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I've been seeing "Battery Calibration" a lot lately especially with custom Roms and how to improve battery life. Here is great info on prolonging battery life for your epic. And what NOT TO DO!
Forgive me if this is in the wrong section of the forum but I saw a lot here on this topic so I thought I would share the information I have.
Lithium Ion batteries DO NOT NEED TO BE CALIBRATED. Forgive me for yelling but I can't stress it enough. The current lithium ion batteries for your computer and most of all, your Samsung Epic4g do not have an internal memory. All they have is an internal chip that prevents them from overcharging, and of course the cells for the Lithium Ion process to occur.
Nickel Cadmium or NiCad batteries do have an internal memory that acts much like a fuel gauge in your vehicle, it tells the battery small information on % charge etc.
Your Samsung Epic 4G has to interpret the amount of charge left and % from your battery. That's why it saves battery stats. It really works by averages and the only thing the battery tells the phone is "I'm Full!" when it reaches 100%. or "I'm Dead!" when the cells are empty. Your phone does the rest and interprets to you in % how much life is left in that battery.
Someone got the not so bright idea of calibrating the battery, maybe because it worked on a NiCad battery, maybe it should work on a Lithium Ion battery? WRONG!
Lithium Ion batteries have a prescribed life. The average life of a 1500mAh battery is around 2000-3000 charges. The reason behind this is the Lithium Cells become unstable and are prone to explosion.
So, every time you fully discharge your battery and recharge it, you just shortened the overall life of your battery. And if you're one of those people who discharge and recharges 3 times consecutively, you're really messing up your battery. Heat is the biggest enemy of Lithium Ion Batteries, if they get too hot, from forced discharges they actually develop tiny crystals on the inside of the cells that prevent it from being truly 100% charged.
So, in reality your phone is telling you your battery is 100% charged when it is only 85% fully charged inside the battery.
Please, please, please, do not discharge your battery and consecutively recharge it again. I love my epic and I hate to see other epics abused like that.
If you want to prolong your battery life follow these short and simple steps:
1. The closer you keep your phone to 100% the longer it will live.
2. Avoid unnecessary discharges to 0%.
3. Charge your phone when it is off, not in standby. - Charging in standby causes unwanted heat.
4. Unplug your battery when it's fully charged. - Sure, that "Battery 100% Full" message is annoying, but maybe it was put there for a reason? Hmm.
5. Wipe your battery stats weekly, only after a full power off charge, or Rom Change
6. Avoid doing anything that heats up your phone. - Sure WiFi Tethering and BlueTooth Tethering is awesome, but it heats up the phone in most cases, this will destroy your battery.
I can't post the link because I don't have enough posts. But go to google , search "battery university" and then look for lithium ion batteries.
I am a computer science / electrical engineer and I have done extensive research in batteries and mobile devices.
Please save those batteries!
-George
Interesting post. Thanks!
Sent from my Emotionlessly Bonsai'd Epic 4g.
A cycle is a cycle friend, whether dropping to 50% twice or dropping to 0% once ... it is still a registered cycle. Below is the best write up I have came across concerning battery care. Still trying to figure out the purpose of this thread however, if you are insinuating that a batt stat reset and full charge to discharge is not helpfull after a kernel change (voltage change) then you are sorely mistaken, it WILL, I repeat WILL cause your device to not register the true charge state of your battery unless you do so. And if your phone is not monitoring your battery correctly it could negate symbiance between your batt and your device.
Wiping your stats without a full discharge is useless btw. In the fact that one of the few things your post was accurate on is that the only two way communications between battery and device happen at full and empty. Would probably do a lot of good if this thread wrought with misinformation was deleted. Just in case it is not a really good caresheet is as follows.
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Lithium Ion Battery Care
Batteries are made to be used, so use them.
Just like couch potatoes, batteries need exercise. The chemicals in Lithium-Ion batteries respond best to regular recharging. So if you have a laptop, don’t keep it plugged in all the time; go ahead and let it drain to about 40 or 50 percent of capacity, and then recharge your computer.
The life of a Lithium-Ion battery can be measured in charge cycles. A charge cycle occurs when 100% of a battery’s capacity is used. Let’s say you use 50% of your laptop’s battery one day, charge it overnight, and then you use 50% of the battery again the next day. Even after charging it back up again, you’ll have only had one charge cycle occur. Most laptop batteries are rated for a useful life of at least 300-500 charge cycles, but high-quality, properly maintained batteries can retain up to 80% of their original life, even after 300 cycles.
Periodically calibrate your battery.
Most batteries that have a “fuel gauge”, like those in laptops, should be periodically discharged to zero. This can be accomplished simply by letting your computer run until it reports a low-battery state and suspends itself. (Do not let your computer deep discharge, as I’ll explain in the next item.)
