Boyue T61/T62 / Icarus Illumina E653 review and Onyx T68 comparison

[NimS]

Originally Posted by downeaster59

According to my Battery app, I have been on battery power for 15 hours and have 75% battery left. I'm not convinced that this is 100% accurate, but I believe that my battery life is pretty close to that of my old NST.

It's a matter of finding the blend of settings that works best for the apps you have. These are what helped me.

thanks for this aspirational battery drain levels!.. implementing your suggestions and i'll see how I go.

Incidentally, I played a little with my T62+ before installing the update and it may well be my imagination but it seemed a bit more responsive and slower to drain... anybody know how to downgrade so i can test?

[downeaster59]

Originally Posted by NimS

thanks for this aspirational battery drain levels!.. implementing your suggestions and i'll see how I go.

Incidentally, I played a little with my T62+ before installing the update and it may well be my imagination but it seemed a bit more responsive and slower to drain... anybody know how to downgrade so i can test?

For some of that battery time, my T62+ was in sleep mode, so I don't know precisely how much of that time I was actually using my device. Battery life has been good, but I agree that it was a little better before the last update.

I don't know how to downgrade, either, but it's possible that one of the tools that nightboy developed in this thread (https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=245888) may help. We'd have to find an older update or image, though.

[NimS]

Originally Posted by downeaster59

For some of that battery time, my T62+ was in sleep mode, so I don't know precisely how much of that time I was actually using my device. Battery life has been good, but I agree that it was a little better before the last update.

I don't know how to downgrade, either, but it's possible that one of the tools that nightboy developed in this thread (https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=245888) may help. We'd have to find an older update or image, though.

well the older update is available:
http://42.121.0.77/cms/firmware/Boyu...SK/2015042209/

the question is... is it worth risking?!

[NimS]

new update available...downloading now...

.....


and flickering gone!!!

lost root... but flickering gone!

now let's see if any changes to battery life!

but flickering gone!! I think it's absence made me realise how much it was annoying me

[diegoocampo]

Originally Posted by NimS

new update available...downloading now...

.....


and flickering gone!!!

lost root... but flickering gone!

now let's see if any changes to battery life!

but flickering gone!! I think it's absence made me realise how much it was annoying me

Could you tell us what version number do you have in this last update? My T62 says "no update found" and my version is V1.1.1-2015042209

[blue_skies]

Mine finally went to sleep and shut down automatically last night like it's supposed to. I'm not sure what changed. It went to sleep and shut down even after using the music player.

I didn't update the FW or change anything. I hope it's not a fluke and it keeps auto-sleeping and shutting down. And if there is a new update available, I may just skip it if the device is finally working correctly. Fingers crossed.

[NimS]

Originally Posted by diegoocampo

Could you tell us what version number do you have in this last update? My T62 says "no update found" and my version is V1.1.1-2015042209

how bizarre!!! My version is V1.1.1-2015042209, the same as it was before it said there was an update available and i downloaded and installed it?

either way the flickering is much less but not gone... but less of a flicker now and more of a intermittent changing of level...

---

err it seems it constantly downloads that update... i also can't turn off my screen or shutdown after any period of time as per settings...

aye this software is crap

----------

and now the flickering is back... sigh....

[DarKHawK]

Battery life of this thing is just awful.

I've tried freezing most non essential apps, and greenfying the rest.
Still the battery drains.
I used to get close to a month and half with the nook in standby, it was rooted and modded heavily not just plain NST.

I've reached the conclusion that since I opted for an Android e-Reader instead of a dedicated one I should pay the battery price.

I then accepted the shutdown route, the problem is the T62+ won't shutdown on it's own. I've set the timer to 20 Minutes, 30 Minutes and 2 hours and it's not working.

Anyone experiencing this?

[blue_skies]

Originally Posted by DarKHawK

Battery life of this thing is just awful.

I then accepted the shutdown route, the problem is the T62+ won't shutdown on it's own. I've set the timer to 20 Minutes, 30 Minutes and 2 hours and it's not working.

Anyone experiencing this?

Yes. Mine won't shut down most of the time. I was all excited yesterday because it started shutting down properly for some reason. And then last night it stopped shutting down automatically and I can't figure out why. It's so frustrating! And the battery keeps draining.

Although I like that this device is open, if the Amazon Voyage had audio, I would have just gone with that and probably would have been happier. I think they do a much better job making sure things work consistently as expected. I never worried whether or not my Kindle Keyboard would function correctly. It just worked without having to give it much thought.

