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Root Root + OverclockWidget = Insane Battery Life 40+ Hours

swazedahustla said:
So over at android central here is what is posted. This was a conversation with a member and the developer. Where it says bills info he is the developer of this app and his statement. So it appears it does help.

Obviously it can't overclock, we all know that because of perflock BUT here's the deal, the EVO CPU is set to scale back when its sleeping by default although it doesn't always do this because it may misinterpret information.

(bills info)
What this widget does is force it to underclock so you may see a slight increase in battery.


So if you guys know more than the devo of this app, so be it. But he clearly says it can increase battery life. Still dont believe it, then don't use it. But this is straight from the horses mouth.
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i see a potential in crappier battery life because the program is telling the phone to constantly poll/scan the phone for standby. therefore when your using the phone, it's actually wasting battery whereas when your on standby, you might save some battery life
 
anozireth said:
It sounds from that like there may be some benefit from that app then. But it's not as drastic as if the CPU was always at max clock speed when idle (which some of the posts here seemed to imply). The benefit only comes when an application needs some CPU time while the phone is idle; instead of getting bumped up to 1Ghz, the app just runs at 200 Mhz (or whatever you set it at).
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I'm still having a hard time being convinced that manages to keep your CPU scaled down. No one has done my test yet, so we don't know for sure, but I'm still positive that if you specifically tell OverclockWidget to scale down when the device is awake and it fails to do so, then it can't possibly scaledown the CPU when its asleep.

One possible explanation that I can think of is that OverclockWidget somehow intercepts messages to raise the CPU when the device is asleep, but that is both unlikely and has nothing to do with underclocking.

@anozireth Can you link is to where the developer had thIs conversation? I'd like to ask him myself.
 
pingpongboss said:
I believe OverclockWidget does NOTHING to help your battery life.

Hello :),

I would like the OP and everyone that claims better battery life through this method to do one simple test. This post is not to discourage people from trying out this technique, but personally I do not believe this method works like the OP claims. But, like atheists, if you show them ANY scientific proof that god exists, they will become believers as well. That's what I want you believers to do.

  1. Disable OverclockWidget (uninstall it temporarily)
  2. Run LinPack and record results (should be around 6.8 MFLOPS)
  3. Install OverclockWidget and set "Screen On Freq Setting" Min to 24576 and Max to 24576
  4. Uncheck Differ Freq Screen Off
  5. SAVE at the bottom
  6. Right now, if OverclockWidget DOES work, then the CPU should be LOCKED at 24576. Why is that? Because you specifically limited both the MIN and MAX to 24576
  7. Run LinPack again, record results (should still be 6.8 MFLOPS)
  8. Now I will argue that if OverclockWidget has NOT affected Linpack, then it has NOT affected the cpu speed at all when the device is awake. (No Linpack is not "broken", it is merely trying to do as many calculations as it can)
  9. Now I will argue that if OverclockWidget does NOT affect the cpu speed when the phone is awake, then it CANNOT affect the cpu speed when the screen is asleep.
  10. Now I will argue that if OverclockWidget CANNOT affect the cpu speed at all, then the battery life increase everyone claims is just a placebo

If any of those steps is not rigorous enough or might produce ambiguous results, please let me know. PLEASE TEST THIS, you people who claim better battery life. I'm sure a lot of us would LOVE to be proven wrong. Who doesn't want a longer battery life?
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I performed this test and found no difference in the Linpack score. I also opened up SystemPanel and the CPU graph is still showing speeds higher than the 245000 I have Overclock set to.

These results would seem to indicate that Overclock is not working. I want to believe, but it is hard to argue with the evidence against this helping battery life.
 
Ok Why dont every one just turn up the max CPU when screen is off, that should kill the battery, then we would know if it drains when set overclocked with screen off.
 
autorail1 said:
Ok Why dont every one just turn up the max CPU when screen is off, that should kill the battery, then we would know if it drains when set overclocked with screen off.
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You'd think that would work, but again, correlation does not imply causation. Proving OverclockWidget can increase CPU speed and proving that it can increase battery life is two very different things. that's because anything else you do, like install a power hungry app, can also have an impact on battery life.
 
