iFail - The truth about the iPhone battery

By Steven j. Campbell




What is the first thing you can remember about your iPhone on day one?

For me it was walking out of the AT&T store and immediately turning on the GPS and watching the blue dot as I went home to the wife.

But on that day I also learned that the dirty secret about the iPhone becomes very clear very quickly:

THE IPHONE'S BATTERY SUCKS

I'm so sorry iPhone. It really isn't completely your fault. Part of it is me. I really can't help wanting to use your shiny advanced features such as 3G web browsing and 3d gaming.

When you first get your idevice, the battery is but a wee child. Not really sure of itself and prone to feeling drained and needing a recharge quite frequently.
After a few weeks your idevice battery has matured and will now behave the same way for the better part of it's remaining lifespan until you need to replace it.

My battery was passable. I heeded all the apple advice on how to prolong use. Then something happened.

I JAILBROKE.

As it stands, the iPhone itself is a remarkable device. It has a fast processor and by default acts as an incoming mail device, mobile phone, and web browsing device. You open and close an app and it's process is terminated. This is how apple designed it and how they want you to use it.

ALONG CAME THE MOBILE SUBSTRATE

When you jailbreak you install what is known as the mobile substrate. Basically a layer that sits between you and any customizations you wish to install and the native iPhone software. This allows custom jailbroken apps to inject code into the regular iPhone software. All this is absolutely necessary to give you all the mods and hacks a jailbroken iPhone can pull off.
Each customization you install (and some people I see have upwards of a dozen) which runs constantly consumes both memory and CPU.
Apple hates this.

WHY IT MATTERS

Ever have a friend or relative who always complains they have a slow pc? If you see the computer itself often times the user has dozens of icons next to thier clock on the taskbar.
Each icon represents an application which is running and consuming memory and CPU.

The iPhone is no different than a pc in the sense that it has a CPU and memory.
More mods and customizations mean more CPU and memory usage.

SO THEN WHAT?

So your battery drops and can drain. Quickly. This also means that your phone could become unstable and crash. If the phone crashes it will crash into a safe mode or may not come back to life at all.

The moral of it all is to be sensible. Be safe, and never bite off more than you can chew when it comes to your modding of your iPhone.