The inquirer has an interesting comment on UMPC battery life today.
They talk about the 7″ screens from the automotive world and they say that the backlight on these LCD screens is responsible for 30 minutes of battery life.
That equates to 2-3 watts which is about right I think based on our tests and predictions. In fact, in an idle UMPC (lets say for example, while e-book reading) the backlight would account for 30-40% of the power drain and would lengthen the battery life of the device by over an hour to 4 hours.
The best bit of the story is that they think that the power-hungry ‘Cold Cathode Fluorescent’ backlight, will be replaced by very low power LEDs before the end of the year. Sounds good to me! Every little bit helps to keep the ‘Carrypad’s Law’ of battery life on track.
power requirements of mobile devices will reduce by 20% a year - Carrypad.
This equates to the following max battery life figures:
- 2006 - Average UMPC life 4 hours
- 2007 - Average UMPC life 4.8 hours
- 2008 - Average UMPC life 5.75 hours
- 2009 - Average UMPC life 6.9 hours
- 2010 - Average UMPC life 8.3 hours.
For more info on the predictions (and more LCD power-saving technology), see this article.
Regards
Steve / Chippy.
