Why does 4g drain so much battery?

[johnnyshinta]

See above

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[Paul627g]

Not sure of an exact technical answer for this but think of it this way.....

4g is way faster... Take that from me, I'm on Sprint and even my best day on 4g doesn't match the speed of LTE 4g from Verizon. Anyways just like anything, the faster it goes the more power it consumes and at faster rate to provide those speeds....

So to keep that separate LTE 4g radio chip powered up and running those speeds its a hard draw on the battery.

That will hopefully be the next big break through in technology is how to get the same performance out of LTE 4g radio's but decrease the amount of power consumed to do it.

I know.... I'm dreaming...

 

[johnnyshinta]

Not sure of an exact technical answer for this but think of it this way.....

4g is way faster... Take that from me, I'm on Sprint and even my best day on 4g doesn't match the speed of LTE 4g from Verizon. Anyways just like anything, the faster it goes the more power it consumes and at faster rate to provide those speeds....

So to keep that separate LTE 4g radio chip powered up and running those speeds its a hard draw on the battery.

That will hopefully be the next big break through in technology is how to get the same performance out of LTE 4g radio's but decrease the amount of power consumed to do it.

I know.... I'm dreaming...

Well with that being said do you keep your 4g on all the time?

I turned mine off on day one because I thought it wasn't really necessary unless I was downloading a lot of content or streaming Netflix. But since you can only do voice and data simultaneously on 4g and its a pain to switch back and forth I'm considering turning it on.


Can you last a full day on 4g?

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[Paul627g]

Well with that being said do you keep your 4g on all the time?

I turned mine off on day one because I thought it wasn't really necessary unless I was downloading a lot of content or streaming Netflix. But since you can only do voice and data simultaneously on 4g and its a pain to switch back and forth I'm considering turning it on.


Can you last a full day on 4g?

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk

As much of a pain as it is to turn on and off, I would run with it off unless your doing heavy intensive surfing/downloading.... Especially if you know your going to be away from a power/charging source for an extended period of time.

I'm not sure what is offered to you on stock OS but I know many of the custom ROMs have a toggle bar on the notification pulldown and they can toggle LTE 4g on & off from there.

 

[ultravisitor]

I leave 4G on all the time and I have no problem getting through an entire day on the battery.

 

[johnnyshinta]

There isn't a toggle available on stock ROM. I just ordered an extended battery so I can use 4g.

Does anyone know if the 4g radio holds a signal better than 3g? Or vice versa.

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[mdmogren]

There isn't a toggle available on stock ROM. I just ordered an extended battery so I can use 4g.

Does anyone know if the 4g radio holds a signal better than 3g? Or vice versa.

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There IS a toggle. Settings - Wireless and Networks - More - Mobile Networks - Network Mode.

You can select LTE/CDMA or just CDMA.

 

[808phoneaddict]

There's an article out there, Google it, I forgot what it is but it's just the type of system, and that's just how the future will be... Try juice defender to see if you like it... I used to use it but I discovered that my gnex was pretty good on a single charge and I uninstalled facebook... That app and Google + really drains the battery!

Galaxy Nexus in the house via Tapatalk!!!

 

[mikestorm]

4G = sex

Pretty much the best thing ever but you can't keep it up indefinitely.

 

[byrds8]

The reason it drains much faster on 4G is because its using two radios instead of one. When you turn 4G off youre only using and the phone is only powering the 3G radio but when it is turned on it still powers the 3G radio and it still looks for the tower and what not. Not to mention if youre in a 4G area you can talk and surf at the same time IIRC. I think eventually we will see the shift away from 3G all together and only power the one but that will not be for quite some time.

 

[li2327]

I keep my 4G turned off because it's not the battery drain to me. 3g is sufficient enough for what I use it for.

 

[craigrn16]

Its a new technology. When 3G first came out it was a big battery drain also. Give it some time it will eventually become more efficient.