Im with you Im skeptical on it working now.

pingpongboss said:
We get the the point guys ;) No need to derail the thread anymore.



You'd think that would work, but again, correlation does not imply causation. Proving OverclockWidget can increase CPU speed and proving that it can increase battery life is two very different things. that's because anything else you do, like install a power hungry app, can also have an impact on battery life.
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autorail1 said:
Im with you Im skeptical on it working now.
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I am also a skeptic now, as well. However, it "seems" to be doing SOMETHING. I did a control test based on sleep, and without the widget, the phone's idle (tracked with juice manager) bar slope was higher than that with the widget (kinda confusing, but tracked on a graph, battery depletion while asleep was greater without widget, than with). Basically implying, the widget is managing sleep times better. However, it did "seem" to me that when the phone was awake, the battery drain was faster with the widget versus without.

Maybe this is simply a placebo effect, but my phone doesn't know that, and thinks it's getting something good...

If you're a heavy user (phone is on a lot, and use it to do multiple things), my suggestion would be to uninstall, and do all the other things that have been listed to increase battery life.

If you're a light user (turn it on to text, sleep it after, occasional internet search, etc), install it and see if it helps. If you see no change, or it hurts, uninstall it.
 
keatre said:
I am also a skeptic now, as well. However, it "seems" to be doing SOMETHING. I did a control test based on sleep, and without the widget, the phone's idle (tracked with juice manager) bar slope was higher than that with the widget (kinda confusing, but tracked on a graph, battery depletion while asleep was greater without widget, than with). Basically implying, the widget is managing sleep times better. However, it did "seem" to me that when the phone was awake, the battery drain was faster with the widget versus without.

Maybe this is simply a placebo effect, but my phone doesn't know that, and thinks it's getting something good...

If you're a heavy user, my suggestion would be to uninstall, and do all the other things that have been listed to increase battery life.

If you're a light user, install it and see if it helps. If you see no change, or it hurts, uninstall it.
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Hmm interesting. I hope we can get to the bottom of this.
 
pingpongboss said:
Hmm interesting. I hope we can get to the bottom of this.
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I agree. I'm leaning towards the belief that:

The Widget does NOT scale CPU at all, but rather it "streamlines" it (I can't think of a better term, but hopefully you get what I mean).

Somewhat like - oh I don't know - adding a higher octane to your car. It doesn't increase it's HP, but it allows everything to run smoother based on the higher combustion*.

Now, how much of a dramatic difference is it? That still needs to be heavily tested, but I'm fairly sure we can say this is NOT scaling the CPU down. BUT - is increasing battery life (based off reports) based off of sleep times.


*(sorry mechanics out there, I'm an average petrolhead, so if that's not 100% right, my apologies, but hopefully people get what I mean.)
 
keatre said:
However, it "seems" to be doing SOMETHING.
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I am not sure if the OC Widget changes the clock speed or not. But I am with you on this. This app is doing something.

When I first tried I posted my results. My battery that day before going to bed was 62% at 2am when I woke up at 8am the battery was at 62%. Then something happened that my battery didn't drain during the night.

Yesterday I did the same but now without the OC Widget. I left my phone at 100% and when I woke up this morning it had 70% battery. (I can't give you the graph because the full version of SystemPanel expired and I didn't notice.)

But as you said SOMETHING is doing. I am not an expert, but that is something that I can easy notice.

EDIT: I am going to try again this to show the graph tomorrow
 
neodorian said:
OK. Just uninstalled OCWidget and plugged back in but before I did, I took a screenshot of my day's usage. I need to charge now since I am going out later and probably will use the phone a lot.

nozgd0.png
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Whats the name of your app that you're using to show all that info?I'm using Juiceplotter but i want to try something else.
 
Did a little experiment today and this does not seem to make much difference. Did a 3 hour test with and with out overclock widget. Using unrevoked root. Tried to make it as close as possible.
Here is what i did for each,
2 hours of phone use (internet, phone, texting, email, app use)
1 hour of standby (30 mins continuous, 10 mins at a time for the rest)
5 pictures taken with flash
Sync on all times (hotmail every 5 mins, yahoo every 15)
Watched the same 4 hd youtube vids
All data on WiFi at the same location
No GPS or Bluetooth

Without over clock widget 37% of the battery was used (100% down to 63% after test), so about 12.3 percent an hour, so with a full charge you would get 8.1 hours of normal to heavy use.

