For the seventh consecutive time, Apple has ranked highest among smartphone manufacturers in customer satisfaction, according to J.D. Power and Associates. The Cupertino-based company achieved a rating of 839 out of 1,000 possible points; the iPhone’s ease of use, features, physical design and battery life propelled the handset to the top spot. HTC, again, followed Apple with a score of 798, with Samsung (769) and Motorola (758) falling in the No.3 and No.4 spots, respectively. According to the survey, smartphone users who were more satisfied with the battery performance of their device were more likely to repurchase the same brand compared to owners who were less satisfied. “Both carriers and manufacturers recognize the fact that battery life needs to be improved,” said Kirk Parsons, senior director of wireless services at J.D. Power and Associates. “However, the study uncovers the need for a greater sense of urgency–short battery life can result in perceived phone problems, higher rates of merchandise returns and customer defections.” Read on for J.D. Power and Associates’ press release.

J.D. Power and Associates Reports: Smartphone Battery Life has Become a Significant Drain on Customer Satisfaction and Loyalty

Apple Ranks Highest in Customer Satisfaction among Smartphone Manufacturers,
While LG and Sanyo Rank Highest in a Tie among Traditional Mobile Phone Manufacturers

WESTLAKE VILLAGE, Calif.: 15 March 2012 — As smartphone users place increasingly complex demands on the functionality of their devices, satisfaction with battery performance is becoming a critical factor in overall satisfaction as well as brand loyalty, according to the J.D. Power and Associates 2012 U.S. Wireless Smartphone Customer Satisfaction StudySM–Volume 1 and the J.D. Power and Associates 2012 U.S. Wireless Traditional Mobile Phone Satisfaction StudySM–Volume 1, both released today.

Satisfaction with smartphones is greatly impacted by battery performance, particularly the length of battery life before recharging is required. In addition, the study finds that satisfaction with battery performance is by far the least satisfying aspect of smartphones, and satisfaction in this area is one of only a few attributes that have declined significantly, compared with Volume 2 of the 2011 study (6.7 in 2012, compared with 6.9 in September 2011).

Satisfaction levels with battery performance differ widely between owners of 3G- and 4G-enabled smartphones. Among owners of 4G-enabled smartphones, battery performance ratings average 6.1 on a 10-point scale–considerably lower than satisfaction among owners of 3G smartphones (6.7). Part of this difference stems from the fact that new 4G smartphones use substantial battery life searching for next-generation network signals, which tend to be scarcer than 3G signals. In addition, owners of 4G-enabled smartphones use their device more extensively–they talk, text, email, and surf the Web more often than do customers with 3G smartphones or traditional handsets–which puts a significantly higher demand on the battery.

“Both carriers and manufacturers recognize the fact that battery life needs to be improved,” said Kirk Parsons, senior director of wireless services at J.D. Power and Associates. “However, the study uncovers the need for a greater sense of urgency–short battery life can result in perceived phone problems, higher rates of merchandise returns and customer defections.”

According to Parsons, smartphone owners who are highly satisfied with their device’s battery life are more likely to repurchase the same brand of smartphone, compared with owners who are less satisfied. Approximately 25 percent of 4G-enabled smartphone owners are highly satisfied with their battery (ratings of 10 on a 10-point scale) and say they “definitely will” repurchase a device from the same manufacturer. In comparison, among owners who are less satisfied with their battery (ratings of 7-9 on a 10-point scale), only 13 percent say the same.

The two studies measure customer satisfaction with traditional wireless handsets and smartphones among owners who have used their current mobile device for less than one year. Satisfaction is measured in several key factors. In order of importance, the key factors of overall satisfaction with traditional wireless handsets are: performance (31%); ease of operation (24%); physical design (24%); and features (20%). For smartphones, the key factors are: performance (35%); ease of operation (24%); features (21%); and physical design (20%).

For a seventh consecutive time, Apple ranks highest among manufacturers of smartphones in customer satisfaction. Apple achieves a score of 839 on a 1,000-point scale and performs well in all factors, particularly in ease of operation and features. HTC (798) follows Apple in the smartphone rankings.

LG and Sanyo rank highest in overall customer satisfaction with traditional handsets, in a tie (716 each). LG performs well in all four factors, while Sanyo performs particularly well in ease of operation. Sony Ericsson (712) and Samsung (703) follow in the traditional handset rankings.

