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taylorpc

macrumors member
Original poster
Dec 29, 2005
58
0
St. Louis, MO
... is this normal battery life for a 5G/video? I skipped around a little bit (seriously, just a little bit...) and it lasted 4-5 hours, at most. This has happened to me every time I've charged it.
 
This is just music, haven't used the video feature yet. I skip around a little, but as I stated in my original post, it's only a little bit. Even so, it shouldn't take away 8 or 9 hours of battery life.
 
Using the EQ and backlight shorten the battery life. If the bit rate of your songs is more than 128kbps then the HD has to spin more often, shortening run time. And as mentioned skipping shortens run time since the HD has to spin more often.

Greg
 
greg555 said:
Using the EQ and backlight shorten the battery life. If the bit rate of your songs is more than 128kbps then the HD has to spin more often, shortening run time. And as mentioned skipping shortens run time since the HD has to spin more often.

Greg

I do use the EQ, I believe it's set to rock. The bit rate is set to 128kbps. Is using EQ + minimal skipping enough to reduce battery life that drastically?

(I listen at about 60-70% volume)
 
I don't think Apple states how much the EQ (or other features) reduce the run time.

Your best bit if you are concerned about the battery life is to run it without EQ, without skipping and see how long it goes. That is how Apple would test your battery (I believe) if you returned it for a battery life problem.

I thought my previous (1st gen) iPod mini was a little under-spec since it seemed to last only 7-ish hours. But when I ran a test on it it lasted 8.5 hours. So the skipping and backlight I was using did have an effect.

Greg
 
Still Rocking the 5 GB

As a proud owner of the 1st generation ipod, I've had some "fun" working with the battery.

Apple's criteria for establishing predicted battery life is something like:

Turn off all the fancy stuff (EQ, Backlight, etc.) so that you're down to just music.

Pick an album, and set your ipod to repeat albums.

Push play.

If you speak to an apple rep, they will probably recommend that you do this very first. It's a very biased test, because no one uses their ipod like this...but it gives the best seeming results because it plays the entire album from RAM, without accessing the hard drive inside the ipod.

If you run this test (which is posted on the ipod help section of Apple's website, btw. Here: http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=61475) and find that your ipod really only works for 4-5 hrs, then you have a legitimate complaint, worthy of a new or repaired ipod.

Also, upgrading the firmware and restoring your ipod also tend to help...no good reason why...but they do.
 
Isn't the deal with Apple that if your iPod is under warranty and it's charge is less than half of what it should be, they'll replace it?
 
Off topic but watch out on the 60-70% volume. Your gonna go deaf dude! :eek:
At least get some sound isolating headphones so that you won't turn the volume up soo high.
 
jsupetran said:
Off topic but watch out on the 60-70% volume. Your gonna go deaf dude! :eek:
At least get some sound isolating headphones so that you won't turn the volume up soo high.

Thanks for the advice! I'm using Grado SR-80's, it seems as if the volume needs to be turned up more on these to get the same volume I was used to with the apple earbuds... I'll have to tone it down :)

So 8 hours is just a little over half of what the charge should be... should I take it in or be happy with what I have?
 
my two cents... I'd take it in. I have a 5G also and my battery life is amazing. I had a nice 3G before and got a solid 8 hours out of it, and I get easily over 10 on this 5G iPod with "Rock" turned on and "Sound check" on as well.
 
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