Windows Mobile battery life tips!

Windows Mobile is easily the most powerful & capable mobile operating systems available, I don't care what ANYONE says. It is the most versatile, the most customizable & hackable, and you can do almost everything with it that you can do with a full computer. Once you go WinMo, you never go back! I have had many WM devices- an Ipaq hx4705, a PPC-6700, a PPC-6600, an HTC Mogul, an HTC Touch Pro, and currently an HTC Touch Pro 2. They were all awesome(especially the new TP2, eeek!), though the Touch Pro's battery life was HORRIBLE. I admit that for a while I thought about trading it for something else due to the battery life. It SUCKED! I got through the day just fine with the Mogul & all the ones before it, but I was outta juice by 1 or 2 pm most days with the TP. I resorted to an extended battery for a while, but I hated that vulnerable feeling of not being able to use a case, so I took steps to fix the issue. I figured that since I managed to up my TP's battery life from about 4-5 hours to 15-18 hours, I should provide a write up on how I did so. A lot of the tips here are common sense, but I will list them anyway. This writeup is mainly for WM6.1 devices & later, and the links for the ROMs are for the Touch Pro ONLY. Do NOT install them on any other device or you will brick it!!! If you go to PPCGeeks.com you can find many ROMs tailor-made to whatever device you own.

My tips for good battery life~

* Use a custom ROM & radio. This is one of the best things you can do for your TP. Mighty Mike's ROMs are, IMO, the best. I used Mighty ROM 4.16 & the Alltel 1.03.13F radio on my TP. Of course you have to unlock your phone first- detailed instructions and downloads here. I have found Mighty 4.16 to be the absolute best for battery life, plus its the closest to the stock Sprint ROM so there won't be 'culture shock' for new flashers(lol).

* Condition your battery. Despite what some people say, Li-Ion batteries DO respond to discharge cycling. Let it go completely dead every once in a while & charge it fully afterwards. Think of it as exercise for your battery.

* Turn off roaming. To do this, go to phone> menu> options> services, tap network services & click get settings. Set it to 'home only'. This will keep your phone from constantly hopping networks, which eats a lot of juice. On the other hand- if you're in an area where signal is really low, turn roaming back on & let the phone hop onto another network. Good signal = good battery life.

* Turn off wifi, bluetooth, and GPS when you're not using them. Also turn off the auto-brightness setting under your power options & set the brightness to one or 2 notches below center. I find this to be plenty bright enough while still being good for battery life. To turn off GPS just go to the phone screen, then menu> options> services, then click "location setting" in the box & click get settings. Turn it OFF.

* Download a registry editor if you don't already have one, PHM is a good free one, and navigate to this key;

HKLM>Drivers>Builtin>Battery

Change batterypoll to 25000 or higher(default is 5000).

This reduces the frequency that the CPU 'checks in' with the battery, thus consuming less power. Note that this key is already tweaked in some ROMs, so just check it everytime you flash a new ROM.

* One trick some people swear by is forcing 1x data. I found that this actually HURT my battery life, but try it & see if it helps you. You can force 1x under the same menu as the roaming settings, under 'mode of operation'. (note- Mighty ROM 4.16 does not have this option, but there is a cab floating around for it somewhere)

* Turn off vibrating alerts unless you absolutely NEED them. Tone alerts consume far less juice than the little motor does.

* Turn off the screen while listening to music. This can be accomplished by simply pressing the power button. Unless you're using Windows media Player, that is. If you find that the power button stops playback, just install this file & it should fix that problem. Also, many players have a built-in screen-off function. May I suggest Nitrogen? 'Tis what I use & 'tis excellent.

* Check your email manually instead of having it auto-check for you. I promise nobody is emailing you every 5 minutes.

* Set it to dim the screen after 10 or 30 seconds, and to turn off after 1 minute. These are the default settings, but just check them anyway.

* Install your apps to the SD card. I don't know if this has any OFFICIAL effect on battery life, but I personally have found that it makes a difference.

* Some people say TF3D eats a lot of battery, I have found this to be not that accurate. I have measured it with TF3D on & off, and the difference was really nominal. But, try it both ways(like a bisexual) & see for yourself.

