On average, if I don't charge throughout the day, I'll end up at around 40-30% battery life at night before bed. The recent nightlies have been fluctuating with battery life and I've lost up to 30% overnight before so to avoid going all the way to 0 on a bad night, I'll charge up to around 70% and unplug before going to bed. I fluctuate between 50 and 85% throughout the following day because I often dock in my car. The reason I don't top off to 100% at night is because if I do, and then I dock in my car, it will sometimes top off again during the day and from what I understand, this is bad for battery longevity.
Should I continue my current routine of only going to ~75% each night before bed or should I switch to going to full and only start charging at a low % all the way back up to full? At this point I'm more concerned with physical battery health vs. battery life in daily use.
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What's a better charging routine?
Started by cmuser, Mar 23 2011 10:05 PM
13 replies to this topic
#2
flacoff
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- Members
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Posted 24 March 2011 - 03:44 AM
never let it go to 0 - i almost never let it go down below 50%
topping off - many people say dont charge to 100% from ~95%. I agree with this, but in your case (and i have similar issues with home to car), i believe there is really no harm charging to full overnight then unplugging and getting in your car and pluggin, IMO. Let's be real here, if you are just walking out the house to your car, your battery meter may say 99 or 98, but i would say you are good to go.
what works for me lately is: charge overnight to 100%, dock in car but dont plug in (i do not use the stock N1 dock), my normal commute is 30-45min with GPS and maybe pandora going at the same time, I get to 70-80% by the time I arrive. and then maybe an hour before lunch charge up to 100%, that takes me through the rest of the day. on the way home in the car, dock, plug in, and then by bed time im back down to ~60%, charge over night. lather, rinse, repeat. For me I want to leave the house in the morning on a full charge, you just never know.
they key is never let it go to 0%, but every 2-3 months cycle the battery (get it down to o%, then try and reboot until it's completely dead)
IMO battery life for LiIon tech is more about heat and not letting it go down below 50% (as I have heard keeping it above 50% doesnt count as a cycle)
edit: you battery will degrade over time no matter what you do. lithium ion tech will loose it's ability to hold a charge after about a year.
topping off - many people say dont charge to 100% from ~95%. I agree with this, but in your case (and i have similar issues with home to car), i believe there is really no harm charging to full overnight then unplugging and getting in your car and pluggin, IMO. Let's be real here, if you are just walking out the house to your car, your battery meter may say 99 or 98, but i would say you are good to go.
what works for me lately is: charge overnight to 100%, dock in car but dont plug in (i do not use the stock N1 dock), my normal commute is 30-45min with GPS and maybe pandora going at the same time, I get to 70-80% by the time I arrive. and then maybe an hour before lunch charge up to 100%, that takes me through the rest of the day. on the way home in the car, dock, plug in, and then by bed time im back down to ~60%, charge over night. lather, rinse, repeat. For me I want to leave the house in the morning on a full charge, you just never know.
they key is never let it go to 0%, but every 2-3 months cycle the battery (get it down to o%, then try and reboot until it's completely dead)
IMO battery life for LiIon tech is more about heat and not letting it go down below 50% (as I have heard keeping it above 50% doesnt count as a cycle)
edit: you battery will degrade over time no matter what you do. lithium ion tech will loose it's ability to hold a charge after about a year.
Edited by flacoff, 24 March 2011 - 03:48 AM.
#3
bassmadrigal
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Posted 24 March 2011 - 07:55 AM
There are a number of safety measures that the CM team and/or Android have done to help with the longevity of your battery. First off, taking the phone to 0% is actually fine (more on this below). You just don't want to do this repeatedly as it is better for the battery to do frequent charges with partial drains rather than full drains. There is still a charge left in the battery. Android will not let you completely drain the battery which is extremely bad for lithium ion batteries.
Second, the default kernel in CM will not charge your battery if you plug it in and it is above 90%. Other kernels have enabled this (known as a trickle charge), but with the default kernel, if you plug in your phone and it is above 90% it will not start charging until it hits either 89 or 90% (I don't know the exact number for the cutoff).