The studies also find the following key wireless handset usage patterns:

The price of a traditional wireless mobile phone continues to decline and averaged $66 between July and December 2011, compared with an average of $81 during the same time period in 2010. The decline is primarily due to discounts provided by handset providers and wireless service carriers to incentivize sales. Currently, 44 percent of owners report having received a free mobile phone when subscribing to a wireless service.

Mobile applications continue to enhance the smartphone user experience. Seventy percent of smartphone owners say they have accessed social networking sites using their device. Nearly three in four (72%) say they have the ability to download and/or view video and movies, while 59 percent indicate having voice recognition and/or command dialing applications. This indicates that smartphone owners are continuing to integrate their device usage into both their business and personal lives.

Two in 10 current smartphone owners report experiencing a software or device malfunction (21%). These problems have an impact on overall satisfaction, as there is a satisfaction gap of 77 points between customers who experience software malfunctions and those who do not. Satisfaction among customers who indicate their device’s software crashes at least once a week averages only 691.

The 2012 U.S. Wireless Smartphone Customer Satisfaction Study–Volume 1 and the 2012 U.S. Wireless Traditional Mobile Phone Satisfaction Study–Volume 1 are based on experiences reported by 7,080 smartphone owners and 8,335 traditional mobile phone owners. Both studies were fielded between July and December 2011.

Nokia said on Twitter Wednesday that a second software update will roll out to Lumia 800 devices over the next two weeks. It is largely expected that the update will help fix the poor battery life that has plagued some, but not all, Lumia 800 users. Nokia has already addressed the battery issue, which limits the capacity of the battery, and has even recommended that those with the problem send their devices in for replacement phones.

[Via The Verge]

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Samsung understands that battery life is a big problem when it comes to smartphones. The company is looking to fix that, however, promising that all Samsung smartphones coming out this year will last all day on a single charge with average to moderately heavy use. “When you wake up to when you go to bed, we don’t want you feeling anxiety about your battery life,” Samsung VP of product innovation Kevin Packingham said in an interview with CNET. Motorola recently announced the DROID RAZR MAXX, a variant of the DROID RAZR featuring a massive 3,300 mAh battery. Samsung will also move to larger batteries, though the company plans to focus on optimizing different aspects of the phone as well, according to Packingham. The changes will come from the way a phone acts when searching for Wi-Fi, to the way it connects to 4G LTE networks. Packingham acknowledged that Samsung “wasn’t quite there yet,” in regards to the company’s first 4G LTE smartphone, the DROID Charge. Despite these upcoming improvements, Packingham noted that power users will always face problems with battery life.

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It has been a month and a half since Apple released its record-setting iPhone 4S and users are still plagued by a series of bugs that has made the device unusable for some. BGR was one of the first sites to report on a troubling glitch that causes audio to cut out during voice calls when using a headset, and many users continue to experience very poor battery life despite the recent iOS 5.0.1 update Apple released to address the issue. Another bug that has not been widely reported in recent weeks involves static sounds that are heard during voice calls, and the issue may be more serious than initially believed. Read on for more.

Thousands of iPhone 4S owners have taken to Apple’s support forum and other forums around the web to complain of a troublesome bug that rears its head during voice calls. According to users, the iPhone emits an annoying “static digital crackling” sound during voice calls.

“[My] wife and I upgraded to new 4s phones. When we talk to each other we both hear the static,” iPhone 4S user Robert Cantrell wrote in a thread on Apple’s support forum with nearly 600 replies. ”I tried calling her with my company blackberry and she sounded good as I did to her. We are on Verizon by the way. She called me back later on my sons Motorola phone and she sounded ok but she said I had static in my voice again.” Hundreds of posts from other users detail similar experiences across various carriers in the U.S., Canada and elsewhere.

“It doesn’t prevent me from having a conversation, but it does get annoying on a long phone call,” one user said on Apple’s support forum. Others are not so forgiving, however, and a number of users say they have returned their iPhones after several exchanges failed to resolve the issue.

While initial speculation suggested software might be to blame, recent posts in at least one thread on Apple’s forum suggest the matter could be more serious. Some users have speculated that the sound is actually caused by a hardware issue related to the embedded 3G radio in the iPhone 4S.

