Samsung Galaxy S2 User

[Gemini Yun]

Hi All,

I am a new user of Samsung Galaxy S2 from Singapore.

I have a couple of questions and i appreciate all positive answers and feedbacks from experience people using the same phone or have knowledge on it.

1) I know S2 drains its battery more than the fruity phone, what are the ways to increase its longevity?
a) Will turning on Wifi rather than using 3G really helps?
b) Will apps (be if greenpower, juice defender) really helps or it just drains out more power?

2) The stock email in S2 initially was working fine when i have 3 Yahoo Mails + 1 Gmails + 1 Office email using Exchange, after a while it simply stop sync all of them.
I had to use the stock email for office use, the Yahoo Mail apps for the 3x Emails accounts and the Stock Gmail for my gmail accout.
This makes me having 3 different emails icons to open to check them
Any suggestion ?

3) May i know what does the "Signal" on the top of the phone means?
SOmetimes it shows 3G, then H+, then H...what is that?

4) When Wifi is in used, does 3G d/c automatically or it's still running somewhere draining my batt?

Lastly, this sounds a stupid question, however just for my knowledge.
* What is 2G, 3G, 4G?

The battery concern is top priority, it drains my batt with above avg usage in 6hours.

When im asleep with 50-60% batt left (no usage at all but my emails apps and all apps i think they are still running) when i wake up 6-7 hours later, the phone is dead)
For iphone, it probably drops 4-5% only (10 times lesser)

I appreciate all answers and thank you so much.

 

[sleedeane]

2g, 3g and 4g, actually stand for generations. My S2 goes through juice rapidly also, but thats the price you pay for all the amenities.

 

[chanchan05]

1) I know S2 drains its battery more than the fruity phone, what are the ways to increase its longevity?
a) Will turning on Wifi rather than using 3G really helps?
b) Will apps (be if greenpower, juice defender) really helps or it just drains out more power?

This is actually very much debatable as there are many factors to consider. For example, to extend the battery life of the phone to the longest possible, is to turn off packet data, put brightness on automatic (or lowest), and switch to GSM only for antenna. Now while for some people this is ok, for others its not. The settings I've mentioned is fine for people who would never use their mobile network connection and use the phone on WiFi exclusively, but if you would, you'd need packet data enabled.

Now here's where it gets a bit tricky. 4G/3G/WCDMA/CDMA uses more battery then simple "2G" or GSM, however they are also loads faster. So switching to one would be depending on how you use the phone. Do you need the higher speed connections? Or would an EDGE connection provided by 2G prove to be enough? If its just for chatting on facebook via an app, a few emails here and there, maybe tweeting or posting every now and then, and you dont mind a little loading time, just go for 2G only and have packet data on.

However if you need a higher speed connection for whatever purpose, you need to have the other options enabled too. And that will drain the battery a lot. What you need to do then is to change the sync settings for your apps. For example, set Facebook and Twitter to sync every hour instead of every 15min, in order to save battery.

Another choice is to manually control mobile internet connection. You keep packet data turned off, and turn it on only when you need it. Green Power as an app seems to use very little juice compared to what a mobile connection does, so it would help, but only in cases where you keep the packet data on.

Personally I just keep to 2G only, since it has bettery coverage, and turn on 3G only when I need the higher speeds. A low signal state would drain battery faster than a state where in you have full signal bars. I also keep my packet data open and use Green Power.

2) The stock email in S2 initially was working fine when i have 3 Yahoo Mails + 1 Gmails + 1 Office email using Exchange, after a while it simply stop sync all of them.
I had to use the stock email for office use, the Yahoo Mail apps for the 3x Emails accounts and the Stock Gmail for my gmail accout.
This makes me having 3 different emails icons to open to check them
Any suggestion ?

I've never had the stock email app cause me to have problems, but I would suggest K9 or MailDroid, since they seem to be the best of the third party apps.

3) May i know what does the "Signal" on the top of the phone means?
SOmetimes it shows 3G, then H+, then H...what is that?

H+ is HSPDA+, 3G, is 3G, and H is HSPDA. It just shows to what connection you are using for internet at a given moment.

4) When Wifi is in used, does 3G d/c automatically or it's still running somewhere draining my batt?

The 3G antennae still work, but you arent actively downloading data through it. WiFi uses less battery than 3G for active web browsing AFAIK.

The battery concern is top priority, it drains my batt with above avg usage in 6hours.

When im asleep with 50-60% batt left (no usage at all but my emails apps and all apps i think they are still running) when i wake up 6-7 hours later, the phone is dead)
.

That's pretty horrific battery life. Has to do with your sync settings most likely. I usually use up only 20-30% of battery life over the 6hours I am asleep, but then that's when it syncs. Something must have synced a lot when you sleep, like a schedule. You can turn off packet data before you sleep, or get an app like tasker to set a task schedule like that, You'll be looking at a 5-15% battery usage for the 6hours asleep with that.

 

[sleedeane]

Thanx for the useful info. I've been pretty confused about the different signals myself.