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Edge and WiFi power consumption comparison

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chungaroo

Lurker
Hi all, I did a (quick) search of the forums, and I couldn't find any threads comparing the power usage of having EDGE only vs wifi (searching/connected) on all day. I'm getting terrible battery life on my G1 that I just bought, and I'm trying to figure out what I can do to maximize it. Bear with me because I know this topic has probably been talked about to death since 2008. Because I don't really have a need for 3G data speeds, I'm fine with using EDGE to connect to the Internet. What I want to know is if I should be connecting to wifi when I'm at home/work/school to take advantage of the speeds or will that cost me battery life?

Related question:
If I turn off Auto-sync in my Data synchronization settings, can I still receive GMail notifications (push)?

Thanks for the help. Hopefully I after tweaking some settings I can get through lunchtime without having my phone at 30%
 
Wi-Fi uses the most power out of Wi-Fi, 2G and 3G.

If you install the Spare Parts app you can set the Wi-Fi sleep policy to turn off while the phone is sleeping so at that time 2G/3G (depending on whether you tick 2G only) will be used and will save your battery.
 
My personal observation is that EDGE uses even more power than 3G. Every time my Hero is on EDGE, the battery drains like crazy.
 
This isn't conclusive by any means but browsing on 3G seems to eat my battery faster than browsing on WiFi.

chungaroo said:
I'm getting terrible battery life on my G1 that I just bought, and I'm trying to figure out what I can do to maximize it.
Click to expand...
Does the G1 have a battery info screen indicating what it thinks is using the battery? I'd suggest starting with that and tackling those items first. There's not much point in futzing with things unless you're certain that they're drastically affecting battery life in your particular situation.
 
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