Touch Battery life - how has it been for you so far?

Psyke · 06-15-2011, 09:42 AM

While the device has only been out just under a week now, the battery life of my previous two devices had wanned by this time; the kobo original was a dud and discharged after a day, and the Wi-Fi, because I was playing with it so much and trying out the wireless, not to mention the issues it had, was discharged within 3-4 days, but did get better over time, however wireless wasn't used much after the initial purchase (mainly because it wouldn't connect to my network anymore...)

The touch however has been fantastic. It was almost fully charged when I took it out of the box; plugged it in and it was topped up after 20 minutes, I've been able to do full reset, play with the wireless, played with the different settings, have read a couple thousand pages between my wife and I. I mean litterally, the device has barely been put down compared to the old wifi; yet as of today, the battery was still showing 2/3's full. And since the battery should get a bit better after the first few charge cycles, this is looking very promising indeed.

So what's your experience been like so far? have you had the need to charge yet? any concerns?

siraks · 06-15-2011, 09:48 AM

still working on my first charge out of the box, i haven't read anywhere near as much as you have but so far so good. i haven't had problems with my wifi model either, both batteries have been superb with respect to being able to go at least 3-4 weeks without charging.

Psyke · 06-15-2011, 09:56 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by siraks

still working on my first charge out of the box, i haven't read anywhere near as much as you have but so far so good. i haven't had problems with my wifi model either, both batteries have been superb with respect to being able to go at least 3-4 weeks without charging.

that's very nice; the most I could get was 12 days out of the wifi, and that was with reading maybe an hour or two a day, if that, and shutting it off when not in use. At the very least, it was consistent.

I actually just topped up the touch and it took only about 10 minutes, so I'm thinking that either they've really improved the charging algorithm, or I'm going to need to let the kobo discharge completely at least once to calibrate the gauge; at 2/3's full, the wifi would have taken just under an hour to charge... so it's very possible the battery had a lot more life to it than it was showing.

Very impressed so far.

george.talusan · 06-15-2011, 10:03 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Psyke

I actually just topped up the touch and it took only about 10 minutes, so I'm thinking that either they've really improved the charging algorithm, or I'm going to need to let the kobo discharge completely at least once to calibrate the gauge; at 2/3's full, the wifi would have taken just under an hour to charge... so it's very possible the battery had a lot more life to it than it was showing.

Very impressed so far.

The battery is fast charged once it goes above a certain voltage. There is however a bit of a discrepancy in battery voltage reading when the mini-USB is plugged in. It reads a bit high, so leave the device charging for a while to properly top it off.

Psyke · 06-15-2011, 10:12 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by george.talusan

The battery is fast charged once it goes above a certain voltage. There is however a bit of a discrepancy in battery voltage reading when the mini-USB is plugged in. It reads a bit high, so leave the device charging for a while to properly top it off.

Thanks for the info; so does that mean that the once the device shows charging complete, that it's reduced to a trickle charge rather than stopped completely? I was always under the impression that trickle charging lipo's was a bad thing cause they really don't like to be overcharged?

george.talusan · 06-15-2011, 10:21 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Psyke

Thanks for the info; so does that mean that the once the device shows charging complete, that it's reduced to a trickle charge rather than stopped completely? I was always under the impression that trickle charging lipo's was a bad thing cause they really don't like to be overcharged?

The charger will not charge past a certain voltage for the reasons you outlined above. The ereader will periodically do a voltage check in the case where it needs to switch the charger back on.

gigidign · 06-15-2011, 06:12 PM

I bought my kobo touch 5 days ago and read about 300 pages so far, haven't used wi-fi... and the battery just died. I can't believe it.

What's is really weird is that I just plugged it in to recharge. After 30 seconds it indicated that it was fully charged ! If this happens again I'll have to return it I guess

taming · 06-15-2011, 06:18 PM

I've used Wifi for syncing , played with the browser, downloaded books, and have not had to top-up the battery yet. I've had it since last Friday and it is about 1/2 full. I've read about 900 pages as well.

joshmosh · 06-15-2011, 06:56 PM

It's been great for me. Much better than the older models which seemed to drain very fast. The auto off timer is very helpful too. Although I haven't read very much it still shows as full which is better than the old models which seemed to go down even with very little use.

robko · 06-15-2011, 07:23 PM

So far (touch wood) I'm really happy with the battery. I think I'm between 1500 and 2000 pages and a bunch of other playing around and daily newspaper wifi downloads and it's at 2/3-3/4 still. I'm very curious to see how battery life is once get control of refreshes and set it back to every page or 2. If I'm not mistaken doing a complete refresh between each page is going to take more power than 1 in 6.

Nigol · 06-15-2011, 09:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by gigidign

I bought my kobo touch 5 days ago and read about 300 pages so far, haven't used wi-fi... and the battery just died. I can't believe it.

What's is really weird is that I just plugged it in to recharge. After 30 seconds it indicated that it was fully charged ! If this happens again I'll have to return it I guess

I had the same thing happen to me, but only after getting it. My guess is that the battery just needs to be calibrated. With use it will fix itself. It didn't happen since.

beautifulsoup · 07-06-2011, 04:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by gigidign

I bought my kobo touch 5 days ago and read about 300 pages so far, haven't used wi-fi... and the battery just died. I can't believe it.

What's is really weird is that I just plugged it in to recharge. After 30 seconds it indicated that it was fully charged ! If this happens again I'll have to return it I guess

I just started using the Touch yesterday.

Today, after reading only a few hours, the battery died - while reading. And in the hours before, the battery icon was showing as being fully charged.

My guess is (between fiddling with the device last night, doing back-page turns, playing with fonts, double tapping, etcetera) that I have probably done somewhere between 1500-1700 "page turns" or "taps." I wasn't counting, lol.

