battery life

[+paul6921]

i have a 450t what do you set your backlight to 30 seconds 1 minute ? what about the screen brightness halfway or full brightness.i use nimh batteries what mha size is best 1800? what about when your going to the cache how can i save power on the compass auto compass on or off? what about nickel metal zinc batteries are they better than nimh? i guess what i am asking is how do i get maximum battery life in my 450t? thanks

[+splashy]

30 sec 80%

2700

About 10 hours

[+dfx]

i have my backlight permanently off, and turn it on explicitly only when i actually need it (at dusk/night, indoors). the reason is mostly that the backlight won't make any visible difference outdoors during the day, and i find it annoying when i always have to push twice on the touchscreen because the first tap only turns on the invisible backlight.

 

more mAh = better, at least within the same battery type. compass on or off won't make any difference. supposedly the "battery save" mode does make a difference and may come in useful if you want to leave the oregon running a longer while without actually using it a lot (i.e. without even looking at it).

 

with my oldish 2100 mAh NiMH batteries i get around 6-8 hours. regular NiMH batteries lose a relatively big fraction of their charge within 24 hours of being charged, so to get the best battery life out of them, charge them up just before you use them. note that the increased voltage will likely throw your compass off for a while in this case.

Edited August 22, 2010 by dfx

[+paul6921]

i have my backlight permanently off, and turn it on explicitly only when i actually need it (at dusk/night, indoors). the reason is mostly that the backlight won't make any visible difference outdoors during the day, and i find it annoying when i always have to push twice on the touchscreen because the first tap only turns on the invisible backlight.

 

more mAh = better, at least within the same battery type. compass on or off won't make any difference. supposedly the "battery save" mode does make a difference and may come in useful if you want to leave the oregon running a longer while without actually using it a lot (i.e. without even looking at it).

 

with my oldish 2100 mAh NiMH batteries i get around 6-8 hours. regular NiMH batteries lose a relatively big fraction of their charge within 24 hours of being charged, so to get the best battery life out of them, charge them up just before you use them. note that the increased voltage will likely throw your compass off for a while in this case.

dfx how do you see your screen without a backlight on mine is dark until i touch it thanks

[+ecanderson]

I'm still happy with my NiZn cells. Backlight set to 15 seconds (that's usually enough to see what needs seen). I leave it enabled because I'm often having a look while in a vehicle where getting the reflective screen to work isn't that easy. Typically get 8 hours of steady use, and with the NiZn, no compass recalibration issues (see other threads).

 

I've seen one poster here who has evidently had one or more of his NiZn cells start to charge poorly already, but no problems here yet (heavy use since early April of this year).

[+dfx]

dfx how do you see your screen without a backlight on mine is dark until i touch it thanks

dark? or blank?

 

if it's blank, you have the "battery save" option enabled.

 

if it's just too dark to be readable, hold it so that the light directly shines into the display. or maybe your model has a different screen than mine and that doesn't work.

[+Unobtainium]

Paul,

 

I Have a 550 and I can get over a days worth of caching out of a set of 2100 mAh 'ready to go' NiMH's. Although I generally have the time out set to 30 seconds and the back light around 3/4, I use the backlight as needed. I paid less than £4.00 for 4 of these batteries, so I would recommend just buying more spare sets.

[+paul6921]

dfx how do you see your screen without a backlight on mine is dark until i touch it thanks

dark? or blank?

 

if it's blank, you have the "battery save" option enabled.

 

if it's just too dark to be readable, hold it so that the light directly shines into the display. or maybe your model has a different screen than mine and that doesn't work.

dfx you are right i had the battery save enabled thank you now i can see the screen it is dark but i can see it especially in sunlight batteries should be just fine.now if it will just cool down hot in georgia