“You can easily expect the battery to last for at least a week.”
Talk time is an important factor while buying any cellphone. You don’t
want your phone dying on you within a few hours, especially during critical
situations or when you’re on the move and don’t have a charging point around.
This is a common problem with many smartphones – you have to charge the handset
at least once (or even twice) a day to keep it alive. The latest trend in the
budget phones segment is the emergence of “Long Battery Life” phones. These are
essentially conventional low-cost Java phones that have been around for a long time,
but with heavy duty batteries. The average battery rating of a candybar phone
is around 1000 mAh and cellphone companies claim you’d get around 6 to 8 hours
of talk time. With a bit of music listening, FM radio, gaming and shooting
photos, you can expect around 3 to 4 hours of talk time. Long battery life
phones are on the heavier side due to the high-capacity batteries they use. The
handsets weigh anywhere between 120 to 140 grams and the weight of the battery alone
is around 50 grams. In this case, the battery rating is a whopping 2,500 mAh –
that’s 2.5 times the average battery rating and the promised talk time is up to
a staggering 18 hours! I had recently gone on a long road trip and I found it a
perfect chance to put one of the long battery phones we got for review through
a gruelling test. Between the iBall Shaan and Sict iV171, I chose to take the
latter because it was lighter (121 g versus 138 g), its battery had a higher
rating (3,000 mAh versus 2,300 mAh) and the FM antenna was built-in. The iball Shaan
carries a price tag of 53.895 $ and the Sict iV171 is slightly more affordable at
41.315 $. I had kept the handset on charge the night before the trip and by
early morning, it was good to go. I had carried the device’s data cable with a
proprietary connector should the battery die within a week’s time. I used it to
make and receive a few calls, send a few messages, listen to the radio for an
hour or so every day, and I never switched off the handset nor did I switch to
flight mode. On the third day, the battery was 65 percent and to my amazement
it was still alive and kicking at 30 percent after an entire week. It took another
two days to drain the battery completely. What I found most annoying was the ringtone
volume – at full volume, you’ll get angry stares from everyone around
you and even at the lowest volume it’s distractingly
loud. To top this, you get only three built-in lousy ringtones. The user
interface is quite good, however, there’s plenty of room for improvement. The
dictionary also isn’t as efficient as the T9 dictionary; there were plenty of commonly
used words that weren’t recognized. The phone was nice and shiny before the
trip, but on return, there were faint scratches on the screen and the glossy
shell. All in all, the Sict iV171 is a great package for its price. Wish Nokia had
a long battery life phone to offer!