The gauge that measures the remaining power in your laptop is based on circuitry integrated into the battery that approximates the effectiveness of the battery’s chemical compounds. Over time, a discrepancy can develop between the capacity that the internal circuitry expects the battery to have and what the battery can actually provide. Letting your computer run down to zero every month or so can recalibrate the battery’s circuitry, and keep your computer’s estimates of its remaining life accurate.
Don’t practice so-called deep discharges.
Most laptops will suspend operation if the battery drains too low. Even if your computer goes to sleep, though, most batteries that are in good working order will still have a reserve charge available. This reserve will hold the computer’s working memory in state for a little while. A deep discharge has occurred when even that percentage of reserve power is used up. The computer will have turned off completely, and sometimes you’ll notice that it will have lost track of the correct date and time. Deep discharges will strain your batteries, so try to charge them frequently.
Avoid exposing your battery to heat (when possible).
Heat can overexcite the chemicals in your battery, shortening its overall lifespan. In fact, it’s been speculated that the biggest cause of early battery expiration is the heat that batteries can be exposed to when they’re stored in computers that are running off AC power. Laptops — especially modern multi-core machines — can get very hot when they’re plugged in, easily over 100 degrees Fahrenheit. That’s hot enough that extended exposure will negatively affect your battery. If you want to be really protective, there’s nothing saying that you can’t pop the battery out of your laptop if you’re going to be within reach of a power outlet for a while.
There may be times that you can’t help but expose your laptop battery to heat; you may live in a warm climate, for instance. You can, however, try and avoid exacerbating the issue. Make sure your laptop is well ventilated and that you’re not operating it on a surface that retains heat, even when you’re not plugged into mains power.
Store your batteries properly.
If your laptop or portable device isn’t going to be used for a while, you should remove its Lithium-Ion battery, if possible. Even if the battery can’t be separated from the device, it should be stored in a cool environment at about one-half charge. Cool temperature is recommended by experts because that can slow the natural discharge that batteries will undergo even when they’re disconnected from their device.
I’ve seen some people go even further and recommend that spare batteries be stored in the refrigerator. I don’t think this is a very good idea; I’m concerned about condensation that might build up. Don’t put your batteries on ice, but keep them out of the sun.
Ultimately, I believe that buying spare Li-Ion batteries is a losing game, because the batteries start degrading as soon as they’re manufactured. Usually those spare batteries spend most of their time sitting in a charger, losing useful life. If you need to be really mobile, you’re better off purchasing an adapter cable you can use with the power sources available in planes, trains, or autos. And, of course, by taking good care of the battery you already have."
One question in regards to your post. I currently use the desk top cradle to plug in when I get home, will this mess with the battery too? It was made by Samsung I am confused as to why they would make something to use with your epic if it will hurt the battery.
HeisRisen said:
A cycle is a cycle friend, whether dropping to 50% twice or dropping to 0% once ... it is still a registered cycle. Below is the best write up I have came across concerning battery care. Still trying to figure out the purpose of this thread however, if you are insinuating that a batt stat reset and full charge to discharge is not helpfull after a kernel change (voltage change) then you are sorely mistaken, it WILL, I repeat WILL cause your device to not register the true charge state of your battery unless you do so. And if your phone is not monitoring your battery correctly it could negate symbiance between your batt and your device.
Wiping your stats without a full discharge is useless btw. In the fact that one of the few things your post was accurate on is that the only two way communications between battery and device happen at full and empty. Would probably do a lot of good if this thread wrought with misinformation was deleted. Just in case it is not a really good caresheet is as follows."
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Don't quite know if you're trying to "one-up" me on battery life, but this post is not misinformation, I am trying to explain in layman's terms on how a battery communicates with the phone. I don't need to cite my academic pedigree and be all "scientific" about saving battery life.
The point of this thread is an answer to all the threats I've seen on improving battery life and the countless posts I've seen on fully discharging a Lithium Ion Battery to "calibrate it"
The point I don't quite understand about your reply to this thread is that it just restates what I already pointed out only it's longer. Maybe if you have more words than me it makes you smarter...
but I stand corrected, I did mean a wipe of battery stats after a Rom Change and Only after a full power off charge, not intermittently.
but...
"one of the few things my post was accurate on" - Hmm, if it's an inaccurate post to you, just report it. - I assure you these are not claims and theories but pure fact.
I'm not here to get into a pissing contest about battery life, I'm just posting here to help people...
emalia said:
One question in regards to your post. I currently use the desk top cradle to plug in when I get home, will this mess with the battery too? It was made by Samsung I am confused as to why they would make something to use with your epic if it will hurt the battery.
