iPod touch found a fix for massive battery drainage issue after iOS4 update

[trunksbyu]

I think I have figured out the issue. Please give this a try and let everyone know if it works or not. This is not necessarily a fix, but a workaround that DOES NOT include restoring, resetting, disabling wifi, push, etc, or using airplane mode.

I have troubleshooted my iPod touch (2G) and my wife's (3G) which have been having the battery drain issue. The Apple Store's solution was to swap out my wife's iPod touch with a "new" (probably just a refurb) one. But we had the same problems and we DID NOT restore from backup but set it up as a new iPod touch.

So, what I think the issue is, is that after the update to the new iOS4 (and all variants including 4.1), there is a firmware issue that the iPod touches do not work well with WPA2 encrypted wireless networks and results in massive battery drains. I disabled my WPA2 encryption and switched to WPA and so far, our batteries are working just fine. PLEASE TRY THIS AND REPORT BACK so we can know what the problem is and for Apple to get off their lazy butts and fix this problem with 4.2.

 

[dave1812dave]

I think I have figured out the issue. Please give this a try and let everyone know if it works or not. This is not necessarily a fix, but a workaround that DOES NOT include restoring, resetting, disabling wifi, push, etc, or using airplane mode.

I have troubleshooted my iPod touch (2G) and my wife's (3G) which have been having the battery drain issue. The Apple Store's solution was to swap out my wife's iPod touch with a "new" (probably just a refurb) one. But we had the same problems and we DID NOT restore from backup but set it up as a new iPod touch.

So, what I think the issue is, is that after the update to the new iOS4 (and all variants including 4.1), there is a firmware issue that the iPod touches do not work well with WPA2 encrypted wireless networks and results in massive battery drains. I disabled my WPA2 encryption and switched to WPA and so far, our batteries are working just fine. PLEASE TRY THIS AND REPORT BACK so we can know what the problem is and for Apple to get off their lazy butts and fix this problem with 4.2.

My wife has a 2G touch with 4.1. No battery drain with our wifi set to WPA2... I've got a 4G touch with 4.1. ALSO, no drain... (sorry, we don't have a 3G here to test for you)

 

[gizmoman0]

Its persistent wifi connection. There needs to be a GIANT sticky on the front page explaining this is the known problem. Many of us with 2g ipod touches can attest to this with the introduction of 4.0 which did not allow features such as multitasking, but included persistent wifi and thus destroyed battery life

 

[emptyCup]

There needs to be a GIANT sticky on the front page explaining this is the known problem.

For those of us who don't know about this known issue can you define "massive drainage"? I see little drainage overnight on sleep and I can go days without recharging. Thanks.

 

[dave1812dave]

Its persistent wifi connection. There needs to be a GIANT sticky on the front page explaining this is the known problem. Many of us with 2g ipod touches can attest to this with the introduction of 4.0 which did not allow features such as multitasking, but included persistent wifi and thus destroyed battery life

Yes, I was earlier addressing the "massive" battery drain. My wife has mentioned after a couple of days, her touch's battery is nearly dead if left in SLEEP mode. I'd hardly call that "massive", and she's had the touch for 2 years, so the battery is naturally getting weaker.

 

[wirelessmacuser]

I challenge the statement "massive drain".

I've experienced no such thing. Nor have the 20 or so friends and family I have using the iPhone 4.

 

[trunksbyu]

"massive"

sorry for the distracting semantics of my post. what i am referring to is indeed the persistent wifi connection while in sleep mode on the iPod touch (only the iPod touch, not iPhone) after updating to iOS4. some, not all, are experiencing their batteries draining overnight even with no applications multitasking. there are other posts on these forums about it. the battery itself is not the issue as users, including myself, have reported that when in airplane mode or wifi disabled, the battery can last for the normal time. those who charge their iPods everyday will naturally have poor battery life due to poor calibration.

the "solution" i have found to work after trying everything from a restore, new iPod touch, to disabling push, was to change the encryption on my wifi network from WPA2 to WPA. i am asking anyone who has been experiencing this to try this workaround to see if it works. one user has already reported on another post that he was using WEP and experiencing the battery drainage on two brand new 4th gen iPod touches. i don't know why there is a persistent wifi connection for some users, but at least for my iPod touch and wife's (2nd and 3rd gens), this has solved the problem.

