Adjustments, tips and tricks to maximize Battery Life on Samsung Galaxy S6/edge

[erasat]

I did and it didn't make much difference. Then again my WiFi is also currently slowed to only 64kbps until the next billing cycle. Though I was talking about the black and white theme that come built into the Nova launcher itself.

Would it be possible for you to post the wallpaper that you are using on here?

Ahh ok, the Lollipop theme (the one in the Icon Pack selections) just changes the stuff that Nova affects, and that's basically the upfront of the User Interface, but you still have all the rest of the components that are not affected and they are still showing whatever theme you have set in TouchWiz. The good about changing the Theme in TouchWiz is that you are changing the rest of that stuff, the things I posted above, then you can change your Icons with the Icon pack you want (if you have Nova Prime) and the wallpapers. I hope this answers your questions this time.

Let me see if I can somehow post the wallpaper here and still keep the full resolution.

 

[erasat]

See if the image stay with full resolution.

 

[razza1987]

I'm using Dolphin browser, it has incorporated a night mode that switches all pages to dark background and white find to contrast, shocking at first but you get used to, for me is perfect for when my wife is sleeping and I'm at the bed reading through the forums.

How do I enable night mode on the browser?

 

[erasat]

How do I enable night mode on the browser?

Enable the swype options mode in settings or at some point during the initial setup it will ask you to, and then just swype to the left and you will see the add-on menu and you have one there by default that says Night mode.

About your cell signal issue, there is a whole thread on XDA for Aussie users and there you can see the issues Telstra users are having, some have said that maybe is a firmware issue affecting some radio bands that they use, so if that's true, and people have complained already, it's possible that with an update those issues are fixed and that can take care of the fluctuations you are having with your battery life.

Check it here.

 

[razza1987]

Enable the swipe options mode in settings or at some point during the initial setup it will ask you to, and then just swipe to the left and you will see the add-on menu and you have one there by default that says Night mode.

About your cell signal issue, there is a whole thread on XDA for Aussie users and there you can see the issues Telstra users are having, some have said that maybe is a firmware issue affecting some radio bands that they use, so if that's true, and people have complained already, it's possible that with an update those issues are fixed and that can take care of the fluctuations you are having with your battery life.

Haha thanks I found it now. I swyped right and it was automatically there. I really like this browser so far. It combines some of the best features of the UC browser while making it easy to search on like Firefox. I might use it for a few days and see how I get on with it.

Yeah I knew it didn't make sense the amount of inconsistency and fluctuations in the battery life. I doubt anything will be done on Telstra end but you never know. They might just surprise me

 

[erasat]

Haha thanks I found it now. I swyped right and it was automatically there. I really like this browser so far. It combines some of the best features of the UC browser while making it easy to search on like Firefox. I might use it for a few days and see how I get on with it.

Yeah I knew it didn't make sense the amount of inconsistency and fluctuations in the battery life. I doubt anything will be done on Telstra end but you never know. They might just surprise me

I just edited the above post to add the link to the thread I mentioned, take a look.

 

[erasat]

After reading this I decided to give this theme a try, even 1 extra hour of SoT would be amazing! ������

Posted with my shiny s6

I doubt that it will give you an extra hour but at the end of the day it gave me about 30 more minutes of what I'm used to get, but again, it may be a combination of the other things I mentioned, like changing the wallpaper also and changing the browser. But whatever it was, it was a pleasant surprise.

 

[razza1987]

I doubt that it will give you an extra hour but at the end of the day it gave me about 30 more minutes of what I'm used to get, but again, it may be a combination of the other things I mentioned, like changing the wallpaper also and changing the browser. But whatever it was, it was a pleasant surprise.

I changed my theme and wallpaper and browser. I do literally everything you suggest for battery saving

 

[erasat]

Haha thanks I found it now. I swyped right and it was automatically there. I really like this browser so far. It combines some of the best features of the UC browser while making it easy to search on like Firefox. I might use it for a few days and see how I get on with it.

Yeah I knew it didn't make sense the amount of inconsistency and fluctuations in the battery life. I doubt anything will be done on Telstra end but you never know. They might just surprise me

I forgot to mention before that there is another very useful add-on and it's called Brightness Control, it allows you to modify the brightness on the browser without changing your phone brightness. Look for it on the Dolphin add-on store.

 

[razza1987]

I forgot to mention before that there is another very useful add-on and it's called Brightness Control, it allows you to modify the brightness on the browser without changing your phone brightness. Look for it on the Dolphin add-on store.

