Kevin Tofel has just completed a well executed battery life test on the Q1 and Q1P (Pentium.) Remember that a few weeks ago he ran a similar test and got some interesting results which resulted in the assumption that Samsung might have updated the Q1P since its launch. Kevin proved that he had a brighter screen and better battery life results than other Q1P owners.
The results show a 25% difference under full-load conditions which equates to about 4W of drain difference. Its likely (although still not confirmed by Samsung which I find amazing) that the screen in the Q1P is a LED backlit unit now, just like the Q1B which has the VIA processor.
So is the Q1B still better for battery life? Unfortunately the same test scenario on a Q1B doesn’t work (the MaxBattery software crashes) so a direct comparison is not possible. However, there’s one result that was posted by Matt Propst on his blog that gives a clue. His test was a high-load test and he got 171 minutes battery life. (2hrs 51 Minutes.) My estimate would be that under similar conditions, the Q1B would reach 150 minutes.
- Q1 – 93 minutes
- Q1P – 116 minutes
- Q1B – 150 minutes (estimated)
But how about under ‘real’ conditions. Under real conditions the effect of the processor is reduced to a smaller percentage of overall drain. In this scenario the screen can take 50-75% of the drain. What I suspect you’ll see is that the Q1P and Q1B will be much closer. The Q1P giving about 3 hours and the Q1B about 3.3hrs. Summary:
- Q1b. Long battery life. No CF slot. Mono speaker. Weaker processor than Intel. (VIA C7) 40GB/512MB $899
- Q1P. Medium battery life. Stereo speakers CF Slot. Good performance processor.(Intel Pentium) 60/1024 $1249
- Q1. Short battery life. Stereo speakers. CF Slot. Better performance processor. (Intel Celeron) 40/512 $999
Prices from cdw.com