To help with battery life, frequent charges to keep the battery at a higher percentage are more beneficial than deeper discharges and fewer charge cycles. This is contrary to what we were taught in the old nickel-based batteries (NiMH and NiCad). Lithium Ion batteries are completely different than nickel-based batteries and frequent full discharges (to the auto-shutdown point) will lower the lifespan of the battery. Now, if you can't get to a charger and you run it down to 10% did you just screw up your battery? No. You can use your battery all the way to zero, but it will shorten the life by a few cycles. Just like if your car engine is run to redline, it won't cause it to blow up, but it does create more wear-and-tear on the engine (even if it does provide benefits like cleaning up carbon buildup on various engine components). Same goes with Li-ion batteries.
You should also avoid powering on your phone if it has done the automatic shutdown without having power to the phone. This can result in a deep-discharge which causes extra strain on the battery and can lead to a shorter lifespan. In the same manner, you should try to avoid excessive heat. Granted, the battery will get warm when the phone is being used, but try to not lay the phone out in direct sunlight or areas that can generate more heat than normal as that will also lead to a shorter battery lifespan.
If you find that your phone is performing the auto shutdown before it reaches 0%, you need to perform a battery calibration. This is not because your battery is starting to get the "memory effect" that other batteries can get, it is from standard deterioration that will occur. The older, not as recommended, way of doing this was when the phone started its auto-shutdown that you plug in the charger and let it charge at least 4-5 hours. This would usually reset your battery level until it has to auto-shutdown again. The better, more recommended, way to calibrate it is with the Battery Calibration app on the market. This is just for Nexus One users (which I heard is because our batteries "battery age" is not calculated and updated properly). I won't go into the instructions for it, because there is a thread dedicated to that and the instructions are pretty involved. This will set your battery age (or essentially the percentage of what the battery is able to do vs what it could do when it was new). This will make the battery percentage much more accurate.
Me personally, I charge my phone every night, overnight. If I really drain my phone, I will throw it in my cardock during my lunchbreak, but this isn't a very common occurrence. If it has been used a lot during the day (or had a bad nightly that uses more battery) I may charge it on my ride home depending on what else I have going that day. Most of the time I am left with 40%-50% at the end of the day without charging.
I really hope I made this clear and understanding. If you have any additional questions, feel free to ask.
Second, the default kernel in CM will not charge your battery if you plug it in and it is above 90%. Other kernels have enabled this (known as a trickle charge), but with the default kernel, if you plug in your phone and it is above 90% it will not start charging until it hits either 89 or 90% (I don't know the exact number for the cutoff).
To help with battery life, frequent charges to keep the battery at a higher percentage are more beneficial than deeper discharges and fewer charge cycles. This is contrary to what we were taught in the old nickel-based batteries (NiMH and NiCad). Lithium Ion batteries are completely different than nickel-based batteries and frequent full discharges (to the auto-shutdown point) will lower the lifespan of the battery. Now, if you can't get to a charger and you run it down to 10% did you just screw up your battery? No. You can use your battery all the way to zero, but it will shorten the life by a few cycles. Just like if your car engine is run to redline, it won't cause it to blow up, but it does create more wear-and-tear on the engine (even if it does provide benefits like cleaning up carbon buildup on various engine components). Same goes with Li-ion batteries.
You should also avoid powering on your phone if it has done the automatic shutdown without having power to the phone. This can result in a deep-discharge which causes extra strain on the battery and can lead to a shorter lifespan. In the same manner, you should try to avoid excessive heat. Granted, the battery will get warm when the phone is being used, but try to not lay the phone out in direct sunlight or areas that can generate more heat than normal as that will also lead to a shorter battery lifespan.
If you find that your phone is performing the auto shutdown before it reaches 0%, you need to perform a battery calibration. This is not because your battery is starting to get the "memory effect" that other batteries can get, it is from standard deterioration that will occur. The older, not as recommended, way of doing this was when the phone started its auto-shutdown that you plug in the charger and let it charge at least 4-5 hours. This would usually reset your battery level until it has to auto-shutdown again. The better, more recommended, way to calibrate it is with the Battery Calibration app on the market. This is just for Nexus One users (which I heard is because our batteries "battery age" is not calculated and updated properly). I won't go into the instructions for it, because there is a thread dedicated to that and the instructions are pretty involved. This will set your battery age (or essentially the percentage of what the battery is able to do vs what it could do when it was new). This will make the battery percentage much more accurate.