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I would advise that as long as you are charging your Epic in the cradle while it is not powered on, then you'll be perfectly fine. Charging it while it is powered on will cause unnecessary heat.
And I finally accumulated enough posts to cite my sources:
http://batteryuniversity.com/learn/article/how_to_prolong_lithium_based_batteries
I have to say that Laptop batteries are a lot different than cellphone batteries, the "do a full discharge after a few weeks" works great for a laptop battery but I would not do this with a cell phone battery. They just aren't the same internally. Laptop batteries are a bit more sophisticated.
actually, lithium ion batteries are best kept at about 50%, not 100
This thread is simply a point of ignorance about what is being described when people talk about "calibrating a battery" on an android phone. The process is not actually about calibrating the battery. It actually calibrates how the software reads battery information. You do see better battery life after going through it, but nothing has changed about the battery.
If you've ever flashed a ROM and suddenly found the battery to significantly higher or lower percentage displayed in the software meter, or if you found the battery seems to drain more quickly than previous(it doesn't, the phone just shows higher than actual charge to start), those are symptoms of poorly or not-at-all calibrated situations. The "battery calibration" process is a fix for that.
And OP, I'd say your understanding is rudimentary at best. While its true that Li-ion batteries don't "have a memory" (no batteries "have a memory", the memory effect was a result of the chemical process used by some batteries), li-ion batteries do show better usable lifetimes when charged according to certain standards. Again, its a matter of how the chemical process works and what wear the battery's internals develop depending on it is used.
akijikan said:
This thread is simply a point of ignorance about what is being described when people talk about "calibrating a battery" on an android phone. The process is not actually about calibrating the battery. It actually calibrates how the software reads battery information. You do see better battery life after going through it, but nothing has changed about the battery.
If you've ever flashed a ROM and suddenly found the battery to significantly higher or lower percentage displayed in the software meter, or if you found the battery seems to drain more quickly than previous(it doesn't, the phone just shows higher than actual charge to start), those are symptoms of poorly or not-at-all calibrated situations. The "battery calibration" process is a fix for that.
And OP, I'd say your understanding is rudimentary at best. While its true that Li-ion batteries don't "have a memory" (no batteries "have a memory", the memory effect was a result of the chemical process used by some batteries), li-ion batteries do show better usable lifetimes when charged according to certain standards. Again, its a matter of how the chemical process works and what wear the battery's internals develop depending on it is used.
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Once again, I'm not in here to get into a specifics and scientific pissing contest on how batteries work, I just put a guide on how to improve your battery longevity.
Not everyone in here is an electro-chemical engineer with a concentration in battery physics. Or whatever. So, stop ripping apart my post with your blabbering physics. Just because I have a low amount of posts makes me inferior to you?
I'm sorry you sensed hostility in my post. But don't ignore what I'm saying about battery calibration.
I think Aki is right, we aren't calibrating our battery, we are resetting battery stats the software keeps. The reason we recommend this is b/c when folks change ROM's some can get miserable battery life in practice until they reset the stats. An experienced dev can tell you why, but it is a common enough fact to warrant wiping battery stats when switching ROM's.
Sent from my Epic 4G on XDA App
akijikan said:
I'm sorry you sensed hostility in my post. But don't ignore what I'm saying about battery calibration.
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It was a bit hostile... I enjoy a good debate and rational thought though, I understand what you're saying, I'm not trying to get into the specifics, but it seems a lot of users are doing this "process" too much, and personally I don't think you should do it at all. I think you should do a full recharge (powered off, not discharge) then wipe battery stats. Period. No need for a discharge to 0.
People, this guy is just trying to help. There is no need to be rude. We are all on this form trying help each other. This whole idea is hurt when someone posts something and gets attacked. There is no need to call someone ignorant if you don't agree
Sent from my SPH-D700 using XDA App
codest3r said:
I think Aki is right, we aren't calibrating our battery, we are resetting battery stats the software keeps. The reason we recommend this is b/c when folks change ROM's some can get miserable battery life in practice until they reset the stats. An experienced dev can tell you why, but it is a common enough fact to warrant wiping battery stats when switching ROM's.
Sent from my Epic 4G on XDA App
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Personally, I've gotten the best battery life when I do what I just posted above. Which is a powered off charge to 100% then a battery stats wipe. Viola, no need to discharge all the way to 0 and back to 100. It just tears up your battery in my experience.
tatoniss said:
People, this guy is just trying to help. There is no need to be rude. We are all on this form trying help each other. This whole idea is hurt when someone posts something and gets attacked. There is no need to call someone ignorant if you don't agree
Sent from my SPH-D700 using XDA App
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I appreciate the support. If you think I'm dead wrong let me know. But the intent is far more important that the means of which I describe how the battery communicates with the phone.
