After installing the update make sure you reset all setttings. I have done a few updates now and have had much better sucess after settings reset all. Standby drain has been virtually eliminated from 2-4% hr before update. It is located in settings/reset//reset all settings. You loose some wifi and desktop settings, but data, apps, etc remain intact.
BradSK wrote:
Hi all, just posting for some advice regarding a system restore.
It seems as though most people have had success after doing a system restore and setting up as a new phone (when I updates to 5.0.1 I needed to restore but chose iCloud backup instead). I am reluctant to lose too much info, so could someone advise me as to what kind of data would be lost a d what could be recovered from the cloud (not via restore but from my old phone)? I know things like apps and music would have to resynced but that's not a problem.
Thanks
Before doing a system restore, try the steps below. Corrupt system level settings created by an iOS 5 bug in the original release that caused battery recalibration issues, etc. Just installing the update does not fix the issue in most cases (sometime it initially can be worse). You need to clear out those settings and recalibate the battery. For those still having the "standby battery drain" issue follow the procedure below in order. It does fix the problem in most cases.
Go through these steps to address the battery after updating to iOS 5.0.1:
1. Reset all settings (settings app-> general-> reset)
2. Go through initial setup steps (lang, wifi, siri, enable location, etc) and choose "setup as new phone" (don't worry your apps, data, contacts, mail photos, will still be there). At this point, Do NOT restore from iCloud or iTunes (It can copy back corrupt settings)
3. Turn off system location services timezone and iAd
4. Fully discharge battery (till it shuts off with the spinning wheel)
5. Fully recharge battery (overnight if possible)
In my experience this improves the Standby battery drain issue significantly in most cases. It reduces drain from 2-4% or more per hr to 0.5% or less. It has worked for many, many users now. If it does not work after a few try's you may have a real battery or hardware issue and should contact Apple. Good Luck!
That didn't work. But my situation may be a little funny. I have Gmail set up as an Exchange account (it is initially how I synced my contacts) and iCloud is setup to sync my contacts. Initially, however, I had Contacts set to "off" in Gmail (because they synced the first time and didn't need to sync again since iCloud handles this). I turned it back on in Gmail and then went to Mail, Contacts and Calendar settings and saw that the "Default Account" for contacts was set to iCloud. I changed this to Gmail since I turned the contacts back on. I then noticed that my messages were associated with names at this point. I then went into Gmail and turned the Contacts "off" and the names were still associated. And also, since those contacts were turned "off" at this point, there was no option for Default Account for contacts. It is now fixed -- I know that was lengthy, but maybe it will help someone.
Tottally agree about reset all settings - general - reset - reset all settings :) I did this and I can see my 4s stay on 100% for about 3 hours or more. What I did was disable all location services and Siri ( she's beta anyway ) and resign my wifi password, don't send diagnosis, turned all iCloud services off until the next update fixes the battery suck - it seems to me all the new additions make a great phone if it could actually perform without draining the battery - I know right why turn everything off, well it's all the same as if it was before iOS 5 in a way - a bit sad but all the location services and Siri's communication with iCloud seems to drain the phone fast - or I could be a couple of apps. Hope it helps.
davidch,
Thank you so much. I have followed your procedure and I currently stand at:
1 hr 53 minutes usage
1 day 0 hours standby
70% Battery remaining
That's an average of 1.15% battery used per hour even with some usage consisting of an even split of shooting photos, shooting video, and surfing Safari.
The setup:
Prior to the 4S, I used an original 8GB iPhone (2G) from September 2007 until December 1, 2011. Until its final day on December 1, that original 2007 iPhone on its original battery would still go 2 days without charging. This shows that I know how to treat a battery and optimize my usage.
When the 4S arrived, I charged it fully and restored my ancient iPhone 2G backup to it. The 4S promptly began losing 2% to 4% per hour on standby. Dismayed, I scoured them intarwebs until I came across your post. Following your directions -- Reset All Settings, Set Up As New iPhone -- appears to have achieved reasonable battery performance.
The battery life is no better than my original 2007 iPhone, but at least it is not much worse.
Apple -- if you are listening -- I would happily buy and prefer a 50% thicker iPhone that had a larger battery. I would even pay more. I know I am not alone -- look at how many people put their super slim iPhone in an enormous bulky case.
