IOS 4.2.1 battery drain

Lawrence Finch wrote:
You cannot go back to the previous version without jailbreaking.

I don't know why you keep insisting on telling people this. It's not true. I went back and didn't jailbreak my phone...as I reported earlier in this thread.

Hello,

It didn't work... Yesterday I tried putting my phone into airplane mode for about 4 hours. No change in battery life. Last night I went to bed with the email turned off and the battery at 100%. This morning when I wake up the battery is at 69%. That's more than a 30% drop in about 8 hours of nothing but standby!

This isn't acceptable, Apple! Please, give us a fix -- and soon.


Z

Did you notice any change in your Data usage? A friend of mine got a nice $200 bill because his iPhone was accessing data under 3G while he charged it over night, unbeknownst to him. He had to turn off Data on and off whenever he needed to use it as a workaround. He finally gave up on Apple and got a Droid.

Hello,

No, data isn't the problem... Cell data was turned off. Even now, Data stats are 167KB sent and 1.0MB recieved.

I'm really frustrated -- this phone used to be so great until the update.


Z

The battery drain problem after installing iOS 4.2.1 is "Find My iPhone".
(it keeps running on the background, thus drain the battery even you don't use the machine).

Just do these and the battery problem will be fixed :

1. Turn OFF "Find My iPhone" (setting->email->MobileMe)

2. Install this profile from the iPhone :
http://support.apple.com/kb/TS3398

An update.
It seems that the "Airplane mode" trick didn't last for more than 3 days.
As I write this the battery drain problem appeared again 😟

My only option is to do a downgrade.
Anyone with any pointers on how to do this the official way?

Thanks.

BB CAT wrote:
The battery drain problem after installing iOS 4.2.1 is "Find My iPhone".
(it keeps running on the background, thus drain the battery even you don't use the machine).

That actually kind a *****. IF it is the Find My Phone app causing the battery drain, then one can never actually use it. Because for it to be effective for what it is, it always has to be on. One doesn't schedule losing their phone. 😉 And if you leave it on, and actually lose your phone, the phone would probably shutdown before you can actually track it.

Well, after installing iOS4.2.1 on my old iPod Touch 2g and turn ON "Find My iPhone", the battery level would drop from 100% to 10% overnight without even using it !

After I turned OFF "Find My iPhone", and also install one special profile from Apple
(install from here: http://support.apple.com/kb/TS3398, it works.),
my battery is holding at 100% for 3 days now.

I am very happy now except I can't use "Find My iPhone" 😟 Oh, well. Apple should fix it soon.

My iPad has no find my phone app. Still, something is draining battery.

iPad can add "Find My iPhone", too. (just add a new email, select MobileMe, then enable "Find My iPhone"). Are you sure you don't have it turn ON?
I am 100% positive that "Find My iPhone" is the cause for severe battery drain. I tested on my iPod Touch 2g and 4g, and also iPad. Same result.

If you really didn't add "Find My iPhone" and still have battery drain problem, then there must be something else that is constantly running in the background and eating up all your battery. Try one step at a time. Disable everything and see if battery is fine, then gradually enable one thing at a time. Then you will know what causes it.

By the way, it's not the "Find My iPhone" app that causes the battery drain.

If you turn ON "Find My iPhone" (by going to setting->email->add new MobileMe email->turn ON Find My iPhone), then the "Find My iPhone" program will be constantly running in the background and communicates to the Apple server. Thus eat up all your battery.

And another update.

Since yesterday I am running again without problems.
What I did this time was to delete my "Mail, Contacts, Calendars" account in iPhone's settings.
Immediately after the removal of the account everything came back to normal.
Of course this is not a solution since I don't have access to my emails and contacts anymore on the
other hand I can now use the iPhone without worrying about the battery.
Why is it taking Apple so long to acknowledge this problem??

By the way I never installed the "Find my iPhone" app.

Message was edited by: tpep

Message was edited by: tpep

Some else suggested emptying our email inboxes.
I did that among many other things.

But the end result is that there is no longer that
hemorrhaging of data or battery drain on my iPhone,
even with my emal accounts turned on.

Of course "push" is now OFF.

Best of luck.

So the new guideline for 4.2.1 is to turn everything off!
Remove all email accounts, turn off wi/fi and notifications, uninstall every app that requires
wi/fi or 3G access and last but not least pray so that you don't wake up one morning and realize
that battery ******* background processes are running again.

Great piece of software ...

Deleting email account also delete the MobileMe account (if you had set it up for Find My iPhone).

Again, it's NOT about the "Find my iPhone " APP. It's not the APP. I still have "My my iPhone" APP on my machine and it's not a problem.

The problem is if you have added a new email account (MobileMe) and select to turn ON "Find My iPhone". Then the service running in the background drain your battery.

Right now, after turn OFF "Find My iPhone", I have everything ON and still have a very good battery.