Battery Test

Hey, all. I'm currently doing a battery test to check on the life of my battery since it's about a year old and my iPod Touch doesn't seem to be lasting as long as it should. I charged it to 100%, selected my songs, turned off the display, and I'm going to let it discharge all the way to 0. Started this three minutes ago.

I do have a question, though. I like to listen to my music at about 75% the volume the iPod has, and I'm curious as to how much this will kill the battery. Also, so I don't overuse my headphones, I'll be turning the screen on briefly to switch headphones and resume playback.

So, how much does volume make a difference when it comes to these tests? Also, does shuffle consume more battery life, along with Equalizer? After I get my result, I'll definitely compare it to what the numbers should be for a 4th gen touch. Also, does running iOS5 have a difference in life versus the iOS4 it came with?

Thanks!

Hi,

There are a bunch of factors which will have a bearing on your battery life in this instance.

The bigger the headphone's the bigger the drain.

The higher the volume (75%+ particularly) likewise.

The higher the bitrate (greater than 128Kbps MP3 particularly) and heavy WMA DRM 10 tracks even more so.. (do we still use Napster/Rhapsody?)

Browsing the library and switching tracks during playback..again

Having Sound Check enabled and the Equalizer above normal.

Any other apps and location services that you may have ticking away in the background and other obvious ones such as the background light on the display.

iOS5 has had some well documented issues against it with regards to people that upgraded from iOS4 and their complaints about battery run time. Hopefully the fixes have filtered through by now.

Usage patterns are the key here and one cannot solely rely on rated battery life.

Cheers,
Liam

p.s just a small point which people tend to get confused with. Lithium batteries do not take kindly to regularly being run down to the red-zone or flattened completely. Smaller more frequent charges will keep your battery in better health.

My battery ran for about 24 hours...

I also thought the more you plug the battery in, the worse it gets. My parents always told me that I should charge my iPod, cellphone, laptop, etc. every night, but I thought that wears out the battery quicker because that's one less charge cycle in the life of the battery.

Also, usually I keep my backlight on the dimmest setting possible. I'd rather tilt my ipod to see the screen than increase the brightness.

I noticed you said browsing the library and switching songs eats power... does repeat/shuffle eat more power too?

Also, about how much battery life does WiFi eat? I also didn't know that better bitrates take more battery life, which makes sense. I like very high quality music, so my files are generally pretty big.

Kaioshoryuken1;1364468]My battery ran for about 24 hours...

I also thought the more you plug the battery in, the worse it gets. My parents always told me that I should charge my iPod, cellphone, laptop, etc. every night, but I thought that wears out the battery quicker because that's one less charge cycle in the life of the battery.

No, that's not the case with Lithium batteries. Assuming 'end of life' is when the battery capacity drops to an arbitrary threshold of 70% then you would expect to achieve 500 Discharge Cycles from 100% Depth of Discharge (DoD) in other words, charging from flat.

The figures get interesting when charging from 50% DoD....1500 cycles, 25% DoD...2500 cycles, 10% DoD...4700. N.B.In this instance 25% DoD = roughly 75% capacity on the fuel gauge.

Partial discharges reduce the stress on your battery. It is important to keep your device cool when charging also, sticking it in a case or sock under a bedside lamp next to a radiator whilst charging for example is not a good idea, any conditions that can cause the local temperature to hang around at 86degF or 30degC and above will compromise the battery life.

Just a moot point about charge cycles, charging from 100% DoD = 1 charge cycle, charging from 50% and then from 25%, and then again from 25% Depth of Discharge still adds up to 1 charge cycle.

Also, usually I keep my backlight on the dimmest setting possible. I'd rather tilt my ipod to see the screen than increase the brightness.

This is good for your battery.

I noticed you said browsing the library and switching songs eats power... does repeat/shuffle eat more power too?

Yes it will...anything that makes your phone use it's internals in a pro-active way will have an effect.

Also, about how much battery life does WiFi eat? I also didn't know that better bitrates take more battery life, which makes sense. I like very high quality music, so my files are generally pretty big.
I believe that it does, I don't have any figures but downloading pictures, movies and streaming video would likely consume a good deal of energy. There is also a phenomenon of excessive battery drain when there are multiple w-fi devices in the same location constantly hunting for a connection before they get their turn to connect and download.

I like quality music too, however I accepted a compromise some time ago. I rip everything in ALAC (Apple Lossless) onto my Mac which I in turn pipe through my AV Amp/Receiver via an ATV2 which gives me a decent output, but I use the settings in iTunes to convert music synced with my iPhone to 128K to save battery and increase file storage capacity.


I hope this helps.

Thank you very much for your informative response, it really did help +1 for rep!

I didn't know heat had a significant effect on the battery life when charging... I have the Incase slider case pictured here on my iPod, and it's had it since I purchased it at the Apple store. I hardly ever take it off. Incase Metallic Slider Case for iPod touch (4th Gen.) - Apple Store (U.S.) I noticed sometimes the ipod gets pretty hot when charging.