 

[trunksbyu]

hey Dave, thanks for your post. again, this seems to only be a problem for some iPod touch users. it may be that for those who do have the problem there may be some hardware/firmware/OS conflict that is forcing a persistent wifi connection. all i know from my experience is that i had the battery draining problem in sleep mode where i'd wake up to a dead battery after a full charge. my battery in airplane mode could last for over a week.

My wife has a 2G touch with 4.1. No battery drain with our wifi set to WPA2... I've got a 4G touch with 4.1. ALSO, no drain... (sorry, we don't have a 3G here to test for you)

 

[trunksbyu]

hey gizmodoman, besides disabling wifi or going into airplane mode, have you found a solution? what kind of wireless encryption are you using?

Its persistent wifi connection. There needs to be a GIANT sticky on the front page explaining this is the known problem. Many of us with 2g ipod touches can attest to this with the introduction of 4.0 which did not allow features such as multitasking, but included persistent wifi and thus destroyed battery life

 

[dave1812dave]

hey Dave, thanks for your post. again, this seems to only be a problem for some iPod touch users. it may be that for those who do have the problem there may be some hardware/firmware/OS conflict that is forcing a persistent wifi connection. all i know from my experience is that i had the battery draining problem in sleep mode where i'd wake up to a dead battery after a full charge. my battery in airplane mode could last for over a week.

sure. I asked my wife today to try turning off her wifi (I'd recently asked her to turn her touch OFF instead of putting it in SLEEP mode) to see if the battery will hold a charge beyond a few days (she doesn't use hers every day like she used to). It'll take a while to see if what she's experiencing is simply a deteriorating battery. I'll update the thread once I see the results of her using OFF mode.

 

[gizmoman0]

hey gizmodoman, besides disabling wifi or going into airplane mode, have you found a solution? what kind of wireless encryption are you using?

I use wpa2 and no, unfortunately I've resorted to turning on airplane mode every night and that helped, but doesn't protect it during the day. I wish apple would have added a persistent wifi toggle in the settings

 

[xbpr]

I suffer from the battery drain issue as well. I went to check my wireless network and discovered that I was already using WPA and not WPA2.

I believe that "persistent wi-fi" is the culprit for my 2nd Generation iPod Touch battery drain woes, I just can't figure out what is causing wifi to stay active during sleep. 95% of the time wi-fi is already on when I wake it from sleep. 5% of the time it is off (which is the behavior I had with OS 4.0 and earlier). I have location and notification services all turned off. I suspect that it is an application that I use, but I'm not sure which one? I'm going to systematically start going through my daily apps to see if I can isolate one.

 

[sracer]

I suffer from the battery drain issue as well. I went to check my wireless network and discovered that I was already using WPA and not WPA2.

I believe that "persistent wi-fi" is the culprit for my 2nd Generation iPod Touch battery drain woes, I just can't figure out what is causing wifi to stay active during sleep. 95% of the time wi-fi is already on when I wake it from sleep. 5% of the time it is off (which is the behavior I had with OS 4.0 and earlier). I have location and notification services all turned off. I suspect that it is an application that I use, but I'm not sure which one? I'm going to systematically start going through my daily apps to see if I can isolate one.

reposting this from another thread....

It's not WPA or WEP or WPA2 that was the issue for me. I simply changed the email push option to off and rebooted the device. Turning off the option alone was not enough. I had to reboot. I no longer have the battery drain issue.

* - to reboot, simultaneously press and hold the home and sleep buttons for 10 seconds.

