Is the guy at Verizon right?

[hookbill]

I hate to say this, but you ARE supposed to remove a LiION battery from a device that is running on AC power. It's bad for a LiION battery to be run fully charged at a high temperature, which is exactly what happens when you leave the battery in while running on AC.

Here's a good link about proper care of LiION batteries. Contrary to popular belief, you DO have to excercise a certain amount of care to prolong lifespan:

How to prolong lithium-based batteries

So, somebody posted something on the web saying the opposite and that automatically makes them right? Battery University.

Well, I can't get hold of my own personal battery expert right now, he's a mod in the Forum as well but I'll have him take a look at that and he will provide a link that I think will have more credibility.

 

[Skull One]

I hate to say this, but you ARE supposed to remove a LiION battery from a device that is running on AC power. It's bad for a LiION battery to be run fully charged at a high temperature, which is exactly what happens when you leave the battery in while running on AC.

Here's a good link about proper care of LiION batteries. Contrary to popular belief, you DO have to excercise a certain amount of care to prolong lifespan:

How to prolong lithium-based batteries

And here is where good information is applied improperly to a situation and makes it bad information for the subject at hand.

First and foremost that particular article was written for laptop batteries and their charging systems. Which differs greatly from cell phones and how they are setup.

Lets break down some significant differences between the two.

1) Cell phone's battery charging systems switch to trickle charge mode no later than 4.00 Volts. 4.01 volts is considered fully charged.

But wait! The article says "4.2V" is fully charged. And they are 100% correct, but cell phone makers know you will leave the phone plugged in over night and that can be for as long as 16 hours for some people.

So why do they go into trickle charge at .2 volts to soon? To protect the anode from oxidation which causes resistance in both the discharge and charging situations. Plus they don't want the battery to fail prior to the warranty expiring.

If you want to have fun, read up on "Bump Charging" for cell phones if you want to understand why the charging circuits are designed to kick in to trickle charge earlier than 4.2V. And how bump charging can get around that and give you "Extra power!" at the cost of battery longevity.

2) The trickle charge mode isn't high enough to sustain a full charge if you are truly putting a load on the phone.

If you care to test that fact, put your phone into GPS mode while using 3G to retrieve the mapping data. And if you really want to see something neat, turn Pandora or a similar program like that on at that same time and watch the charger not be able to keep up when it switches back to full charging mode. Some car charges use lower currents and can't keep up.

3) Cell phone batteries are smaller than laptop batteries.

Li-Ion batteries can reach "Thermal Runaway", a form of self heating, at temps as low as 140F. But if you read every word in the article it talks about temps of 113F. There is a HUGE reason for the difference in temps and warning about them. Cell phone batteries can dissipate heat faster than laptop batteries by a factor of, lets go with 20 to 1 (it is probably much higher). Why is the difference that high? Surface area exposed to cooler air. Laptop batteries simply can't dissipate the heat fast enough. So they have to start worrying about heat build up long before cell phones do. That and the fact that they go to the FULL 4.2V charging spec. Which is the danger zone for oxidation of the anode.


So in short the article is 100% correct for a Li-Ion battery of large mass being charged to the full 4.2V specification.

Cell phone batteries don't meet either condition. Not by a long shot.

 

[pattikate]

Thanks for all this input everyone. This is all interesting stuff. Well, how about this? Let me re-phrase by asking all of you, has anyone been powering their Droid X off their laptop or pc for hours at a time, and have you incured any noticable battery problems yet? How long have you had your phone?

 

[Skull One]

Thanks for all this input everyone. This is all interesting stuff. Well, how about this? Let me re-phrase by asking all of you, has anyone been powering their Droid X off their laptop or pc for hours at a time, and have you incured any noticable battery problems yet? How long have you had your phone?

My wife's DX is on the charger for at least 12 hours a day for the last 4 months. I'll ask her not to charge it starting Monday and see how long it can go before it hits 40%.

 

[RW-1]

The phone will always pull juice from the USB port first. To do otherwise would be bad design. It will supplement from the battery if it needs to. Then, when you're done, it will start charging the battery up if it needs to.

+1

If the batt is charged, it will be drawing power from AC and not be doing anything to the battery while you are playing.

Now, I can see how some might see this as a bad thing... you have a car charger type adapter and the AC plug.

You can run the phone all day long off AC, but you can't do that on a car charger type, it just doesn't give enough juice, which is why you can run down a batt while plugged into one, etc.