Me personally, I charge my phone every night, overnight. If I really drain my phone, I will throw it in my cardock during my lunchbreak, but this isn't a very common occurrence. If it has been used a lot during the day (or had a bad nightly that uses more battery) I may charge it on my ride home depending on what else I have going that day. Most of the time I am left with 40%-50% at the end of the day without charging.
I really hope I made this clear and understanding. If you have any additional questions, feel free to ask.
#5
danger-rat
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Posted 24 March 2011 - 03:28 PM
+1
Great post!!
Just one question:
So, if I run my battery to 0%, it will reduce carbon build up, right? (just kidding)
Sent from my Nexus One using Tapatalk
Great post!!
Just one question:
So, if I run my battery to 0%, it will reduce carbon build up, right? (just kidding)
Sent from my Nexus One using Tapatalk
#6
cmuser
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- 174 posts
Posted 24 March 2011 - 06:32 PM
bassmadrigal, on 24 March 2011 - 07:55 AM, said:
There are a number of safety measures that the CM team and/or Android have done to help with the longevity of your battery. First off, taking the phone to 0% is actually fine (more on this below). You just don't want to do this repeatedly as it is better for the battery to do frequent charges with partial drains rather than full drains. There is still a charge left in the battery. Android will not let you completely drain the battery which is extremely bad for lithium ion batteries.
Second, the default kernel in CM will not charge your battery if you plug it in and it is above 90%. Other kernels have enabled this (known as a trickle charge), but with the default kernel, if you plug in your phone and it is above 90% it will not start charging until it hits either 89 or 90% (I don't know the exact number for the cutoff).
To help with battery life, frequent charges to keep the battery at a higher percentage are more beneficial than deeper discharges and fewer charge cycles. This is contrary to what we were taught in the old nickel-based batteries (NiMH and NiCad). Lithium Ion batteries are completely different than nickel-based batteries and frequent full discharges (to the auto-shutdown point) will lower the lifespan of the battery. Now, if you can't get to a charger and you run it down to 10% did you just screw up your battery? No. You can use your battery all the way to zero, but it will shorten the life by a few cycles. Just like if your car engine is run to redline, it won't cause it to blow up, but it does create more wear-and-tear on the engine (even if it does provide benefits like cleaning up carbon buildup on various engine components). Same goes with Li-ion batteries.
You should also avoid powering on your phone if it has done the automatic shutdown without having power to the phone. This can result in a deep-discharge which causes extra strain on the battery and can lead to a shorter lifespan. In the same manner, you should try to avoid excessive heat. Granted, the battery will get warm when the phone is being used, but try to not lay the phone out in direct sunlight or areas that can generate more heat than normal as that will also lead to a shorter battery lifespan.
If you find that your phone is performing the auto shutdown before it reaches 0%, you need to perform a battery calibration. This is not because your battery is starting to get the "memory effect" that other batteries can get, it is from standard deterioration that will occur. The older, not as recommended, way of doing this was when the phone started its auto-shutdown that you plug in the charger and let it charge at least 4-5 hours. This would usually reset your battery level until it has to auto-shutdown again. The better, more recommended, way to calibrate it is with the Battery Calibration app on the market. This is just for Nexus One users (which I heard is because our batteries "battery age" is not calculated and updated properly). I won't go into the instructions for it, because there is a thread dedicated to that and the instructions are pretty involved. This will set your battery age (or essentially the percentage of what the battery is able to do vs what it could do when it was new). This will make the battery percentage much more accurate.
Me personally, I charge my phone every night, overnight. If I really drain my phone, I will throw it in my cardock during my lunchbreak, but this isn't a very common occurrence. If it has been used a lot during the day (or had a bad nightly that uses more battery) I may charge it on my ride home depending on what else I have going that day. Most of the time I am left with 40%-50% at the end of the day without charging.