I just want Epic Users to get the best out of their Epic.
I think a lot of people think they are calibrating their battery, but in all actuallity it's the information in the phone about the battery that needs to be callibrated.
gwcarpenter said:
I appreciate the support. If you think I'm dead wrong let me know. But the intent is far more important that the means of which I describe how the battery communicates with the phone.
I just want Epic Users to get the best out of their Epic.
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You have to understand that the battery percentage is calculated by the phone. If the phone has no way of knowing the actual battery percentage accept with an indication that the battery is full or an indication that the battery is dead, then logic serves that one would have to perform a complete cycle to get accurate statistics. Let's say you have an electric car that's 'fuel' gauge is based solely on an indicator from the battery when it is full and when it is empty. It was initially calibrated to go ~300 miles on a full charge. Now say you get a new engine that might use energy at a different rate than the previous engine (analogous to say a kernel update). You don't really know the percentage of the battery until you record how many miles you've driven before the battery becomes empty. For the statistics to be accurate you must record the statistics over the entire battery discharge cycle. If the only indicator the software has is full and empty, the only thing you can gather from the statistics without a full cycle is the amount of energy that wasn't a full cycle.
Another analogy would be being blindfolded and sipping water through a straw. If you are told that it is full when you start and you drink 25% of it and then we fill it up again. Now you drink the same amount, how much is left (keeping in mind you are still blindfolded.) You have no idea, because you haven't done a whole cycle. You have no idea if you just drank 25% or 50% or 75% because you have never finished it.
My point is, is that you can't record the full capacity of batteries without doing a full charge, discharge cycle.
gwcarpenter said:
Lithium Ion batteries DO NOT NEED TO BE CALIBRATED.
Heat is the biggest enemy of Lithium Ion Batteries, if they get too hot, from forced discharges they actually develop tiny crystals on the inside of the cells that prevent it from being truly 100% charged.
So, in reality your phone is telling you your battery is 100% charged when it is only 85% fully charged inside the battery.
If you want to prolong your battery life follow these short and simple steps:
1. The closer you keep your phone to 100% the longer it will live.
4. Unplug your battery when it's fully charged. - Sure, that "Battery 100% Full" message is annoying, but maybe it was put there for a reason? Hmm.
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Above are some things you said, and below I'm going to copy and paste some stuff from the article.
Although lithium-ion is memory-free in terms of performance deterioration, batteries with fuel gauges exhibit what engineers refer to as "digital memory". Here is the reason: Short discharges with subsequent recharges do not provide the periodic calibration needed to synchronize the fuel gauge with the battery's state-of-charge. A deliberate full discharge and recharge every 30 charges corrects this problem. Letting the battery run down to the cut-off point in the equipment will do this. If ignored, the fuel gauge will become increasingly less accurate.
The worst condition is keeping a FULLY CHARGED battery at elevated temperatures
If possible, store the battery in a cool place at about a 40% state-of-charge.
Avoid keeping the battery at full charge and high temperature.
While the battery is kept fully charged, the inside temperature during operation rises to 45°C (113°F).
Batteries with fuel gauge (laptops) should be calibrated by applying a deliberate full discharge once every 30 charges. Running the pack down in the equipment does this. If ignored, the fuel gauge will become increasingly less accurate and in some cases cut off the device prematurely.
gwcarpenter said:
Personally, I've gotten the best battery life when I do what I just posted above. Which is a powered off charge to 100% then a battery stats wipe. Viola, no need to discharge all the way to 0 and back to 100. It just tears up your battery in my experience.
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That is correct. Discharging to 0% does nothing. The most important thing is getting the battery as full as possible, and then reset the fuel gauge(wipe battery stats.) Personally, I use the external Samsung spare battery charger to charge the battery to full, then insert it in the phone, and boot into recovery and wipe batterystats.
What many don't understand is that wiping batterystats in CWM deletes the batterstats.bin file in data/system. So when you do a data wipe, you are wiping batterystats also. This is why it is important to have a full battery when flashing a new ROM. Something else to remember is that restoring data from a Nandroid backup will also restore an old batterystats.bin file, which is fine if the new ROM has a kernal that is the same or similar to the previous one, but it will negate any batterystats wipe you did before restoring data.
Should I charge my phone when it has like 0.5% battery left always, or can I charge whenever it gets a little low, like 30-40%?
Also, can I leave my phone plugged into the charger overnight? Will that drain the battery?
I leave mine in the charger every night. And I'll put it in charge at work, too, or whenever a charging opportunity arises. With this kind of battery, it really doesn't matter.
Here is a very good article that discusses Lithium Ion batteries:
http://batteryuniversity.com/learn/article/charging_lithium_ion_batteries
I don't get the article.