-Walter
Daryl,
Follow Davisch's post exactly. It does not use iTunes restore feature. Its all done directly on the iPhone itself. Also do not use the "erase all content" option that WILL delete all your data. And you do not want to restore you settings from the backup as the current backup is a backup of your device with the problem. So effectivley it will restore the items you are attempting to get rid of. Since this procedure does not impact your data/apps etc there is no need to restore it anyway. Certainly you still want a backup just in case but after the process is completed and all is well, THEN backup again with the "fixed" version and you will be good to go and have a good backup of the phone in a working state. Luck to ya! Hope it helps.
walter.penn wrote:
davidch,
Thank you so much. I have followed your procedure and I currently stand at:
1 hr 53 minutes usage
1 day 0 hours standby
70% Battery remaining
walter... that looks good now and i am glad it worked so well for you.
When the 4S arrived, I charged it fully and restored my ancient iPhone 2G backup to it. The 4S promptly began losing 2% to 4% per hour on standby. Dismayed, I scoured them intarwebs until I came across your post. Following your directions -- Reset All Settings, Set Up As New iPhone -- appears to have achieved reasonable battery performance.
yes... as a long time iPhone user (bought a 4G iPhone 2G on day 2), i was pretty frustrated myself with my battery performance of my 4S the first few days. once i figured out a solution and tried it a few times on other folks iPhones with the issue, i figured it was time to spread the joy 😀 to the forums. i tried a couple of post on the other threads, but the complaining and negativity was hard to break through so i started my own.
The battery life is no better than my original 2007 iPhone, but at least it is not much worse.
agree, the battery life of my iPhone 4S seems very similar to my original 2G new (maybe a little better), but you gotta admit it can certaintly do a lot more now and virtually flys doing it 😎
Great news Susan, One other item to suggest. You may want to set your email to manually. It downloads quickly when you press the mail app. I figured for me (2 email accts) I dont really need the mail sitting there until i am ready to view it. I mean just because its there dont mean I am ready to actually open it to read so I just check mail whenever i need to and it comes in within seconds of starting the app. So that saves all those 30 minute cycles of checking mail. Just a suggestion. Some folks open mail every time a message comes in. I get to much to do that. Glad that worked for you .Davidch is really on to something I believe. Great results for a lot of people.
miteglia90 wrote:
4. As a best way of charging the battery, should I turn it offevery time I charge - or ON is OK?
Related question is it best practice to charge the phone even if it’s not depleted yet or still more than 20%? Or itdoesn’t matter since it’s a Li-Ion battery?
Please our experts here enlighten these few questions i would really appreciate.
Thanks!!
Michele
(oops, looks like i missed #4) it is recommended that when you first get your iPhone you charge full (if not full already), then discharge fully and then do a full recharge. this allows the software to calibrate correctly with the battery. it is then recommended that you calibrate you battery routinely every few months (fully discharge and fully recharge). other than that you should be able to charge and recharge as you see fit. this is not an issue with the Li-Ion battery (like the Ni-Cad batteries of past). it is merely away for the software to recalibrate with the storage capabilities of the battery.
ihmo, it seems that incorrect or corrupt calibration of the battery is the cause of standby drain problem and the basis of my process. by resetting all the settings, you clear out any corrupt settings or prefs. then by recalibarting everything is set as it should be... my hypothesis is that the original iOS 5.0 build had a bad process that incorrectly calibrated or interpreted the battery incorrectly (i.e. saw that battery capacity as less than it actually was and adjusted drain accordingly)... the 5.0.1 update fixed that bad process, but the corrupted settings/prefs were still there. by clearing all that out and starting over everything works correctly again... i also think carrying over those prefs from a previous backups (from a different phone calibration, etc) could potentially also cause the problem.
grahamfrompg wrote:
First of all thanks davidch for starting this thread and offering advice. Here is my experience for what it is worth. This is the second time an ios update has totally ruined the battery life on my 3gs - first an upgrade to ios 5.0 which eventually required a new phone from Apple, and now an upgrade to 5.01. In the latter case I have tried everything to sort it (including the advice in this thread) our but failed and so have just upgraded to an iPhone4 as I was almost at the end of my contract (and tether). Now a few of my own observations:
- The heating of the phone is absolutely a symptom of this drastically reduced battery life. The phone is clearly repeatedly trying to do something which is destroying the battery life..
- Going abroad and disabling data roaming helped, but only partially.
