By Jo Best, 21 September 2005 16:25
NEWS Mobile TV and MP3 players are all very well, according to mobile phone users, but longer battery life is top of their feature wish-list.
A survey of global mobile users by research firm TNS found that two-thirds of phone and PDA owners said the most essential feature for a converged device is a two-day battery life span.
Consumers' love of long battery life also means they are currently reluctant to use power-hungry media applications such as games, the research found - a concern for mobile operators keen to drive use of data services.
Tacis Gavoyannis, head of technology at TNS said consumers really want to be able to travel with a phone or PDA for a couple of days without needing to pack a charger with them - and they're prepared to sacrifice playing music and the like to do it.
"It indicates where people's interest lies," he said. "[A mobile] is useless at the end of the day if it can't do what it's designed for", making voice calls.
Even in advanced markets in the Asia-Pacific region, where consumers are already comfortable with such mobile tech as 3G and mobile TV, there is still a proportion of phone owners who shun data services.
Gavoyannis said: "They need to understand how it works, how the pricing works and they need some education. But in some markets the technology doesn't make it easy."
High resolution cameras and video phones were also ranked as an "important" feature for more than half of those questioned, with 46 per cent saying they now use MMS and 23 per cent revealing they send audio or video clips.
Comments
There are 8 comments. Join the discussion
1. Karen Challinor
Throw in a waterproof coating that will survive being dropped in a sink or a fishtank, impact resistance from a height of about a metre and being stepped on resistance by a person of average weight.
Then I might think of buying one
2. James Button
Battery problems - insufficient capacity, short life, no replacement.
I avoid buying high price devices (Ipod) included as, not only is the cost of spare battery (and charger), if you can get them at all, usually near the cost of the whole device.
But - when the product is a year old you almost certainly will not be able to get a replacement battery at a reasonable cost.
(anybody want some Motorola phones - useless batteries)
So, before paying for a 'tech toy' add in the cost of a couple of spare battery packs - one for now to extend the daily use, and one for six month's time.
And don't forget to add in the means to charge it!
3. Nick Cole
Useless value added frippery is clearly not what people need. They may want it but when they understand it they realise it is unnecessary and unhelpful.
All these add on services are nothing more than a way of suppliers trying to extract money from consumers by inventing a new 'need' or must have.
Using useless or unwanted add-ons doesn't make anyone more sophisticated, especially when essentially what we want is to make a phone call! What point is there in a device that runs out of power when it is needed for its base purpose because of some minute game or impossibly small film or similar diverting someone's attention from work?
4. David Fletcher
I've got a Nokia 6230i which I think is an excellent product and would be far better if only:-
1) the case was made double it's present volume, with the extra space filled with battery. Phones are starting to get too small to use the keypad with ease anyway, and in my opinion a larger keypad would be better.
2) it were made as simple to set up email as the Motorola E680 I was using for a short while.
The E680 went back to the store in disgrace when the example I had managed to empty it's battery in about 6 hours of standby and 2 minutes of talk.
5. Jeremy Wickins
Bells and whistles are fine, but make sure the core function of a device is attended to first. Battery life is a serious problem, regardless of the appliance - the reputation of a device is very often tied up with its average time between charges. The issue with iPod batteries is a case in point. Laptop manufacturers are starting to realise this - Centrino technology is successful partly because of its relatively long battery power (even though - arguably - it still isn't long enough).
6. Paul Nash
trouble is with PDAs that run at 400MHz in order to get any sense out of WinCE.
palm OS seems to be better, running at 133 (although they are going the same way)
I've used the treo range sucessfully for a couple of years now, and battery life has never been a problem.
Spare the cpu cycles from rotating hour glasses - and battery life is bound to improve!
7. Jeremy Wickins
Further to my earlier comment, the other way of doing it is to have standard battery sizes - just like the AAA, AA, C, D cell standards for other devices. New battery technology could be accommodated that way - after all, one can get alkaline, NiCd, and NiMH in the standard sizes. That way, people can at laest have the comfort of knowing that they can buy (or borrow) a comaptible battery from somewhere. If manufacturers also made a standard charger socket in appliances, dependent on power rating, this would also make things so much more convenient. However, profit tends to win out in the short-term, so I don't expect these ideas to be taken up soon!
8. James Fletcher
I look forward to OLED deployment. The backlighting of LCD displays drains batteries.