Is DRM sucking the life out of your MP3 player?

It's almost a given that battery life claims from manufacturers tend to be inflated. Whether you're using a digital camera or digital audio player, chances are your batteries aren't going to last quite as long as the manufacturer would like you to think. But it turns out that there may be a hidden culprit lurking inside your MP3 player, sucking the juice out of your batteries at a faster pace than you even realized: PlaysForSure DRM. According to tests conducted by CNET, strong DRM "not only slows down an MP3 player but also sucks the very life out of them." CNET found that the extra processing power required to check licenses and decode protected tracks could cut battery life by as much as 25%. In tests conducted on a Creative Zen Vision M, CNET was able to get 16 hours out of the player when listening to generic MP3s. When they switched to protected WMA tracks, battery life plummeted to 12 hours. Other PlaysForSure players had similar results. And iPod users aren't off the hook either: when playing tracks protected by Apple's FairPlay DRM, CNET found that iPod battery life declined by 8%. So, what can you do to maximize battery life? Short of moving to France, you can just rip your music from CDs, avoiding the DRM issue in the first place (or if you just love DRM, be prepared to carry extra batteries).

[Via CDFreaks]

[dutch @ Mar 16th 2006 3:26PM]

Don't forget that Apple's DRM tracks are also using AAC, a computationally heavier codec, so that could also account for it. I wonder if they compared DRM AAC against AAC or MP3

[Bennie Rutherford @ Mar 16th 2006 3:26PM]

AllOfMP3.com

[Matt @ Mar 16th 2006 3:30PM]

These are flawed tests. Compare DRM-WMA to regular WMA...not MP3. Same with FairPlay AAC - only comparisons with AAC of the same bitrate are valid.

[Jake M @ Mar 16th 2006 3:32PM]

The problem with this experiement is there is no control. They're comparing MP3's to WMA's, two completely different codecs with their own processing requirements. How obvious is it that the test should be between clean WMA's and DRM's ones?

[Trojan @ Mar 16th 2006 3:37PM]

Absolutely right Matt and Jake M.
They needed to control these tests correctly. AAC Fairplay vs. AAC (Same bitrate), and WMA without DRM vs WMA with DRM (Same bitrate).

The tests are worthless as they stand, as they're comparing different codecs.

[tiuk @ Mar 16th 2006 3:45PM]

As for over-inflated battery claims, I've always been pretty impressed with Apple's estimates. I usually do a test when I get a new MP3 player that entails putting it on shuffle and repeat, 50% volume, and just letting it play. I monitor it throughout the day and see when the battery dies. I usually get a couple hours more than Apple's estimated battery life. Of course, this is without constant track skipping or having the screen on, but overall I think their estimates are very fair.

[jon @ Mar 16th 2006 3:46PM]

well, it's nice to know that at least MP3 will use less battery power than copyrighted WMAs. which is kinda telling u at least something. it's comparing different codecs, but not completely worthless...now i know that i should convert files to mp3 and not copyprotected WMA if i want more battery.

[Steve Jobs @ Mar 16th 2006 3:50PM]

hi, i'm a troll. spam me please: [e-mail]

[Craig @ Mar 16th 2006 4:03PM]

Regardless of the tests' validity, it's a good idea to reject DRM in all its forms. Locked content is less valuable than unlocked content -- that lesson needs to be reinforced to the media/technology companies and the only way to do that effectively is to vote with your wallets.

[Rory @ Mar 16th 2006 4:04PM]

"It's almost a given that battery life claims from manufacturers tend to be inflated."

In fact, battery inflation has always been an issue with Apple. In comparison, Rio Audio used to underestimate its battery longevity on packaging and users were often pleasantly surprised to find the batteries going strong hours after the packaging noted.

Had to get that in there. ;)

[Steve Jobs @ Mar 16th 2006 4:08PM]

hi, i'm a troll. spam me please: [e-mail]

[Floyd @ Mar 16th 2006 4:35PM]

Hmm...I guess I'll stick with my iRiver IHP-140 and the ogg vorbis codec.

[zip22 @ Mar 16th 2006 4:59PM]

actually, steve, they did list the ipods battery life, and it was much more than 10 hours. i'm not sure where you're pulling that number from, buts its clearly incorrect.

you comparing players with completely different characteristics is much more irrelevant than cnet comparing mp3 to wma-drm. (comparing flash players and players with oled screens to color lcds?) and (in case you come out of bubble) the ipod video's battery is 450mah and it got 14.7 hours in cnets test. the nw-hd5 has a 880mah battery and it got 28 hours. id say that pretty good for efficiency considering the ipod's color lcd, wouldn't you? in fact, its very apparent you have no actual information regarding the effiency of the sigmatel chip or any others for that matter.

[Saif @ Mar 16th 2006 5:00PM]

Why do we need to boycott iPods if we want to boycott DRM? Just boycott the iTunes music store. I don't have a single copyprotected track in my 8,000 song music library on my iPod, and I'm doing fine. Fine with the battery life, too. If the iPod *required* the DRM, then I'd say to boycott it, but it doesn't -- nor do most PlaysForSure compatible players.

