Battery Life Thread

[berty6294]

I've had my 928 for a while now and my god is the battery a blessing! I'll go the whole day on my phone and around 10pm (when I usually plug any other phone in) I look at my 928 and it says 68% battery! Most any other phone would be dead or in battery saver mode (less 10%). I'm very happy with the battery! And this isn't a one day thing, I'm consistently finding my battery to last leaps better than any other smartphone I've had!

 

[Serious Tone]

Hmm, so I just read that actually keeping your WiFi on all the time, even when not in a spot with a connection and also keeping the WiFi radio on when the cell is in standby actually increases battery life.

Anybody have any knowledge about this. I have my phone to shut off WiFi when the screen goes off, which I thought saved battery, but actually uses more because then the cellular network is then continuously searching and draining it.

Maybe a reason some peoples battery isn't as good..?

 

[Mocah]

Hmmm... I could be wrong, but I don't think it does. When battery saver initiates, it turns my WiFi off. So I'd imagine that keeping it on drains the battery.

 

[Serious Tone]

For all the people that have been experiencing bad battery life, it might have been already said, but I just found it today.

I had all my accounts to manually refresh and I thought I was keeping my apps from running in the background but i didnt even know about the applications section under battery saver. I found that the apps app highlights, YouTube, here drive plus beta and weather were all running in the background. After I disabled all of them my performance from what I can tell has shot way up.

Woops, looks like I didn't need this replacement after all.

 

[Ryano89]

For all the people that have been experiencing bad battery life, it might have been already said, but I just found it today.

I had all my accounts to manually refresh and I thought I was keeping my apps from running in the background but i didnt even know about the applications section under battery saver. I found that the apps app highlights, YouTube, here drive plus beta and weather were all running in the background. After I disabled all of them my performance from what I can tell has shot way up.

Woops, looks like I didn't need this replacement after all.

I do not see an applications section under battery saver, what am I missing?

 

[Serious Tone]

Sorry, its under settings, swipe to the right to applications, then its under background tasks.

 

[hopmedic]

For all the people that have been experiencing bad battery life, it might have been already said, but I just found it today.

I had all my accounts to manually refresh and I thought I was keeping my apps from running in the background but i didnt even know about the applications section under battery saver. I found that the apps app highlights, YouTube, here drive plus beta and weather were all running in the background. After I disabled all of them my performance from what I can tell has shot way up.

Woops, looks like I didn't need this replacement after all.

Of those you mention, only Here Drive + can run constantly. The others only have background agents that are allowed to run for up to 25 seconds every approximately half-hour. And that depends on your settings - the weather app probably has a setting where you can choose how often it updates (you didn't say which weather app, so I don't know). Here Drive+ will only run in the background if you are actually navigating.

 

[jleebiker]

Of those you mention, only Here Drive + can run constantly. The others only have background agents that are allowed to run for up to 25 seconds every approximately half-hour. And that depends on your settings - the weather app probably has a setting where you can choose how often it updates (you didn't say which weather app, so I don't know). Here Drive+ will only run in the background if you are actually navigating.

Hop, I've been reading your posts for some time. (Thank you btw for all your insights of WP8). Is there a list somewhere that will spell out for people which of the more popular apps WILL and will NOT run constantly? I read the thread about why we don't need to manage background apps, but I think it would make people feel better if they could compare to a list somehow. Thoughts?

 

[hopmedic]

I'm not aware of a list of which apps use which background tasks. The way it works, the only ones that can use the background constantly are the ones that are tracking location actively (like the Here Drive+, or apps that track location for exercise, like mapping your run/walk/bike), and apps that play music in the background.

Location tracking apps cannot track your location without your permission. They must present you with notice the first time that they request location tracking, and they must have a method of disabling location tracking, or they will not pass certification. They have to have a reason to track your location - can't be tracking location for kicks. A year or two ago there was an app from AGV Antivirus (like why would we need that, since it was incapable of doing what it claimed to do), and what it truly did was reported your location occasionally to their servers. Microsoft pulled it as soon as this was discovered.

As a developer, one of the things that irritates me, since most of my apps are free with ads, is that the ads require device identification and other capabilities that I would rather not enable, simply because to some people these capabilities raise their level of suspicion. I understand why the ads use these capabilities, as it helps them to target their ads, but I wish there were a way around it.

As for apps that play music in the background, if you hit the volume button and make sure it is paused, you're not using any CPU cycles. If you're like me, and use bluetooth to stream, then you'll notice that when you connect/disconnect BT you can end up with music playing unexpectedly. For that I use the Stop Music app. From within the app, tap the pin tile button and the tile that is pinned will stop the music without you having to go into the app. One touch from the start screen stops the music.

VOIP apps like Skype have some kind of exception as well, but I haven't looked into them, so I don't know how they work, or whether they are allowed to be active in the background all the time, or if they are using some other method to wake up the app when an incoming call is detected.

Hope this helps!

