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penajmz

macrumors 68040
Original poster
Sep 11, 2008
3,797
4,029
New York City
To start seeing normal battery discharge? I'm on my second total discharge now to charge up to 100% again.


How many times do you think it takes?
 
Zero, I don't deep drain my battery, its shortens the lifespan.
 
To start seeing normal battery discharge? I'm on my second total discharge now to charge up to 100% again.


How many times do you think it takes?

Actually, you've gotten some bad information somewhere. With Lithium Ion batteries, you NEVER want to completely drain them (if you can avoid it). You don't have to "condition" these batteries, and draining them completely can actually shorten their life.
 
I do it once to make sure I don't have a bad battery. But that's it for me because as mentioned full discharges and recharges kills a battery.
 
Oh wow, this is definitely new information for me. Let me plug it in right now then...

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I do it once to make sure I don't have a bad battery. But that's it for me because as mentioned full discharges and recharges kills a battery.


I've only done it once so far too so I'll stop now.
 
Doing one full drain cycle will calibrate the battery charge indicator, so you will be more accurate about how much remaining life you have -- which will probably allow you to use more battery before you think the battery will die.

Typically, if you drain an iPhone down to 1% battery life, you will find that it will continue to work for 30+ minutes, because the calibration is incorrect.

To properly calibrate:
1) Fully charge battery (let sit overnight)
2) Fully drain battery until screen TURNS OFF
3) Fully charge battery (let sit overnight)

This doesn't actually give you any more battery life, but you will be able to use more due to better information.
 
Doing one full drain cycle will calibrate the battery charge indicator, so you will be more accurate about how much remaining life you have -- which will probably allow you to use more battery before you think the battery will die.



Typically, if you drain an iPhone down to 1% battery life, you will find that it will continue to work for 30+ minutes, because the calibration is incorrect.



To properly calibrate:

1) Fully charge battery (let sit overnight)

2) Fully drain battery until screen TURNS OFF

3) Fully charge battery (let sit overnight)



This doesn't actually give you any more battery life, but you will be able to use more due to better information.


I think you're absolutely right. When I first drained it on Saturday it lasted a loooong time at 1%.
 
Doing one full drain cycle will calibrate the battery charge indicator, so you will be more accurate about how much remaining life you have -- which will probably allow you to use more battery before you think the battery will die.

Typically, if you drain an iPhone down to 1% battery life, you will find that it will continue to work for 30+ minutes, because the calibration is incorrect.

To properly calibrate:
1) Fully charge battery (let sit overnight)
2) Fully drain battery until screen TURNS OFF
3) Fully charge battery (let sit overnight)

This doesn't actually give you any more battery life, but you will be able to use more due to better information.

This.

Apple recommends doing this calibration about once a month. Otherwise just use the battery however you want it.

As for the others here saying it harms the battery? What are you smoking? Show me a link. There is absolutely no evidence of that.

https://www.apple.com/batteries/
 
This.

Apple recommends doing this calibration about once a month. Otherwise just use the battery however you want it.

As for the others here saying it harms the battery? What are you smoking? Show me a link. There is absolutely no evidence of that.

https://www.apple.com/batteries/

I looked through that link and didn't find where it recommends calibrating it (deep draining) it once a month. I think years ago that was the case, but there is no longer a need to calibrate iPhone batteries. I've never calibrated mine and the reporting statistics were spot on.

Usage will help break in the battery and improve performance but I think overall you do more harm then good with draining it once a month.

For intance, my wife deep drained where battery on her iPhone 5, not for calibration sake but just usage, I on the other hand avoided that. My battery was significantly in better shape then her phone's.
 
This.

Apple recommends doing this calibration about once a month. Otherwise just use the battery however you want it.

As for the others here saying it harms the battery? What are you smoking? Show me a link. There is absolutely no evidence of that.

https://www.apple.com/batteries/

They are a bit confused. If you drain a lithium battery completely it destroys them. There is circuitry involved that prevents this. So an "empty" battery isn't really empty.
 
I looked through that link and didn't find where it recommends calibrating it (deep draining) it once a month. I think years ago that was the case, but there is no longer a need to calibrate iPhone batteries. I've never calibrated mine and the reporting statistics were spot on.

Usage will help break in the battery and improve performance but I think overall you do more harm then good with draining it once a month.

For intance, my wife deep drained where battery on her iPhone 5, not for calibration sake but just usage, I on the other hand avoided that. My battery was significantly in better shape then her phone's.

Wow, you're right! Wonder when this changed? This is really good to know- thank you!
 
Once a month is probably excessive, but I have certainly found the calibration on my 5s to be off, and re-did the calibration probably once every 3 months.

In some cases I would get up to 1 hour after reaching 1% -- that's a pretty big calibration error to ignore, and a lot of life to leave on the table.
 
I looked through that link and didn't find where it recommends calibrating it (deep draining) it once a month. I think years ago that was the case, but there is no longer a need to calibrate iPhone batteries. I've never calibrated mine and the reporting statistics were spot on.

Usage will help break in the battery and improve performance but I think overall you do more harm then good with draining it once a month.

For intance, my wife deep drained where battery on her iPhone 5, not for calibration sake but just usage, I on the other hand avoided that. My battery was significantly in better shape then her phone's.

Not a good test. Some iPhone 5 batteries had serious problems. Still, maybe you're right about Apple's recommendations. I haven't looked through it all in a while.

I do know calibrating helped a lot when I had a battery that kept shutting down at about 10%.
 
I just do it once out of the box and after that I just charge normally. Although it's not necessary to do it on first charge out of the box as it comes pre-conditioned but I like to test how long my device lasts.
 
You can do it but it's not really necessary and draining a lithium ion battery actually damages it so don't do it too much.
 
There's an interesting article over on phys.org's site about a fairly recent (April of 2013) find about lithium-ion batteries.

They have also previously been widely believed to exhibit no memory effect...

For example, a battery powered shaver or electric toothbrush that is recharged before the battery runs out, can later take revenge on the prudent user. The battery appears to remember that you have only taken part of its storage capacity – and eventually no longer supplies its full energy.

The memory effect and its associated abnormal working voltage deviation have now been confirmed for one of the most common materials used as the positive electrode in lithium-ion batteries, lithium-iron phosphate (LiFePO4).

Scientists have found that idling a sufficiently long period of time can be used to erase the memory effect. However, in accordance with the many particles model, this only happens under certain conditions. The memory effect only vanished if one waited a sufficiently long time after a cycle of partial charging followed by full discharge.

Read more at: http://phys.org/news/2013-04-memory-effect-lithium-ion-batteries.html#jCp
 
I drain out of box. Full charge. Drain again. Full charge. Good to go. My numbers weren't very strong with battery usage at first. Then after the 2nd charge it was looking good after a few hours use and standby.
 
They are a bit confused. If you drain a lithium battery completely it destroys them. There is circuitry involved that prevents this. So an "empty" battery isn't really empty.

Not confused. Lithium ion batterries hate doing full drains and fully recharging. While it doesn't exactly damage the battery, it makes it wear down faster leading you to replace it sooner. Whether it matters to people who upgrade every 2 years, probably not. But want that battery to last a long time? Avoid full cycles( 100%->0%->100%).

It's why the Chevy Volt only uses ~50% of its batteries capacity. It drains down to about 30% and charges up to 80%. This produces less wear on the battery making it last longer.

Also using high power chargers also put more wear on the battery. You may be able to charge it faster, but the battery won't last as long.
 
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