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Help Battery Usage Question
- Thread starter sugaman1
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- samsung galaxy s2
Tasmin
Well-Known Member
That's referring to talk time, not idle or "non-phone" time. Yesterday was my first full day of "typical" usage with a full charge. After some light talking, texting, and general use for email and surfing, I still had an estimated 6 hours of battery left at the end of the day, for a grand total of 21 hours worth of battery life.
Each your heart out, Captivate. At it's best I rarely got >12 hours out of it, and never >18.
Each your heart out, Captivate. At it's best I rarely got >12 hours out of it, and never >18.
greggebhardt
Android Enthusiast
I have been using the SG2 on AT&T for a long time now and for the average person the SG2 has plenty of battery.
I do 60+ emails a day and equal texts and use about 2000 minutes a month and still come home with 50% of battery when I put it on charge.
The SG2 with 2.3.4 does very well, better than any Android phone I have used.
I do 60+ emails a day and equal texts and use about 2000 minutes a month and still come home with 50% of battery when I put it on charge.
The SG2 with 2.3.4 does very well, better than any Android phone I have used.
m.vasquez009
Member
how are you guys getting this kind of battery life... im only getting about 9 hours of total phone on time and i have all gps, email bluetooth etc turned off
Just got my Galaxy S2 last night and my history is I've been carrying a Blackberry for years. I've enjoyed today learning and setting up the phone and your comment about GPS on/off got me thinking. Since I've really no idea how long my battery potential is yet should I be turning off the GPS while I'm not using any app that uses it? I have the power savings widget set and super easy to get to so turning it on when I need a map reference or chase my kids would be no problem.
Is it worth the battery savings to turn it on and off?
On the Epic forum, someone stated that leaving GPS on does not drain battery. I'm a young, small, good looking female, so I considered keeping GPS on in case I'm abducted (I watch too much crime news stuff!!) and police could possibly find my body that way. I did not notice a drain on the battery, nor did it show up in the Battery Usage stats.
I keep it off now, though. Not sure why I decided to.
I keep it off now, though. Not sure why I decided to.
Tasmin
Well-Known Member
My philosophy: If I can make it comfortably through the day, I have enough battery because I always charge overnight anyway. So if I was you, I wouldn't sweat it if you're comfortable (if you're not, read on).
I have the 200MB data package, so I actively manage my data connections to avoid going over. I use Tasker and Juice Defender to create setting packages that I can activate with the click of a widget. So when I'm in "Home" mode, my wifi is on, my mobile data is off, background data is allowed. When I'm at work I turn on my work mode: there's no wifi so I turn wifi off to save battery (why search for something that's not there?), turn off mobile data since I'm sitting in front of my computer anyway, etc. I have a Tasker profile that activates my GPS automatically when I open any of my apps that need it and turns it off when I exit those apps. Is all of this really necessary? Probably not. How much battery does it save? I have no idea because I would do all of this anyway to save my data. But some food for thought if you are really unhappy with your battery life.
I have the 200MB data package, so I actively manage my data connections to avoid going over. I use Tasker and Juice Defender to create setting packages that I can activate with the click of a widget. So when I'm in "Home" mode, my wifi is on, my mobile data is off, background data is allowed. When I'm at work I turn on my work mode: there's no wifi so I turn wifi off to save battery (why search for something that's not there?), turn off mobile data since I'm sitting in front of my computer anyway, etc. I have a Tasker profile that activates my GPS automatically when I open any of my apps that need it and turns it off when I exit those apps. Is all of this really necessary? Probably not. How much battery does it save? I have no idea because I would do all of this anyway to save my data. But some food for thought if you are really unhappy with your battery life.
OK.......this is why I like bulletin boards.
I bought my daughter a phone (HTC Status) and I was wondering if you could disable the At&T data all together and use my wi-fi at home for her. Now with this phone I would like to do the same to make sure as you have that I/we don't waste data time. I was under the impression (or should I say, I hoped) that as long as we had wi-fi on the AT&T portion would automatically be suppressed.
I have wi-fi at both home and work. I've not been home since I bought the phone so I've not had a chance to test the speeds there but the difference between wi-fi and tower is huge here at work. I would imagine it's the same there.
Could you point me in the right direction to get that going?
Tasmin
Well-Known Member
Having a wifi signal does automatically suppress your mobile data usage, but if you have shaky wifi in parts of the building or you're just a control freak (like me), then it's nice to just be able to turn it off and not worry about using your data plan when you don't want to.
Juice Defender is the app that lets you switch mobile data on and off manually. There's a beta version free in the market that has all of the functionality you need. Tasker is a very powerful app that's one of the few I've paid for and well worth every penny if you have an interest in automating certain functions on your phone (or just like geeking out). There's a steep learning curve though, but the website has a lot of tutorials and there are threads scattered around here where people post their Tasker profiles. You really only need it though if you want to get all fancy and make a widget to let you control JD's functionality.
