MacOSG: iPhone usage stats problem
Posted by Dave Merten 
May 17, 2008 at 1:22am
Recently, we ran a story on optimizing an iPhone’s battery life. One of the tips was to monitor your battery usage. I went to check mine the other day and all I could see was ”-” for readings, as in the picture below. Underneath it reads, “Usage times will be shown after iPhone is fully charged.” Well, I had just got done charging my iPhone and it was fully charged. So why wasn’t I getting any readings?
I went and done some research and found the following post at Apple Discussions with a solution.
erugalatha states, “I was having problems where the iPhone usage stats (Usage & Standby only) would reset to a ”-” and I would get the message “Usage times will be shown after iPhone is fully charged.” Sometimes only minutes after I had fully charged the phone the usage & standby would go blank and I’d get that message – sometimes after a day or so it would disappear. I was also getting poor battery charge longevity … only about 2.5 days.
So I might have found a resolution but what I did was.
1. Let your iPhone battery drain until it turns off and gives you the connect to power icons.
2. Turn on the phone a few times while it’s completely drained so the icon appears and disappears again after a while (not sure if this is necessary, but it completely drains the battery).
3. Plug your iPhone into the AC charger (NOT USB) power and leave it charge. It will turn on and buzz after a while and you should have it set so it goes into standby and the phone is on but screen is off.
4. Leave it to fully charge until your green battery icon kind of has a glow off it (please apple give us a percentage or something so it’s easier to see it’s full)
5. After it’s fullt charged, unplug it.
6. Now, plug it back in.
7. Turn the phone off and charge it for an additional one hour while the phone is completely off. No large green battery on screen – phone completely off.
8. Use your phone see if it fixed.
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Dave Merten Says:
A Li-ion battery can go into a state that is known as “deep discharge.” At this point, the battery may take a very long time to recharge though. For example, a laptop battery that normally charges fully in 3 hours may take up to 42 hours to recharge. Also, all Li-ion battery systems are equipped with a circuit that shuts down the system when the battery is discharged below the predefined threshold, thus preventing damage.
I always charge my iPhone via USB. I sync it quite a bit with different video and podcast media, so I just leave it plugged it to charge. But it is good advice to recharge before the battery is totally dead.
My 19 mo. old MBP has 329 recharge cycles on it and has over 60% battery capacity left. I normally recharge when I get the warning that the battery will be dead in a few minutes.
Posted on May 18, 2008
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Dave Merten
Dave was one of the founding guides at ‘The Mining Company,’ now known as About.com, in February 1998. Dave was their ‘Focus on Mac Support’ guide. In 2004 he started ‘G5 Owners Support Group,’ and in 2005, renamed it ‘Mac Owners Support Group.’ In 2006, he started the ‘MacOSG Support Corner’ column here at Macsimum News.
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daPrinz Says:
I had once the same issue. It happened if I charged the iPhone while it was off. It doesn’t happen if you keep it on (at least mine). I never charge it via USB, so I can’t say if that has an effect.
One thing that I know for sure is that you should NEVER EVER (N E V E R)
drain the battery to the point that it shuts itself off!
It may have worked with older batteries but for the new generation Ion-batteries this and high heat levels means death!
Charge you phone immediately after the 20% warning!!!
Posted on May 17, 2008