The music I listen to sounds amazing in my Skullcandy Uprock headphones 2011 Uprock SC Blue
and I'm used to having a 256k bitrate or higher with my music. If any songs are in lower quality than that on my ipod, I'm very likely to skip them and not listen to them because my ears are very fussy. I have some music that I ripped off multiple CDs some time ago, and through me being stupid with format conversion to mp3 it lost a lot of its quality and punch, and because of that I generally don't listen to it... and it's around 128k, but a bad sounding 128k.

What's a better size compromise? I realize that 320 clearly takes up a lot of space and energy to play.

Ultimately when I return home in two months for spring break, I might just take a trip to the apple store and stop by the Genius bar to see if they will give my iPod a new battery/replacement iPod because its life is dropping rapidly. I've even noticed more and more of a difference of battery drain when it's just in standby.

There's another thing, usually I leave my iPod touch in standby. Is it a good thing to get into the habit of shutting it off when not in use?

No problem Kaioshoryuken1

Yes it does unfortunately, however the case in my opinion should not have any serious effect. It's better to provide some air to circulate underneath when charging.

Lithiium batteries and charge circuits can get hot initially under charge, if it stays hot throughout the charge process then you need the iPod checking out.

With regards to perceived differences of bitrate and audio output quality this is a many spleandoured subject and can get extremely subjective and confusing (for me also).

Fundamentally, we don't listen in digital (0's and 1's) but analogue, and our listening equipment headphones, amps, avr's, speakers etc all output in analogue.

The equipment relies on the DAC or Digital to Analogue Convertor to produce the Analogue signal. Your iPod and any other mp3 player has an onboard DAC to convert the signal so that the sound can be output through the headphones. Putting the argument as to whether the iPod DAC is good or not so good to one side for the moment, your choice of headphones is also critical and the listening experienced can be spoiled by hooking up poor quality phones, buds or whatever. My honest opinion is that your h/phones would fall way short of what can be achieved with listening to 128kb which is perhaps why you are upping the bitrate for a better experience. One look at the Headphones listing in the Apple Store will give you some indication as to where you should be pitching your choice and budget.


There is much opinion on what Apple do with the digital signal before output, and some feel that it is compressed too much. Certainly there is a huge difference in audio quality between hooking up an iPod to a basic dock connected to a Hi-Fi, and instead docking it with a dedicated DAC/Media Transport to extract the clean digital signal so that the audio is greatly enhanced. I have first hand experience of this, with my iPod and an Onkyo ND-S1 connected to my Denon amp, the difference is remarkable.

One more word on your battery if you are getting noticeably less and less runtime then it's likely that it is on the wane. The iPod will still self-discharge if turned off but not by much compared with leaving it on standby.

Regards,
Liam

One more question though - (thanks again!)

If I buy much higher quality headphones, wouldn't I still need a high bitrate track because I would be hearing the imperfections and low quality-ness of a lower quality file, say 128k? For example, like playing a standard video quality video game on a high definition television. The TV is better, and the video quality looks poorer.

I understand what you were trying to say that by using my headphones, I am compensating for a lack of quality in the headphones with a higher quality bitrate on my tracks.

The main thing that keeps me away from purchasing headphones like Bose and Sennheiser is a) the cost, I'm a poor college student and b) I'm pretty rough with my headphones, though trying to take considerably better care of them now than I did in the past.

I try to get some bang for my buck and I want good quality for what I'm paying. That's why I like these Skullcandy Uprock headphones - they're much better than the Sony Fashion Earbuds I was using before, and I wasn't going to pay $60 for a pair of skullcandy headphones. Because I'm prone to destroying headphones, I don't want to throw too much money out on them.

Kaioshoryuken1 said:

One more question though - (thanks again!)

If I buy much higher quality headphones, wouldn't I still need a high bitrate track because I would be hearing the imperfections and low quality-ness of a lower quality file, say 128k? For example, like playing a standard video quality video game on a high definition television. The TV is better, and the video quality looks poorer.

I understand what you were trying to say that by using my headphones, I am compensating for a lack of quality in the headphones with a higher quality bitrate on my tracks.

The main thing that keeps me away from purchasing headphones like Bose and Sennheiser is a) the cost, I'm a poor college student and b) I'm pretty rough with my headphones, though trying to take considerably better care of them now than I did in the past.

I try to get some bang for my buck and I want good quality for what I'm paying. That's why I like these Skullcandy Uprock headphones - they're much better than the Sony Fashion Earbuds I was using before, and I wasn't going to pay $60 for a pair of skullcandy headphones. Because I'm prone to destroying headphones, I don't want to throw too much money out on them.

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But your logic is similar to filling a dumpster of a motor with high octane fuel and running out of gas at the end of the block.

If you've not heard 128kb through a decent set of cans then where is your point of reference?

It's all supposition and subjectivity, yes you'll probably experience a bit more 'Quality' putting 320kb through your h/phones , but you can't describe 320 as 'very high quality' and 128kb as 'low' because there are too many other factors in the mix...such as source,equipment, frequency,environment etc.

ALAC is quite average in the scheme of lossless codecs but there is no stopping you syncing in 320 and listening on your existing cans, I haven't a problem with it because that is your personal choice, it's just that the theme of your OP was battery life.