Conserve Your iPhone's Battery, Plus iOS 5.0.1
Last week, Apple acknowledged the battery drain issue in the iPhone 4S, citing bugs in iOS 5 in addition to user preferences within it.
I mentioned some of the preferences one could change in last Friday’s issue of Kibbles & Bytes, and it looks as though there are more settings that Apple recommends changing. Via a little research and a call to AppleCare, I’ve found the following have substantially improved the battery of the iPhone 4S:
- Settings > General > Slide Bluetooth to OFF
- Settings > General > Set Auto-Lock to 1 Minute
- Settings > Mail, Contacts, Calendars > Fetch New Data > Set to Hourly or Manually (you can leave Push ON, but turning off would likely save even more battery life)
Just how much more battery life have I experienced? The battery would last about 3/4 of the day (approx. 4 p.m.) before the “10% battery” message would pop up, and now that message appears either by 10 p.m. or the following morning (though I end up charging the phone every night anyway).
The AppleCare representative also reiterated that the iOS 5.0.1 update should be out “momentarily,” and sure enough, it was released yesterday. To update to iOS 5.0.1, simply plug your device into iTunes and click “Update” or update wirelessly within your device’s Settings panel. This update marks the first available for wireless syncing.
In addition to battery bug fixes, iOS 5.0.1:
- Adds Multitasking Gestures for original iPad
- Resolves bugs with Documents in the Cloud
- Improves voice recognition for Australian users using dictation
Combined with the preference changes, the iPhone 4S battery is back from the brink!