WiFi vs 3G

[DGRYAN1977]

Based upon reading through this message board I was convinced that turning on Wifi and leaving it connected I would get better battery life.
After a few days of trying this I can say "FALSE".
My battery life has been greatly affected. This is with my normal use. No more use than usual.
I read that having it connected to wifi prevents the phone from constantly searching for 3G. Under battery and use the wifi has been using 25% of my battery.
I am going back to leaving the 3G on

 

[JuniorNA]

not sure if your post was a question or a statement. I'm pretty sure it was a statement. For me, I don't have the same results as you. When i leave WiFi on when i'm home...i don't lose as much battery as I do with 3G. perhaps it is because wifi is faster, and the chip gets the data it needs, and then puts the card in idle state until a request for data is made. I feel the request for data using 3g pulls more battery power because when i leave wifi off and leave 3g on, I have more of a battery drain.

I can't get into specifics because i'm not sure.

There are questions like

Is the distance between your phone and the verizon tower draining battery while using 3g since it has to connect to something that is further away?

Is wifi using less battery because it connects quickly to the AP, uses the data it needs, then goes to sleep

Does wifi use less battery because it's closer to the end device, which in this case is your router.

Does the wifi chip itself has circuitry that drains less battery, vs 3g chip circuitry. Which one actually needs more power to activate?

All of those questions should be coming up when trying to get an actual answer on which consumes more.

but from my own testing, and this is just testing battery...i get more battery when leaving WiFi on (3g off), vs. leaving 3g on at night, and wifi off.

edit, actually i just leave 3g off when i'm at work since i'm in front of a computer most of the day and don't need data feeding to my phone at all (which is a good 9 hours of the day). So i save battery by having wifi and 3g off as well.

 

[DGRYAN1977]

When I have WiFi on do I need to manually do anything else to turn 3G off?

 

[JuniorNA]

no, it will use Wifi until it's out of range and then use 3G. I just manually turn off 3G for my own personal satisfaction when i'm home and when I turn on Wifi. But not everyone HAS to do it. If you leave Wifi on, that has priority over 3G, but I figure both chips being turned on might use more battery, so i turn off 3g. My reasoning is not logic, because if I'm saying wifi will take priority over 3g, that means the 3g chip will not be in use right? Well i still turn off 3g because i'm crazy

 

[DGRYAN1977]

That would be "Mobile network" correct? Sorry for the dumb question

 

[A.Nonymous]

It may depends on the strength of your wifi signal too. If your wifi signal is weak and it's constantly searching for it I don't think you're going to reap any more benefits than if you were on 3G and constantly searching for a 3G signal.

 

[ChiTownJim]

I just leave both on so I can connect to wifi when it's available and not have to worry about it. I get much better battery life, I once night was out and my battery was running low so I just turned off Mobile Data Wifi pretty much everything when I woke up I turned Mobile back on but not WiFi went about my day normally and the battery drain diffrence was HUGE one of the only days where my battery only made it thru the work day 12hrs .

 

[BzB]

in almost all cases wifi will use less battery for data connections than 3g. only time i can think that wouldn't be the case is if your 3g signal strength is very strong and your wifi signal strength is very weak. otherwise the wifi antenna is shorter range antenna and requires less transmit power than the 3g antenna.

since i have wifi at home and work i pretty much have wifi on all the time. i also set my wifi sleep policy to never. if i'm out somewhere where wifi isn't available i manually disable it.

 

[NoShftShck16]

That would be "Mobile network" correct? Sorry for the dumb question

Not a dumb question, but yes Mobile Network is 3G.

Have you rooted? I put Cyanogen onto my phone and the power control widget thats nested in his ROM can be customized to include 3G. So I can turn it off with a tap of my screen.

Also, Timeriffic + APNDroid allows you to set times of the day when 3G will automatically turn off. My WiFi is set to turn on at 7 and 3G goes off as this is usually the time where I am at home after work.

 

[s_franchise]

Im going to try using my WiFi more, ive only really had the phone on one battery cycle, and im going to see if that helps improve my battery life today. i was at work most of the day, and had to rely on 3G coverage, and it ate my battery up.

Appreciate all the helpful stuff seeing as im new to this Dinc device