- Now that I have decommisioned my old 3gs, battery life on it is now completely back to normal. Dropped 11% in a day. So the only things I have done are to take out the sim card so I'm not making calls on it, and remove my exchange account. I've effectively been using it as an iPod Touch all day on wifi, playing games, apps and music etc. It is stone cold. This makes me think that the people who say that ios 5.x has synch issues with mail accounts may be correct. Thus one way forward may be to delete and then reset mail accounts.
Now that I have 2 phones, I'll try to replicate the problem again on my old 3gs by separately putting in my daughters sim and re-activating my Exchange account. I'll let you know how I get on but I'm betting its the exchange account that is the issue...
graham... i recommend you try my process step by step and in order, if you haven't yet.
1. Reset all settings (settings app-> general-> reset)
2 a. Go through initial setup steps (lang, wifi, siri, enable location, etc) and choose setup as new phone (don't worry your apps, data, contacts, mail will still be there). Do NOT restore from iCloud or iTunes (It can copy back corrupt settings)
2 b. If you do not get the complete new setup screen with language setup and setup as new phone or restore from iTune/iCloud backup, be sure to go back to #1 and reset all settings again (it should happen the second time)
3. Turn off system location services timezone and iAd (settings -> location services -> system services)
4. Fully discharge battery (until you get the spinning wheel and it shuts off)
5. Fully recharge battery (overnight if possible)
In my experience this improves the Standby battery drain issue significantly in most cases. It reduces drain from 2-4% or more per hr to 0.5% or less. It has worked for many, many users now. If it does not work after a few try's you may have a real battery or hardware issue and should contact Apple. Good Luck!
pulkit ad wrote:
Brother I am facing a weird problem.. i am having iphone 4. bought a month ago,running on ios 5.0.1 and its battery never got full charged, 95% or sometimes at 97% it shows a full charge symbol.. and it not charges further..
i dont know what to do.. and ya after completing a battery cycle i got a 100% charged symbol but when i removed a charger it again went to 97%.
tell me bro what should i do to fix this problem..
il be very thankful to you..
in addition to just battery cycle, i recommend you try my process below step by step and in order. it may take 1-3 times to get it work, correctly. if that does not work you may try to delete your mail accounts and recreate them. i corrupt and/or damaged account or mail message can also cause drain issue.
1. Reset all settings (settings app-> general-> reset)
2 a. Go through initial setup steps (lang, wifi, siri, enable location, etc) and choose setup as new phone (don't worry your apps, data, contacts, mail will still be there). Do NOT restore from iCloud or iTunes (It can copy back corrupt settings)
2 b. If you do not get the complete new setup screen with language setup and setup as new phone or restore from iTune/iCloud backup, be sure to go back to #1 and reset all settings again (it should happen the second time)
3. Turn off system location services timezone and iAd (settings -> location services -> system services)
4. Fully discharge battery (until you get the spinning wheel and it shuts off)
5. Fully recharge battery (overnight if possible)
In my experience this improves the Standby battery drain issue significantly in most cases. It reduces drain from 2-4% or more per hr to 0.5% or less. It has worked for many, many users now. If it does not work after a few try's you may have a real battery or hardware issue and should contact Apple. Good Luck!
OhYeahNatan wrote:
I bought my iP4s and it has 5.0.1 already out of the box. What can i do to improve its battery?
Follow my steps below and in the exact order as specified... good luck!
1. Reset all settings (settings app-> general-> reset)
2 a. Go through initial setup steps (lang, wifi, siri, enable location, etc) and choose setup as new phone (don't worry your apps, data, contacts, mail will still be there). Do NOT restore from iCloud or iTunes (It can copy back corrupt settings)
2 b. If you do not get the complete new setup screen with language setup and setup as new phone or restore from iTune/iCloud backup, be sure to go back to #1 and reset all settings again (it should happen the second time)
3. Turn off system location services timezone and iAd (settings -> location services -> system services)
4. Fully discharge battery (until you get the spinning wheel and it shuts off)
5. Fully recharge battery (overnight if possible)
In my experience this improves the Standby battery drain issue significantly in most cases. It reduces drain from 2-4% or more per hr to 0.5% or less. It has worked for many, many users now. If it does not work after a few try's you may have a real battery or hardware issue and should contact Apple. Good Luck!
9tigereatrice wrote:
Hi
I just recently did the steps on my new iphone 4s also. My battery life seems to be average but my caller ID have stopped working after settings reset. All my contacts are still there but calls coming in or recent calls, there is no name just number.
How can I fix this? I'm on Verizon.
