Stupidiest BB Feature: No calling when battery <10%

**PhillyM** · 04-19-2010, 05:43 AM

Hi people,

I have a 9700 and one of the 'features' of this BB is that it automatically blockes calling or any networkrelated functions when the battery is under 10% (or was it 5%?), probably to save the battery.

Now, this is the most stupid thing of the BB. Why do people have a phone? To communicate, to call, to text etc. THIS SHOULD BE THE LAST THING ONE CAN DO WITH A PHONE. Why does BB turn all this off when the battery droppes under 10%? Shouldn't the possibility to call be the most important feature of a phone and therefor the last one to survive? What does RIM expect the user to do with his/her phone when it droppes to the critical <10%? Play some games? Scroll through the menu? Write some memo's? Pfff, it's ridiculous.

Is there a way to turn this feature off?

regards

**F0nage** · 04-19-2010, 05:57 AM

I guess you can still use the address book and get a number to use on another phone before yours dies, plus you can still send BBM and email?

I don't know because I didn't see this feature yet on my handset.

**PhillyM** · 04-19-2010, 05:59 AM

i believe you cannot send bbm and email, because the networkconnection is shut down.
browsing thru contacts could be a reason yes, but why from 10% or 5% down, way too much

**pilsbury** · 04-19-2010, 06:02 AM

I doubt if there's a way to disable it. Im sure its a hardware feature designed as some kind of safety feature. I do know that it's not good for your battery to let it drain completely out, it weakens it. I believe you can still make an emergency call with it that low though.

**fatboy97** · 04-19-2010, 06:36 AM

It's there so you don't damage your battery... if you run these battery completely dry it damages them - Severely!!! If you damage them that severely they will Never be the same again and it will go downhill from there. Best thing to do is to keep them as charged as possible and if you really need to you might consider carrying an extra fully charged battery with you at all times... or a car charger, or plug your device in where ever you go.

**NozGT** · 04-19-2010, 06:39 AM

dial 911 this automatically activates the radio, then u can make calls, that's what i always do, try that see if it works.

**lush242000** · 04-19-2010, 07:20 AM

I don't recall what it is, but there is a free program that will let you bypass this rule.

**infinus** · 04-19-2010, 07:28 AM

Originally Posted by PhillyM

Hi people,

I have a 9700 and one of the 'features' of this BB is that it automatically blockes calling or any networkrelated functions when the battery is under 10% (or was it 5%?), probably to save the battery.

Now, this is the most stupid thing of the BB. Why do people have a phone? To communicate, to call, to text etc. THIS SHOULD BE THE LAST THING ONE CAN DO WITH A PHONE. Why does BB turn all this off when the battery droppes under 10%? Shouldn't the possibility to call be the most important feature of a phone and therefor the last one to survive? What does RIM expect the user to do with his/her phone when it droppes to the critical <10%? Play some games? Scroll through the menu? Write some memo's? Pfff, it's ridiculous.

Is there a way to turn this feature off?

regards

Their exist a gsm/cdma radio through which data/voice transmission is done
Now.....
They emit low wavelength radiation while using radio....
And as you know BB's are always on devices ( you do not manually connect call/data, like in Nokia ).....

Now at very low battery more power is consumed to maintain stable connection....
And as a result more radiation is emitted.....
Again this is very harmful....
Since BB are always on....
Radiation exposure is more....

So,
To avoid this situation....
Radio is switched off after a certain level of battery falls.

Hope it helps

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

**amlongclan** · 04-19-2010, 07:33 AM

There is a program called force radio on I believe

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

**canusaybimmy** · 04-19-2010, 08:09 AM

Originally Posted by amlongclan

There is a program called force radio on I believe

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

+1 I believe I've seen this before.

**FreshThePoet** · 04-19-2010, 10:55 AM

What if you got kidnapped and you need to call someone but can't cause of that? Do you take one for the team?

**pltan75** · 04-19-2010, 11:23 AM

Originally Posted by FreshThePoet

What if you got kidnapped and you need to call someone but can't cause of that? Do you take one for the team?

No... Watch for BlackBerry to have integrated tasers soon! Woohoo...sadly after two shocks the battery is drained below 10% .... So back to square one

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

**Pete6** · 04-19-2010, 11:34 AM

I always though that this was a really usefule and well thought out feature of BlackBerrys. It has been in there since my old 7290.

It means that the phone won't just shut off. Instead it degrades gracefully. After all, you only have to manage the phone and your self to keep the battery reasonably charged on a daily basis. I hnestly cannot remember the last time I ran my battery flat. It must have been years ago.

I keep a charger and a micro-USB cable in my car and a micro-USB cable un my briefcase so I can grab a charge if I need it but mostly I charge at night and that's me good for the next day.