Thanks for this tip. I find night mode just a little too dark on dolphin browser but I like to keep my brightness at zero percent so it's nice to know that there is a work around for this

 

[erasat]

I changed my theme and wallpaper and browser. I do literally everything you suggest for battery saving ������

Well I appreciate your vote of confidence and I just hope that this tweaks that I post here give you the same results that give me in my S6 and my S6 Edge, plus in the other 4 S6 and edges I have personally set. Like I've mentioned before, all of them are getting similar battery life. (obviously not the same as everybody's usage is different)

On Monday I'll be setting my 7th, as there is a Green Emerald S6 Edge waiting for me at work, so you know I'll set it as I've set it the rest. The best thing that all of them have been set for the 3 different major carriers here where I live, so that can tell you that it works in all of them

 

[razza1987]

Well I appreciate your vote of confidence and I just hope that this tweaks that I post here give you the same results that give me in my S6 and my S6 Edge, plus in the other 4 S6 and edges I have personally set, like I've mentioned before, all of them are getting similar battery life. (obviously not the same as everybody's usage is different)

On Monday I'll be setting my 7th, as there is a Green Emerald S6 Edge waiting for me at work, so you know I'll set it as I've set it the rest. The best thing that all of them have been set for the 3 different major carriers here where I live, so that can tell you that it works in all of them

I will be interested to see how my phone goes over the next few days. I will definitely be posting my results. I used to only see four hours of screen on time and now I see more like 6-7 hours

 

[drone3]

From my personal testing there seem to be 3 issues that are causing abnormal battery drain.

1. WiFi - with WiFi on my standby time is terrible and it can easily lose a third of my battery throughout the day. With WiFi off it seems just like KitKat with minimal battery drain. I'm currently using the setting when the screen is off WiFi turns off / unless plugged in , this has helped a lot, but once the screen is off it takes a while for it to turn off the WiFi.

2. Network signal strength - now I'm convinced that this is actually a problem with the Samsung radio as the signal strength is much weaker than my HTC One M7 on the same network in the same location.

3. Rogue Apps - I'm pointing straight to the Google apps that don't follow there own rules, Google photos is the perfect example, I have it set to upload when Im charging, but it will randomly activate even when not plugged in.

dreaming of electric sheep

 

[erasat]

From my personal testing there seem to be 3 issues that are causing abnormal battery drain.

1. WiFi - with WiFi on my standby time is terrible and it can easily lose a third of my battery throughout the day. With WiFi off it seems just like KitKat with minimal battery drain. I'm currently using the setting when the screen is off WiFi turns off / unless plugged in , this has helped a lot, but once the screen is off it takes a while for it to turn off the WiFi.

2. Network signal strength - now I'm convinced that this is actually a problem with the Samsung radio as the signal strength is much weaker than my HTC One M7 on the same network in the same location.

3. Rogue Apps - I'm pointing straight to the Google apps that don't follow there own rules, Google photos is the perfect example, I have it set to upload when Im charging, but it will randomly activate even when not plugged in.

dreaming of electric sheep

This is what I posted to Razza, I think on a Friday;

<Go to Settings-About device-Status and in Signal Strength you will see your real cell signal strength. A signal of -60dBm is nearly perfect, and -112dBm is call-dropping bad. If you're above about -87 dBm, (lower is better) Android will report a full 4 bars of signal, and you showing just 1 bar tells me that you should be getting a very bad signal there. That will never helps you in that department and will clearly explain your inconsistencies.>

I've noticed that you are also a Telstra subscriber and you posted that your signal is constantly between - 112dBm and - 120dBm so as you can see with the above, you're signal is pretty bad, that alone will kill your battery, plus your Wifi issues for me it all mean that you are one of the unlucky ones with radio problems. If you check the link to an XDA thread I posted to Razza there are a lot of Aussie users with the same, this must be something related to your carriers, they must have screwed something with the radios, good news at least is that if this is the reason, but least it can be fixed with just an update. But I'd be in contact, daily, South your carriers demanding a fix or a replacement phone, maybe you get another one without issues.

BTW, Razza, you never posted what was your signal strength, did you check that?

