Hotmail Sync Settings and battery usage

[Mainer82]

I have a Lumia 928 and a Hotmail account, if I have the settings set to "as item arrives" when checking email, will this drain my battery any faster than "every 15 minutes"?

 

[Laura Knotek]

"As items arrive" should use less battery than "every 15 minutes", since "every 15 minutes" means that the device talks to the server every 15 minutes whether or not there is any new email. If its syncing every 15 minutes whether or not needed, that will use more battery than if it only syncs as needed (when there are new emails).

 

[mase123987]

I was thinking the same thing as Laura.

 

[pdaneophyte]

Generally the more useful cut off time is 30 minutes. It depends on how many emails you will get within that 30 minutes time.
If you receive a lot of emails within 30 minutes time you will get a better battery life if you check your mail every 30 minutes.
If you only receive a few emails (less than 5, I suppose) then you will get a better battery life if you set "as items arrive".

Bottom line, a lot of emails -> batch process. A few email -> as items arrives.

 

[svenhassel]

If you put the settings "as items arrive", shouldn?t the phone connect to the server often, and then drain the battery more? I?m thinking in the exact opposite way to Laura, lol.

I know it?s a different OS, but in my iPad, the instructions says that if you allow "push" (which I think has the same function as "as items arrive"), it will use more battery power.

 

[gsquared]

I'm in agreement with sven. "As items arrive" would have to keep a near constant connection back to the server.

 

[pdaneophyte]

No, well behaved email client usually only ping the server around every 20 minutes or so to indicate the server it is still connected to network. Note it is just saying I am here every 20 minutes or so. It isn't going to drain your battery. What is going to drain power is the quality of the network connection. If you are in bad signal area, your phone is going to raise power to maintain connection. Use wifi if you are in a bad signal area, if you can.

 

[OzRob]

Whether push or poll uses more battery is highly dependent on how many emails per hour you receive and what poll interval you select.

Here's an article that looks at some figures for this.

The conclusion is that push email uses the same energy as a 10 minute polling interval if you get seven emails per hour. If you get less than seven emails per hour, push is more efficient. If you get more than seven emails per hour, 10-minute polling is more efficient.

Obviously the 'break even' figure changes with the polling interval, but if you have a polling interval of say 30 mins, then this would be more efficient than push email even if you only receive a couple of emails per hour.

So 'push' is only the better option (power-wise) if you don't get a lot of emails.

 

[OzRob]

pdaneophyte is correct. Whether push or poll uses more battery is highly dependent on how many emails per hour you receive and what poll interval you select.

Here's an article that looks at some figures for this.

The conclusion is that push email uses the same energy as a 10 minute polling interval if you get seven emails per hour. If you get less than seven emails per hour, push is more efficient. If you get more than seven emails per hour, 10-minute polling is more efficient.

Obviously the 'break even' figure changes with the polling interval, but if you have a polling interval of say 30 mins, then this would be more efficient than push email even if you only receive a couple of emails per hour.

So 'push' is only the better option (power-wise) if you don't get a lot of emails.

 

[OzRob]

If you put the settings "as items arrive", shouldn?t the phone connect to the server often, and then drain the battery more?

Depends on how many emails you get per hour. "As items arrive" uses a 'push' from the server to deliver mail, so the phone only connects to the server when new mail is available. If you only get one email per day, the phone will only connect to the mail server once per day. If you get lots of emails, your phone will connect to the server often.

 

[OzRob]

I'm in agreement with sven. "As items arrive" would have to keep a near constant connection back to the server.

No it doesn't. 'Push' email technology is server-initiated. When the phone is set to "as items arrive" it doesn't connect to the server unless it gets a ping from the server to say new mail is available. Obviously, if you get a lot or emails this will happen often. If you don't get many emails, the phone will connect to the server infrequently.

 

[Mainer82]

I don't get a lot of email thankfully (it's a personal one, my work email on the other hand will not be added to the phone) so I'm going to try the push option. I'll keep an eye on how many I get per hour but I'm guessing it's much less than 7 an hour on average.