iPod Photo 40GB Battery Test (Very Impressed)

[smsmasters]

I decided to do a battery test on my iPod Photo 40GB, which I bought last December 2004.

I fully charged my iPod to 100% via the mains charger.

I then turned off sound check, equaliser settings and set the backlight to off.

I then let a playlist play repeatedly on 100% volume, set the hold switch to off and left it overnight.

I started at 11pm and the iPod completely switched off at around 1:20pm the next day.

At 100% volume, the battery life was around 14 hours!!!

I think this is great! :)

How long do you think the battery life would be at 50% volume? I usually keep the volume at 10% with my Etymotic er6i's!

[Parrothead Phan]

I too am very impressed w/the battery life of my 60GB photo. I consistently get just about 15.5 hours of continuous playtime on mine, using similar parameters as you did, except I have the volume set to 50% (with headphones on it's usually morel like 30-40%) and the backlight set to 5 seconds. The other huge factor in all this is the bit rate of your files...all of mine are at 128kbps (MP3 & ACC), which sounds just fine to my untrained ears. Apple rates the battery life (i.e. 15 hour estimate on the photo) based on files encoded at 128kbps AAC.

[iPodiophile]

It makes sense. The higher the bit rate is the larger the file. The larger the file, the more your iPod is gonna spin it's hard drive to fill up it's cache. And as a concequence, your battery will die earlier.

[Usuyami]

Hey, how do you know when your ipod shuts off? I'm gonna do a battery test on my 30gig.

[podder60gb]

the screen goes blank and it stops playing music... lol... :)

Just keep a timer going and check it every ten mins or so when its getting close to the end of its battery...

[Usuyami]

Oh lol, I thought there was a more efficient way of doing it. Oh well, that works too.

[wytwolf]

I'm doing a battery test on my 30Gigger right now. I started about 11pm last night (about 13.75 hours ago) and my battery meter at about 1/4, but still green. I had sound check on by accident (just turned it off) and had volume at about 50%. Considering most pple get several hours out of their battery after they see the red battery meter i think i might get more then the 15 suggested hours.

Also most of the songs in my playlist are 192kbps( about 18 are 192, 3-4 are 128, and 3-4 are 200+). I'll post again when my battery dies.

[Bobboes]

Originally posted by Usuyami
Oh lol, I thought there was a more efficient way of doing it. Oh well, that works too.

you thought that was the only way to shut it off, you just hold the play/pause button for like 3 seconds and it will shut off

[wytwolf]

Originally posted by Bobboes
you thought that was the only way to shut it off, you just hold the play/pause button for like 3 seconds and it will shut off

No they are doing a "battery test". Therefore u don't want to shut it off on your own. Usuyami was just that there was a more efficient way of knowing when his battery died.

A soft beep (as an option in the settings of course) in the headphone jack would be good, but "only" when the battery is really low. Not when the battery meter turn red

[wytwolf]

Well my battery died a few minutes about (about 7:28pm local time). I'm really impressed. I started last night at 11:06pm, and it constantly played up to about 7:28pm (give or take a minute or 2). So that's amost 20.5 hours. I had the backlight turned off, volume at ~50% (accidently had sound check on for 13 of the 20.5 hours) and most of the sounds were 192kbps (apple suggest 160mp3 for the test). So if i used the lower bitrate and had sound check turned off i probably would have gotten 22-24 hours. I'm happy.

I just bought a usb adapter card (same price as the usb2 card), the itrip and power pod (power pod comes with a firewire cord). What a difference in upload speed, wow. It now uploads about a song every 1-2 seconds, usb 1.1 only uploaded about 3-4 songs a minute.