iPhone: The Missing Manual

Usage

In the months before the iPhone was released, Apple watchers whipped themselves into a frenzy of speculation about the iPhone's battery life. Wi-Fi, videos, Internet, cellphone calls—that's a lot of drain on a slim little internal battery. How would it do?

You probably already know the official Apple battery-life statistics: 8 hours of talking, or 6 hours of Internet, or 24 hours of music playing, and so on. But you don't have to trust Apple's figures, thanks to the handy built-in battery-life calculator shown here.

• Time since last full charge. The Usage readout shows, in hours and minutes, how much time you've spent using all iPhone functions (although it's not broken down by activity, alas). Standby is how much time the iPhone has spent in sleep mode, awaiting calls.

  Note

  The iPhone resets the Usage and Standby counters to zero each time you fully charge the battery.

• Call Time. These two statistics tell you how much time you've spent talking on the iPhone, broken down by Current Period (that is, during this AT&T billing month) and in the iPhone's entire existence. That's right, folks: For what's probably the first time in history, a cellphone actually keeps track of your minutes, to help you avoid exceeding the number you've signed up for (and therefore racking up 45-cent overage minutes).

• EDGE Network Data. These tallies indicate how much you've used the Internet, expressed as ...