Optimus V Battery Drain Optimization Tests Part 2

The 04/03 release of aospCM7 seems to have much better battery life. I don't have the equipment to test like you do, so I'm looking forward to any results you might find (when you have the time).

Gone from a single days battery life, to over a day and a half with light usage.
 
The 04/03 release of aospCM7 seems to have much better battery life. I don't have the equipment to test like you do, so I'm looking forward to any results you might find (when you have the time).

Gone from a single days battery life, to over a day and a half with light usage.

Done and Done.
 
Curious if anyone has any experience with location based wifi control?

I primarily use wifi at home, and I can quickly enable it if I'm near a hotspot I want to use, but that's rare. I would like to use a location based app to turn off wifi and turn on 3G when I leave my house, and turn it back on when I come home. I do this manually now, but was wandering if an app to do it automatically will help save battery life, or just waste more running in the background?
 
Curious if anyone has any experience with location based wifi control?

I primarily use wifi at home, and I can quickly enable it if I'm near a hotspot I want to use, but that's rare. I would like to use a location based app to turn off wifi and turn on 3G when I leave my house, and turn it back on when I come home. I do this manually now, but was wandering if an app to do it automatically will help save battery life, or just waste more running in the background?

Yup, it's called Auto WiFi Enabler:
https://market.android.com/details?id=com.martinutils.autowifi

I'd think it'll only help you save battery life if you find yourself often forgetting to manually turn off WiFi when it's not needed. And it's a convenience thing too for those who don't want to be bothered with manually toggling WiFi.
 
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Yup, it's called Auto WiFi Enabler:
https://market.android.com/details?id=com.martinutils.autowifi

I'd think it'll only help you save battery life if you find yourself often forgetting to manually turn off WiFi when it's not needed. And it's a convenience thing too for those who don't want to be bothered with manually toggling WiFi.

Doesn't adjusting the WiFi Sleep Policy to "when screen turns off" do essentially the same thing?

Screen off: Wifi off
Screen on: wifi on, but only if its available otherwise use 3g
 
Curious if anyone has any experience with location based wifi control?

I primarily use wifi at home, and I can quickly enable it if I'm near a hotspot I want to use, but that's rare. I would like to use a location based app to turn off wifi and turn on 3G when I leave my house, and turn it back on when I come home. I do this manually now, but was wandering if an app to do it automatically will help save battery life, or just waste more running in the background?

Your wifi already does this. When there is no AP to connect to, the Wifi will turn off and wait X amount of seconds before looking for an AP again. The X amount of seconds is controlled by wifi.supplicant_scan_interval in your build.prop. Any program you install to do this will only drain more battery than it saves.
 
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Your wifi already does this. When there is no AP to connect to, the Wifi will turn off and wait X amount of seconds before looking for an AP again. The X amount of seconds is controlled by wifi.supplicant_scan_interval in your build.prop. Any program you install to do this will only drain more battery than it saves.

Thanks, that's what I suspected.
I'll do it manually, it's only when I leave and return home that I make the adjustment.
 
I know what you're saying, JerryScript.
I pretty much just use quick settings to flip wifi on and off when i leave/return, sort of a routine like waking up a PC or hanging my keys on the keyring. I keep my sleep policy as always on for my home use, and while it is a bit more of a drain, it's nowhere near the soul-sucking battery leeching 3g does on my device.

-K
 
i have a question about the underclocking costing you battery life... i am currently using "No-Frills CPU Control" (it was free) with a min speed set at 122mhz and a max of 748mhz, using the interactive governer. if i am reading these results correctly, it seems that what you are saying is that having the 122mhz set as my min speed will actually DECREASE my battery life...? how is this so, i'm not sure i fully understand... how would setting a higher min speed improve battery life? any insight into this would be appreciated, and i am also open to anyone's recommendations as to what min/max/governer settings i should try.

thanks!
 
i have a question about the underclocking costing you battery life... i am currently using "No-Frills CPU Control" (it was free) with a min speed set at 122mhz and a max of 748mhz, using the interactive governer. if i am reading these results correctly, it seems that what you are saying is that having the 122mhz set as my min speed will actually DECREASE my battery life...? how is this so, i'm not sure i fully understand... how would setting a higher min speed improve battery life? any insight into this would be appreciated, and i am also open to anyone's recommendations as to what min/max/governer settings i should try.

thanks!

The phone is more efficient at higher speeds and less efficient at lower speeds. And since it's not udervolted at a slower speed there's no reason to use the slow speed as there aren't any gains.
 
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yes, this is what im trying to understand... if the interactive governer bases its speedstepping on processor use, and it ramps up to 750 under load, how does the lower speed setting produce decreased battery life, since presumably it would only be running at the lower clock speed when idle?
 
also, by less efficient, are you speaking purely in terms of the phones processing abilities, or in terms of battery life? is there really that much of a noticable difference in battery life with underclocking? sorry if i'm asking a bunch of obvious questions here, i've been a computer nerd for years and years, but just recently got my hands on an android and started learning about the ARM architecture...
 
i can see there being an inefficiency with the processor having to poll and adjust its speed, but if interactive mode is, as i understand it, adjusting proc speed based on load, then wouldn't this eliminate the inefficiency?
 
It decreases life since it takes longer, much longer to process the work and go back to idle compared to the faster speed which completes the work in much less time, thereby using less power overall or the same chunk of work. Does that make sense?
 
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yes, very much so... thanks for that. however, and forgive me if you've already answered this and i just didn't catch it, but wouldn't the proc just scale up if it had work to do? or am i to understand that when idle with screen off, it will constantly run at that min speed and not scale up?
 
also, by less efficient, are you speaking purely in terms of the phones processing abilities, or in terms of battery life? is there really that much of a noticable difference in battery life with underclocking? sorry if i'm asking a bunch of obvious questions here, i've been a computer nerd for years and years, but just recently got my hands on an android and started learning about the ARM architecture...
Yeah, I'm a computer dork too.

Efficiencies as in processor efficiency. There is no way to undervolt this chipset currently, so underclocking it does not see any real gains.
 
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yes, very much so... thanks for that. however, and forgive me if you've already answered this and i just didn't catch it, but wouldn't the proc just scale up if it had work to do? or am i to understand that when idle with screen off, it will constantly run at that min speed and not scale up?
The phone still performs operations while the screen is off and idle. I'm not sure entirely, but you'd think it could just scale up to complete an operation and then scale back down to idle. I didn't take the measurements, the OP did ;)
 
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okay, this is making a lot more sense. so, if the stock optimus V runs at a min/max of 200/600, i would probably do better using values of, say, 400/750? thanks again!!
 
Because when there is a transition from idle to higher CPU load, it takes time for the clock speed to be changed. And there could be many tiny tasks that pop up that cause this: syncing the clock, checking the cell tower signal, detecting if you have an incoming call....

All of these tasks will take just a bit longer because when they start, they start with a lower clock speed. Then SetCPU has to detect that the CPU load is higher and adjust the clock speed. There is a sampling rate that SetCPU uses to try to detect these changes, but the faster you make the sampling rate, the harder SetCPU has to work. The lower you make the sampling rate, the longer the CPU will sit at the lower speed until the higher speed is kicked in.

All of these result in inefficiencies that add up over time. Since there is no advantage to the lower clock speed when idling, and there is no advantage to the lower clock speed when there is high CPU load, there is no advantage to ever use a lower clock speed. It won't lower heat output, and it won't make you battery run longer. I will only do the opposite.


Edit: Dang! I type slow. I missed the whole conversation.


You'll do best with 750/750.
 
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