Backup battery

[FieldDoc]

Hi,
What is the average lifespan of one? I have had my Axim since Friday but the backup battery has gone from 100% yesterday to 90% this morning. The main battery is fully charged and I make sure it always is. The unit hasn't been on for more than 4 hours or so I guess.
Is this just a crap battery estimate or do these batteries just not last very long?

[PotPie]

FieldDoc,

I've had my Axim since early December and I am still using the original backup battery. The backup battery meter does move around quite a bit. In fact, mine will go from 100% to 80% rapidly, but then will go back to 100%. You may be able to find more posts on the subject by doing a search. It seems like this has come up before and from what I remember, all Axim users, myself included, have the same issue with the backup battery.

Enjoy your Axim!

[GoldKey]

Second PotPie's answer. Just don't worry about it unless it starts consistently staying below say 60%.

[FieldDoc]

Thanks guys, I thought it was a bit strange for a cell battery to deplete so quickly

[PetiteFlower]

yeah it seems that they are not at 100% charge when they ship. Personally though I don't think it's that big of a deal.

[etalianstallion]

I had the same problem before where the back-up battery fluctuates between 80% and 100%. However, in the last week, it's gone all the way down to 10%, and it is now at 0%!!! I performed a soft-reset and it went back up to 80%, and about an hour later, I got the pop-up warning message telling me that it is critically low. I checked the level again and it is back down at 0%.

Is this a glitch? I am quite diligent in keeping my Axim charged on a daily basis and have never reached below 20% on the main battery. Anyone else see this happening? If not, I guess I should call in and get a replacement unit sent out to me. This would be my second replacement (the first one was for a defective d-pad).

[etalianstallion]

I just saw the other thread about the back-up battery, basically saying that it drains if you let the main battery level go too low. How low can the main battery go before I should start worrying about my back-up battery draining?

[PetiteFlower]

You don't need a new unit, just get a new backup battery. You can get them at Radio Shack for like $5.

And I think 20% charge is low enough to start draining the backup.

[etalianstallion]

Thanks for the advice.

I'm still not sure what role the back-up battery plays here in the Axim. From what I understand, the back-up battery should only be used to keep your data in the memory when the main battery runs out, but it should not be used to power the PPC when the main battery is running low. In that case I would expect the PPC to warn my when my main battery is getting low, and just shut off when the main battery is completely out. The back-up battery should then just keep the data intact.

Is this a correct assumption? I'd appreciate any information.