 

[trunksbyu]

Dang. Thanks everyone for responding. Our iPod touches work just fine now with no other changes except to our network. The only other network setting i changed is the channel width which was set at 20 to auto. This is definitely frustrating for all. I've been having the battery problem since June and just now decided to fiddle with the network... I wish it was as simple as disabling push, restarting, closing apps... Good luck to everyone still having problems. Maybe 4.2 in November?

 

[vanzantapple]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPod; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/532.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0.5 Mobile/8B117 Safari/6531.22.7)

2 days to sleep away the battery. If that's not massive, it is at least significant. I'm just under half life on my battery now and that should get me 135 hours of sleep mode.

 

[battlekid]

Um, actually I've never had a problem on my 3G or 4G iPod Touch. I got the 3G with 3.1, and it's seen 3.1, 3.1.1, 3.1.2, 3.1.3, 4.0 and 4.0 Jailbroken. Never really had a problem. Always keep clearing your multitasking tray, and don't leave skype running. BTW my network is WPA2 personal and it's hidden. An Apple Airport network if you need to know.

 

[trunksbyu]

this isn't a problem for all iPod touch users. but thanks.

Um, actually I've never had a problem on my 3G or 4G iPod Touch. I got the 3G with 3.1, and it's seen 3.1, 3.1.1, 3.1.2, 3.1.3, 4.0 and 4.0 Jailbroken. Never really had a problem. Always keep clearing your multitasking tray, and don't leave skype running. BTW my network is WPA2 personal and it's hidden. An Apple Airport network if you need to know.

 

[trunksbyu]

again, good for you. this problem isn't being experienced for all. glad you don't have a lemon.

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPod; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/532.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0.5 Mobile/8B117 Safari/6531.22.7)

2 days to sleep away the battery. If that's not massive, it is at least significant. I'm just under half life on my battery now and that should get me 135 hours of sleep mode.

 

[Panther71]

I'm not sure if this is part of the battery drain issue, or not, but I seem to consume 15-20% of my battery if I am using the Wi-Fi connection for no longer than an hour. Is this normal, or do I have an issue I need to be concerned with and think about trying to get a replacement?

 

[wordoflife]

Thank you so much! I changed the encryption on our network and now we have no issues.

 

[trunksbyu]

finally! it worked for someone else too!

well, maybe it is a fix for some after all! thanks for checking in! did you switch to WPA? what were you on before?

Thank you so much! I changed the encryption on our network and now we have no issues.

 

[trunksbyu]

hey Panther71, that's a normal drain. the problem some of us are/were having was that even with a full charge and no apps multitasking, the battery would rain overnight in sleep mode. if you're concerned about maximizing battery life, go to apple's website and look up the battery calibrating FAQ.

I'm not sure if this is part of the battery drain issue, or not, but I seem to consume 15-20% of my battery if I am using the Wi-Fi connection for no longer than an hour. Is this normal, or do I have an issue I need to be concerned with and think about trying to get a replacement?

 

[trunksbyu]

can you switch from WPA2 and give WPA a shot? it worked for another person on this forum. it may be worth a try! it seems like WEP may also not work well, but those who i've asked on other posts to switch to WPA haven't responded. of course some have also said that they are already using WPA but you never know. switching to airplane mode sucks!

I use wpa2 and no, unfortunately I've resorted to turning on airplane mode every night and that helped, but doesn't protect it during the day. I wish apple would have added a persistent wifi toggle in the settings

 

[wordoflife]

well, maybe it is a fix for some after all! thanks for checking in! did you switch to WPA? what were you on before?

Before: WPA-PSK [TKIP] + WPA2-PSK [AES]
After: WPA2-PSK [AES]

No idea, weird stuff - but what ever works!

 

[Panther71]

hey Panther71, that's a normal drain. the problem some of us are/were having was that even with a full charge and no apps multitasking, the battery would rain overnight in sleep mode. if you're concerned about maximizing battery life, go to apple's website and look up the battery calibrating FAQ.

Thanks for the info and tips.