Test Confirms iPhone 4S Battery Issues Are Software Based

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Posted November 14, 2011 at 8:17pm by iClarified

A test performed by a developer for ZDNet confirms that the iPhone 4S battery issues are software based.

This developer who wanted to remain anonymous had two iPhone 4S devices purchased at the same time, connected to the same network, and running iOS 5.0.1. One had battery issues and one did not.

So that we could totally rule out this being a hardware problem the developer took things a step further. He factory reset both handsets and then recovered then from a backup. However, rather than reloading them with their original backup, he swapped them over. He reloading his day-to-day handset with the backup from his development handset, and loaded the development handset with the backup from his regular day-to-day handset.

The problem jumped handsets. Now the handset that was his development test bed (but loaded with the apps and settings from his day-to-day handset) is displaying the battery drain problem. The other handset (the one that was displaying the problem), is showing excellent battery life.

The iPhone 4S battery issues were always assumed to be software related; however, this provides some confirmation of that. Apple has said it continues to work on resolving the issues.

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Test Confirms iPhone 4S Battery Issues Are Software Based

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giento - November 17, 2011 at 3:00am

with all do respect this article really doesnt prove jack shit. Unless the phones were exactly identical in settings, (other than one was 5.0 and one was 5.1) it cant be relied upon. your "day to day" phone probably has different wifi settings, brightness settings, bluetooth, maybe you had some webpages open in the background, etc... the only way this test would be accurate if they were both factory restores from scratch. One would have to run 5.0 and the other 5.1, both with IDENTICAL wifi, brightness, etc settings. Keep in mind im just using wifi and brightness as an example for sake of simplictyh, they are other several factors that would be involved. I like the article, i think your on to sometihng, but try one on 5.0 and one on 5.1 with identical settings and then tell us which one dies first...

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Notch - November 16, 2011 at 7:20pm

Could it be that all the traffic sent to Apple servers to track your phone is the problem? I just read that Siri sends back amazing amounts of data. I'm sure other apps can be just as bad.

Adnan - November 15, 2011 at 12:29am

I noticed if alert type for emails are set to banner or alerts in notifications battery drain very fast and if none is selected battery issue is not there

PICO - November 15, 2011 at 12:29am

Good analysis, very conclusive. Would like to now see the error prone software package drilled down into to reveal the offending code and related software

jailbreak - November 14, 2011 at 9:23pm

We want to jailbreak our iPhone 4s ,who cares about the battery I have no issues with the battery. So new users don't know what they are doing,, Go back to your flip samsung Phone Plea DEV TEAM release jailbreak this week

Nick - November 14, 2011 at 9:27pm

You do realize that iclarified doesn't actually jailbreak iPhones right? So the fact that they are posting articles about this is not hindering the actual devs from working on the jailbreak. And simply put, the problems aren't happening to just new users and has nothing to do with whether or not people know how to use their iPhone.

Tom - November 14, 2011 at 9:35pm

Not going to happen anytime soon buddy sorry. iOS 5.1 will be out within weeks or in Jan so don't count on it to be before then, that's if apple let's dev team do it for iPhone 4 and iPad 1.

Tom - November 14, 2011 at 8:57pm

Listen Nick I had iPhone since the first iPhone came out and I ALWAYS restore from back up and never had battery issue until iOS 3.1.3.... Now on iPhone 4 same issue battery so it's software issue and that's what I have been saying since day one!!!

Nick - November 14, 2011 at 8:59pm

I never said that restoring from backup will 100% of the time cause problems, all I was saying is that the majority of issues I've seen from restoring backups to new models or update such as 4.x to 5.x are caused from restoring backups. I'm not excusing Apple for these bugs either, because no one wants to lose their data.

Tom - November 14, 2011 at 9:32pm

Well I'm a iPhone owner since 2007 and I can tell you it's iOS issue which does mean it's also apples fault. It's not battery issue it's iOS issue.

Nick - November 14, 2011 at 9:36pm

Same here, and I think you're misinterpreting what I'm saying. I know it's an iOS issue, but it's an iOS issue that has to do with draining the battery. Just because I or anyone says it's a battery issue doesn't mean it's hardware, it means the battery is being drained and isn't lasting as long as it should. Also, "I'm not excusing Apple for these bugs" was me saying that it's Apple's fault.

Nick - November 14, 2011 at 8:38pm

I'm betting that restoring from backup is the cause of the problems and if you just simply set it up as a new device and don't restore your backup you won't have any issues. This seems to be a common occurrence when you restore your data to a new model or to a new version of the firmware (I'm speaking of going from 4.x to 5.x and not 4.1 to 4.2).

Adam - November 14, 2011 at 8:41pm

I don't want to lose my texts, settings, app data and other stuff every year though. Unless in missing something?

Nick - November 14, 2011 at 8:44pm

If you don't want to lose your data, then you'll have to wait for Apple to fix the issues.

Nick - November 14, 2011 at 8:52pm

Yeah, me telling people how to fix the battery issue without waiting for apple is worthless. I'm not the one who has nothing else better to do than waste my time writing worthless comments on here. I guarantee you that most people don't know this will fix the battery issues.

Stefan - November 14, 2011 at 10:22pm

We know that, but we don't want to lose our data every year...SIMPLE.

Qbert - November 15, 2011 at 3:22am

Who saves text messages? lol Do you really go back and read them again?

AleXxX - November 15, 2011 at 3:07pm

Haahahhaha +1 m8

Carlos - November 15, 2011 at 10:11pm

I tested and I did notice a favorable improvement,.... at 8am i got 100%and now i have 60%! I recommend this to all of us that have this big important issue