 

[razza1987]

This is what I posted to Razza, I think on a Friday;

<Go to Settings-About device-Status and in Signal Strength you will see your real cell signal strength. A signal of -60dBm is nearly perfect, and -112dBm is call-dropping bad. If you're above about -87 dBm, (lower is better) Android will report a full 4 bars of signal, and you showing just 1 bar tells me that you should be getting a very bad signal there. That will never helps you in that department and will clearly explain your inconsistencies.>

I've noticed that you are also a Telstra subscriber and you posted that your signal is constantly between - 112dBm and - 120dBm so as you can see with the above, you're signal is pretty bad, that alone will kill your battery, plus your Wifi issues for me it all mean that you are one of the unlucky ones with radio problems. If you check the link to an XDA thread I posted to Razza there are a lot of Aussie users with the same, this must be something related to your carriers, they must have screwed something with the radios, good news at least is that if this is the reason, but least it can be fixed with just an update. But I'd be in contact, daily, South your carriers demanding a fix or a replacement phone, maybe you get another one without issues.

BTW, Razza, you never posted what was your signal strength, did you check that?

Didn't think there would be much sense to as I thought it would be pretty obvious but here it is. Though again the signal thing makes no sense to me whatsoever for inconsistent battery as I am in the exact same place on my bed 24/7 so it would have the exact same signal effecting it all day every day

 

[erasat]

Didn't think there would be much sense to as I thought it would be pretty obvious but here it is. Though again the signal thing makes no sense to me whatsoever for inconsistent battery as I am in the exact same place on my bed 24/7 so it would have the exact same signal effecting it all day every day

No, that's what I was trying to explain in my previous posts, even at your same spot, the signal is not steady, and at the level of signal strength you are having (which BTW is drop calling bad as I can see in your screenshot) is even more inconsistent. Try the same every time you remember about it, and write a log of date, time and Signal strength, if I'm right it will rarely be the same, plus you'll have a lot to show to your carrier of their crappy signal.

That kind of signal that you and drone3 are getting from the same carrier tell me that they have a big issue with their firmware and radios, more obvious if you have other devices with better signal, please call them and demand them a fix as I can tell you that both my S6 and S6 Edge have one of the best, if not the best radios I've had in a phone, both my cell and my wifi signals are constantly a lot better than all my previous phones maybe with the exception of a Moto X I had for about a week.

 

[razza1987]

No, that's what I was trying to explain in my previous posts, even at your same spot, the signal is not steady, and at the level of signal strength you are having (which BTW is drop calling bad as I can see in your screenshot) is even more inconsistent. That kind of signal that you and drone3 are getting from the same carrier tell me that they have a big issue with their firmware and radios, more obvious if you have other devices with better signal, please call them and demand them a fix as I can tell you that both my S6 and S6 Edge have one of the best, if not the best radios I've had in a phone, both my cell and my wifi signals are constantly a lot better than all my previous phones maybe with the exception of a Moto X I had for about a week.

Yeah except Telstra just don't care about customer satisfaction. I have both tweeted them and posted on their forums. One time I raised an issue to Telstra and actually got blocked from posting on their Facebook page

 

[erasat]

Yeah except Telstra just don't care about customer satisfaction. I have both tweeted them and posted on their forums. One time I raised an issue to Telstra and actually got blocked from posting on their Facebook page

After I posted the previous message I edited it to add that you should check throughout the day so you can have a log of your signal and see for yourself that it rarely will be the same, plus you will have a log to show your carrier.

One more thing that it's alarming on your screenshot is te ASU value besides the dBm that 0 in there is even worst than your dBm value, check this thread, http://forums.androidcentral.com/google-nexus-5/333298-what-your-signal-strength-your-cell-network-provider-your-n5-dbm-asu.html and it will tell you about it, but in a summary, while having lower values in dBm means better signal, it will need greater values on ASU for the same, and you have 0.

To give you an example, at home, I have good cell signal, not bad, not great, and that means 2-3 bars, but it shows around -91dBm that is good and 48 ASU. And I barely see that ASU value goes lower than 25. So that can tell you that either they have a huge issue with their radios on the S6 or their signal got worst, but then, if you put your Sim in other phone and the signal is better, then it's the radios. So, fight those b*st*r*s.

 

[razza1987]

This is the signal strength on 3g but the battery drains like there is no tomorrow on 3g -_-

 

[erasat]

This is the signal strength on 3g but the battery drains like there is no tomorrow on 3g -_-

Yes that was the norm back in the 3G only days. But as you can see, the 3G radios are working better for you, so they definitely have an LTE signal issue (but if you have other phones and are better on LTE then it's not that) or their firmware screwed the LTE radios.

Do you have other LTE only features like VoLTE or enhanced services?