sansa battery life

[EdisLeado]

sorry for another thread, but...

well, i dunno what's going on with the mp3 player -- but i've recently charged the battery and after using it for a little bit the numerical battery display went down to about 84 -- and with the theme i'm using, it says that it only has like 4 hours left on the battery if it's at 84. what the? isn't the e200 series advertised with 20 hours of battery life?

i even charged it to 100% one time and after using the thing for like an hour or two, a window popped up in rockbox saying that the battery was low and then it just shut off?

what is going on?

[Vortex]

The battery level display and estimated running time are awfully inaccurate on Rockbox. Actually the running time estimate is not even inaccurate but plainly wrong.

However, since this is not a serious issue it might not get fixed soon.

isn't the e200 series advertised with 20 hours of battery life?

Yes, but using Rockbox currently shortens your battery life a little. I got about 16 hours of continuous playback on my Sansa (without turning the backlight on).

i even charged it to 100% one time and after using the thing for like an hour or two, a window popped up in rockbox saying that the battery was low and then it just shut off?

I never had that happen on my Sansa yet. Even when the battery was low, it just shut off without saying anything. That's (as far as I know) because the shutdown is not triggered by Rockbox but by the hardware/bootloader.

If your battery had really run dry after just an hour or two I guess you might have to replace it.

[EdisLeado]

well, so far the "battery is low RECHARGE" message only came up once in rockbox for like a split second before shutting down. i forgot to mention i only bought this mp3 player like 2 days ago.

the rockbox manual says that i can change the battery capacity in the settings, but when i get there, it wont even let me -- no matter what button i click, it just takes me back to the previous menu.

[Vortex]

Changing the battery capacity setting does not affect the actual running time in any way. It's only used for calculating the battery level and estimated running time left.

Like I said, Rockbox does not power your player down when it thinks the battery is low, so it doesn't really matter what battery level it displays.

If your battery really died after just 2 hours it might be defective. You should check that by using the Original Firmware for a while.

[EdisLeado]

Changing the battery capacity setting does not affect the actual running time in any way. It's only used for calculating the battery level and estimated running time left.

Like I said, Rockbox does not power your player down when it thinks the battery is low, so it doesn't really matter what battery level it displays.

If your battery really died after just 2 hours it might be defective. You should check that by using the Original Firmware for a while.

Considering my system clock doesn't work either, it might actually be the battery. Otherwise, the MP3 player seems fine. Is it maybe because I'm keeping the MP3 player plugged in alot of the time and it's deteriorating the battery?

[mschneider]

Well, are you using an official build? I know this is the exact problem i am having with my build because of a patch but i havent had any problems using a daily build.

[EdisLeado]

It's about the same with every build I've tried (the official one and yours).

[mschneider]

The problem is about the same or the estimated time? As stated before the battery estimation on rockbox is not much short of dreadful, but the problem may be unique to a certain build.

[EdisLeado]

well, so far the mp3 player seems fine -- as far as the battery goes :/ (that broken system clock is still bothering me though) -- so i guess the estimation just really sucks.

oh yeah, estimation is the same no matter what build i use.

[AlexP]

Estimation has not been calibrated on newer targets, on my H160 it is very good.  For some odd reason, the devs seem to focus on making the hardware work and removing bugs than on the runtime estimation.  % battery left is correct, use that instead.

[bluebrother]

The battery level display and estimated running time are awfully inaccurate on Rockbox. Actually the running time estimate is not even inaccurate but plainly wrong.

Well, to be exact, this is only an issue for the players using a PortalPlayer chip. Battery display and estimated running time are working great on all other devices (Iriver h100 and h300 series, Iaudio, etc.)

[GodEater]

Even the Gigabeat? I thought that was still in the throes of being calibrated ?

[pixelma]

And the runtime estimation is not calibrated on the Iaudios either - only the battery level percentage is...

[Vortex]

% battery left is correct, use that instead.

Except that it stays at 20% forever on my Sansa, then suddenly drops really low. But that's just before the player actually shuts off.

[bluebrother]

Even the Gigabeat? I thought that was still in the throes of being calibrated ?

D'oh! Forgot about those ...