Preserving Battery Life

[WozzaTT]

It seems that one of the biggest drains on the battery is apps synchronising constantly but I'm still confused as to how to set the phone up with this in mind! Should Background data be switched off?! What's the difference between Background data and Auto-sync in settings? Which should be on, or should both be off?

I guess what I'm ideally looking for is one button I can press on my Homescreen which will sync everything when I want it to, say a couple of times a day. I'm thinking gmail, news and sports updates, weather, that sort of thing.

Or am I being too fussy? It seems a shame to have such a clever phone but have to have everything switched off because of the battery. I'm tempted to have everything switched on constantly and just charge it all night every night, have it on charge at work and carry a charger in the car just in case. Does anyone else do this?

If people more knowledgable than me about this (not difficult ) could post how they have their phones set up this would be extremely useful to me and I'm sure lots of other peeps!

TIA

I'm in danger of becoming obsessed with this - phone has only been on for 2 hours after an all night charge, I've done practically nothing with it and the battery indicator in the notification bar has already run down slightly!

 

[Wardogz]

Hi

It's a case of only using what you need.

Try using GSM only in network settings and only use 3g when you need it.

I leave auto sync enabled, I only use facebook and I let it sync every 12 hours.

Unfortunately I don't know of a auto sync widget that automatically syncs your apps etc. You can get ones that enable and disable it though.

I set emails to download every hour.

Also try not to cram the internal memory full of apps as this consumes more battery, it wont be long before the Andriod 2.2 update is out and then you will be able to store as many apps as you want on the SD card.

Do you use advanced task killer (ATK) ? You can download it from the market place, you can set it to auto kill apps that run in the background. However I dont use autokill, I use the ATK force close down widget, one tap kills all the apps running in the background. I found disabling background apps massively improved my battery life.

disable haptic feed back.

Disable always on mobile data.

Personally i think having auto weather updates is pointless too, I mean how often do you really need to check the weather?

 

[WozzaTT]

Thanks for the tips!

No - I don't use a task killer, I think I'll have a look.

So is simply being connected to wifi or 3g etc much of a drain on the battery in itself, ie without even browsing the web or whatever? I'm thinking I might just keep both switched off until I need them and see if that makes much of a difference.

I know what you mean about the weather updates - just nice to know that it's updated reasonably often otherwise you'd be stuck with sunshine on your home screen when it may actually be raining outside!

Think I'll leave auto-sync enabled and change how often individual apps update. Then again, with wifi and 3g switched off it's all academic anyway I guess!

 

[Ian80]

There is a sync all widget that I use to update the weather animation.
Not sure what else it updates, I think its everything in accounts and sync under settings?

Does anyone know of a widget that toggles between GSM only and WCDMA only?

 

[Willie Heckerslyke]

There is a sync all widget that I use to update the weather animation.
Not sure what else it updates, I think its everything in accounts and sync under settings?

Does anyone know of a widget that toggles between GSM only and WCDMA only?

Don't think there's one that will toggle this directly....The best I've found so far is one called 'Switch Network Type' This will take you right to the Mobile Network Settings option to quickly choose what you want....

 

[uzetaab]

Don't think there's one that will toggle this directly....The best I've found so far is one called 'Switch Network Type' This will take you right to the Mobile Network Settings option to quickly choose what you want....

Actually, HTC have included a widget that does exactly this.

"+>widget>settings>mobile network"

when off, calls & texts only, when on, full internet access, including email & sync updates.

Personally, I have my charger plugged in next to my bed. charging it overnight is enough for me to get through a day, but I imagine that there are other people who would need to charge during the day too.

Deep cycling (not charging it until the battery is flat & the phone turns off) the battery once a month is highly recommended too.

For more on getting the most out of your battery check this post in my battery thread:

http://androidforums.com/htc-desire/77857-batteries-explained.html#post826098

 

[nx1977]

I leave sync on (weather on 3 hours), 3G on and always on data.

I found turning always on data to off used MORE power as widgets turn on and off the connection to update. Significantly more!