Oh, and nice job, posting as "Steve Jobs" when making an anti-Apple comment. I'm sure your comment made a lot of Mac fanatics think to themselves, "maybe I'm wrong! Maybe Apple products *do* suck, because this anonymous troll on an Engadget comment thread said so!"

If convincing people that iPods suck is your mission in life, then you seriously need to reconsider what makes one's life worthwhile.

[aetherion @ Mar 16th 2006 5:00PM]

CODECs: what everyone is saying is true. You have to do apples-to-apples comparisions. WMA vs WMA+WMDRM, AAC vs AAC+Fairplay. MP3 is by FAR the least CPU-consuming mainstream CODEC, due to it's age, less efficient compression, and popularity.

DRM: there is some battery hit mostly due to hard disk seeking to find a license to play a song. This will get better over time as companies learn tricks to optimize this process.

OGG: most inefficient CODEC to date on portable players. This will also get better over time as firmware developers get used to it...it's already come a long way and has quite a ways to go.

DRM in general: My policy is no DRM for purchased music, but DRM is ok for "rented" subscription music. I listen to unlimited songs on Napster then buy the CDs I like at a store and rip them. It's the ultimate try-before-you-buy system and I encourage others to try the same policy. Subscription+DRM really isn't all that evil.

[tp @ Mar 16th 2006 7:13PM]

ipods suck

[James Kim @ Mar 16th 2006 7:35PM]

I wrote the piece about battery life. It's true that an apples-to-apples comparison (ie WMA vs. WMA DRM) would have been more telling (and more time consuming), but my point was to prove (to those who don't know) that users will have the best shot at hitting that rated battery life by using MP3s-- and that companies should offer up a rated battery life for DRM tracks.

[Deluxe @ Mar 16th 2006 7:39PM]

James, this means two things.

1) Never under-estimate the power of nerds and their pointless banter, missing the point entirely.
2) So, get cracking! I'm waiting!

[Rick Dobbs @ Mar 16th 2006 7:47PM]

Or use Tunebite and get those DRM'd files in to MP3. That way you get to use the music that you paid for in the manner in which you see fit, not the way some company decides for you.

[u2g0d @ Mar 17th 2006 12:57AM]

I thought DRM was only about sucking my money and energy out of me (http://spaces.msn.com/umeshunni/blog/cns!E6F4034858BD6D88!189.entry?_c=BlogPart). Now I know it's also about sucking my batteries dry :-)

[binary_hero @ Mar 17th 2006 4:21AM]

The point is that DRM will drain battery life (and to a much lesser extent storage space), because you need to decrypt the file to play it. The codec only matters if you want a detailed analysis of it. Most mp3 player CPUs don't have FPU's either, which will just add to the processing time and battery drain.

[Eric @ Mar 17th 2006 8:36AM]

One type of DRM that acually saves battery life is Sony's ATRAC3. But as Matt said, you can't compare and ATRAC3 to an MP3 because the two have different bitrates.

[Trojan @ Mar 17th 2006 11:18AM]

Actually binary_hero, that's exactly what this DIDN'T Tell us.

We have no idea if the battery life difference is due to the need to decrypt the track, or if it's due to differences in the capabilities and performance of the codecs because of how the test was run.

The ONLY way to know if the extra battery consumption is due to the need to decrypt tracks, is to compare the same codecs with and without DRM at the same bitrates.

The article comes to the wrong conclusion, MP3 will give you better battery life than the DRM encumbered tracks, that is pretty much indisputable, but we don't know why.

[o rly @ Mar 17th 2006 5:27PM]

If the real James Kim is dumb enough to post here, maybe he should use that time to make a worthy review, like putting the 2 top "editor's choices" DAPs against each other in a head to head battle (iPod vs Zen Vision:M) and maybe trying to be less biased this time (compared to that pitiful Samsung YP-Z5 review). Then again, comparing an 8.0 DAP vs a 7.3 DAP makes more sense in the cnet world (iPod vs Philips GoGear HDD6330) than comparing two 8.0 DAPs.


lol @ Saif's "If convincing people that iPods suck is your mission in life, then you seriously need to reconsider what makes one's life worthwhile." yet he typed a 4+ line reply to Steve Jobs to prove an iPod's worth.

[doug @ Mar 21st 2006 4:27PM]

You guys all miss what should have been the real comparison as it is telling to know the difference between AAC, WMA, and MP3 because all mp3 players support multiple formats. The only thing that would be interesting is to make sure your comparison is similar in audio quality.
It is generally accepted that WMA and AAC at the same bitrate are about the same quality but MP3 requires higher bitrates to compare. So the truly interesting thing would be to see:

128 bit WMA (Plays for sure and unprotected)
128 bit AAC (Fairplay and unprotected)
160 bit MP3 (unprotected)

This would tell me what I should encode my music in to get max battery life at the same audio quality. My guess is that the higher bitrate required of MP3 will make is worse than Fairplay AAC and about the same as WMA.

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