[Aroc]

Seido Online purports to have a 3500mAh battery and battery door (link) for the BlackBerry Bold 9000. The same place also have pouches and holders for the Bold to accomodate the extra 5-6mm of depth for the 3500mAh battery. Also consider either charging it during the day in your car or from your PC. Another option is a second battery (perhaps two 3500mZh extended ones?) and this extended charger (link)

Our sales force typically had the same problems with the 8700c and earlier devices (mainly from NEXTEL - now there was some seriously BAD-BAD battery life). The current curve and (later) pearl models without Wi-Fi are generally regarded as having the best battery life thus far. Our sales people generally (before the curve) had to both charge the devices in their car and when using their notebook computers.

3G really kills battery life (apparently on nearly all 3G devices). For now, only Executives and higher-ups (and me) will get Bolds at our company. Everyone else will need to stay on a Curve.

buy an extended battery and keep it charged or get two and an external charger. You remind me of some of my notebook users who expect 10-12 hours of PC life, yet refuse to carry extra or extended batteries.

(disclaimer: I don't work for Seido Online)

[mooondog]

Originally Posted by Aroc

buy an extended battery and keep it charged or get two and an external charger. You remind me of some of my notebook users who expect 10-12 hours of PC life, yet refuse to carry extra or extended batteries.

(disclaimer: I don't work for Seido Online)

Are you kidding me!?!?! Asking a phone to simply work all day on average or even LOW use on an overnight charge is NOT even remotely equivalent to some guy expecting a notebook to last 10-12 hours. (which I agree is ridiculous).

So...no...I'm NOT going to buy an extended battery. The Bold is a bit too heavy for my liking to begin with. The Bold is a sweet phone but not "that" sweet. I'm back to the Pearl (8110) for now. And love the fact I can use it all day and not worry about power. Any phone that can't do that simply won't work for me (and a majority of business users). I'm not going back to my "Star Tac" days thank you very much.

btw ---- i've had 1 dropped call on the Pearl in 4 days. I probably had more dropped calls the 3+ weeks I had the Bold in at least a YEAR because of 3G I suppose. Or perhaps just a real crappy unit. Either way.....

[novalovr66]

Honestly, when I bought my Bold I did not see this issue at all, it is an ATT branded phone shipped with .167. When I upgraded to .190, I did experience the terrible battery drain. Thought it might be an install issue so, I re-installed it again. Nope, not an install issue. Consequentially downgraded to .168, same battery drain issue though not as bad. When I did go back to .168 I noticed that some of my applications would re-boot my phone when I ran them, (BB maps, yellow Pages). I tried to re-install those applications with the same result. So, end story, went back to .167 and have not had any issues with battery life. On all of the OS's I had everything on, 3G, WIFI, and Bluetooth. I don't live in an area where I receive 3G, but when I travel to the city, (almost daily) I would pick up a strong 3G signal. I also use VIIGO that is set to upgrade every 30 minutes and can still last a full day and even 2 days if I really wanted to stretch it with .167.

[muck]

sounds like you prefer the pearl over the bold anyway, and got sucked in by all the hype

i too hate charging my phone during the day, once its out of the charger i expect it to go the distance.
i run mine solely on 2g, in return it provides me with 2 or 3 extra hours everyday.

[Aroc]

Originally Posted by mooondog

Asking a phone to simply work all day on average or even LOW use on an overnight charge is NOT even remotely equivalent to some guy expecting a notebook to last 10-12 hours. (which I agree is ridiculous).

The battery life issue doesn't seem to be an issue for many. Admittedly we only have two Bolds here. I don't have trouble going 1-2 days between charges. I only spend a half-hour to 45 minutes on the phone. I do get upwards of 150 emails a day though. My boss' boss has the other Bold, and he has no trouble with getting through on a single day on a single charge. He's a frequent BB and phone user (though I don't believe he needs 5 hours of talk time either in 24 hour period, so perhaps that is a factor).

The current Pearls and Curves are best for battery life (of the current shipping models) as you have found out. We'll probably keep our Sales force on the Curve or Javelin (Curve's replacement, also lacks 3G HSDPA) for the same reason as well as lower device purchase cost.

btw ---- i've had 1 dropped call on the Pearl in 4 days. I probably had more dropped calls the 3+ weeks I had the Bold in at least a YEAR because of 3G I suppose. Or perhaps just a real crappy unit. Either way.....

Could be a possible bad unit (I've seen those). We also had some problems with the Curve and Curve Titanium at certain locations when those devices came out on AT&T. I had to really ride AT&T business to support for a few weeks, when the problems suddenly disappeared. In some spots the Curve would drop down GMS or GPRS from EDGE in the same places where a 8700c didn't see that. We'd have trouble making and receiving calls and the email and browser would stop working. We went through three Curve Titaniums and two regular Curves for that user. I'm still convinced that was a telco issue since it only happened on the north campus at work and at the user's residence. It never happened at my house, for example. So it could very well be the telco.

At first I thought you wrote that you needed 10-12 hours of talk time (not just run time). The Bold and AT&T should have no trouble making through a single day on one charge except for hard use, a device device, or defective telco service in your area.

[mooondog]

Originally Posted by muck

sounds like you prefer the pearl over the bold anyway, and got sucked in by all the hype

The things I love about the Pearl are the small size, battery life and I can type like a madman on that thing. It was tough getting used to the full qwerty on the Bold....my thumbs were getting tired because they weren't used to covering that much real estate. I love everything about the Bold except the size and battery life.

As mentioned before, my boss had the same battery life issues. On Monday another coworker was showing me his Bold. It was at lunch and I said "seee!!! it's only noon and you only have 20% battery!!"...... and he said "Dude.....last time I charged it was Saturday".

[JW021979]

Crumbs. Five hours is really poor. My Bold is connected to WIFI, 3G and Bluetooth nearly all day at work and home and 3G and Bluetooth inbetween the 2 and I still get about 2 days from the battery.

[rambo47]

If you want that legendary battery life, go old school and get a used 7290. Those suckers will go a week on a single charge!