Help Sync/Status/Internet Questions

[CoolKiwiBloke]

Hi Guys,

Just got an LG P350 and have a few questions.

1) On the notification drawer what is the purpose of the 3G connection icon?

2) With wi-fi enabled do I assume that the phone uses the wi-fi connection in preference to the phone service provider?

3) Sync - I can't quite understand the settings for this, being on a pay-as-you-go scheme I would ideally like no automatic sync-ing, or at least none using the phone network as that costs money. I see I can turn auto-sync off and background data off - does that stop any application from using data? Manual sync seems quite hard to get to, one has to get to the accounts, click the account and then click sync. Other phones I have seen have a sync button on the notification bar which allows for easy manual sync. I tried to put a shortcut to the accounts on the front but couldn't

Cheers,

Dale

 

[Laudano]

Hi there,

1) It just shows you're connected to the 3G network. If you set your phone to use only 2G, this icon will display differently.

2) Yes, the wifi network has precedence over 3G or 2G.

3) You can disable completely the sync or the traffic over the mobile network on the same section of the phone settings you use to force the phone on 2G or wi-fi only. Also, there's an widget called "power control" which helps turning on and off most of the settings you're asking for without the need to go to the phone settings section.

Hope it helped,

Rico

 

[CoolKiwiBloke]

1) On the notification bar there is a 3G icon that can be turned on and off. What happens when one turns 3G off? Does that mean the phone no longer uses the network provider for data transfer? Or just uses old fashioned slow data transfer - in which case whats the point in being able to turn it off?

3) So I've turned sync off, but is there any easy, shortcut, way to sync an account manually? Its a pain in the neck having to go through settings, find the account, and then sync it.

 

[Laudano]

1) That's only important (enabling or disabling 3G) if you have a small cap on your data plan. Say you have 200Mb per month: with 3G (1 to 7 Mbps) on you'd probably spend this cap on the first day with a normal use of Internet and you would be paying the heavy surcharge fees carriers usually apply when you exceed your plan cap. So it's useful to have this on 2G (32 to 110Kbps). Besides this, 2G spares battery power.

3) As I've said on the first reply and you obviously didn't read: "Also, there's an widget called "power control" which helps turning on and off most of the settings you're asking for without the need to go to the phone settings section. "

 

[CoolKiwiBloke]

Thanks Laudano, but you don't need to be insulting. I did read it, and didn't see anything in power control about account syncing. I've googled further and found loads of power control widgets, and you're right it looks like they might do the job.

And on the subject of reading, I did say in my first post that I'm on pay-as-you-go which means I pay for all data I use right from the start.

I was hoping that turning 3G off would stop the phone from syncing except when a wireless connection was available. But it sounds like this isn't the case, it will just sync but slower.

 

[CoolKiwiBloke]

Where does one find out what these features actually do? The user manual for Android phones seems rather lacking in solid information.

For example, what is the exact difference between "General Sync Settings: Background Data" and "General Sync Settings: Auto-sync". The first says "applications can sync, send and receive data at any time" the second says "applications can sync automatically". Those definitions seems to overlap.

 

[CoolKiwiBloke]

OK - found the android user manual which explains some of this better. How would a non-technical person have any idea what is happening with their phone? I guess they're not meant to... they just use the defaults and pay the data cost.

Also on this phone after experimentation I can confirm that although the user manual says you can turn on or off the 3G Connection (and you can) the icon they are referring to turns data on or off. The phone will not attempt a data connection when that icon isn't selected. (Don't know where the setting actually resides though).