Does 4.2V mean 100% battery life?
If you want to charge it to 4.0 V, does that mean its like 90% battery life?
convolution said:
I don't get the article.
Does 4.2V mean 100% battery life?
If you want to charge it to 4.0 V, does that mean its like 90% battery life?
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Not certain, but it seems the charger and/or battery on the Vision is designed so that it does not keep the voltage at 100% when its charging and full. I've noticed the battery meter periodically drop to 99% when still on the charger, then back up to "F" (full). While I know the battery meter is not really accurate enough to read to 1% increments; what this seems to indicate is that once a full charge is achieved, the system is going to let the charge drop below a certain threshold, then top off again, rather than keep the voltage at 100% constantly.
The table below is a little more easily digestible (not overly technical). It says you can keep the battery on the charger.
It also says not to let the battery discharge below 20%. Overdischarge of Li ion batteries can result in your battery no longer accepting a charge, on the off chance the safety circuit does not trip properly. The safety circuit is designed to prevent over discharge of the battery, but this has been known to fail, at least on other phones. And there is no benefit to letting the battery discharge below 20%.
http://batteryuniversity.com/learn/article/do_and_dont_battery_table
convolution said:
I don't get the article.
Does 4.2V mean 100% battery life?
If you want to charge it to 4.0 V, does that mean its like 90% battery life?
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There are two terms you need to understand when it comes to batteries: volts and amps.
Volts is "static" for a battery, meaning it doesn't change. You have a 1.5V battery, it will always be a 1.5V battery. Now the capacity of the battery is measured in amps. A 1Amp battery has more capacity than a 500mAh battery. At 100% fully charged, you'd have 1000mAh (or 1A). At 90%, you'd have 900mAh.
What that article tells you is that your phone is charged to (or close to) 100% using a specified voltage (probably whatever the battery is rated at...3.7V?). Now batteries and chargers of the past had what's called a "trickle" effect, in which it still chargers the battery when it is (or close to) 100%, but at a much lower voltage. If you phone was to stop charging after it hit 100%, it would start to discharge. When you unplugged it (assuming you charge it over night) in the morning, you would have less than 100%. The trickle is so that your battery will still have 100% when you unplug it.
Think about if you filled up your gas tank and left your car running over night. When you woke up, you wouldn't have a full tank anymore. But if you left the gas nozzle in the tank while it was running, it would continually "top it off". That or gas leak everywhere and your car would burst into flames...therefore canceling the point that you wouldn't a full tank...
Anyways...Li-Ion batteries charge and behave differently that batteries of yore. It's bad to let it go down to almost 0%. It's also bad to let it continually sit on the charger. I personally charge mine every other day but I used to charge my Vibrant and HD2 every night.
The batteries in these phones have protection circuits to prevent over charging as well as over discharge. It is perfectly safe to charge over night as well as discharge until empty. What the display shows as 0% does not mean the battery has actually reached 0%. It is just were the protection circuit deems safe. It is possible to over discharge a Li-ion/LiPo battery which may cause it to no longer charge but there are ways to bring it back for the willing. Our phones, however, will not do this due to the protection circuit unless that fails. If that happens you need a new battery because Li-ion/Lipo batteries are very dangerous if over or under charged.
Also, the voltage is static in theory but in real life the the voltage does drop as the battery is discharged. The drop is not large however. A 3.7v Li-ion/LiPo cell will read around 4.2v at full charge and lowers to just over 3.7v at full SAFE discharge. If the battery falls below 3.7v, you will likely have damaged the cell. Again, our phone batteries have a protection circuit to prevent this.
ihateusernames said:
The batteries in these phones have protection circuits to prevent over charging as well as over discharge. It is perfectly safe to charge over night as well as discharge until empty. What the display shows as 0% does not mean the battery has actually reached 0%. It is just were the protection circuit deems safe. It is possible to over discharge a Li-ion/LiPo battery which may cause it to no longer charge but there are ways to bring it back for the willing.
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It would require a special charger with a "boost" function, which most people do not have access to.
From the previously linked battery University page:
In spite of these preventive measures, over-discharge does occur. Advanced battery analyzers (Cadex C7000 series) feature a 'boost' function that provides a gentle charge current to activate the safety circuit and re-energize the cells if discharged too deeply.
Most of us let our battery drain low on accident from time to time. But it makes not sense to do it intentionally or make a habit of it, as it yields no benefit (some people think they are "conditioning" or "calibrating" the battery, which does not apply to Li ion batteries), and actually hurts battery life. Also from Battery University: "Do charge the battery often. The battery lasts longer with partial rather than full discharges."
