense users really do keep their phones on standby almost all day, or that different kernels really do cause the screen to use different amounts of power (different amounts here referring to a 300+% increase from one kernel to another)... but I think that's a little naiive.

If I had access to a Nexus One, I'd be testing it myself right now. However, I don't (they're relatively rare here in Germany), so I'm doing my best to gather data without one.

I'm in agreement that gathering data through surveys and so on is sub par, but the results are straightforward enough (in that the two power usage statistics are worlds apart) that I'm inclined to believe they are accurate - at least to an extent that would allow us to conclude that the power usage statistics in either Sense or AOSP builds are defective.

Efficiency = Uses less power to get the same thing done (same thing here being running a phone the way the user wants it).

Why are you assuming that HTC has tweaked their Desire kernel for lower AMOLED power consumption? It would be an explanation that makes sense, but why do you think that this is even technically feasible? I'm no display technician, but as far as I know, it's just not possible.

:confused:

We're talking about percentages here... By definition, if you have 60-80% taken up by the screen, there's only 20-40% left to be used by other components. I don't really understand what you're getting at here.

Also, please try to watch the grammar and spelling a bit - I'm having a bit of a tough time understanding you.