*NOTE- this nest tip is up for debate, because I found out recently that underclocking actually hurt my battery life rather than helped it. I am of the opinion that fudging with your processor is not very good for it, but like with everything else, try it & see if it works for you. nueClockControl is one tool to do this. I would not recommend this though, honestly, nor would I recommend installing anything like nuepowerCPL or anything that tries to control power or battery life. I have personally found that they have a negative impact & tend to have the opposite effect of what they claim to do. But, you can always try them & see what they do for you. Just track your mAh drainage with & without these types of programs. Which leads me to...

* Download a battery-monitoring program like DrSigStat to monitor your drainage. Normal battery drain is anywhere from 40mAh to 80mAh on standby. This is a useful way to see if your battery is draining abnormally fast.

* If you find that it IS draining too fast, download a task manager like Dotfred's task manager and use it to check your running processes & CPU consumption. This way you can track down any rogue apps that are being gluttonous with your precious juice. You can also disable CMguardian with this app. Don't ask why, just DO IT. Heh.

* Download Advanced Config and Diamond Tweak and enable all the power-saving hacks. Set it to disconnect the data connection after 5 minutes or less. Check this setting periodically too, because I've found that for some reason it seems to revert itself every once in a while.

* When the phone is done charging & the charging light is solid, unplug it & replug it until the light starts immediately going solid. You can kind of 'top it off' this way, and this is good to do on your first charge after a flash or hard reset.

* If you are still getting bad battery life- try doing a "master reset" on your battery. There is a rumor that there's a bug in WM that causes it to measure the half-full battery charge on a new phone as full(You know how when you buy a new phone, how the battery is only half full), and it will only charge to that level from then on no matter how much you calibrate it. I dunno how truthful this rumor is, but the "fix" certainly can't hurt anything, so just try it. This is how to do it-

1. Let the phone go completely dead, until you can't even boot it up.

2. Charge for about 5 minutes, just long enough to get enough of a charge to boot up & hard reset.

3. Let the phone do it's configurations & reset, then plug it back in & let it charge OVERNIGHT.

Whether or not this rumor about the bug is true or not, doing this literally TRIPLED my battery life, so I'm inclined to believe it's at least partially true.

* If you still get bad life after trying a different radio, try this little tweak. This can be kind of unnerving for a n00b to do, but follow the steps & you'll be fine.

1. You need your MSL code. BAFMSL is the best way to get it. Install & run.

2. After getting your MSL(which you should write down for future reference), click (from within the program) on EPST. and click 'Edit'.

3. Click 'View Info' then 'NAM Settings'.

4. Go down to ACCOLC in this windows and edit it to be 7 or 8.

5. Click 'View Info' again, then 'Modem Settings'

6. Edit your Slot Cycle Index (SCI) to 3. This lengthens the amount of time between tower polls by the radio(AKA how often the phone checks in with the cell towers to see if a call is coming through). Do not change it to 4 or higher or you could start missing calls. Your Preferred Service System should be [Carrier Name] Only. I.E., I use Sprint, so mine says 'Sprint Only'. Finally make sure that 'HDR Hybrid Preferred' is enabled. While you're already here, click 'View Info', then 'Data Parameters', and make sure that your Rev.A is ENABLED.

NOTE- this hack is apparently reset to default if you hard reset or flash a new rom, so check it every flash/reset.

7. Click OK at the top right corner, click yes when it asks you if you want to update the items, and click OK again to soft reset.

* If you follow all these tips & tricks and you are STILL getting shitty battery life, your battery could be defective. Its actually very common, Touch Pro batteries seem to be utter shite. I have had 2 TP batteries fry out on me within 2 months! They really need to recall these batteries before one catches on fire & kills some poor schmuck. The symptoms of a bad battery are excessive heat & rapid discharge even in standby mode, and you'll know it's kaput if it won't charge at all(duh!). If this sounds like you & you are still under warranty(1 year from HTC), take it to any sprint repair center & they will exchange the battery for you. Be sure to re-calibrate it!

* After you've done all this, just USE the damn thing for a while. I have found that all batteries tend to improve over time, once you work 'em out a bit. My Mogul's battery was pretty bad at first too, but once I used it for a while, it got much better. Same thing happened with my old Sidekick(god, how embarrassed I am to admit that I was once an active member of the Sidekick community. It's like admitting to liking Britney Spears).

That's all I can think of for now, but I this post will be updated periodically as new tips/tricks/hacks are discovered. Good luck & enjoy your badass battery life :)