Eeeeek.... (and with a full battery charge still showing, not even an hour ago).

I hope this is just a case of calibration - and that it works itself out soon, as others have suggested might happen.

It is charging now as I write this (I connected to computer about five minutes ago, and I did not have the luck that you had of it being fully charged after 30 seconds).

Nigol · 07-06-2011, 04:32 PM

I think it is either a bug or a calibration problem. The other day I was reading with a full battery. Put it to sleep and 5 min later it was saying it was empty. I just powered it up and it was working perfectly.

From what I can tell the battery on it is amazing. I have mine since June 10th and only connected it briefly a couple of times to my computer to load books and I am still not at halfway through the battery.

beautifulsoup · 07-06-2011, 05:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nigol

I think it is either a bug or a calibration problem. The other day I was reading with a full battery. Put it to sleep and 5 min later it was saying it was empty. I just powered it up and it was working perfectly.

From what I can tell the battery on it is amazing. I have mine since June 10th and only connected it briefly a couple of times to my computer to load books and I am still not at halfway through the battery.

Thanks for the info, Nigol.

Mine ended up showing as fully charged again after 10 minutes.

I hope this isn't a bug - I mean, I hope this won't end up as a reason for exchange.

robko · 07-06-2011, 08:36 PM

I had it happen once last week. I turned it off and back on (didn't charge it at all) and all was good and continued reading since. I read somewhere that installing an update can sometimes cause the meter to become "confused" (I had installed a new beta firmware some point before the issue). Haven't had any issues since.

06-15-2011, 09:42 AM	#1
Psyke Evangelist Posts: 482 Karma: 534340 Join Date: Oct 2010 Location: Ottawa/Canada Device: Kobo Wi-Fi - Kobo Touch - GNex - N7	Battery life - how has it been for you so far? While the device has only been out just under a week now, the battery life of my previous two devices had wanned by this time; the kobo original was a dud and discharged after a day, and the Wi-Fi, because I was playing with it so much and trying out the wireless, not to mention the issues it had, was discharged within 3-4 days, but did get better over time, however wireless wasn't used much after the initial purchase (mainly because it wouldn't connect to my network anymore...) The touch however has been fantastic. It was almost fully charged when I took it out of the box; plugged it in and it was topped up after 20 minutes, I've been able to do full reset, play with the wireless, played with the different settings, have read a couple thousand pages between my wife and I. I mean litterally, the device has barely been put down compared to the old wifi; yet as of today, the battery was still showing 2/3's full. And since the battery should get a bit better after the first few charge cycles, this is looking very promising indeed. So what's your experience been like so far? have you had the need to charge yet? any concerns?

06-15-2011, 06:12 PM	#7
gigidign Junior Member Posts: 1 Karma: 10 Join Date: Jun 2011 Device: kobo touch	dead after 300 pages I bought my kobo touch 5 days ago and read about 300 pages so far, haven't used wi-fi... and the battery just died. I can't believe it. What's is really weird is that I just plugged it in to recharge. After 30 seconds it indicated that it was fully charged ! If this happens again I'll have to return it I guess Last edited by gigidign; 06-15-2011 at 06:18 PM.

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06-15-2011, 09:48 AM	#2
siraks use the force Posts: 575 Karma: 564666 Join Date: Mar 2011 Location: Ontario Device: Kobo Touch, Lenovo K1	still working on my first charge out of the box, i haven't read anywhere near as much as you have but so far so good. i haven't had problems with my wifi model either, both batteries have been superb with respect to being able to go at least 3-4 weeks without charging.

06-15-2011, 06:18 PM	#8
taming Trying for calm & polite Posts: 4,012 Karma: 9455193 Join Date: May 2010 Location: Mostly in Canada Device: kobo original, WiFI, Touch, Glo, and Aura	I've used Wifi for syncing , played with the browser, downloaded books, and have not had to top-up the battery yet. I've had it since last Friday and it is about 1/2 full. I've read about 900 pages as well.

06-15-2011, 06:56 PM	#9
joshmosh Enthusiast Posts: 38 Karma: 12 Join Date: Jun 2011 Location: Canada Device: Kobo Glo, Kobo Touch	It's been great for me. Much better than the older models which seemed to drain very fast. The auto off timer is very helpful too. Although I haven't read very much it still shows as full which is better than the old models which seemed to go down even with very little use.

06-15-2011, 07:23 PM	#10
robko Wizard Posts: 2,454 Karma: 5469320 Join Date: Jul 2010 Device: Kobo	So far (touch wood) I'm really happy with the battery. I think I'm between 1500 and 2000 pages and a bunch of other playing around and daily newspaper wifi downloads and it's at 2/3-3/4 still. I'm very curious to see how battery life is once get control of refreshes and set it back to every page or 2. If I'm not mistaken doing a complete refresh between each page is going to take more power than 1 in 6.

07-06-2011, 04:32 PM	#13
Nigol Groupie Posts: 185 Karma: 363616 Join Date: Dec 2010 Location: Montreal, Canada Device: Kobo Original, Kobo Touch	I think it is either a bug or a calibration problem. The other day I was reading with a full battery. Put it to sleep and 5 min later it was saying it was empty. I just powered it up and it was working perfectly. From what I can tell the battery on it is amazing. I have mine since June 10th and only connected it briefly a couple of times to my computer to load books and I am still not at halfway through the battery.

07-06-2011, 08:36 PM	#15
robko Wizard Posts: 2,454 Karma: 5469320 Join Date: Jul 2010 Device: Kobo	I had it happen once last week. I turned it off and back on (didn't charge it at all) and all was good and continued reading since. I read somewhere that installing an update can sometimes cause the meter to become "confused" (I had installed a new beta firmware some point before the issue). Haven't had any issues since.

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