Help battery drains at idle!

[FireAtmE]

I got sony Ericsson Xperia Play a few days ago, as I switched from IOS to Android. However one issue really bothers me, ie the battery life. The manufacturer stated standby hours are like 400ish hours, but I got less than two days standby time! Today when I arrived at work at 12.30, I have about 88% battery life, then at my break which was around 6.30 the phone had only 53%, when I finished work at 11.45, the battery is down to 14%! The phone was in idle state. what could be the reason for this battery problem? I have WIFI, BLUETOOTH, AUTO SYNC disabled, and background data on, most of my apps like twitter and emails are updated around every 2-4hours. And in the "Running Apps" I have like about 17apps, but most of them are system apps. like play on device, crash moniter, android system, things like these, and they turn themselves on automatically, even I killed them, few minutes later they turn themselves back on again.

weird thing is sometimes, the battery consumption is very low, for example for similiar situation like above I got 12% battery lost in total. and I have not done anything major changes on the phone. does the cached background process has anything to do with battery life、

sorry for this long and unclear question, any help is appreciated!

 

[chanchan05]

I got sony Ericsson Xperia Play a few days ago, as I switched from IOS to Android. However one issue really bothers me, ie the battery life. The manufacturer stated standby hours are like 400ish hours, but I got less than two days standby time! Today when I arrived at work at 12.30, I have about 88% battery life, then at my break which was around 6.30 the phone had only 53%, when I finished work at 11.45, the battery is down to 14%! The phone was in idle state. what could be the reason for this battery problem? I have WIFI, BLUETOOTH, AUTO SYNC disabled, and background data on, most of my apps like twitter and emails are updated around every 2-4hours. And in the "Running Apps" I have like about 17apps, but most of them are system apps. like play on device, crash moniter, android system, things like these, and they turn themselves on automatically, even I killed them, few minutes later they turn themselves back on again.

weird thing is sometimes, the battery consumption is very low, for example for similiar situation like above I got 12% battery lost in total. and I have not done anything major changes on the phone. does the cached background process has anything to do with battery life、

sorry for this long and unclear question, any help is appreciated!

Never believe manufacturer standby time quotes. Those were tested in laboratory conditions designed to extend battery life as long as possible. The normal lifespan for an Android phone in your setup is two days in idle.


Also, check the signal. Lower signals mean higher battery consumption, especially 3G. Since you have autosync disabled, I'd assume you aren't connected to network internet? If that's the case, I'd suggest you to turn off 3G and use a GSM network only.

 

[jerofld]

Go to Settings > About Phone > Battery. You get a nifty little information panel. Push the Battery Use button. Now you get a nifty read out of how long your device has been on battery, including what is using the most power. For the vast majority of people, the display should be top power consumer. This is normal. You can make a shortcut to this by long pressing an open spot on a blank spot, selecting shortcut > settings > battery.

Now tap the chart at the top. That graph is expanded and it shows different information at the bottom. Phone signal is your actual cell signal. The color codes represent signal strength. As long as there are no red sections, you can pretty much ignore this bar. Red means there's no signal and you can expect high power drain from the cell just idling.

The bars below them represent activity time. As long as wifi is enabled (even if you're out of wifi range), the wifi bar will be solid. Awake means that the device is awake and processing something. Screen on means the screen is on. Now, over the course of 8 hours, Awake should have have a few, but not a lot, of marks where the screen isn't also on. Obviously, when the screen is on, the device is awake and should match the screen's activity.

If Awake is on a lot when the screen isn't, you might have an app wake locking it. Wake locking means that an app is keeping the device awake when the screen is off. This kills battery.

 

[FireAtmE]

Never believe manufacturer standby time quotes. Those were tested in laboratory conditions designed to extend battery life as long as possible. The normal lifespan for an Android phone in your setup is two days in idle.


Also, check the signal. Lower signals mean higher battery consumption, especially 3G. Since you have autosync disabled, I'd assume you aren't connected to network internet? If that's the case, I'd suggest you to turn off 3G and use a GSM network only.

