I bought a used N900 back in September and the battery life isn't great in either of the original genuines. In the better one, I can make it through the day if I use less than one hour of all of the following added to together: music, 3G data, maybe a few minutes of basic games, fumbling through the application grid for a minute or so a few times a day. Problem is, if I do that, my battery can't make it throughout the 12 to 15 hours of my day.

Again, this is only maybe 10 to 15 minutes of 3G data, wifi completely disabled (wifi-switcher), 25 to 35 minutes of music, 5 to 10 minutes of interacting with the OS itself, power kernel running on 250 to 600Mhz, stock speeds, or sometimes 600 to 600Mhz (I noticed the OS is way way better if you remove on the spot scaling. Normally this may seem bad for battery but since the processor idles at 2 to 5%, it can't be too bad. Screen brightness is always at two out of five.

I'm going to purchase a genuine battery in the next few weeks and I was wondering what I should expect out of it. Can anyone with a newish genuine battery report:

1 What they do when the phone isn't in idle.
2 For how long they do it daily.
3 Kernel, clock speeds, screen brightness.
4 How many hours their phone will make it before hitting 20%

Thanks.

I know it seems excessive, but if I constantly used the phone starting at 8 AM, running only one to two applications at a time, I could kill the battery with 3G web browsing, listening to music (not at the same time), and watching a 20 minute video by 10 AM.

My advice is: don't use the N900 when you want to save on batteries.

This is not as stupid as it sounds. I don't know about you, but most of the time I am surrounded by hardware that does a better job than any cellphone or internet tablet for music, surfing, communication, games, programming and whatever. So I only use the N900 for phone calls and when there is no better hardware around.

A special case is the routeplanner, butt hen I connect the N900 to the cigarette lighter.

Hope this helps you get a more realistic view on hardware and the use of.

Paai

Ok, Paai, I have to ask: why bother blowing all that money on an N900 (or any other unlocked smartphone/tablet, for that matter) if you're just using it for phone calls? If that's the case, why not just get a subsidized phone for free or the cheapest unlocked one you can find?

In other words, for the USD $399 I paid for my N900 in October, I could have bought a laptop or netbook; if I'd saved, I could have bought an ipad or Galaxy Tab.

Your argument just doesn't make any sense to me...

Now, Matt, 2 things to keep in mind:

1. Li-ion batteries age whether you use them or not. At 3 years old from manufacture, they have roughly half their capacity before further subtracting more life due to cycling (which they don't like either), and any N900 or smart phone battery will see LOTS of cycling! My laptop's battery is experiencing this right now as it appears to be approaching 3 years old. Bottom line: if you buy a new battery, try to find out the actual manufacture date of the cell inside.

2. The N900 and Fremantle/Maemo5 is notorious for different apps, app versions, or even kernel versions causing WILDLY varying power usage! If you haven't done it already, I strongly suggest a complete re-flash of your device to pr1.3. If you're up to it, I also recommend power kernel version 46 (without overclocking and after the re-flash) and swappolube. Make sure not to install apps like "flashlight-extra" which leaves scripts behind even after un-installation that will eat your battery quick. With these things I'm getting half a day's moderate use and 3-4 hours of heavy use (videos and heavy gaming); with little to no use, I get 24 hours or more (I plug it in when I go to bed or when I drain it). Just remember you're not going to get the life out any kind of device in the N900's class, regardless of OS, that you will out of a simpler phone with far less capabilities and power usage. (The battery size was one of the original complaints of the N900 vs its predecessors, BTW.)

One more thing: do you really want to pay the genuine price? There's a thread somewhere on TMO about that subject and some 3rd party brands beat the genuine batteries for a fraction of the dough. The possible catch is whether they have the safety circuitry that will keep your face from ending up like the guy I saw on TV last week when his iphone blew up--I'm not sure if that thread is covering that or not.

Good luck!

Mike

Storkus, I did say *when there is no better hardware around*. That incl,udes tethering my laptop when there is no wifi around or reading mail & internet when I am travelling light. And as a Linux person, I *really* appreciate the shell and scripting possibilities. Oh, and I admit getting a kick out of installing a httpserver with php, and kosting a complete website on my N900, although I never discovered an use for it :-)

I think I got my money's worth with the N900, even when I don't use it full time for games, videos and music.

Paai

When I bought my N900 from new I left the original battery in the box - as I already had a genuine use 5800 battery, so i've been using that for a year.

Recently it started to fail and I could barely get 4/5 hours without it dropping to zero.

I've since upgraded to PR1.3 and now using the NEW battery that came with my N900 and can EASILY get a full 12 hours of usage out of the N900, thats even with downloading 350mb file over HSDPA, browsing a little, always connected to skype and google talk, and RSS feeds updating every 15 minutes and the weather every hour.

Plus my two gmail accounts updating every half an hour.

I start around 8.30am, and my phone lasts till at least 9.30pm normally - thats if I go to the gym and listen to music for about 30-40mins, if I don't go to the gym it lasts longer.

I'm quite pleased with that! I think if your's does not last that long then your battery must be on it's way out.

Don't buy batteries of ebay - more often than not they are fakes. And if you do buy used ones instead.

yeah i'm aware of how bad li-ons can be with age, i've been using the ones that came with the phone, used, so they're likely about two years old. i'm getting a geniune so i know fer sure how well this thing behaves. i cant even keep an active internet connection if i wanna go more than 6 hours. i reflash probably once every two weeks due to experimentation, so thats not an issue.

i just wanna know what i should expect usage-wise coming from a possibly two year old li-on.

I'm guessing after two years of use it's pretty much dead.

Just to add my phone is clocked to 1Ghz, and brightness set to 3 and I'm using the power kernel and I have 16GB Micro sd Card.

I don't bother with disabling wifi - for some wierd reason it seems to last longer if I don't use wifi switcher, (perhaps thats just my perception?), but it does search for wifi every 10 minutes.

When the phone is idle I make SURE i close ALL apps including web browser - they just suck battery.

I think the easiest way to describe N900 battery drain is like this:
- If you use it as a phone - you should get average phone battery life (~4-5 days).
- if you use it as notebook - you should get average notebook battery life (~6-8 hrs).

I bought mine about week ago and still experimenting. I did PR 1.2 -> 1.3 when the phone was "clean". I noticed that in 2G mode and all remaining RXs and TXs off it uses about 8% every 10hrs. Which in theory should give about 5 days. On the other hand I can easily drain 20% in 1hr watching internet TV or high definition film.

I have standard 1.3 kernel. Brightness 2/5. I don't use sdcard.

Consider carrrying an extra battery with you. It isn't heavy and doesn't take long to swap.

I haven't done any proper measurements but if I use the N900 like a laptop (surfing, chatting and playing music nonstop) it lasts 3-5 hours. If I use it like a phone (occasional music and surfing plus some talking) it lasts me 12-17 hours.