Now with the overclock widget installed and active with the settings in this post, same testing but i did send less emails, texts and phone during this time, something i could not control. I charged the phone back up to 80% and at the end of 3 hours it was down to 44%, or 36% of the battery was used, even 12% per hour, so a full charge would get you 8.3 hours of normal to heavy use. So with less use of texting, calling and emails sent, the overclock widget only saved 1% of battery used.

Does not seem like this does much, will be uninstalling.
 
Incredible with 1750 ah and root + overlook my android system % has dropped in half compared to cell and idle. Can't post screen cap from phone. 31hrs uptime 25% battery left.

Ah here.
 

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3 hour test with 2 hours usage? What does that prove? It should only help during idle periods. I've only played with this the last 2 days but it seems to be doing something. I left the phone off the charger after a full charge over night and without the widget it was at 60% after 8 hours. With the widget 90% after 8 hours the 2nd night. The phone sat in the same place with pretty much no difference in usage. Will keep testing this out to see if it holds up.
 
robotphood said:
3 hour test with 2 hours usage? What does that prove? It should only help during idle periods. I've only played with this the last 2 days but it seems to be doing something. I left the phone off the charger after a full charge over night and without the widget it was at 60% after 8 hours. With the widget 90% after 8 hours the 2nd night. The phone sat in the same place with pretty much no difference in usage. Will keep testing this out to see if it holds up.
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But what does that prove? if it doesn't really help unless it is idle most of the time why bother, i bought this phone to use it, not to have it idle. I could turn off all the radios, take off auto sync, not play music and just leave the phone off and get 100hrs, but who cares. Just saying for people who use their phones this won't make a difference.
 
I am in a 4g market ; I use hot spot for my laptop & iPad . I have sync & notifications running at all times.

I average only 3-4 hours of battery until I get the 15% warning.

Today I had it in the car charger for 3 hours and it lost power.

I am switching from an iPhone 3G ; it got about 3 hours until I lost battery ; I used a mophie juice air pack ; this got me an extra 4 hrs every day ; I had a charger in the car ; my home office ; my office office ; and I always made it all day every day.

So far with the evo 4g; I have car charger ; home office charger ; pffice office charger; 2 sprint travel charger plus(s) / they give me an extra 2-3 hrs bur have to be plugged in ; which I hate.

Yesterday at my sons graduation ; I followed advice on forums ; turned off notifications ; used app killer for most apps ; I was able to stream world cup for 2 hrs ( with chargers plugged in for all 3 hrs) ; I ran down to 20% remaining ; both chargers were empty ) ; was back in my car back on car charger ; back up to 70% after 2 hours.

I love the device; 4g market ; mobile hot spot; android os; screen;

I share all this as my first post as I work for a solution ; if I can get the same battery solution ad I did with my iPhone ; I will be happy.

I am not worried ; unhappy or upset. Just a consumer who understands that such a powerful device uses a ton of " juice".

My next step will the process in this thread ; I will post my anticipated success !
 
Jonhern said:
But what does that prove? if it doesn't really help unless it is idle most of the time why bother, i bought this phone to use it, not to have it idle. I could turn off all the radios, take off auto sync, not play music and just leave the phone off and get 100hrs, but who cares. Just saying for people who use their phones this won't make a difference.
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It does help. But you are right, it must be idle. The only reason I'm continuing to run it is because I'll come home from a pub and forget to plug the phone in. In the morning, and two aspirin later, I can see the phone is still charged in its sleep mode. Without the widget, the battery would have been much lower (from my my own tests).

As I explained earlier, this does little or may hurt when the screen is on, but with the screen off, I believe it's able to streamline the CPU someway to improve battery life. If you use your phone non-stop until the battery dies, uninstall this widget. If you use it for the "bursts" and then let it sleep for hours, then I would advise playing with the widget to see if it helps at all.
 
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