Battery Life on the PocketPC
Recharge frequency:
You should be able to get at least 8-10 hrs of actual usage between charges.
In practice, this means that you should recharge at least twice per week. If you
use your device lots, this is unlikely to be a concern because you will probably
be synchronising your device daily anyway. If you are away on holiday, and the
device is not being used at all then it will probably last up to two weeks on a
charge. In a situation like this, it may be best just to leave it sleeping in
its charging cradle.
Backup battery:
Older PDAs had small button type backup cells as a safeguard against data
loss. Recent devices do not when 10% of
battery life remains, the device shuts down and uses the remaining power to
protect your data. You cannot use the device again until you have recharged it.
You have approx 12hrs before you may lose everything. [See
Backup & Restore]
Type of Battery :
Most recent devices have a new type of battery - a Lithium-polymer cell, which is lighter
and more powerful than a Lithium-ion cell. There is no memory effect. In fact,
the cell does not like to be deep-discharged.
Flat battery:
So what does happen if I completely run it flat? Well...I hope you made a backup
copy of your data. All of your carefully entered data is toast! The main
programs will be ok since they are stored in non-volatile memory, but any
installed programs and all your data are lost! There is no hard disk in these
devices. This will happen to you at some point so make regular backups.
Reducing Power Consumption:
The backlight is the biggest power drain - turn this down to its dimmest setting. Or in good light, you can turn off the light, without going through all the Settings rigmarole by holding down the power switch until the light goes off (and vice versa). Music and movies also drain the battery quite quickly but this is beyond the scope of the project. Besides, if you have figured out how to do that, then you have probably already figured out all the power settings.
On older iPAQs, if you like the idea of the Auto-sensor turning on the light only when
needed, you may have found that it is overly sensitive and dims the light when
it shouldn't. You can fix this by applying two layers of semi-transparent tape
over the sensor. (Outlined in orange in the image below)
