Has Skype fixed its power problem?

Glen Campbell — Mon, 16 Aug 2010 15:36:05 +0000

I see that Skype has updated its iPhone application this morning. The app had been updated to run on iOS4 and support background operation (i.e., being able to stay running and receive calls while in the background), but had reportedly caused serious power consumption problems. In my own personal test, with Skype alone running in the background, my battery went from 100% to 73% in a little under an hour—with the power plugged in! Obviously, this really made background operation unfeasible, and many people like myself avoided it.

The new version (2.1.1) makes no mention of the power issue in the release notes, but it does mention these new features:

You can now disable IM alerts
The dialpad is now more responsive (ed: I wonder what that means?)
The behavior of the volume, when Skype interacts with other apps, is better
When your status is set to Do Not Disturb, notifications are not shown when the app is running in the background.

I suppose its possible that these may have addressed the power consumption issue, and a brief (30 minute) test this morning did not show any unusual power drop while running Skype in the background, so it’s possible this may have been fixed as a bug.

I plan on running Skype in the background today, so I can give you a full update later.

I think it’s worth pointing out that Skype is not really focusing on its iPhone app. If you visit the main Skype site (link above) and click the “Go mobile” link, you’re treated to a page discussing Verizon, Blackberry, and Android 3G. There’s a small button at the bottom of the page for “Other mobile solutions” that takes you to a page where you can choose Skype for either iPhone or Symbian. In addition, Skype has been extremely slow (compared to other app developers) in responding to iOS updates and hardware changes such as the new iPhone 4.

Glen Campbell » skype

Has Skype fixed its power problem?