On the AC wall adapter, such as direct, or for a better example, in a DOCK, you can run an app, music, etc. all day long and it will have NO effect on the battery. Except if you placed it initially on that adapter not fully charged, it will charge the batt then stop.

 

[procrastination]

Skullone is awesome.

--------------------------------------
So tell me Future Boy, who's President of The United States in 1985?

 

[dangerous]

Won't hurt your battery......
they wouldn't have made the Car Dock if it was going to be a problem. the GPS navigation is as intensive as Gaming. and that is keeping your phone plugged in.

 

[Ag3nt X]

The other day I asked my local Verizon rep if running a Droid X off the AC wall adapter while playing games and applications was bad for the battery. He said he wouldn't recommend it, because using the phone with the adapter plugged in (for instance, listening to music or playing a game for an hour or so) might wear down the battery an shorten battery life.

Do you guys agree? Do you think it's not a good idea to use the Droid X with the adaprter plugged in? I figured this might help conserve the battery, but I could be sending my battery to an early grave, according to the man at the Verizon store.

What do you think?

This is definitely reduce the lifespan of the battery. No doubt about it.

 

[Ag3nt X]

Won't hurt your battery......
they wouldn't have made the Car Dock if it was going to be a problem. the GPS navigation is as intensive as Gaming. and that is keeping your phone plugged in.

Wrong answer. The car dock has the ability to control the charging feature. Plugging in to a wall you do not have this ability.

 

[Skull One]

The other day I asked my local Verizon rep if running a Droid X off the AC wall adapter while playing games and applications was bad for the battery. He said he wouldn't recommend it, because using the phone with the adapter plugged in (for instance, listening to music or playing a game for an hour or so) might wear down the battery an shorten battery life.

Do you guys agree? Do you think it's not a good idea to use the Droid X with the adaprter plugged in? I figured this might help conserve the battery, but I could be sending my battery to an early grave, according to the man at the Verizon store.

What do you think?

This is definitely reduce the lifespan of the battery. No doubt about it.

Is it safe to assume you didn't read what I have already posted on why your statement is incorrect and why it can't physically/chemically happen?

I mean I have only been doing this silly electronics stuff since 1985 and have read quite a bit on Lithium-Ion battery technology over the years. Would love to have you point me towards the data and articles that back up your "No doubt about it" statement. I love learning new things. Even when those things are 180 degrees out of phase with real world data.

 

[Skull One]

Won't hurt your battery......
they wouldn't have made the Car Dock if it was going to be a problem. the GPS navigation is as intensive as Gaming. and that is keeping your phone plugged in.

Wrong answer. The car dock has the ability to control the charging feature. Plugging in to a wall you do not have this ability.

Please show me where it is documented that the Car Dock charging system differs from the wall outlet charger. This should be a fascinating read all things considered on how the Droid series of phones currently charge themselves. Especially since the charger doesn't control anything, the phone does.

 

[Ag3nt X]

The other day I asked my local Verizon rep if running a Droid X off the AC wall adapter while playing games and applications was bad for the battery. He said he wouldn't recommend it, because using the phone with the adapter plugged in (for instance, listening to music or playing a game for an hour or so) might wear down the battery an shorten battery life.

Do you guys agree? Do you think it's not a good idea to use the Droid X with the adaprter plugged in? I figured this might help conserve the battery, but I could be sending my battery to an early grave, according to the man at the Verizon store.

What do you think?

This is definitely reduce the lifespan of the battery. No doubt about it.

Is it safe to assume you didn't read what I have already posted on why your statement is incorrect and why it can't physically/chemically happen?

I mean I have only been doing this silly electronics stuff since 1985 and have read quite a bit on Lithium-Ion battery technology over the years. Would love to have you point me towards the data and articles that back up your "No doubt about it" statement. I love learning new things. Even when those things are 180 degrees out of phase with real world data.

Clearly you have not done your home work on the issue then.
If you regurarly use the phone while it is charging I assure you that your battery will not have as long a life as if you had not done this and let your battery drain down to 25% or so before recharging to 100%.

This is a very well known fact about lithium-Ion batteries.
I love when people think they know everything but in reality could not be further from it.

 

[Ag3nt X]

I hate to say this, but you ARE supposed to remove a LiION battery from a device that is running on AC power. It's bad for a LiION battery to be run fully charged at a high temperature, which is exactly what happens when you leave the battery in while running on AC.

