Hardware Does your 3DS battery last long?

[TankedThomas]

I'm not going to make this a poll, but I'm genuinely interested in how people have found their 3DS battery life. Mine started off pretty good where I got about four hours out of it before it became low power, but then just yesterday, I played for about two hours straight (I was playing Four Swords, so it wasn't even a 3DS game nor in 3D, although I did have the brightness right up, but the audio was also off 90% of the time) and it shut itself off suddenly.

The first problem for me was simply.... wait, two hours? That's ridiculous. It wasn't in 3D, and it was only a DSiWare game. Has anyone else had such a shocking battery life occurrence?

The second problem was the light on the console. So it indicates if you have a low battery. I was pretty sure I didn't see it change colour, but then I realised that the palm of my hand was completely covering it, because the lights are in the stupidest place, compared to the other DS systems and Game Boys that put them elsewhere. Even if it had changed colour, I wouldn't have seen it. This also brings me to the stupid DS Expansion Slide Pad. Won't that thing do that same as my palm and cover up the lights? That'd be bloody helpful. Not.

Has anyone else had similar problems or am I just unlucky? I guess I just want to know if the 3DS "sucks" more than people originally thought (and I still quite like it, even if I'm looking forward to the Vita more and would rather play PS3).

 

[azure0wind]

nope, my 3DS become low-battery when i play like 3-4 hours.
my palm never covered the light before, and i always set the brightness to 2, or 3, also i dont think the sound might affect the battery life :/

 

[Fyrus]

I only have that problem when I have my DSTWO in my 3DS.
Otherwise, it lasts a good 6-7 hours.

There's also a light for notifications when your battery's about to do down, It's the same used for Spot/Street pass notifications, and it flashes orange quickly.

 

[TankedThomas]

I think my notification light is broken somehow because it barely ever lights up. Very rarely has it ever lit up for SpotPass, and never for StreetPass, but it most certainly didn't blink.

Also, the sound does affect the battery life. How significantly though, I'm not sure. It seems my battery has just suddenly got worse though. It never used to be that bad. My eyes aren't great though, so higher brightness usually helps. I did have it on 3 or 4 at one stage though. I don't know why I felt the need to turn it back up.

 

[chris888222]

My battery generally lasted:
4 - 5 1/2 hours in 3D
6 - 7 hours in 2D
4 - 6 hours playing on my supercard.

Yeah, the supercard is a general battery sapper.

BTW - my wireless is always on, brightness at 1 or 2, PSM on

 

[HeyItzRayy]

my battery life is pretty decent I guess. But I dont have any 3D Games. So yea..

 

[KidIce]

I use "full" settings at all times: 5 screen brightness, max 3D, no power saving mode, etc. I've never had my 3DS battery fail after only 2 hours from a full charge even playing SSF4 or LoZoT. I also don't ever turn my 3DS off unless I have to (i.e it crashed).

I DO shut off my wireless when it's not likely to be useful. Sitting at my desk at work is not EVER going to score me a Street Pass hit, for example.

What firmware are you running? The latest update is far better on the battery if your have wireless enabled all the time than previous versions.

 

[Weaselpipe]

I find that I get quite good battery life when playing in general- there are exceptions though.
DSiWare- though a normal DS cart gives me 6+ hours before a red light starts to alert me, Shantae and 4 Swords give me about 3
GB Virtual Console- similar to DSiWare, the ambassador games are ok but an hour of Mario Land 2 took my full battery to half.
I rarely play with the 3D on now, I tend to use it for the initial play of a game then have it in 2D after (I like to have it in 2D on the menu, as I tend to be looking at it from all sorts of angles unless I am playing a game, then I forget to whack it back up). In comparison to the PSP1000 the battery life is great

Just out of curiosity, how do you hold your 3DS?! Nintendo gave you an annoying flashy red light just above the right hand side of the touch screen- when that starts to go I have got at least 5 minutes out of it before getting to the charger- are you sure there wasn't some sort of glitch? There are 2 low battery indicators!

 

[joeylamngam]

My settings playing 3DS games:

-Brightness: 2
-Power saving mode: Off
-3D: On all the time
-Wireless: On/Off depending on game

I've been playing OoT3D for awhile now and I'm using these settings, I manage to get almost 5 hours of playtime, without interruptions.

 

[joeylamngam]

I find that I get quite good battery life when playing in general- there are exceptions though.
DSiWare- though a normal DS cart gives me 6+ hours before a red light starts to alert me, Shantae and 4 Swords give me about 3
GB Virtual Console- similar to DSiWare, the ambassador games are ok but an hour of Mario Land 2 took my full battery to half.
I rarely play with the 3D on now, I tend to use it for the initial play of a game then have it in 2D after (I like to have it in 2D on the menu, as I tend to be looking at it from all sorts of angles unless I am playing a game, then I forget to whack it back up). In comparison to the PSP1000 the battery life is great

Just out of curiosity, how do you hold your 3DS?! Nintendo gave you an annoying flashy red light just above the right hand side of the touch screen- when that starts to go I have got at least 5 minutes out of it before getting to the charger- are you sure there wasn't some sort of glitch? There are 2 low battery indicators!

I think we all have got 2 red flashing LED's. Right corner of the hinge and bottom one

Edit: forgot to answer ur question lawl...

Well, kinda hard to explain but I hold it in my palms as of a console controller, with the exception of my pointy fingers sometimes. I either have them behind the screen on the L and R triggers, or they're placed on the screen's sides, for help supporting uhm... lawl...
Just realised that they're only on the sides for comfort purposes.

 

[TankedThomas]

I always have the latest firmware updates installed on my devices. My SpotPass/StreetPass light doesn't often come on though, as I said. I have noticed it flashing on low power once before, but this time it didn't. My hand only covers the bottom lights. I still think they're badly placed though. I haven't tried playing it heaps since then, so I can't say if it was an anomaly or not. It probably was.

I don't play in 3D much, but that's because I leave Dead or Alive in there and just play a little bit every now and then, sometimes when I'm watching a video, so it's too hard for me to jump between 2D and 3D without screwing with my eyes and giving me a headache. Sometimes I use the 3D though. I also keep my wireless on all the time. I have no real reason to turn it off.

 

[Zarxrax]

My 3DS has about 300 hours of use on it. I haven't ran out of battery, or even ran low on battery (to the point of getting the red light) even once.
But I also never play for more than a couple hours at a time.

 

[andre0407]

On DS mode using my r4i gold, it takes about half my battery life at the 3.5 hour mark into playing.

Running a 3DS game generally takes half my battery life at 2.5 hours, more or less.

I generally set the brightness to the lowest, use a pair of headphones and if I don't have to, I turn the wireless switch off.

So generally yes, no problems for me; but you can always get the Nyko Power Pak+ or Dreamgear's Power case for your power woes, I guess?

 

[Sick Wario]

the 3ds battery lasts about 3h using ds download play