“It’s definitely a hardware problem,” a user wrote on Apple’s support board after performing a series of tests. ”If I use the Siri with 3G network, the noise is absolutely happened. But [if] airplane mode is ON and Wifi is also ON, there is no noise. That means a 3G module inside the iPhone 4S makes a noise. I don’t know the technical issue exactly, but the first reason is by using a 3G module.”

“With every app that requires 3G connection (have not testet [sic] WI-FI yet) the static sound appears when you hold listen on the backside (around the apple logo),” another user wrote. “This seams [sic] like the sound appears when it is connected and loads data.”

Apple has not publicly addressed the matter and BGR has been unable to reproduce the bug during tests performed with two iPhone 4S units.

Apple has reportedly delayed the release of iOS 5.0.2, German-language technology blog Macerkopf.de said on Monday. Rumors surfaced last week suggesting that Apple was preparing to release the update, which is expected to address poor battery life with iOS 5, out of the door before the end of this week. Macerkopf.de said iOS 5.0.2 has been delayed to fix “address-based memory leaks,” or bugs that cause apps to consume memory without releasing resources once they are no longer needed. A new release date for iOS 5.0.2 has reportedly not yet been scheduled.

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Apple is reportedly hard at work on a new update to its iOS operating system that will address the remaining issues users are having with battery life. German-language technology blog Macerkopf.de cites information received from an unnamed Apple software engineer in claiming that the new update, iOS 5.0.2, will be released to public before the end of next week. A more significant update, iOS 5.1, is also in the works according to the report. Apple’s first major update to iOS 5 will supposedly feature several enhancements to Siri that will give the virtual assistant access to new functions such as capturing a photograph or video, or even enabling and disabling Wi-Fi or Bluetooth. The report does not indicate when iOS 5.1 might be released to the public.

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Apple on Thursday released an update to iOS 5 that addressed issues many users were having with poor battery performance. The Cupertino, California-based company had been testing the solution for some time, even uncharacteristically reaching out to affected end-users and having them install the potential fix to test its effectiveness. Despite Apple’s determination that iOS 5.0.1 resolved issues related to battery life, however, not all users are finding that to be the case. Read on for more.

“After upgrading to 5.0.1 my iPhone is draining the battery even faster,” one user posted to Apple’s support forum. A number of other iPhone owners have taken to Apple’s forum to complain that instead of improving their battery life, iOS 5.0.1 has actually exacerbated the issue. Numerous threads can be found on Apple’s website and on other forums around the web, and some users claim to lose as much as 50% of a charge in two hours or less. Apple has not publicly addressed users’ complaints.

Apple released iOS 5 on October 12th and reports of significantly decreased battery life surfaced almost immediately. BGR has independently tested a number of handsets and while battery life does seem less impressive than it was with iOS 4, we have not found performance to be nearly as bad as many reports indicate.

Battery life with iOS 5 eating away at you? Apple’s software update, and the first update since iOS 5 was released, is finally out. Changes include improved battery performance on iOS devices, other bug fixes and changes like the return  of multitasking gestures for the original iPad, improved voice recognition, and more.

iOS 5.0.1 Software Update

This update contains improvements and other bug fixes including:

• Fixes bugs affecting battery life
• Adds Multitasking Gestures for original iPad
• Resolves bugs with Documents in the Cloud
• Improves voice recognition for Australian users using dictation

Products compatible with this software update:

• iPhone 4S
• iPhone 4
• iPhone 3GS
• iPad 2
• iPad
• iPod touch (4th generation)
• iPod touch (3rd generation)

For information on the security content of this update, please visit this website:

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1222

It’s available at the moment as an update in iTunes, it will also be available as an over-the-air update right from your device, no cables required, within a few minutes.

Apple has already released two beta versions of its iOS 5.0.1 software to developers, but now it is beginning to seed the software update to several end users through AppleSeed as well. The update is expected to offer improvements to the Siri voice engine and should address issues many users have been having with battery life. Participants who choose to test the new iOS build will not be able to revert to an earlier version after upgrading, but they will be able to upgrade to the final patch when Apple releases it in the next few weeks. Read on for more.

In addition, 9to5Mac published a memo on Tuesday that reportedly advises Apple Store employees on how to deal with customers who are complaining about battery issues. The memo, captured in a screenshot, says: “A small number of customers have reported lower than expected battery life on iOS 5 devices. If you are helping one of these customers, follow standard procedure to rule out any hardware issues with the device. If no hardware issues are found, let the customer know that Apple has found a few bugs in iOS 5 affecting battery life and Apple will release a software update to address those in a few weeks.” A screenshot of the employee memo follows below.

