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Thursday June 4, 2009
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 The Palm Pre is a great device, but the battery needs a little help. Like with the iPhone, you shouldn't expect this phone to last more than a day or two on a charge. Palm gave us these useful tips for making the Pre's battery last longer. We tried them, and they made a big difference.
Log out of IM, especially AIM. There's a bug in the AIM client that sucks up battery way too quickly (Palm's fixing it) and the Google Talk presence alerts also use battery, though less than AIM. Remember, you can't just throw the IM program's card away; you have to click on "Sign Out" in the IM applications.
Turn on Wi-Fi. Sounds unintuitive, right? Well, the Pre doesn't have the greatest Sprint reception of anything we've ever tested, and it actually has a relatively power-efficient Wi-Fi radio. When the Pre's Wi-Fi is running, it uses Wi-Fi rather than 3G to make Internet connections. So connecting via Wi-Fi saves battery rather than wasting it.
Change your e-mail settings. By tapping on the upper left corner of the screen in the e-mail program, you can pop down a menu that lets you change e-mail preferences. For accounts where you get relatively little mail, set them to push. But for accounts where you get an e-mail every five minutes or more often, set them to check every 15 minutes. That will save battery.
With these battery tips, you'll definitely get more than a day's use out of each charge on the Palm Pre.
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June 4, 2009 11:47 AM
Now that a great piece.....
http://techno-uptodate.blogspot.com/
June 8, 2009 1:34 AM
Thanks for posting this information.. I really love this thing, but I had been trying to figure out why I was burning through the battery so fast, I was starting to get worried that I was going to have to return it. I can't live tethered to a charger all day, and with the apparent inability to plug-in and get the phone back on immediately, I'd be left with few options (it forces you to wait until it's charged up quite a bit, ~30-60 minutes charging from USB port).
Turns out IM has been running continuously since I set-up the phone (I don't get too many IMs) and I get poor reception in my house, that in addition to heavy usage (Pandora through my BlueTooth-audio car stereo rocks!!), well it's no surprise I only made it through until the early evening on a charge. In fact, with that much radio usage, I'm surprised it lasted as long as it did.
My only gripe now is that plugged in to the car charger didn't seem to pull enough juice to keep the phone running. My phone shutdown while in-call even when plugged in to the charger. I don't intend to let the battery get that low again, but it was damned annoying, especially because of the enforced charge wait time. I'm of the opinion that a charger should, at the very least, operate a device at it's maximum potential power consumption, unless it's explicitly a trickle charger. C'est la vie..
June 10, 2009 11:11 PM
besides low battery life, phone gets suprisingly hot fast after use, i found that when the phone is open from tex key pad, and goes into sleep mode, the "on" button is strangely placed on the top backside of the phone, so is difficult to get to when the phone is open. sprint is not my favorite for my area, and drops alot of calls, i left verizon after 20 years! gonna need some getting used to, but so far must say i am overall satisfied! gooo!! palm pre!!!
June 11, 2009 11:10 PM
"the "on" button is strangely placed on the top backside of the phone, so is difficult to get to when the phone is open."
If you have the phone open, just hit the space bar and it'll wake it up like the power button. =)
My phone gets hot, but only when I seem to be doing a bunch of things and have it plugged into the wall. It doesn't seem to get as hot when it's plugged into the computer.
Sorry to hear you are having problems with the Sprint network, it's working great for me and calls are so much better than they were on my Treo.
June 12, 2009 12:58 AM
I have owned my pre for 4 days now. I have actually returned mine for another one because the battery wore down so fast,and it got hot.I am trying to find tricks to save my battery, i too can`t be tethered to a cord all day. i don't have aim ,so i think i will check that. Overall this is the best phone i have used in a while.Its a little hard to answer in the car when you have big fingers.This is the first PDA i have owned and the store manager where i bought it talked to me like i was supposed to know all the errors with the phone. the pre was my graduation present from graduating from college,the problem is every phone call i get the low battery sign beeps.Decides battery great phone, i gues 35,000 people in 4 hrs thought so too.
June 12, 2009 3:00 PM
Also turn off the gps if not in use.
Go to location services and turn it off.
Hope it helps!
June 15, 2009 10:03 AM
I will have to agree with everyone abbt the battery life.. It really sucks.. I dont have AIM on or GPS on... I receive emails at 30mins & still after sending 5+ txts on a full battery, I'm down to 90% life.. I took mine back for a new one as well bc I thought something was wrong with the battery & the bc it gets hot.. Not only while it's on the charger, when it's in the case as well.... Palm needs to come up with a quick fix..
June 16, 2009 3:49 PM
It does get quite hot after running lots of apps. I also find that the airplane mode is really easy to turn on and off to conserve battery life while on the subway. I'm at 63% now at about 4pm with email being downloaded every 30 minutes and using the phone quite a bit today.
June 17, 2009 11:43 AM
I have to say i love the WebOS. I like the phone so far. My only gripe is the damn battery, i didn't even make it through the night and charged fully at 5pm. I have since turned off aim and my gps. hopefully that will make a difference. i now have chargers at home, car and office. palm better get on the stick and fix this problem or there will be many more blackberry and iphone users.
June 19, 2009 4:57 AM
I have been putting off a phone upgrade until Sprint came out with something exciting and this gadget has not disappointed me. I got a Plantronics Voyager 855 stereo bluetooth, stream Pandora between phone calls, and have requested TWO touchstones for Fathers Day, one for home and one for office, and plan to try one with a DC/AC inverter as my car charger. Also the camera function is beyond my wildest expectations and it is so easy to shoot and MMS photos. This phone really helped me catch up with my kids (21 and 30 years old) when it comes to cell phones - one has Iphone and one has Instinct. I flaunt, I taunt, I annoy, and I enjoy.
June 25, 2009 9:04 AM
Thanks for the tips. I'll definitely use these.
I got my pre last night, and wow. I love this thing. After about an hour of watching me play around on mine, my mom decided she wanted one, haha.
Awesome device, the WebOS is everything that it looked like it would be. I find that often, something looks really cool, and you really wanna get it, but that's certainly not the case with this phone.
GO PRE! :D
June 27, 2009 2:51 PM
I love the phone too...just having to use the charger way to much. I checked yesterday...While plugged into computer's usb and using phone it actually loses a charge. You need a powered USB or Plug into the wall. Car charger and wall are much faster!
July 21, 2009 5:35 AM
It's not the battery,
it's the E-Mail.
My phone was HOT, when Standby!
I had Send/Receive at 1hr
It wasn't until I removed the e-mail completely that the phone cooled off,
and the battery life is good now, should last over a day.
September 11, 2009 6:01 AM
I found that putting email on manual is the best, I hardly check my email from my phone, but its their when I need it. Also, for those pandora users, make sure its not streaming in the higher quality...that will take about 2% of your batter per song. YIKES!
November 21, 2009 1:45 PM
After yrs with att i switched over looking at the paln pre.battery life sucks and it does get hot which i never had that problem with my blackberry.hope i made the right choice.