 

[jleebiker]

Thanks Hop! That'll do. I think it's better to have an understanding as to the WHY and HOW, rather than just a list anwyway. I was just hoping to get a list for some people who might do better with a list.

 

[Riverrunner88]

For what it's worth, I've had mine for 6 days. I unplug from the charger at 0530 and plug back in at 2200 with 25 to 30% left. It will certainly go all day for my use. I'm not a power user by any means... 20 or 30 mins on the phone, wifi when at home, 3 email accounts (2 are push), some social media (FB and twitter), about an hour of music play, taking a few photo's, and internet stuff. LTE signal is 1 to 2 bars....sometimes I see 3G so I'm guessing my LTE reception isn't that great.

 

[jleebiker]

Hmm, so I just read that actually keeping your WiFi on all the time, even when not in a spot with a connection and also keeping the WiFi radio on when the cell is in standby actually increases battery life.

Anybody have any knowledge about this. I have my phone to shut off WiFi when the screen goes off, which I thought saved battery, but actually uses more because then the cellular network is then continuously searching and draining it.

Maybe a reason some peoples battery isn't as good..?

Can you cite a source? I can't imagine how having a component running would inspire LESS power consumption. Sounds like it may be anecdotal based on a new user's observations on an un-calibrated battery?

 

[hopmedic]

Actually, there were studies done (I don't have a link handy) and that's why they added the constant-on wifi with the Portico update. Prior to Portico, if the phone screen wasn't on, the wifi was off. It was found that using wifi used less power than cellular (how this doesn't make sense is a mystery to me), so they made it so that when the phone goes to sleep the wifi will stay on.

How it matters when out and about I don't know. I leave my wifi, BT, and NFC on all the time, and don't worry about it. I have a wireless charger at my desk so I frequently leave the phone lay on it, and if I worry about it in the car (where I listen to podcasts frequently on my hour-long commute, streaming with BT), I plug in (but can't wait for the Nokia Wireless Car Charger). Admittedly, I'm charging a lot more often than most people, but that's partly because I'm at my desk all day, partly because I have a long commute, and partly because I'm battery-level OCD. I don't judge the phone for that, though - that's MY defect. :wink:

 

[Serious Tone]

Android 101: Save battery by keeping Wifi alive | Android Central

Makes sense after reading that.

 

[jleebiker]

I can easily see were WiFi component could, in theory, use LESS power. Let's say you're in a marginal area for cell signal. The cell adapter is constantly going to be working to adjust power up and down to get the best signal possible. If your WiFi is a typical home WiFi router, you will have good to excellent signal and it won't be modulating to try and get a good signal.

I'm just saying that, all things equal, if you were to run a test, and compared power consumption with the WiFi components ON vs WiFi components OFF, I can't imagine having them ON would consume LESS power.

 

[Serious Tone]

Not necessarily saving power just because WiFi is on, but having it on so that it can connect to a network should you be near one and get off the cellular network asap.

 

[jleebiker]

Hmm, so I just read that actually keeping your WiFi on all the time, even when not in a spot with a connection and also keeping the WiFi radio on when the cell is in standby actually increases battery life.

So you're NOT saying it actually increases battery life correct?

 

[jleebiker]

Actually, there were studies done (I don't have a link handy) and that's why they added the constant-on wifi with the Portico update. Prior to Portico, if the phone screen wasn't on, the wifi was off. It was found that using wifi used less power than cellular (how this doesn't make sense is a mystery to me), so they made it so that when the phone goes to sleep the wifi will stay on.

How it matters when out and about I don't know. I leave my wifi, BT, and NFC on all the time, and don't worry about it. I have a wireless charger at my desk so I frequently leave the phone lay on it, and if I worry about it in the car (where I listen to podcasts frequently on my hour-long commute, streaming with BT), I plug in (but can't wait for the Nokia Wireless Car Charger). Admittedly, I'm charging a lot more often than most people, but that's partly because I'm at my desk all day, partly because I have a long commute, and partly because I'm battery-level OCD. I don't judge the phone for that, though - that's MY defect. :wink:

I see alot of similarities in how you charge your phone Hop and myself. I have a wireless charger on my desk at work, but usually only put it there when it NEEDS a charge. I tyically leave it off the charger since I am still paranoid about the "memory affect". I know my phone isn't supposed to get the memory effect, but I'm still paranoid about it.
I charge mine up in the car as well since I have an hour commute each way. It is nice though NOT to have to charge it if I don't want to. I now have options and am not tied to a charger. I think I will be doing more "lving" with the phone than always stressing over it's charge levels.

 

[jleebiker]

Woah! That was my 500th post! Woah!!!

 

[Serious Tone]

So you're NOT saying it actually increases battery life correct?

I might have worded mine wrong, especially since I hate typing from touch screens, but I am saying it DOES increase battery life. Basically by cutting the cell network off from draining it as it would.

Read that link I posted, it explains better.