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Apple has just seeded iOS 5.0.1 to developers for iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad devices. Here are the changes, and most notably, Apple has confirmed that some users have experienced unideal battery life and iOS 5.0.1 should fix that:

iOS 5.0.1 beta contains improvements and other bug fixes including:

• Fixes bugs affecting battery life
• Adds Multitasking Gestures for original iPad
• Resolves bugs with Documents in the Cloud
• Improves voice recognition for Australian users using dictation
• Contains security improvements
• iOS 5.0.1 beta introduces a new way for developers to specify files that should remain on device, even in low storage situations.

We have seen a number of reports suggesting that the Apple iPhone 4S has a software bug that has resulted in poor battery life. iDownloadBlog says that adjusting the time zone settings on the iPhone might help alleviate the issue. Reportedly, a bug within iOS 5 forces the phone’s location tracking feature to remain active far more than it should, which in turn drains the phone’s battery too quickly. Users can manually turn off the automatic time zone setting by navigating to Settings > General > Date & Time and toggling “Set Automatically” to “Off.” Other users, however, have suggested that the time zone function has nothing to do with the poor battery life, which has left some people fighting to squeeze more than just a few hours of battery life from their iPhone. Apple has yet to release an official patch to address those with poor battery performance, but we suggest adjusting your time zone settings to see if that helps in the meantime. In our independent tests, we’ve found that disabling the setting does improve battery life to some degree, though none of our units were as bad as many users are reporting even with the setting enabled.

[Via PCMag]

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T-Mobile has officially announced that it is now pushing out Android 2.3 (Gingerbread) to its LG G2x customers. The update includes the following enhancements:

Improved battery life

Improved front-facing camera operation when using Qik record and share

Improved disabling Car Home

Helps address unexpected reboots.

T-Mobile confirmed the update is rolling out over the air (OTA) now, but you should be able to manually check for the software by going to Settings > About Phone > Software Update. We heard early reports that some G2x customers were experiencing a lot of bugs with their devices so we hope this update fixes most, if not all of them.
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Verizon Wireless has detailed a software update that will soon be pushed to the Motorola DROID X, thus confirming that the phone will be upgraded to Android 2.3 (Gingerbread). The update will include a number of enhancements and the more prominent ones include a new user interface, better word prediction, app grouping, an improved email application, geo-tagging support in the camera, a download manager application, auto-focus improvements for the camera in low-light conditions, and improved battery life while using Bluetooth. Phone Scoop says Verizon has confirmed it will begin pushing the Android 2.3 update to DROID X phones on May 27th.

[Via Phone Scoop]

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Barnes & Noble on Tuesday unveiled its all new NOOK eBook reader, and to say it’s an improvement over the previous-generation model is an understatement. This new version replaces the older greyscale model, not the still-young NOOK color, and it features a major improvement we probably all saw coming… a touchscreen. The eReader sports an on-screen keyboard and it also allows readers to look up words or take notes with simple taps on the beautiful E Ink display. The new NOOK features just one button compared to the Kindle’s 38, which obviously simplifies the user experience significantly. More importantly, the new NOOK can last up to two months on a single charge — double the battery life of Amazon’s Kindle. Other nifty features include a new proprietary dissolve transition that takes readers from one page to the next, and social media integration that allows users to share recommendations via Twitter, Facebook and more. Of course the new eReader also features Wi-Fi connectivity and owners can enjoy free hotspot access at all Barnes & Noble stores as well as every AT&T hotspot across the country. The new NOOK will retail for $139.99 when it becomes available on June 10th from Barnes & Noble, Best Buy and more. Pre-orders are available immediately.

According to a report from CIO, BlackBerry users who installed RIM’s latest update for the tablet’s QNX operating system are now experiencing weakened battery life. The recent 1.0.3 software update introduced BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) and video chat to the device, but it also appears to have had a substantial impact on battery life, possibly reducing it by 11% or more. RIM addressed the issue by suggesting that users accept the new license agreement for video chat, which may drain the battery if left unchecked, and the company also suggested that users fully charge and discharge the PlayBook battery several times in order to restore full function. Many users report that neither proposed solution has has an impact on the weakened battery life, however.

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