With Bluetooth OFF, Beam Receive OFF, and brightness set to 1/4 to 1/3, you're looking at anywhere from 3.5 to 5 hours. I have reached 4 and still had power. It also depends on what you're doing on it those "3.5 to 5 hours." I can use mine "often for short periods" and have plenty of juice (50% or better) after three days of "on and off;" some members on here have really complained about the "short life," however, and especially compared to PocketPC.
My solution for you would be get a cigarette lighter charger for the car, and perhaps a travel charger so you don't have to lug around a cradle. There are also "Power to Go" packs which seem quite impressive and charge the T3 twice on a charge of their own; they're rather expensive, however ($100+?). No matter what Palm PDA you have, it'll "never have enough" battery power and compared to my old M505 I'm very happy with the T3 battery.
BEST SD CARD BAR NONE, IMHO, : P A N A S O N I C.
Memory cost has dropped significantly since I paid $70 for my 256MB; if you WANT 1GB that's fine; I personally think that's an awful lot of "stuff" to risk if the card fails. I'd get two 512 MB cards or 4 256s! Whatever the size, PAY MORE FOR THE PANASONIC; you don't buy one every week. I wouldn't use a SanDisk for a toothpick. Also, make sure you get a PC Card reader, and every now and again DRAG AND DROP the SD Cards contents to the desktop and BURN A CD of it for safekeeping. Good rule of thumb is buy the next size card UP from what you think is the MAXIMUM you'd need . . . like a moron I started with a 16MB, then 32, 64 - then got smart and SKIPPED 128 . . and got a 256. That's "small" by today's popular choices - 512MB or 1GB. Just remember the T3 has to "hunt through" whatever you get. If you're talking about a lot of music, probably a 1GB would be fine. Mine's mostly for "data," and I still have 180MB left on it! Then again, I'm a "free memory" freak.
The "SD Card fix" was a download patch to fix "problems" with SD Cards and the T3. Originally it was an old M505/515 problem where they couldn't use a card larger than 64 mB, if memory serves. On a NEWER T3, I believe made after October of last year, the SD Card is fixed. If you download the patch but don't need it, you'll get a message saying that. Chances are you're fine, and if not the fix "fixes it," so that's good.
Don't be "worried" that 64MB (52 useable!!) is "not as big as the T5." There are plenty of "ways to get around" that . . . from investigating using FLASH memory to using "TealAlias" to launch apps from the card directly from the launcher (I believe there's a popular launcher that does that too; someone else can help you there) to a NEW BETA program, not out yet, that should give you 256 MB of virtual RAM or MORE on your T3.
You can get into all that after the initial purchase and getting used to the unit. Ask any questions on here and there are some INCREDIBLY well qualified folks on here that can always help you. This isn't only the BEST forum for "Palm-Speak" with the best people on it -- it's the only forum I'll even mess with any more. Haven't even looked at another Palm Forum in months.
Some developers have their OWN forums and they can be quite good . . . but I consider this "intelligence central."
