iPod battery life? 8-9 hours on Gen5, normal?

I bought a 5th Gen 30 GB iPod in November of last year, and after about a month I realised that the battery didn't seem to be lasting as long as they claimed it would (14 hours). So I took it back to the store, and after about 4 weeks (Christmas/New Year holiday season of course) I got a brand new iPod back with some notes from the tech who looked at it saying they replaced it.

Now I've had my new one for about two months, and today is the first day I've really been able to listen to it continuously with few interruptions (usually I'd only listen for 30 mins to an hour or so) and it seems that this new one is also only lasting for 7-8 hours, or about 100 songs.

Is this normal, or should I take this second one back too?

 

I have a 30GB one also and the battery is acting the same way as yours, always has. I know a few people who also have one and theirs all do the same thing. I think Apple just over-exaggerated the advertised expected battery life saying it's 14 hours..because out of probably six people including myself that I know who have used these, all have similar results, 8-9 hours max. That's music only, no video. I don't think there's anything wrong with yours I think it's just the unfortunate reality that that's all we're going to get from these things. Sad.

 

So 14 hours is only if you have your volume turned down to 'just audible' with the backlight turned off the entire time you are using the device?

They really should not be advertising battery life in terms of 'special conditions' but rather the conditions that any normal person would actually use it for.

 

I agree, but of course they are going to sell more units by advertising that way! It's a cruel world we live in.

 

Turning the hold switch on will also help battery life while you are listening to it.

 

Very true! Nobody else advertises like them, and that's why they dominate the MP3 Player market! And advertising the absolute highest possible battery life is going to help them out even if they don't disclose all the "settings" you have to have to get that battery life.

 

For them to be the true average, 50% of ipods would need to have longer batteries life and 50% to have shorter.

So far, every iPod mentioned in this thread has been on the lower side (30-50% lower than stated) which tends to indicate that this isn't an average at all, but a number they pulled out of thin air.

As for marketing being the only reason I bought the iPod - no. I looked at 6 or 7 different mp3 players in total and the iPod was the only one that had a decent price combined with high capacity, small size and good battery life. Battery life was part of the consideration, and the fact that apple have grossly misrepresented the actual battery life of the product annoys me more than just a little bit.

 

I agree, I got mine as a gift, I probably would not have bought it for myself but it does annoy that it's such a big difference in advertised vs. actual bettery life. Very frustrating!

 

Every advertised battery length for any product [laptops and other mp3 players] is going on minimum battery consumption. I don't hold Apple responsible for advertising the maximum battery life.

 

Apple saying they state the average battery life of 14 hours really is an average. It's just an average of numerous iPod 5G battery life on the settings Apple specifies. I understand where you're all coming from but it's just good business tactics and every company manufacturing something with a rechargable battery does it [laptops, mp3 players, cell phones et cetera...]

 

Exactly, that's why they are so successful!

 

I meant that they are so successful because of their smart advertising.