[NimS]

Originally Posted by DarKHawK

Battery life of this thing is just awful.

I've tried freezing most non essential apps, and greenfying the rest.
Still the battery drains.
I used to get close to a month and half with the nook in standby, it was rooted and modded heavily not just plain NST.

I've reached the conclusion that since I opted for an Android e-Reader instead of a dedicated one I should pay the battery price.

I then accepted the shutdown route, the problem is the T62+ won't shutdown on it's own. I've set the timer to 20 Minutes, 30 Minutes and 2 hours and it's not working.

Anyone experiencing this?

Ah, we have travelled the same route from rooted/modded NST to this... battery drinker. With cpu constantly running at the minimum speed 312MHz I'm getting a 3%/hr drain, whether I'm reading or it's sitting there in deep sleep.

I also decided to accept the poor battery and go the shutdown option. I've determined. at this stage, that the shutdown has only worked for me directly after having rebooted. ie having run no apps. Actually, I think it's no apps apart from the stock reader.

I'm hoping the battery will 'settle in' as they have on other of my android devices but I'm not so hopeful.

Just turned off and on to check.. and without opening anything the 'screensaver' kicked in as did the auto shutdown. So it does work.

So, if it goes to the screensaver it makes it to shutdown, I'm going to test what i can open and it still shutdown. One thing i've found tho is that once you opened say, moon + reader and then close it, it will no longer shutdown...

if others discover more please post too!

[blue_skies]

I briefly thought that the issue was because my running apps listed Update as "restarting". I thought that was preventing auto-sleep and shutdown... as I noticed that once it was no longer listed as "restarting" and was just normally open, it shut down okay. But then it didn't.

It has even shut down at times while the music app is open, after it finishes playing. Except when it doesn't.

There doesn't seem to be any rhyme or reason involved. I shut down almost every app last night, but it still wouldn't sleep and shut down properly. Very frustrating!

[downeaster59]

The culprit, as far as battery life is concerned, seems to be something in the later updates. I say this because I had a T62 (T62B, to be exact) before I decided to upgrade to the Carta T62+ (or T62D). That T62B, when I first bought it and rooted it, used less battery while in sleep mode. But even the T62B began to use a little more battery in sleep mode after I gave it the last update (before I bought the T62+). I have no idea what change(s) impacted battery life, but something did.

If you ever have the chance to compare the battery life of the T62 with its nearest competitor, the Onyx Boox C67, it's no contest. The T62 easily wins. (It has a bigger battery, so it ought to win!) I had a Nook Simple Touch and once rooted it and installed Play Store, etc., on it. If I recall, that did degrade battery life a little. Still, that NST was great on battery (it had no backlight, however).

Still, if Nook had decided to put out a new version of the NST/Glowlight with a newer version of Android, it would likely have better battery life. I think that the T62 or the Onyx C67 is what the Nook Glowlight should have been. It would have given Nook an absolutely unique E-Ink device in the USA. (End of lament for an old Nook fan!)

[NimS]

well.. I have a breakthrough!

I fully charged the T62 and then read for about an hour and then left it for another 8 hours... and the battery was on... 99%! So I turned it off and on and read a little more, put it down and shortly after it turned itself off as it was supposed to in the settings.

Now, almost 24 hours later the battery is still @ 99%!! Both "better battery stats' and 'gsam battery monitor' agree it's still 99% charged.

So, realistically, something has gone wrong and the battery will suddenly die unexpectedly at some point Still it's nice to have the fun experience of feeling like it's my old NST!

[blue_skies]

I charged mine yesterday and left it turned off all day. I still have it set to sleep after 1 minute and shut off after 60 minutes. My mind wandered while reading a page last night and the device shut off the light and went to sleep. I turned it back on and listened to a recording. The light shut off after a minute and the device went to sleep after the recording finished, as it was supposed to. And the device was off this morning like it was supposed to be.

Will it work again tonight? Who knows. Fingers crossed.

NimS, if only that were the accurate battery charge!

I am not fond of charging so often, but if it at least sleeps and shuts down properly, I will deal.

I think downeaster59 is correct and an update is the culprit. It seemed to work better with the first update I had after I received my device. I think there has been 1 or 2 updates since though, that made things worse.

[NimS]

Originally Posted by blue_skies

NimS, if only that were the accurate battery charge!

well, i just needed to recharge after almost 72 hours... so the 9 hours the battery said it was at 99% seems to have added to the overall length it lasted?!

who knows what will happen next?