I know the manufacturer's standby time is a big lie, but i am not getting anywhere near a full day, nevermind two days on most of the android phones.
I was connected to the network internet. the setting is on WCDMA only. I used GSM/WCDMA option before and there seems no difference. using GSM only is kind of stupid, no offense. it is just too slow for a smart phone.
Today I turned off the background data, and started work at 12 with 66% battery life, then on my break, which was about 2 and half hours later, the battery is down to 40ish %. then around 6.30, have only 12%, the phone was in idle state during these hours. I addressed my issue to my collegues, during that little conversation, which lasted about <10mins, the phone lost 2% battery life.

 

[FireAtmE]

Go to Settings > About Phone > Battery. You get a nifty little information panel. Push the Battery Use button. Now you get a nifty read out of how long your device has been on battery, including what is using the most power. For the vast majority of people, the display should be top power consumer. This is normal. You can make a shortcut to this by long pressing an open spot on a blank spot, selecting shortcut > settings > battery.

Now tap the chart at the top. That graph is expanded and it shows different information at the bottom. Phone signal is your actual cell signal. The color codes represent signal strength. As long as there are no red sections, you can pretty much ignore this bar. Red means there's no signal and you can expect high power drain from the cell just idling.

The bars below them represent activity time. As long as wifi is enabled (even if you're out of wifi range), the wifi bar will be solid. Awake means that the device is awake and processing something. Screen on means the screen is on. Now, over the course of 8 hours, Awake should have have a few, but not a lot, of marks where the screen isn't also on. Obviously, when the screen is on, the device is awake and should match the screen's activity.

If Awake is on a lot when the screen isn't, you might have an app wake locking it. Wake locking means that an app is keeping the device awake when the screen is off. This kills battery.

I got section with red colour, and there are lot of marks in Awake while only a few marks in Screen On.
is there anyway of finding out which app is awaking the phone?

 

[chanchan05]

What apps do you have installed on your phone at the moment? The ones you installed yourself. I remember having a similar problem when I first got my phone, lasting only 8hrs. Now I'm getting about 20-30hrs standby out of it. What I did was change the settings for a lot of apps and installed Juice Defender.

I only suggested GSM if you are not using mobile data always, and use primarily call, text and wifi. I had thought that was the case since you had sync turned off. Also, WCDMA only does use more battery, especially in cases where you only have 50%signal or below.

 

[FireAtmE]

What apps do you have installed on your phone at the moment? The ones you installed yourself. I remember having a similar problem when I first got my phone, lasting only 8hrs. Now I'm getting about 20-30hrs standby out of it. What I did was change the settings for a lot of apps and installed Juice Defender.

I only suggested GSM if you are not using mobile data always, and use primarily call, text and wifi. I had thought that was the case since you had sync turned off. Also, WCDMA only does use more battery, especially in cases where you only have 50%signal or below.

most the apps i have installed are social media like tweeter and facebook etc. they are updated once every few hours. i found out that the battery drains slower when i use these social apps and the news apps on wifi, roughly about 2% loss in about ten mins. while on 3G network, i got 1% loss every two mins while using apps or browser. is this normal? have u ever encountered a similiar problem?

 

[chanchan05]

3G network uses a lot more battery of course. Its like throwing a ball. Using a wifi, you need only as much power to throw the ball back and forth to the router, which is a pretty close distance. On 3G, well it requires power enough to throw the ball back and forth between your phone and the cell tower, which could be a mile or so away.

Normally I'd expect the phone to last 4-6hrs of continuous browsing over an internet connection. So basically, if I get 20hrs of standby time (100% to 0%) or 4hrs continous browsing (100% to 0%), if I browse for 1hr, that equates to 5hrs lost in standby time. Are you getting my drift?

