Android setting questions

[bigboss]

primarily dealing with battery life:

#1
what exactly does the "Background Data" option enabled do?
from my limited experience, it only affects Marketplace
and is it a no brainer that leaving it off = better battery life?

will it affect any apps i have running? (twitter widget, beautiful widgets, pure calendar)
I currently have twitter to synch every 2 hours, beautiful widgets home to sync every 12 hours, and pure calendar every 12 hours

Does the background data option enabled affect PUSH gmail and my fetched yahoo email?

#2:
What is this "Auto-Sync" setting people are saying to turn off, in order to save battery. I see no such option when i look at my settings, unless they are referring to background data? And what does auto sync affect?

and i seriously do not understand how people are making their droid x last more than 24 hours with moderate use, i have every single setting turned OFF (gps, wifi, bluetooth, background data) and my screen brightness on 20%

 

[RayStinkle]

I asked these identical questions 5 months ago with my first android phone, and I still don't really know the answer. These 2 settings don't seem to be global that all apps obey, so I really have no idea what the answer is. My best guess is that only stock Google apps obey these settings but not much else.

 

[terpitude71]

primarily dealing with battery life:

#1
what exactly does the "Background Data" option enabled do?
from my limited experience, it only affects Marketplace
and is it a no brainer that leaving it off = better battery life?

will it affect any apps i have running? (twitter widget, beautiful widgets, pure calendar)
I currently have twitter to synch every 2 hours, beautiful widgets home to sync every 12 hours, and pure calendar every 12 hours

Does the background data option enabled affect PUSH gmail and my fetched yahoo email?

#2:
What is this "Auto-Sync" setting people are saying to turn off, in order to save battery. I see no such option when i look at my settings, unless they are referring to background data? And what does auto sync affect?

and i seriously do not understand how people are making their droid x last more than 24 hours with moderate use, i have every single setting turned OFF (gps, wifi, bluetooth, background data) and my screen brightness on 20%

the answer to #1 is that disabling background syncing will disable google services from automatically syncing to your phone. this means no gmail push, no calendar sync, no ongoing contact sync. on the X, it also effects the social networking apps that are built into the UI, meaning the facebook, twitter, picasa, yahoo, etc, etc. any data pulled in by a third-party app will NOT be affected by disabling this; they all fetch data themselves. meaning that if you use the twitter client built into the UI, you wouldnt get twitter updates pushed to you if you turned off background sync, but if you used a third party app like seesmic, it would still refresh at whatever interval you want it to.

now for #2, i believe that "auto-sync" and enabling background data are one and the same in peoples perception. however, here is a cool battery saving trick. the thing killing battery on the sync side is the social networking stuff. google syncing is not a battery drain. you can go into the data manager, and specifically set things up to have the social networking features only update over wi-fi. since you seem to be using third-party apps for your networking, it shouldnt make a difference not having those updates constantly. this, coupled with using smart mode on some capacity, should considerably improve your battery life

 

[bigboss]

Wow, very clear response. Thanks for clearing that all up! No wonder i wasn't getting my gmail pushed.

I think i'll leave background data on for that purpose

Sent from my DROIDX using Tapatalk

 

[.46caliber]

and i seriously do not understand how people are making their droid x last more than 24 hours with moderate use, i have every single setting turned OFF (gps, wifi, bluetooth, background data) and my screen brightness on 20%

Common misconception, WiFi kills battery life. In fact, the opposite can be true. When at home or anywhere else with WiFi, turn it on. When you log on to a WiFi connection, the phone will stay connected to that source until it loses the signal or you tell it do otherwise. If you are not in an area where you can connect to WiFi, turn the radio off. Leaving your WiFi radio on in an area without WiFi will drain your battery as the phone will continuously search for a network. Just like your phoning chewing up more battery when your 3G cuts in and out.

3G is constantly pinging towers to see which connection is strongest and will disconnect and reconnect to several towers. This eats battery.

Most of the people I run into with battery issues have ridiculous expectations of what a device should do. They want a bright 4.3 inch screen, they want Facebook updated and checked every 30 seconds, and Twitter every 10 seconds. They want a weather widget that updates the weather based on position, send 300 texts a day, 30 emails and a handful of calls. And the battery should do all of this for 24 hours.

I want Verizon CEO Ivan Seidenberg to personally thank me for dumping ATT and offer me an upgrade every 6 months for the rest of my life.

It's about the same expectation.

Take a look at what you have running. Do you have a lot of widgets that update info? Did you remove all the widgets that Moto had setup from the get go? Do you run a live wall paper? It is a simple wall paper or is it the movable Andys that requires input from the accelerometer? Evaluate what you have running that you need, what you have running that you want, and what you have running just because you can.

I would consider myself a moderate user. I have a weather widget that updates every 2 hours. I have the Android Central widget that updates headlines just about instantly. I read articles from Android Central, Droid-Life, Android Guys, and Engadget throughout the day. I peruse websites, send some texts. My phone hasn't been plugged in since 8 this morning and I am at 40%. I have my back light as low as it will go, until I'm outside and need more light to see the display. I have a static wall paper, and I use ADW Launcher. 12+ hours and I still have juice to spare.

For those that want more than that, cryogenically freeze yourself for 10 years and by then technology will catch up to the outlandish expectations.

