Another Reason To Hate DRM - Shorter Battery Life

Michael Santo of RealTechNews writes:

Naturally, battery life is a big issue when looking at an MP3 player, whether it be the ubiquitous iPod or something else. Another big issue of late has been DRM, as noted during the Sony debacle. An article by MP3 Insider digs deep into battery life, and comes up with something that probably should have been obvious, but slipped past most of us… tracks encoded with DRM drain your battery faster.

It makes sense. There has to be software checking the DRM, and that means more CPU power used. For example, in the article:

The Archos Gmini 402 Camcorder maxed out at 11 hours, but with DRM tracks, it played for less than 9 hours. The iRiver U10, with an astounding life of about 32 hours, came in at about 27 hours playing subscription tracks. Even the iPod, playing back only FairPlay AAC tracks, underperformed MP3s by about 8 percent. Source: MP3 Insider

We Say: I didn’t need another reason to hate DRM, but there you go!

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[tags]ipod,mp3,drm,realtechnews,michael santo[/tags]