Maximizing battery play time on my iPod...what settings work?

Posted:
in iPod + iTunes + AppleTV edited January 2014
I am going to be on an Airplane for over 8 hours and I want to get the most out of my iPod in that 8 hours. I usually play on shuffle and I can't get 8 hours out of a single charge.



I currently have the backlight off, clicker off, Equalizer off.



Are there any other settings or play mode (by artist album, or song) that I can do to get the absolute most out of my iPod on the plane?



Regards,



Eric

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 15
    Don't skip a lot of songs, that's my suggestion. Don't pause the music very frequently. Hmmm... don't play Music Quiz or any of the other games. That's all I can think about for now. Just hit play, sit back and listen.
  • Reply 2 of 15
    omegaomega Posts: 427member
    Turn off shuffle.

    Turn off clicker.

    Dim the screen.

    Do not use the backlight.



    Prepare a playlist that you can play through with issues.



    You should get 8 hours easy. The less you touch it the better.



    I think sound volume also plays a part (can anyone confirm?), so take a good pair of headphones.
  • Reply 3 of 15
    Hey that's a good question. Do headphones play a significant role with the battery life? Say, should my Apple earbuds make my battery last longer than when I use my Sony MDR-Q33 clip earphones?



  • Reply 4 of 15
    ipodandimacipodandimac Posts: 3,273member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by monkeyastronaut

    Hey that's a good question. Do headphones play a significant role with the battery life? Say, should my Apple earbuds make my battery last longer than when I use my Sony MDR-Q33 clip earphones?







    headphones dont make one bit of difference in battery life, but obviously the louder the ipod is, the less battery life (cause it's sending a stronger signal to the phones.)
  • Reply 5 of 15
    omegaomega Posts: 427member
    But if I have a nice pair of Sony-DJ700's that make everything sound louder.....allowing me to have it at a lower volume, this would save more battery life???



  • Reply 6 of 15
    dfilerdfiler Posts: 3,420member
    Songs encoded at lower bit rates require far less power to play. Hard drive access is the primary power draw in an iPod so by using lower bit rates, less information is read for each song. The drive is accessed less and battery life is greatly increased.
  • Reply 7 of 15
    ipodandimacipodandimac Posts: 3,273member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Omega

    But if I have a nice pair of Sony-DJ700's that make everything sound louder.....allowing me to have it at a lower volume, this would save more battery life???







    well yes. that's what i said. if your iPod volume is less, you will have better battery life. I was saying that there's no DIRECT link between brand of headphones and battery life.
  • Reply 8 of 15
    Add Sound Check to the list of things that should be disabled. I was having problems with the battery of my old iPod, and turning off Sound Check and Equalizer more than doubled the time I got.
  • Reply 9 of 15
    mr. hmr. h Posts: 4,870member
    Despite the fact that everything's been pretty much covered, as an electronics engineer I can't resist adding to the thread.



    The biggest power consumers are:



    Hard Drive

    Back light

    Processor

    Headphone amplifier + headphones



    Keeping the back light off obviously eliminates that drain on the battery.



    You can minimise hard drive usage by using more compressed songs (i.e. lower bitrate), which means that more music (in terms of time) will fit into the iPod's 32 MB solid-state memory which has negligible power consumption relative to the HD. Using shuffle mode should not make any difference. Skipping songs often will also cause more HD usage.



    The processor power consumption is much higher when playing games or when using the equaliser. I'd be surprised if soundcheck alone makes that much difference, but I've not done a comparison myself. Soundcheck should require only one floating-point multiply per audio sample rather than many multiply-accumulates required by the equaliser.



    The headphone amplifier + headphones consumption is more complicated than people have made out. It does depend upon the headphones that you use, but the differences are probably quite small relative to other things such as the equaliser or HD usage. The overall power consumed is a complicated function of headphone impedance, sensitivity, headphone amplifier class (e.g. class-A, class-B, class-D; I don't know which it is), and music volume. I would have thought that getting the most sensitive earphones, or ones that block external noise, or both, would make the most impact on improving battery life in this area.
  • Reply 10 of 15
    relicrelic Posts: 4,735member
    Fly business so you can have a power socket, iPods lasting 8 hours
  • Reply 11 of 15
    webmailwebmail Posts: 639member
    In other words... don't have fun. Why don't you get an airline power cord for it or buy an extra battery pack to extend the life of your device?





    Quote:

    Originally posted by monkeyastronaut

    Don't skip a lot of songs, that's my suggestion. Don't pause the music very frequently. Hmmm... don't play Music Quiz or any of the other games. That's all I can think about for now. Just hit play, sit back and listen.



  • Reply 12 of 15
    aplnubaplnub Posts: 2,605member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by webmail

    In other words... don't have fun. Why don't you get an airline power cord for it or buy an extra battery pack to extend the life of your device?



    Extra battery pack??? For the iPod??



    I didn't think seats in coach have power outlets for devices. Am I wrong? It has been over 12 years since I have flown.



    Eric
  • Reply 13 of 15
    Quote:

    Originally posted by webmail

    In other words... don't have fun. Why don't you get an airline power cord for it or buy an extra battery pack to extend the life of your device?



    Well, at least it's cheapest option. :P
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