 

[terpitude71]

Common misconception, WiFi kills battery life. In fact, the opposite is true. When at home or anywhere else with WiFi, turn it on. When you log on to a WiFi connection, the phone will stay connected to that source until it loses the signal or you tell it do otherwise.

this is true, but only if you have access to a wi-fi connection. if there is no available connection, the wi-fi service will constantly keep searching for an access point, which is the thing that makes it a battery drain. same goes for bluetooth. fine if it is actively being used, but turn it off when you arent

 

[.46caliber]

this is true, but only if you have access to a wi-fi connection. if there is no available connection, the wi-fi service will constantly keep searching for an access point, which is the thing that makes it a battery drain. same goes for bluetooth. fine if it is actively being used, but turn it off when you arent

I will qualify. Internet Forum Lesson #1: Nothing goes without saying.

 

[bigboss]

Points well taken, i do use wifi whenever possible and definitely notice extended battery life with this. Also never had live wallpapers, for sure looks like they would drain battery life.

Any widgets i set to update every 2 hours at the earliest, my beautiful widg home with weather updates every 6hrs now, and pure calendar every 6 as well.

Im satisfied with getting 10 to 12 for the abuse i put on the phone, i just can't comprehend how ppl are getting 24 hrs with the same use as me

Sent from my DROIDX using Tapatalk

 

[terpitude71]

Points well taken, i do use wifi whenever possible and definitely notice extended battery life with this. Also never had live wallpapers, for sure looks like they would drain battery life.

for the record, properly coded live wallpapers (read: the ones pre-installed on the phone) arent going to impact the battery too severely. but third-party ones will generally obliterate your battery for sure

 

[bigboss]

Random but do these "launchers" have any advantage in extending battery life? Im not sure of the purpose of those

Sent from my DROIDX using Tapatalk

 

[terpitude71]

Random but do these "launchers" have any advantage in extending battery life? Im not sure of the purpose of those

Sent from my DROIDX using Tapatalk

no advantage or disadvantage on battery. launchers exist, to me anyway, to give you a more customizable and convenient experience on your device. the stock launcher is fine, but i use launcherpro plus, and i love the fact that i can put my most used apps on a bottom dock rather than being relegated to the dialer/contacts apps on the default launcher.

 

[.46caliber]

I have been running ADW Launcher since before my battery was broken in. I cannot say for sure whether or not if will help battery, but it helps in plenty of other areas.

 

[.46caliber]

bigboss,

As mentioned in your other thread, an hour of YouTube will consume a ton of power. That is a lot of data that is being downloaded, compressed, processed and finally rendered on your screen.

 

[dvader]

why would you want / expect 24 hours from your phone?
last i checked humans needed sleep, unless you are strung out on coke, then you'll need to sleep, so just put it on the charger when you do.

 

[Mudvayne622]

I know im gonna catch hell for this question so please...be gentle.

With wifi on can i still recieve calls and texts?

 

[dvader]

yes

 

[CarbonOak]

Common misconception, WiFi kills battery life. In fact, the opposite can be true. When at home or anywhere else with WiFi, turn it on. When you log on to a WiFi connection, the phone will stay connected to that source until it loses the signal or you tell it do otherwise. If you are not in an area where you can connect to WiFi, turn the radio off. Leaving your WiFi radio on in an area without WiFi will drain your battery as the phone will continuously search for a network. Just like your phoning chewing up more battery when your 3G cuts in and out.

3G is constantly pinging towers to see which connection is strongest and will disconnect and reconnect to several towers. This eats battery.

Most of the people I run into with battery issues have ridiculous expectations of what a device should do. They want a bright 4.3 inch screen, they want Facebook updated and checked every 30 seconds, and Twitter every 10 seconds. They want a weather widget that updates the weather based on position, send 300 texts a day, 30 emails and a handful of calls. And the battery should do all of this for 24 hours.

I want Verizon CEO Ivan Seidenberg to personally thank me for dumping ATT and offer me an upgrade every 6 months for the rest of my life.

It's about the same expectation.

Take a look at what you have running. Do you have a lot of widgets that update info? Did you remove all the widgets that Moto had setup from the get go? Do you run a live wall paper? It is a simple wall paper or is it the movable Andys that requires input from the accelerometer? Evaluate what you have running that you need, what you have running that you want, and what you have running just because you can.

I would consider myself a moderate user. I have a weather widget that updates every 2 hours. I have the Android Central widget that updates headlines just about instantly. I read articles from Android Central, Droid-Life, Android Guys, and Engadget throughout the day. I peruse websites, send some texts. My phone hasn't been plugged in since 8 this morning and I am at 40%. I have my back light as low as it will go, until I'm outside and need more light to see the display. I have a static wall paper, and I use ADW Launcher. 12+ hours and I still have juice to spare.

For those that want more than that, cryogenically freeze yourself for 10 years and by then technology will catch up to the outlandish expectations.

QFT

 

[.46caliber]

QFT

I'm not familiar with all the forum shorthand. I've been on a one year forum hiatus.

EDIT: Nevermind, urbandictionary FTW. Last internet forum I was involved with was a very harsh place and QFT had 2 different meanings.

 

[.46caliber]

I know im gonna catch hell for this question so please...be gentle.

With wifi on can i still recieve calls and texts?

Yep, no problem at all. Data is transfered to WiFi, like Market Downloads, email, web browsing etc. You will still receive and be able to send texts and phone calls. Market downloads take a fraction of the time. It will take your phone longer to install it than it will to download it.

 

[Mudvayne622]

Yep, no problem at all. Data is transfered to WiFi, like Market Downloads, email, web browsing etc. You will still receive and be able to send texts and phone calls. Market downloads take a fraction of the time. It will take your phone longer to install it than it will to download it.

So then does this mean that keeping wifi on while at home will really help to conserve battery?