Thanks
this is a common problem wth verizon... dial *228 and then option 1. wait until it finishes. then close the phone and message app (double tap home button, hold an icon until the red circle shows and tap each app to close). after a minute or so try it.
Davidch,
After following your instructions for the reset I cannot load the App Store. It says 'loading' and nothing happens then eventually pops back to the main page. Any suggestions?
Thanks
**Nevermind... I shut off phone and then turned it back on and App Store loaded fine. In the process of draining battery to recharge. I so hope this works!
Velixar, I would suspect that maybe you have a roque app installed causing this type of issue. Did you happen to restore from an older device like a iPhone 3G or 4? Have seen that cause this kind of issue. If you have, I would restore to factory via iTunes, then use iTunes to sync (not restore) to get your contacts etc back. Back it up to iCloud or via iTunes first just to be safe. Try that and see if the phone starts behaving. If it does then you can can assume an app was at fault and you can install a few apps at a time and see how it progresses. If it still does not behave when factory fresh then perhaps a trip to Apple is in order. BTW iOS 5.1 should be out soon and its expected to address lingering battery issues. Early reports are favorable!
Velixar wrote:
The problem I am having is that my usage and standby time shows the exact same number. Added to that, the phone seems to lose 3-4% per hour while being on standby. I have just tried your suggestion now to reset all settings and am currently letting it sit on wifi and watching videos to run the battery down. Previously I have tried a hard reset, resetting network settings, and other various techniques that you can find with a google search. Hopefully this will work. Is there a specific technique to use when the usage and standby time shows the same? I've still got a little over a week to return the phone, though I really don't want to. I already sold my ipod touch so if I return the phone I will have nothing to play the apps I have purchased on itunes, but this is frustrating.
To add more information, I have just about everything turned off including all notifications beyond messaging and phone. I do not have Siri on nor do I have location services on. Cellular data is turned off and I do not have wifi on unless i specifically need to connect to the internet for something. My total average time from 100% to 0% is around 30 hours. While that might seem like a lot based on some of the other posts, I lose ~20% at night when the phone is on standby, which should not be happening at all. I have not made any phone calls the past few days either as I try and figure out what the problem is. I would say for a full cycle, the wifi is on at absolute most for 2 hours, cell data is never on, and if you want you can throw in 30 minutes of talking.
ddranade wrote:
Hi davidch,
Thanks for your reply. Here is the statistic for today. I will try doing the reset again today and will let you know.
Battery Percentage - 17%
Usage - 3 Hours, 40 Minutes
Standby - 11 Hours, 59 Minutes
Is this still something to worry about ? Please let me know, else I can go to the Apple Store. Also I did observe one thing today that after about 30-35 mins of 3G Usage, the phone was getting hotter just below the Apple Logo at the back. This is making me nervous day by day, didn't expect this from my first ever Apple purchase :-(
Please let me know your thoughts.
Thanks.
per spec and assuming that your data usage was 50/50 wifi/3g, 12/200 -> 6% standby usage, 3.67/7.5 -> 49% data usage. 100 - (6+49) = 45% @17% you would be 28% below spec. if we assume you data was all 3g, 3.67/6 -> 61%. 100 - (6+61) = 33% @17% you would be 16% below spec. seems you may have some other issue (rogue app, mail, etc) or a real hardware issue causing excessive drain. you could try my process one more time, but if you don't see better results, i would recommend taking it in to be reviewed by apple.
For anyone new to the thread be sure to go through these steps to address the battery after updating to iOS 5.0.1:
1. Reset all settings (settings app-> general-> reset)
2 a. Go through initial setup steps (lang, wifi, siri, enable location, etc) and choose setup as new phone (don't worry your apps, data, contacts, mail will still be there). Do NOT restore from iCloud or iTunes (It can copy back corrupt settings)
2 b. If you do not get the complete new setup screen with language setup and setup as new phone or restore from iTune/iCloud backup, be sure to go back to #1 and reset all settings again (it should happen the second time)
3. Turn off system location services timezone and iAd (settings -> location services -> system services)
4. Fully discharge battery (until you get the spinning wheel and it shuts off)
5. Fully recharge battery (overnight if possible)
In my experience this improves the Standby battery drain issue significantly in most cases. It reduces drain from 2-4% or more per hr to 0.5% or less. It has worked for many, many users now. If it does not work after a few try's you may have a real battery or hardware issue and should contact Apple. Good Luck!
iPhone 4S 5.0.1 Update Improves Battery w/ Settings Reset