There have been pretty occasional cases on the Touch Pro 2 forums of people over-discharging the battery, and rendering it useless. So it does happen. Some have claimed that the Android OS, or the Vision phone itself handles the battery better to avoid over discharge. Maybe so. But do you really want to test that theory, if it can most usually be avoided?
redpoint73 said:
It would require a special charger with a "boost" function, which most people do not have access to.
From the previously linked battery University page:
In spite of these preventive measures, over-discharge does occur. Advanced battery analyzers (Cadex C7000 series) feature a 'boost' function that provides a gentle charge current to activate the safety circuit and re-energize the cells if discharged too deeply.
Most of us let our battery drain low on accident from time to time. But it makes not sense to do it intentionally or make a habit of it, as it yields no benefit (some people think they are "conditioning" or "calibrating" the battery, which does not apply to Li ion batteries), and actually hurts battery life. Also from Battery University: "Do charge the battery often. The battery lasts longer with partial rather than full discharges."
There have been pretty occasional cases on the Touch Pro 2 forums of people over-discharging the battery, and rendering it useless. So it does happen. Some have claimed that the Android OS, or the Vision phone itself handles the battery better to avoid over discharge. Maybe so. But do you really want to test that theory, if it can most usually be avoided?
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I agree that it can happen which is why I stated that the prevention circuit can fail though I do believe it to be a rare case that this happens. I charge when ever I am near a charger as I don't like to run low but I also don't freak out if I am close to dead. I also charge over night every night and have for years. I just don't believe that it is necessary to worry that my phone has been on the charger too long or that I am running close to 0% as there is redundant protection in place and for the most part, this protection works very well. Hell, your phone COULD burst into flames while holding it next to your ear due to the volatility of the Lithium Ion chemistry if exposed to air but that also very rarely happens.
I believe it is probably worse on the battery to watch movies on the phone while overclocked with the battery getting too hot than to discharge to 0% occasionally.
I do agree that it is pointless to try conditioning lithium batteries as they have no memory effect.
Reviving an over discharged Lithium battery should not be attempted by most. I fly RC Helis and my electrics use 3 or 6 cell LiPo's. On the very rare occasion I kill a cell, I isolate the bad cell and trickle charge until it matches the others and then resume balance charging. The batteries in our phones can be revived in the same manner. It requires low current and constant observation and should not be done by the inexperienced.
At the office I leave my phone in a cradle. When I get calls I remove the phone to answer and then return it to the cradle when done. My battery goes from 100% down to somewhere in the 90's then charges back to 100% in the cradle. Does this repeated process harm the battery in any way? I've read that these batteries don't suffer from the memory effect, but I'm still not sure if this counts as a charging cycle.
Sent from my Desire HD using XDA App
You should always let the battery run down completely some times maybe once a week.
Really? I've read on this forum that there is no need to do that with the new Lithium Ion batteries. I've even read that this could have a negative effect and you should try not to let the battery drain completly.
I don't understand why there isn't a proper battery care section in the manual. Its as if its some kind of voodoo science.
Perhaps not Once a week. But Once a "while"
The reason is that, Phone software uses approximation to calculate the charge left in the Battery. So over time, battery ages and software may not be calibrated to match with the battery's storage capacity. So draining the battery entirely and charging them fully gives the phone's software to assess the battery's health and recalibrate.
It's a lithium battery mate. The only way you can really damage it is by a complete discharge. So long as you don't switch the phone back on once it switches itself off due to low battery you needn't worry about anything else.
Also in theory the lithium batteries have a lifespan of say about a 1000 charges for example and everytime you charge it has one charging less left. This ofcourse isn't exactly how it is in practice but charging the battery alot wears it down. It isn't good either to keep it in the charger for a longer time after it's reached a 100%.
Hi,
this is only partly correct:
Suppose the battery can make 1000 (which I don't believe) charge cycles,
it means that you can charge 1000 times from empty to full.
If you just charge 1000 times from 50% empty to full it counts for 500 cycles!
So,
don't worry, let it stay in the cradle if you like
There are 500 opinions about that but believe, as I wrote is correct.
Theo
Yes, what I said wasn't exact science and I used 1000 cycles as an example, but from what I've read it is better to let the battery drain to less than 50% and then charge it full rather than charge 5% at a time. My previous post was meant to illustrate this.
Sent from my Leedroid powered pocketsized supercomputer using XDA App
geenome said:
You should always let the battery run down completely some times maybe once a week.
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That's a load of crap, no offense... Lithium batteries have no memory effect and have absolutely no need to be completely discharged, that's a ancient thing from the time of nickel-metal hybrid batteries. The only actual reason for full charge cycles is to calibrate the device for that exact battery.
