When Apple announced that it was going to continue selling the iPad 2 for $399 alongside its new tablet, the company never mentioned any changes. After all, it’s the same iPad 2 that it’s been selling for more than a year. Right?
Not exactly. The folks over at AnandTech uncovered a minor, but perhaps significant, change in the discounted tablet’s A5 processor that gives the slate nearly two hours of added battery life. Keep reading to find out how… Read More
What you see here is a brand new breakthrough battery design from NEC called Organic Radical Battery (ORB). Measuring just 0.3mm in profile thanks to the use of polymer film of 0.05mm thickness, these ORBs are just a fraction of the somewhat bulky lithium-ion polymer batteries found in today’s smartphones and other portable devices.
What’s best, the tech sports fast charge time and is is completely eco-friendly, unlike their lithium-polymer counterparts that contain some harmful elements. Apple’s iOS gadgets and notebooks currently utilize the lithium-polymer battery technology.
According to a new report, Apple is interested in using the extremely thin yet powerful ORB battery technology in its revamped next-generation iPhone, expected some time during the early-summer or Fall. Read More
In what could be described as a timely (and prudent) move to prevent the perceived battery issues with the new iPad from getting overblown, California-based Apple has dispatched its vice president of iPad marketing Michael Tchao, who went on the record to indicate that overcharging your iOS device won’t harm its battery.
According to a statement provided to the AllThingsD blog, run by the Wall Street Journal network, this is by design and there’s nothing wrong with the iOS battery gauge. It says 100 percent just before your device reaches a completely charged state, continuing charging to 100 percent. Then, it discharges a bit and charges back up to 100 percent… Read More
There is no doubting that our iOS devices are beginning to use even more power than their ever-increasing batteries can provide them. It’s an unfortunate fact that while we continue to crave smaller, thinner and lighter device, something inevitably has to give. In most cases, that thing is battery life.
The iPhone 4S for example isn’t exactly known for its ability to hold a charge. We’ve covered various power-related issues with the iPhone 4S over the months since its release, and alas, things don’t really seem to have improved with subsequent iOS releases. What we need is a way of extending our iPhone’s battery prowess, and the easiest way to do that is to get a battery pack.
One battery pack that we’ve been putting through its paces recently is the SPIGEN SGP F16s battery pack for the iPhone. After a few weeks of living with the F16s and at times very much relying on its ability to keep an iPhone going beyond its usual capacity, we’re finally ready to announce our verdict… Read More
When used as a personal hotspot only over Verizon’s 4G cellular connection, the new iPad gets more than 25 hours of run time, AnandTech found out in their battery life testing published this morning. This is better than your average MiFi device by at least a factor of five. Matter of fact, it gets exactly an hour less in hotspotting tests compared to WiFi benchmarks, which falls in line with Apple’s official specs.
The Asus Eee Pad Transformer Prime beats Apple’s third-generation tablet when hotspotting in Normal, Balanced and Power Saving profiles. With that in mind, the ability to use your iPad as a personal Verizon hotspot for more than 25 hours is certainly welcome news in a string of negative reports alleging issues with the tablet’s much-improved 42.5Wh battery. Read More
As we told you last week, unplugging your brand spanking new iPad as soon as the battery gauge hits the 100 percent mark entails missing out as much as ten percent of additional run time, or about 1.2 hours. This has been attributed to the iOS battery algorithm, which kinda brings back old memories of a bug in reporting cellular signal levels on the iPhone 4, later fixed with a software update.
According to new findings, this is actually a system-wide behavior in Apple’s mobile operating system – thus affecting older iPads, as well as your iPhone and iPod touch. In fact, all iOS devices are affected by what’s been called “busted” battery algorithm, it’s just more pronounced on the new iPad due to its 70 percent more capacious battery.
What exactly is going on here, you ask… Read More
With all the hoopla around the new iPad getting a little bit toastier than its predecessor, Dr. Raymond Soneira is in high demand these days. Yesterday, he explained how the demanding Retina display and brightness levels affect the iPad’s run time. Today, he’s back at it, warning the device keeps charging even when it claims to have been filled.
Is this an iOS software flaw akin to a “bug” in cellular signal levels on the iPhone 4 (later fixed with a software update)? Hard to tell. All we know is it keeps charging for as much as an hour after the battery gauge hits the 100 percent mark. This, too, might explain why some people experience shorter run times with the new iPad versus its predecessor… Read More
The interest surrounding the iPad overheating meme isn’t vaning. Quite the contrary, folks are eager to get to the bottom of this thing. As we hold our breath for today’s definite findings of “a battery of tests” conducted by Consumer Reports, a display expert sheds more light on how an improved LED backlighting system on the iPad’s Retina display contributes to Heatgate and, specifically, the tablet’s run time.
You’ve already seen heat maps which prove that the new A5X chip with its jumbo-sized quad-core GPU is the biggest heater in the new iPad. That said, its souped up LED backlighting is actually the No. 1 factor leading up to a faster battery drain and is partly to blame for the gizmo’s five-degree Celsius temperature increase… Read More
The new iPad. Two generations from the somewhat enigmatic, yet overwhelmingly successful debut, Apple’s latest tablet is firing on all cylinders.
No longer is there a question as to whether such a device has a place in people’s day to day lives, it’s now a question of how many such devices are necessary to have for one household.
Indeed, the iPad is about as mainstream as mainstream gets, only a few years removed from many pundits, including myself, questioning its viability.
The truth is that maybe only a handful of people knew how insanely successful Apple’s tablet would be, but now everyone but the most blinded of opposers is a believer. Even if you don’t own an Apple device, you’re compelled to give credit where credit is due… Read More
For those of you wondering how Apple managed to keep the iPad’s legendary 10 hour battery life despite the addition of a Retina display and LTE technology, we’ve come across a good explanation: the battery is a lot bigger than its predecessors. Surprise!
How much is a lot? Well according to the recent iFixit teardown, and other reports, the new iPad’s battery has roughly 70% more capacity than the one used to power the iPad 2. But unfortunately this also means that it takes a lot longer to charge… Read More
