Lest you think I’ve forgotten about the FlyBook V33i on loan from iCube, I figured a reminder might be in order. This week, I’ve focused on using the device in my daily grind and running my standard Windows XP setup; over the next few days will be "the Vista challenge". The FlyBook has performed like a champ, although it took a few days to get used to the mini-keyboard. I can’t type nearly as fast on it as I can with my full-size (but folding) Think Outside Sierra keyboard, but it comes in handy. This will definitely be a focus point in a video review because it’s something you have to see. I’ve also weaned myself off of the integrated WWAN capabilities. They work well and as advertised, but I like to take advantage of my EV-DO connection over the slower EDGE capability. PDANet and the XV6700 smartphone work as expected.
Quick update aside, one of the oft asked questions for any mobile device is: how long does the battery last? I haven’t yet run Battery Eater on the FlyBook, but I do have some useful information to share thanks to Notebook Hardware Control….
Since I received the FlyBook with both the standard and extended battery, I’ve used both in various settings. The standard battery has a capacity of 2400 mAh, while the extended unit doubles that exactly, yet isn’t physically double the size. In fact, the extended battery adds just enough space to make for a more comfortable wrist rest when using the keyboard. On the downside, the FlyBook won’t fit into the included case with the extended battery in the unit.
Another key point to remember here as I compare the power usage of the FlyBook with the Samsung Q1: the FlyBook runs the Intel Pentium M CPU which supports dynamic CPU speed switching or "speed-stepping"; this means that the CPU will run faster (and use more power) when needed, but drops to a lower power state when not. Using Notebook Hardware Control, I can actually see when the CPU jumps between 1.1 GHz clock cycles and 600 MHz:
I typically use a computing device with at least one radio one, be it WiFi, Bluetooth, or in the case of the FlyBook, the WWAN radio. This graphs shows the rough power usage of the FlyBook with WiFi on and the screen around 50% brightness:
In this usage scenario, NHC reported a battery drain around 12.5 Watts. Doing the simple math of power consumption into power capacity of the battery, NHC figures about 2 hours of battery life. My real world usage in this case comes very close to that figure, so expect 2 hours, but not much more, from the standard battery. Obviously, if you reduce the screen brightness, keep the CPU at 600 MHz, turn off WiFi, etc…you can get a little more computing time. On the flipside, adding a BT headset or keyboard, increasing screen brightness and more will decrease it. Figure two hours on average.
Next up is the same test case with the extended battery. No surprise here as the power drain is the same; the only differing factor is twice the battery capacity. I’m no mathematician, but if you double a 2-hour runtime, you should get 4 hours. ;) NHC seems to confirm that as well:
Back in June, I ran a similar test using NHC on the Samsung Q1. Unfortunately, at that time, I ran the test with WiFi off, so I re-ran it today with WiFi on to replicate the same scenario as with the FlyBook. I manually deactivated the Bluetooth radio on the Q1 and re-ran NHC with WiFi on and the screen at 50% brightness for the following result:
The Q1 shows an average drain around 9 Watts and with a slightly higher battery capacity over the FlyBook standard battery, shows around 2.5 hours of usage. My real world testing is closer to 2-hours, but of course your results may vary. One of the key difference is that the FlyBook has computing flexibility that the Q1 does not as the CPU can speed up on demand when needed. Regardless; both devices are in the 2 hour use range on standard batteries. I suspect that the FlyBook screen uses more power than the Q1 screen and also that the Q1 integrated graphics requires less power than the FlyBook’s ATI graphics modules, but these are speculations on my part.
It’s impossible to account for every usage scenario, which is why I pick the "WiFi on and screen at 50%" use case. Suffice it to say, you should get 2 hours of use with the FlyBook on a standard battery and closer to 4 with the extended; not bad for a mobile device of this size and class.
Oh, I’d be remiss in my duties if I didn’t call out the excellent job that Dialogue has done with the shortcut keys on the FlyBook! They’ve made it very easy to adjust or control any feature on the device that changes the power usage. The following items can be turned on/off or up/down as needed with the Fn key and a Function # key:
- Screen brightness
- Volume Control
- WiFi
- Wireless WAN / Cellular radio
- Bluetooth
An on-screen display appears whenever you use one of these key combos, so you always know what you just adjusted. Very nice! Thanks again to iCube for the loaner, we’re taking good care of it while we put it through the paces!




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