Keeping a lithium-ion battery in a charger most of the time will wear the battery down faster than getting it drain more and then charging it. Keeping the battery almost fully loaded/in a constant loading state wears the battery capacity by approximately 20% a year (can't recall the source/study just now)(EDIT: and my personal experience is that the battery capacity will wear that much anyway, no matter how you use it). The life-cycle of phones these days are roughly two years nowadays so IMO you can keep it in a cradle with no worries, if you wish. And lets face it, a new battery after a year of usage won't be that big an investment after all.
To add to the above post, running down a lithium battery completely does more damage than benefit. This is almost impossible though with normal use as the phone shuts down long before the battery is completely empty
do i drain the battery before first charge? is it really necessary to do overnight first charge or 3-4 hour full charge will do? need to take extra care since it is non removable.
I know that's really un-educated but I'm not sure about those things as well ... is it good to drain it first and then recharge it, or recharge it at the beginning .. and is it bad when you take it off the charger in the middle of the process?
I know it depends on battery type. And actually what would make sense is just following the manual. Why shouldn't the manufacturer know?
Anyway, anyone with some knowledge on that, please help!
Nearly all cell phones use Lithium-based batteries, which should not be drained before charging. The "drain before charge" thing only applies to nickel cadmium batteries.
You should charge your phone battery as often as possible. It's better for the battery to go from 100% to 80% five times than to go from 100% to 0% once.
I have read several articles that state it is BAD to completely drain a lithium polymer battery so I plan to just keep it charged as usual.
Bronk93 said:
I have read several articles that state it is BAD to completely drain a lithium polymer battery so I plan to just keep it charged as usual.
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I've heard the same info too where it'll damage the battery by draining it completely. Although, I heard that power management on devices sometimes need to be calibrated by taking the lithium battery to near 0%...it's that way on my macbook pro...not sure about phones.
Hi there ,
I have to calibrate my battery and I need to use a way to do it , but I'm not sure what's the best method !
Which way or software do you suggest to solve this issue?
I have to say my tablet isn't root.
Thanks in advance.
"Battery calibration" is a myth. What most people and apps accomplish when they "calibrate the battery" is either wipe or somehow modify the battery stats - this has absolutely nothing to do with the actual battery output or how the system reports the battery output.
The only thing that battery stats are utilized for is an estimated report of an individual app's usage of the battery. Wiping the battery stats (or modifying them) only decreases the accuracy of these estimates.
Read more here
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1443108
Sent from my Nexus 7 using XDA Premium HD app
dayv said:
"Battery calibration" is a myth. What most people and apps accomplish when they "calibrate the battery" is either wipe or somehow modify the battery stats - this has absolutely nothing to do with the actual battery output or how the system reports the battery output.
The only thing that battery stats are utilized for is an estimated report of an individual app's usage of the battery. Wiping the battery stats (or modifying them) only decreases the accuracy of these estimates.
Read more here
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1443108
Sent from my Nexus 7 using XDA Premium HD app
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Thanks buddy.
Yes , I got it!
I read some useful articles from http://batteryuniversity.com. I understood that the best way to calibrate the battery is a full discharging , then doing full charge.It should be done once every three months or after 40 partial cycles.
shab_2008 said:
Thanks buddy.
Yes , I got it!
I read some useful articles from http://batteryuniversity.com. I understood that the best way to calibrate the battery is a full discharging , then doing full charge.It should be done once every three months or after 40 partial cycles.
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The calibration that is being referred to in the articles and papers found at the battery university website is referring to the internal circuitry and controls of the actual battery. The ideas that "full" discharge and subsequent "full" will help improve the accuracy of the reporting of its state of charge to detectable level in a typical cell phone or tablet battery is guess work at best for us the typical end user.
Also the internal circuitry and controls inside these poly lith ion batteries (these circuits help control the rate of charge as well as prevent these batteries from ever actually reaching a true full charge or true complete discharge) is continually improving.
And besides using and charging your battery you have no actual control over the batteries internal circuitry or how it reports its state of charge.
So you can run your battery down low then charge it up to a high charge, but I doubt you will notice much of a difference and you will not have any way of ever knowing if it had any affect on the accuracy the battery's reporting of its state of charge.
And lastly remember if you intentionally practice the full drain and full charge that you will never reach a true full charge (the internal circuitry in the battery will try to prevent this) as your battery would explode in flames first. And the longer you keep your battery at a high charge state the more you will shorten its life span. Also the circuitry in the battery will try prevent you from reaching too low of a charge because if it happened you would not be able to recharge the battery ever again (at least not with any standard ac charger).
So the idea that you or I (or any other typical user) can do anything to improve the calibration (at least anything that can be measured) on our poly lithium ion battery is a myth.