I really hope I made this clear and understanding. If you have any additional questions, feel free to ask.
Second, the default kernel in CM will not charge your battery if you plug it in and it is above 90%. Other kernels have enabled this (known as a trickle charge), but with the default kernel, if you plug in your phone and it is above 90% it will not start charging until it hits either 89 or 90% (I don't know the exact number for the cutoff).
To help with battery life, frequent charges to keep the battery at a higher percentage are more beneficial than deeper discharges and fewer charge cycles. This is contrary to what we were taught in the old nickel-based batteries (NiMH and NiCad). Lithium Ion batteries are completely different than nickel-based batteries and frequent full discharges (to the auto-shutdown point) will lower the lifespan of the battery. Now, if you can't get to a charger and you run it down to 10% did you just screw up your battery? No. You can use your battery all the way to zero, but it will shorten the life by a few cycles. Just like if your car engine is run to redline, it won't cause it to blow up, but it does create more wear-and-tear on the engine (even if it does provide benefits like cleaning up carbon buildup on various engine components). Same goes with Li-ion batteries.
You should also avoid powering on your phone if it has done the automatic shutdown without having power to the phone. This can result in a deep-discharge which causes extra strain on the battery and can lead to a shorter lifespan. In the same manner, you should try to avoid excessive heat. Granted, the battery will get warm when the phone is being used, but try to not lay the phone out in direct sunlight or areas that can generate more heat than normal as that will also lead to a shorter battery lifespan.
If you find that your phone is performing the auto shutdown before it reaches 0%, you need to perform a battery calibration. This is not because your battery is starting to get the "memory effect" that other batteries can get, it is from standard deterioration that will occur. The older, not as recommended, way of doing this was when the phone started its auto-shutdown that you plug in the charger and let it charge at least 4-5 hours. This would usually reset your battery level until it has to auto-shutdown again. The better, more recommended, way to calibrate it is with the Battery Calibration app on the market. This is just for Nexus One users (which I heard is because our batteries "battery age" is not calculated and updated properly). I won't go into the instructions for it, because there is a thread dedicated to that and the instructions are pretty involved. This will set your battery age (or essentially the percentage of what the battery is able to do vs what it could do when it was new). This will make the battery percentage much more accurate.
Me personally, I charge my phone every night, overnight. If I really drain my phone, I will throw it in my cardock during my lunchbreak, but this isn't a very common occurrence. If it has been used a lot during the day (or had a bad nightly that uses more battery) I may charge it on my ride home depending on what else I have going that day. Most of the time I am left with 40%-50% at the end of the day without charging.
I really hope I made this clear and understanding. If you have any additional questions, feel free to ask.
+1
SOLID post, thank you!
#7
bassmadrigal
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Posted 25 March 2011 - 07:36 AM
danger-rat, on 24 March 2011 - 03:28 PM, said:
+1
Great post!!
Just one question:
So, if I run my battery to 0%, it will reduce carbon build up, right? (just kidding)
Sent from my Nexus One using Tapatalk
Great post!!
Just one question:
So, if I run my battery to 0%, it will reduce carbon build up, right? (just kidding)
Sent from my Nexus One using Tapatalk
Haha... good thing you wrote the kidding part, otherwise everyone would be doing it to help save the planet!
#8
drmsr
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Posted 25 March 2011 - 01:25 PM
Good comments. However, for my needs really would like to trickle charge when battery charge is over 90%. Any program/widget that will enable this?
Thanks,
Thanks,
#9
temasek
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Posted 25 March 2011 - 01:29 PM
drmsr, on 25 March 2011 - 01:25 PM, said:
Good comments. However, for my needs really would like to trickle charge when battery charge is over 90%. Any program/widget that will enable this?
Thanks,
Thanks,
http://wildmonks.who.../2.6.37/031811/
#10
bassmadrigal
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Posted 25 March 2011 - 03:13 PM
drmsr, on 25 March 2011 - 01:25 PM, said:
Good comments. However, for my needs really would like to trickle charge when battery charge is over 90%. Any program/widget that will enable this?