**ridesno159** · 04-19-2010, 11:36 AM

Originally Posted by FreshThePoet

What if you got kidnapped and you need to call someone but can't cause of that? Do you take one for the team?

Originally Posted by NozGT

dial 911 this automatically activates the radio, then u can make calls

That's another reason why you should always keep your BB charged though. You never know when you might get kidnapped and need to use the phone.

**nutter426** · 04-19-2010, 11:36 AM

It basically puts it in flight mode, you can still open received emails and create replies, and make appointments in your calendar. You could always turn it off completely if you want.
For the record its 5% for radio shut off

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

**Sihanling** · 04-19-2010, 11:47 AM

Originally Posted by PhillyM

Hi people,

I have a 9700 and one of the 'features' of this BB is that it automatically blockes calling or any networkrelated functions when the battery is under 10% (or was it 5%?), probably to save the battery.

Now, this is the most stupid thing of the BB. Why do people have a phone? To communicate, to call, to text etc. THIS SHOULD BE THE LAST THING ONE CAN DO WITH A PHONE. Why does BB turn all this off when the battery droppes under 10%? Shouldn't the possibility to call be the most important feature of a phone and therefor the last one to survive? What does RIM expect the user to do with his/her phone when it droppes to the critical <10%? Play some games? Scroll through the menu? Write some memo's? Pfff, it's ridiculous.

Is there a way to turn this feature off?

regards

Totally draining a battery weakens and destroys it. Here is the part that many people don't know

Modern smartphones never run their battery completely dry.

They all shut off with 5% or 10% of total charge still left in them. You just are never told you have that much left.

What most phone companies do is they program the phone to shut down when it reaches say a relative 10% or less. However the phone tells you the battery is at 0% which is again a relative value.

The designers scale the phone battery meter to show you a value relative to what the designers know the phone electronics can truly run at before low voltages start currupting data or damaging other sensitve electronics.

Low voltages are actually quite harmful.

So you could in lay mans speak say that these phones "lie" to you about how much power is in the battery.

Well at least RIM is honest... your actually getting a true percentage and not a relative one.

Maybe they should do what the other companies do and just "lie" about whats actually in the battery. LOL

When I fully charged my old symbian phone, I was electrically only able to use 92% (of the the 1000mA 4.3Volt battery) but that 92% is indicated as 100%

This is a sort of user power range. The rest belongs to the device.

Anyway, the phones normally go into a sleep mode when they shutdown on low battery. The CPU is still running, the RAM is still active and the clock and organiser data is still active.

The phone wakes up again when you plug in the charger but you never have to press the power button of the phone. Ever notice that ?

As for not being able to make calls... you can't do that with any smart phone once it reaches true 10%. The voltage and current delivery capacity of the battery is simply too low. Smart phones are too power hungry to give you abosulte battery access.

**Pete6** · 04-19-2010, 11:56 AM

^^^ this is true. When the battery gets to about 10% any power surge will result in the voltage dropping. This results in the phone behaving erratically.

RIM were very smart to shut off the radio at the 10% point in order to avoid this.

**mi_canuck** · 04-19-2010, 12:14 PM

can it be modified (the radio shut-off)... to say 2% ?

**F0nage** · 04-19-2010, 12:39 PM

Originally Posted by Sihanling

Totally draining a battery weakens and destroys it. Here is the part that many people don't know

Modern smartphones never run their battery completely dry.

They all shut off with 5% or 10% of total charge still left in them. You just are never told you have that much left.

Except for my Nokia 5800 which just drops dead suddenly, like when you're expecting an alarm for an important appointment! It runs the battery totally dead. Very uncool. I prefer RIM's approach although I plug it in whenever I'm near my desk so I don't usually have problems.

**Sihanling** · 04-19-2010, 03:48 PM

Originally Posted by F0nage

Except for my Nokia 5800 which just drops dead suddenly, like when you're expecting an alarm for an important appointment! It runs the battery totally dead. Very uncool. I prefer RIM's approach although I plug it in whenever I'm near my desk so I don't usually have problems.

There are some firmware issues with the 5800 and its little brother the 5530.

**Sihanling** · 04-19-2010, 03:50 PM

Originally Posted by mi_canuck

can it be modified (the radio shut-off)... to say 2% ?

Doing this will corrupt your data and may damage your phone... I doubt anyone in their right mind would even program an app to do this. Who'd want to ***up their phone ?

**Pannenkoeken1** · 04-19-2010, 04:02 PM

Well this is not true because I tried to call while having 5 percent left and it worked. The signal only stops at 1 percent.

**M00k** · 04-19-2010, 04:06 PM

I prefer to think of it as gaining 5% extra battery for still being able to access your data rather than losing 5%. It's much better than having the whole thing power off and totally unusable.

I mean, can you honestly say you actually know how long 5% battery lasts, enough to miss it? (The answer is obviously no, because battery usage varies...)