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dayv said:
The calibration that is being referred to in the articles and papers found at the battery university website is referring to the internal circuitry and controls of the actual battery. The ideas that "full" discharge and subsequent "full" will help improve the accuracy of the reporting of its state of charge to detectable level in a typical cell phone or tablet battery is guess work at best for us the typical end user.
Also the internal circuitry and controls inside these poly lith ion batteries (these circuits help control the rate of charge as well as prevent these batteries from ever actually reaching a true full charge or true complete discharge) is continually improving.
And besides using and charging your battery you have no actual control over the batteries internal circuitry or how it reports its state of charge.
So you can run your battery down low then charge it up to a high charge, but I doubt you will notice much of a difference and you will not have any way of ever knowing if it had any affect on the accuracy the battery's reporting of its state of charge.
And lastly remember if you intentionally practice the full drain and full charge that you will never reach a true full charge (the internal circuitry in the battery will try to prevent this) as your battery would explode in flames first. And the longer you keep your battery at a high charge state the more you will shorten its life span. Also the circuitry in the battery will try prevent you from reaching too low of a charge because if it happened you would not be able to recharge the battery ever again (at least not with any standard ac charger).
So the idea that you or I (or any other typical user) can do anything to improve the calibration (at least anything that can be measured) on our poly lithium ion battery is a myth.
Sent from my Nexus 7 using XDA Premium HD app
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The right term here probably isn't "calibrate," but "condition". For most modern (LiPo/Lion) batteries, you will want to "break them in" so to speak by performing a few "full" charge cycles (as mentioned, onboard hardware will prevent the battery from really depleting all the way/charging to full capacity). Afterwards, you're generally recommended to perform a full cycle once a month or so. But other than that, the idea that you need to fully discharge a battery from day to day is silly. Any charge level below around 10% (even 20% if you're being conservative) can slightly diminish your overall carrying capacity.
Having it happen once or twice is nothing to write home about though.
Rirere said:
The right term here probably isn't "calibrate," but "condition". For most modern (LiPo/Lion) batteries, you will want to "break them in" so to speak by performing a few "full" charge cycles (as mentioned, onboard hardware will prevent the battery from really depleting all the way/charging to full capacity). Afterwards, you're generally recommended to perform a full cycle once a month or so. But other than that, the idea that you need to fully discharge a battery from day to day is silly. Any charge level below around 10% (even 20% if you're being conservative) can slightly diminish your overall carrying capacity.
Having it happen once or twice is nothing to write home about though.
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In the articles from the website there are discussions about the accuracy of the "state of charge" reporting and some comments were made that the occasional "full drain" and "full charge" would improve the accuracy or "calibrate" the "state of charge" reporting. One article actually recommended once every 40 charge cycles would be good. The only problem with this line of reasoning is that there is no real good way to tell if the battery had actually ever lost any significant accuracy in its own "state of charge" reporting - your battery may maintain a high level of accuracy throughout its entire life cycle and you would never know.
And subsequently while the idea of doing a "full discharge" and "full charge" cycle sounds like a good idea, the truth is there really is no way to know if it had an actual effect or not.
As for conditioning or exercising a battery there is some truth to this in the case of a poly lith ion battery that has been in storage for a while or a battery that has continually drained and charged to almost the exact same levels repeatedly over several cycles. A "full discharge" and "full charge" may speed up the conditioning process, though the typical average use would achieve the same conditioning given enough cycles.
As for the longevity of a battery, high charge states do more to shorten life of a lith ion battery than low charge states. The down side to running the battery low is that once it gets too low it can't be recharged - now there is a safety circuit built in that stops a battery from discharging too low. This is where you battery shuts down and your device turns off. The down side here is that the battery will still slowly lose charge. So if you hit the too low shut off and take too long to start charging the battery you can end up with a battery that is difficult to nearly impossible to recharge.
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After thinking it through some more I'm doubtful that there is a high occurrence of poly lithium ion batteries failing to accurately detect and report its "state of charge" otherwise there would be a lot more occurrences of these batteries exploding.
The whole purpose of the batteries internal circuitry and controls is to kick in the high charge (and low charge) safety circuits - there is also a safety to keep these batteries from charging to quickly as that could also cause the battery to burst into flames.
If these batteries were to lose the ability to accurately self detect and self report their "state of charge" regularly as often as just 40 charging cycles then there would be a lot more batteries out there that would not know when to kick in their high state of charge safety circuit. Which means there would be a lot more exploding batteries out there.
Since the instances of exploding batteries is rare and becoming rarer, it is evident that the accuracy of these poly lithium ion internal circuitry detection and control is really good and only getting better.
Like I said the whole idea that battery calibration is needed (or even can be done) is just a myth.
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