[gweilo]

Hi everyone..

I recently purchased an 8700c but found that the battery life is horrific. I charge 24 hours and per the 'settings-status' screen, the battery is 100%. However, within 8 hours, I'm down to 25%. During this time, I have used the phone for less than 5 minutes and sent less than 10 short emails. I haven't used any other functions.

My first assumption is that the battery is simply bad, and I am going to try to find a replacement (difficult here in Hong Kong since they don't sell the 8700 with the CS-2 battery yet), but wanted to see if others have experienced this or if there has been a known problem with the units themselves. That would be a real nightmare for me since it will be difficult to exchange the unit from here.

In the meantime, I'll try to condition the battery to see if it helps (not sure this works on Li-Ion models), but something tells me the batt is shot.

Thanks. Eric

[epark21]

Try conditioning the battery.

I personally have been impressed with the battery life. I charged mine full on Tuesday afternoon for my trip from Atlanta to DC to Portland and back and I'm sitting on 25%.

[peznut]

Originally Posted by gweilo

Hi everyone..

I recently purchased an 8700c but found that the battery life is horrific. I charge 24 hours and per the 'settings-status' screen, the battery is 100%. However, within 8 hours, I'm down to 25%. During this time, I have used the phone for less than 5 minutes and sent less than 10 short emails. I haven't used any other functions.

My first assumption is that the battery is simply bad, and I am going to try to find a replacement (difficult here in Hong Kong since they don't sell the 8700 with the CS-2 battery yet), but wanted to see if others have experienced this or if there has been a known problem with the units themselves. That would be a real nightmare for me since it will be difficult to exchange the unit from here.

In the meantime, I'll try to condition the battery to see if it helps (not sure this works on Li-Ion models), but something tells me the batt is shot.

Thanks. Eric

Eric, by any chance, is it difficult to remove the battery from its compartment? I ask because the first 8700 I received had a quirky battery level - it would show 70% one minute and 30% the next, even after charging it for hours. Moreover, I had to return that unit because it constantly rebooted itself every few minutes. It was only once I received the replacement unit that I realized that something weird was up with the first battery/compartment. I had to lever the battery out each time (my fingernails couldn't budge it) whereas the battery in my replacement pops out easily - as it should.

I still don't know the reason why my first 8700 was screwed up, but I suspect it was either a bad battery or more likely a bad "build," i.e. the battery compartment was too tight somehow and the battery wasn't making the proper contact to charge/power. It might be your battery (and I agree with you that "conditioning it" probably isn't the answer) but if you find the battery even remotely difficult to remove, you might just have a bad BB and should insist on an exchange. Hope this helps...

[coreyg510]

Sir, you have a defective battery. I sell alot of these, the battery is not as good as the 7xxx series or any of the older models for that matter, but that much drainage seems extreme.

[gweilo]

Thanks for everyone's comments. In fact I did order a replacement battery from the USA (no way to exchange over here since the 8700 isn't on sale yet).

However, in the meantime, the battery seems to have fixed itself. I'm on my 36th hour since the last charge and it's still at 65% !!! And that's with normal phone and email usage.

Don't ask me what happened - still haven't received the new battery yet so it's not that. I can only assume that some gremlins finally escaped from my new 8700 and left everything back to normal.

[bperkins]

Wirelessly posted (Blackberry 8700: BlackBerry8700/4.1.0 Profile/MIDP-2.0 Configuration/CLDC-1.1 VendorID/102)

I had a similar issue. As suggested by RIM support I reloaded the os and it fixed the problem. When I first received my 8700 the battery worked 2-3 days before a recharge was needed about two weeks ago I was lucky to get 12 hours. After reloading the os I am back to the 2-3 days.