Thanks,
Thanks,
The CM team delibertaly left trickle charging out of the kernel (and it is only something that is enabled through the kernel, so apps/widgets aren't able to do it) due to problems it can cause in possibly overheating the battery; which can cause burns, broken phones, and/or fires. It isn't conclusive (in fact, there is a lot of information out there that is contradictory) that this can happen, but according to Battery University, it is not adivsed to keep your phone at a full charge, rather it is better to let it reach a full charge and then turn off the charger until it gets to a lower percentange and then occasionally put some juice back into it.
Battery University said:
Li-ion cannot absorb overcharge, and when fully charged the charge current must be cut off. A continuous trickle charge would cause plating of metallic lithium, and this could compromise safety. To minimize stress, keep the lithium-ion battery at the 4.20V/cell peak voltage as short a time as possible.
SOURCE:Battery University: Charging Lithium-ion Batteries
SOURCE:Battery University: Charging Lithium-ion Batteries
This is a portion of the reason that CM decided to leave trickle charging out of the kernel. Here is ciwrl's post about it http://forum.cyanoge...harge-kernels/.
And here is an article from phandroid on "Bump Charging" (charging your phone, and once it says full, unplug it and plug it back in to charge more, which is essentially the hard way to trickle charge). It also talks about the reasons the battery guage isn't that accurate for a while after you take the phone off the charger with a non-trickle kernel.
Like I said, depending on who you talk to, and what article you read, there is a lot of information out there. Read up on it (multiple links for both sides of the argument in ciwrl's post) to make sure that you understand what possible risks may be out there. No doubt, trickle charging will give you a longer battery life, but the question that remains is what damage might it be causing?
#11
polaris2k3
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Posted 26 March 2011 - 02:58 PM
I also think trickle charging lithium-based batteries are a bad idea. The potential harm far outweighs the potential benefits. There is a reason why NO consumer electronics manufacturers does this on their devices.
Here is the wiki page and section on charging Li batteries: http://en.wikipedia....olymer#Charging
Its also interesting to note that in the recent patent Apple filed in changing the way batteries are charged to increase charging cycles, it also does NOT include trickle charging as a part of the charging procedure. Here is the link for that, btw, http://www.engadget....es-improved-ch/
Here is the wiki page and section on charging Li batteries: http://en.wikipedia....olymer#Charging
Its also interesting to note that in the recent patent Apple filed in changing the way batteries are charged to increase charging cycles, it also does NOT include trickle charging as a part of the charging procedure. Here is the link for that, btw, http://www.engadget....es-improved-ch/
#12
drmsr
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Posted 26 March 2011 - 09:51 PM
Nice comments. My thoughts are just to trickle charge back up to 100% and than stop charging. More an issue, when I use phone for 1/2 hour and then want to fully charge before going to work. My other android phones did this nicely and my battery life was excellent. Once you reach 100%, no charging should occur with Li Batteries. But if the charge is less than 100% charging up to 100% via trickle charge is very appropriate.
My two cents.
Thanks.
My two cents.
Thanks.
#13
samarium
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Posted 26 March 2011 - 11:20 PM
drmsr, on 26 March 2011 - 09:51 PM, said:
Nice comments. My thoughts are just to trickle charge back up to 100% and than stop charging. More an issue, when I use phone for 1/2 hour and then want to fully charge before going to work. My other android phones did this nicely and my battery life was excellent. Once you reach 100%, no charging should occur with Li Batteries. But if the charge is less than 100% charging up to 100% via trickle charge is very appropriate.
My two cents.
Thanks.
My two cents.
Thanks.
IIRC from discussions on the XDA battery calibration thread, some phones deliberately don't display the battery %, and instead keep showing 100% until the phone discharges to below some threshold, then show correct %. This is supposed be stop people charging the phone until there is a reasonable chunk to charge.
#14
drmsr
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Posted 27 March 2011 - 01:21 PM
Loaded Windmonks kernal. Tested it yesterday and today. Found works well, just charges to 100% and will allow charging again if level is less than 98% and above 90%. It does stop charging at 100%, battery temperature was appropriate. Solves my problem to keep phone near 100%.
Thanks.
Thanks.