Here's a good link about proper care of LiION batteries. Contrary to popular belief, you DO have to excercise a certain amount of care to prolong lifespan:

How to prolong lithium-based batteries

And here is where good information is applied improperly to a situation and makes it bad information for the subject at hand.

First and foremost that particular article was written for laptop batteries and their charging systems. Which differs greatly from cell phones and how they are setup.

Lets break down some significant differences between the two.

1) Cell phone's battery charging systems switch to trickle charge mode no later than 4.00 Volts. 4.01 volts is considered fully charged.

But wait! The article says "4.2V" is fully charged. And they are 100% correct, but cell phone makers know you will leave the phone plugged in over night and that can be for as long as 16 hours for some people.

So why do they go into trickle charge at .2 volts to soon? To protect the anode from oxidation which causes resistance in both the discharge and charging situations. Plus they don't want the battery to fail prior to the warranty expiring.

If you want to have fun, read up on "Bump Charging" for cell phones if you want to understand why the charging circuits are designed to kick in to trickle charge earlier than 4.2V. And how bump charging can get around that and give you "Extra power!" at the cost of battery longevity.

2) The trickle charge mode isn't high enough to sustain a full charge if you are truly putting a load on the phone.

If you care to test that fact, put your phone into GPS mode while using 3G to retrieve the mapping data. And if you really want to see something neat, turn Pandora or a similar program like that on at that same time and watch the charger not be able to keep up when it switches back to full charging mode. Some car charges use lower currents and can't keep up.

3) Cell phone batteries are smaller than laptop batteries.

Li-Ion batteries can reach "Thermal Runaway", a form of self heating, at temps as low as 140F. But if you read every word in the article it talks about temps of 113F. There is a HUGE reason for the difference in temps and warning about them. Cell phone batteries can dissipate heat faster than laptop batteries by a factor of, lets go with 20 to 1 (it is probably much higher). Why is the difference that high? Surface area exposed to cooler air. Laptop batteries simply can't dissipate the heat fast enough. So they have to start worrying about heat build up long before cell phones do. That and the fact that they go to the FULL 4.2V charging spec. Which is the danger zone for oxidation of the anode.


So in short the article is 100% correct for a Li-Ion battery of large mass being charged to the full 4.2V specification.

Cell phone batteries don't meet either condition. Not by a long shot.

Just to show you I saw your post with this article. I have quoted it.

If you care to test that fact, put your phone into GPS mode while using 3G to retrieve the mapping data. And if you really want to see something neat, turn Pandora or a similar program like that on at that same time and watch the charger not be able to keep up when it switches back to full charging mode. Some car charges use lower currents and can't keep up.

And this comment is rather funny. I am not even going to bother to tell you how screwed up this commnet is but you can feel free to let us all know when you figure it out.

 

[Ag3nt X]

Won't hurt your battery......
they wouldn't have made the Car Dock if it was going to be a problem. the GPS navigation is as intensive as Gaming. and that is keeping your phone plugged in.

Wrong answer. The car dock has the ability to control the charging feature. Plugging in to a wall you do not have this ability.

Please show me where it is documented that the Car Dock charging system differs from the wall outlet charger. This should be a fascinating read all things considered on how the Droid series of phones currently charge themselves. Especially since the charger doesn't control anything, the phone does.

Tell you what there mr know it all...... Why don't you from this point forward try charging your phone only by your vehicle ( according to you this is the best method seeing as how it does it with less "current")
Go for it charge your phone only with your vehicle. We will be waiting for you to begin whining about your battery not holding a charge.

 

[wingdo]

Clearly you have not done your home work on the issue then.
If you regurarly use the phone while it is charging I assure you that your battery will not have as long a life as if you had not done this and let your battery drain down to 25% or so before recharging to 100%.

This is a very well known fact about lithium-Ion batteries.
I love when people think they know everything but in reality could not be further from it.

I believe you are the one who has not done his homework. Both of those statements are incorrect.

The phone and not the charger control charging on the Droid 1. Period.

There is no memory effect on a Li-ion battery, memory effects take place in the software which gauges how much life is left in a Li-ion battery. This is why some people tell you to take the battery down to the point the device powers off. You do this to re-educate the software as to the high and low voltage points on the battery, not to make the battery itself more efficient.