 

[Roze]

So, I was wondering what App shows the app that's using the phone while it is in idle? I'm using SystemPanel and it doesn't have that feature (or that I know of). I vaguely remember I used an app that showed this before I flashed my phone (apps backup got corrupted )

 

[Sak01]

^^How about Quick System Info? It give usage time for each app.

 

[FireAtmE]

3G network uses a lot more battery of course. Its like throwing a ball. Using a wifi, you need only as much power to throw the ball back and forth to the router, which is a pretty close distance. On 3G, well it requires power enough to throw the ball back and forth between your phone and the cell tower, which could be a mile or so away.

Normally I'd expect the phone to last 4-6hrs of continuous browsing over an internet connection. So basically, if I get 20hrs of standby time (100% to 0%) or 4hrs continous browsing (100% to 0%), if I browse for 1hr, that equates to 5hrs lost in standby time. Are you getting my drift?

yea, you cleared things up for me. thanks. I can get roughly 4-6hrs on browsing over the wifi. it is just the battery drain in idle state bothers me. with 3G network, no battery saving apps and only the system running in the background, I lost 1% around every 13mins.

If I stay connected to wifi while in idle state, will it increase the battery life?

 

[jerofld]

yea, you cleared things up for me. thanks. I can get roughly 4-6hrs on browsing over the wifi. it is just the battery drain in idle state bothers me. with 3G network, no battery saving apps and only the system running in the background, I lost 1% around every 13mins.

If I stay connected to wifi while in idle state, will it increase the battery life?

Yes, connecting to wifi when idle saves power.

As for wakelock awareness, there is an app (works for non-rooted phones, as well) that will see if anything is using a lot of your system's time. It's a little hard to follow at first, but it's good at identifying wakelock apps:

[APP] BetterBatteryStats adds battery history back to Gingerbread - xda-developers

 

[chanchan05]

yea, you cleared things up for me. thanks. I can get roughly 4-6hrs on browsing over the wifi. it is just the battery drain in idle state bothers me. with 3G network, no battery saving apps and only the system running in the background, I lost 1% around every 13mins.

If I stay connected to wifi while in idle state, will it increase the battery life?

Probably, if the battery drain was caused by the connection to the internet and a constant ping. Or you could just install Juice Defender or Green Power.

 

[AndroidAdvntge]

I recommend JuiceDefender, along with easy changing things like brightness, gps, bluetooth, ect.
I have an article that I've already helped a few people on the forums with, it will take care of you.
Battery Life Optimization Guide

And to the person that says 3g takes a lot of battery life, that may be true, but the wifi process is a known battery sucker so only keep it on when you are going to surf/download/game. Since we are talking about idling (and JuiceDefender will cut off data usage during idle) keep off wifi.

 

[FireAtmE]

I recommend JuiceDefender, along with easy changing things like brightness, gps, bluetooth, ect.
I have an article that I've already helped a few people on the forums with, it will take care of you.
Battery Life Optimization Guide

And to the person that says 3g takes a lot of battery life, that may be true, but the wifi process is a known battery sucker so only keep it on when you are going to surf/download/game. Since we are talking about idling (and JuiceDefender will cut off data usage during idle) keep off wifi.

my xperia play last very long on wifi, longer than my iphone4. the battery seems last shortest while idle on 3G. so im thinking of keep the phone on 2G and hope that improve the battery life by a large amount. i noticed that the data traffic on 3G maybe responsible for the drain. if i turn off the data traffic does it mean that notification on social apps will no longer works?

 

[xb35]

I also use "Juice Defender" too. Its free and very easy to set up. Works great for me!!!!

 

[porio]

On what country/network are you? I'm having exactly the same problem with Claro chile with a Xperia X8 and ALSO with a Motorola XT531. Both started having the issue around mid february and I'm almost sure is something with the network.

 

[gun1agus]

I removed everything from Explay (including unmounting the SD card),
lo and behold still 100% after more than seven hours. Also don't
forget the flight mode on. Perhaps it is a "personal lab condition".