Yes this has proven to be a dead end. The problem must be something else. I hope the battery life issue can be figured out soon!

Some people have it, some dont and no one seems to know what or why conclusively

thats true why some people have better battery live then others me and my friend bought the N900 as soon as it was released and my device can maximum handle 18 hours a day with a minimum usage os IM web and 3G and my friends can last double than me if he use it by the same way ! its kind strange since when i used his battery it did the same only 18 hours so what the heck is wrong the only difference is that mine is US version his is middle east version !

IM should not need 3G on to work perfectly well.

I get a full day if I set the phone to 2G or am on wifi most of the time. Naturally it all depends very much on what you do. I use gtalk, ovi, skype and msn. With 3G I get 8 - 12 hours. But as I said it all depends on how much I use the device. I usually put it on charge when I have the chance (if it's 50% or less), so I don't have to worry if I need to do something battery heavy in the evening.

Some IM protocols are far more 'chatty' than others. I woud also suspect that the number of contacts being monitored and relative traffic too. Unless there is a very contrived and controlled test environment I think the best we can hope for is improvements in usage fro each protocol.

Guys, I am sorry to ask such a silly question but I've had enough...I've been looking for the past hour for the way to manually switch between 2G and 3G but I can't find it...and I am sure I saw it VERY recently!

GAR someone end my suffering plzzzz

Thanks

My N900 is always online - period! Right now I've got 8 IM and VoIP accounts defined:

2 SIP Accounts
1 Skype Account
3 Jabber/Gtalk Accounts
1 Yahoo
1 MSN (Haze)

And it is always on all of them. The time I get is about this:

3G/3..5G: About 8-10 hours or so
2G/2.5G: About 18-24 hours
Wifi (w. powersavings): About 24-30 hours

My normal config is to run 3G (I get too many missed calls when on Edge) with automatic shift to Wifi if available - and that usually does result in a full day battery.

It's an app.
3G/2G/Dual Mode Selection Applet

Haha I found it about 3 seconds before you posted that. Thanks a lot mate ^^

My battery life with IM activated is so much less then w/o.
I'm getting around 6 hours with 3/3.5G and IM.
With only 3/3.5G and w/o IM I'm getting around 12 hours.