Battery consumption, connections... anybody help me?

[Guest Phantom75]

Hi people,

Sorry if I'm asking something that has been discussed over zilions of topics. I've been through all of them, trying to find out anything that can help me to have a normal battery life, let's say, a couple days with my common usage.

I don't consider myself a noob. I know that touchscreen phones usually consume more battery juice, I know that 3G phones consume even more, and I also know that using many of that so-called smartphone features (like surfing the net, receiving emails, syncing and so on) drains the battery. But maybe I'm an Android noob.

Since 2007 I have been playing around with that kind of "toys", essentially PPC-PE devices, so I guess Windows Mobile is my comfort zone. I have had many HTC Devices, such as the original Touch, Touch Cruise, Diamond, Xperia X1a (ok, this one's SE branded, but it's HTC made). My last phone was a Samsung Omnia2, not HTC, but was a PPC-PE phone. Been using WM for those years gave me a huge knowledge about that platform, all good (and bad) stuff about it. I can say I deeply know how to tweak a WM phone to fit all my needs.

When the Nexus One was released, followed by the HTC Desire, I have really started wanting to test an Android device, just for kicks. Those seemed perfect to me, powerful, 840x480 AMOLED displays, without a hardware keyboard, really sleek phones. The fact that most Android phones uses capacitive screens is also an attractive (one can get bored of using resistive screens for so many time).

So I have decide myself, sold my Omnia2 and bought a Desire. I'm happy with it, specially because of its beauty and build quality (it sure beats my old Omnia2, that was all plastic-cheap made). But... well nothing is perfect. I can't say I'm completely satisfied.

The main issue of it, IMHO: battery. I have seen many complains about it here and in other Android forums, and now I know why. I've been trying all tips to save battery, tips which would not affect my usage. For example, disabling 3G to use 2G is not applicable to me, because I use 3G to surf the net. Disabling mobile data connection is a no-go, because I want the weather widget to be auto-updated, I want to receive emails automatically.

I've seen also completely different opinions between Desire users. One tells his Desire lasts for 50 hours on a charge, other tells his one lasts for 30 hours.

So I've been trying to follow, as I said, other tips like stop using a live wallpaper, install and use Juice Defender, disable push Gmail, things like that. And still, I'm not able to get my Desire running for more than 28 hours!

Do I use it very much? I don't think so. Let's do this, I'll show you my daily usage and compare it to my previous Omnia2. In a normal day I use:

- 40 minutes of phone calls (made/received);

- 90 minutes (1,5 hours) of listening to music over bluetooth, using a bluetooth stereo headset;

- Auto-sync weather every 3 hours;

- Auto-sync email every 3 hours;

- 10-15 minutes of internet browsing;

- Manual sync of my Google account to update agenda and contacts twice a day.

All connections are made using 3G, I'm over a 3G network all day long.

With this daily usage, I got my Omnia2 running for about 65 hours! Let's say, almost 3 days long! I even left it on all night long, without worrying with the battery. Each day consumed 30%-35% of battery juice.

With that usage in my Desire, after one day 45% to 50% of battery juice is gone. I have to turn it off at night so I can use it the next day without recharging. It's about 26-28 hours of total usage before I have to charge it. Is this normal, or I have just got spoiled with Omnia2 battery?

I guess that connection must be the main reason of battery usage. In WM, it's easy to control when a program open or close a connection. In Android this has been a bit hard for me to understand.

First of all, there's Accounts and Sync. I have only three accounts in there, Stocks and Weather (which are HTC default, I guess), and my Google account. Only Weather account is marked as an auto-sync account, because I want my weather widget to be auto-updated every 3 hours. Also, in that screen, I have Auto-sync enabled (to update the weather widget, as I said) and Background data enabled. Ok, people say that leaving Background data enabled drains the battery. But if I disable it, I don't get auto-updated weather, so I'll leave it enabled.

Now, in Wireless & networks, let's check Mobile network. If I disable it, I'll save some juice. But I'm also losing weather and e-mail auto-sync, because those need mobile network enabled to be updated. Now this is different from Windows Mobile. In WM, when a program needs connection (for example, SPB Weather), it opens a data connection and does what it has to do (download new weather information). Then it leaves the data connection idle, and after some time, if this data connection is not used, it gets closed. I couldn't do this in Android, maybe I'm doing something wrong here, some help would be appreciated.

Let's go now inside Mobile networks. There's this option "enable always-on mobile data". What the hell is that? I really don't get it, some people say it helps to save battery by not opening a connection every time, others say it drains battery because it keeps the connection alive all the time. What I've checked is that when I put my Desire in standby, after some time it disables the connection. Well, that may save some battery, but it will also make weather and email auto-update not work, because this auto-update can only happen if the device is awake. So I have to leave this option enabled, I guess.

And that's it. I have put email to sync every 3 hours, same thing for weather. My usage is written above. I don't know what more should I do to save battery, so I don't have to turn off my Desire at night and at least it lasts about 40 hours on a single charge.

I really need some help. As I have said above, maybe I'm an Android noob, and experienced Android users as we have here can give me some useful tips.

[Guest spammyspam]

Compared to others in this forum, I have crap battery life. I get blamed for using it too much, but even in standby and without using it I only get 7-8 hours.

I've come to the conclusion that the network you connect to matters, and that mine adversely takes its toll on the Desire.

I know you don't want to hear it, but for me using 2G in my home gives fabulous results (no where near 50 hours though).

I'm hoping new radios will help.

[Guest Diggedy]

It actually sounds like your getting better battery than most people here. definitely more than me. one thing that will help you is a task killer. you will get many arguments to say I'm wrong but I've been trying with and without for a few weeks and not using one can increase my battery consumption by up to 3x. Some other people will say its my apps not doing what they are supposed to but I only use apps I need to so my only answer is a task killer

[Guest Phantom75]

It actually sounds like your getting better battery than most people here. definitely more than me. one thing that will help you is a task killer. you will get many arguments to say I'm wrong but I've been trying with and without for a few weeks and not using one can increase my battery consumption by up to 3x. Some other people will say its my apps not doing what they are supposed to but I only use apps I need to so my only answer is a task killer

If this is good battery, don't wanna see what's a bad battery life.

I do like my Desire, but I'm starting to miss the Omnia2. I'm also considering the idea of coming back to WM and give the HTC HD2 a try. Gotta check if the HD2 has an acceptable ~40h battery life.

[Guest DarrenMowat]

Hi, well i agree that your getting pretty good battery life. Task killers do not help, the Android system automatically kills processes if it needs the resources they are using. Also i find that if i turn wi-fi off when im not using it that i save a lot of battery life.

Have you tried a rom with a uvoc kernel?