I think myself and others have posted on this a couple of times over in the Captivate forum; it's probably elsewhere as well. When I have more time this weekend, I'll see about either locating my old post or putting together a new one.
Juice Defender is the app that lets you switch mobile data on and off manually. There's a beta version free in the market that has all of the functionality you need. Tasker is a very powerful app that's one of the few I've paid for and well worth every penny if you have an interest in automating certain functions on your phone (or just like geeking out). There's a steep learning curve though, but the website has a lot of tutorials and there are threads scattered around here where people post their Tasker profiles. You really only need it though if you want to get all fancy and make a widget to let you control JD's functionality.
I think myself and others have posted on this a couple of times over in the Captivate forum; it's probably elsewhere as well. When I have more time this weekend, I'll see about either locating my old post or putting together a new one.
HornAlum02
Lurker
My phone seems to last about 20-24 hours before needing another charge.
Exchange Active sync set to 1 hour refresh during peak hours, 15 minutes during non-peak (i wish there was a 30 minute setting)
GPS is turned off
Wi-Fi is on
Brightness turned down
Very little time using talk (I think my dad called me to see if I saw that Steve Jobs passed away ... about a 2-3 minute phone call there)
Emails here and there.
Turn off active applications frequently
I would think the battery should last longer than that. If all it is doing is grabbing emails every so often, the phone should last at least 48 hours
I couldn't find a setting to only check GMAIL every so often
Exchange Active sync set to 1 hour refresh during peak hours, 15 minutes during non-peak (i wish there was a 30 minute setting)
GPS is turned off
Wi-Fi is on
Brightness turned down
Very little time using talk (I think my dad called me to see if I saw that Steve Jobs passed away ... about a 2-3 minute phone call there)
Emails here and there.
Turn off active applications frequently
I would think the battery should last longer than that. If all it is doing is grabbing emails every so often, the phone should last at least 48 hours
I couldn't find a setting to only check GMAIL every so often
Tasmin
Well-Known Member
Was getting all set to write up using Tasker and JuiceDefender, but then double checked an app I've installed out of curiosity but never used much - Elixir. It's free, comes highly recommended on a lot of sites, and is basically a set of highly useful system widgets, including a mobile data toggle. So if all you want to do is toggle data, I suggest you look into Elixir here. You might also try out Widgetsoid, but I know even less about it than I do Elixir.
Once you install Elixir, remember it's a set of widgets - so you have to long press on your home screen and select Widgets -> Elixir. There is a huge list of sizes to choose from, and from there you can choose the function you want for it by tapping on the square at the top of the screen.
Once you install Elixir, remember it's a set of widgets - so you have to long press on your home screen and select Widgets -> Elixir. There is a huge list of sizes to choose from, and from there you can choose the function you want for it by tapping on the square at the top of the screen.
glorifiedsins
Newbie
I easily send around 100 texts a day I talked for a total of 2 hours and 15 minutes and surfed the web for about 20 minutes and I still had 30% battery after being off the charger for 36 hours...if you constantly have wifi, background data, GPS, and packets turned off you get amazing life. I only had BT enabled during the calls. I also used a flashlight app and a compass app a few times over those 36 hours.
glorifiedsins
Newbie
Packets otherwise known as apn...you can disable this setting via wireless and networks subsection mobile networks...with this disabled your phone wont constantly search for at&t's lte network which only exists in five cities anyway or any form of cell tower media signal available, edge network etc. This is essentially your link to the internet via cell towers. A few things of note though. 1. You wont be able to receive pictures or videos via text message with this turned off (ie multimedia messages but calls and regular texts will work normally. And 2. In order to receive software updates from at&t for your phone this setting will need to be turned on but you can turn it back off after the updates are done. Frequency of updates is determined by at&t but I generally power cycle my phone once a day and check during this time.
sugaman1
Newbie
Well after a week with the phone the battery is doing fine im using it all day and getting 9 hours of usage with out having to charge the phone so it's fine..... I was getting 4 out of my captivate so Im happy 
I posted some pic's o the cover and screen protecter I got off ebay in my albulm
I posted some pic's o the cover and screen protecter I got off ebay in my albulm
caddyescalade
Lurker
I've been running into a couple problems with my battery after having the phone for a couple weeks. I was usually getting over 30 hours with moderate use. From Thursday to Saturday I managed to get 59 hours out of the battery. After I charged it again I only got 16 hours and I'm trying to figure out why. It lost 45% while I was asleep. Brightness is down all the way, sync is turned off, gps was off, and bluetooth was off. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
sugaman1
Newbie
If your a heavy internet user, you should kill all widgets. The battery widgets and clock widgets are a waste anyway. Sg2 already has them on the screen so I figure why bother. Use Friendcaster instead of facebook. FB app is bad battery killer. Animated wallpapers are bad as well.
N6EAJ
Member
Check to see if "Android OS" used a lot of battery (more battery than the display). I was seeing that quite often..... even days when I had the display on quite a bit. I did a bit of searching about high Android OS useage and the "fix" is a reboot of the phone. It seems to be a very intermittent problem.