Battery Saving Tips

[LukeH]

Introduction: In this tutorial, I will give you several tips that will increase the length of your battery life. Before I learned the settings, I couldn't make it an entire day on my Droid Bionic standard battery. Now, I can survive an entire day with at least 20%-30% battery life left. Let's get started.

Widgets: A widget is a running application on your homescreen that allows you to have quick access to information. The more widgets you have on your homescreen, the faster your battery will be drained. The widgets that constantly push data are the ones that will use the majority of your battery. For example, the Google toolbar widget will use less battery than a weather widget that is constantly pushing in data to update the status of the weather. A helpful tip would be to set the weather update to every 15-30 minutes. This will have a great impact on your battery. This applies for your other widgets as well.

Account Sync/Data Manager: This can be accessed by going to Settings > Accounts. This is a list of every account you have set-up on your Bionic. This includes your email, Google account, Twitter, Facebook, etc. Delete any that you do not need or use. Now, go to Settings > Battery & Data Manager > Data Delivery. Under Application Data Delivery, you will have two tabs labeled Email and Corporate Sync and Social Applications. Click on Email and Corporate Sync first. Then click Email Delivery. Turn off Data Push and click the Fetch Schedule button. Have it push emails to you every 15 minutes, or however long you think you can go without receiving an important email. Now go back to Application Data Delivery. Choose Social Applications, then Data Delivery Frequency. Have it sync the data every 15-30 minutes. This will drastically improve your battery life because your phone isn't constantly searching for information.

Data Delivery: Go to Settings > Battery & Data Manager > Data Delivery. Enable Background Data, but disable Data Roaming and Data Enabled.

WiFi: This can be accessed under Settings > Wireless & Networks. Using WiFi uses less battery than a 3g or 4g connection. When using data in a WiFi area, it is recommended to turn it on, and turn your 3g or 4g connection off.

Display: The Droid Bionic features what is called a Pentile display. Basically, it is already set-up to save battery life. It may not look as good as an iPhone retina display, but it's considerably close. The average user probably can't even tell the difference. When it comes to display, set it to the lowest brightness settings or around 1/4 of max brightness. Anything more than that is unnecessary.

Games: Obviously games like Angry Birds, Cut the Rope, Words with Friends, etc. are heavy on your battery. Use them sparingly, as they can zap your battery in no time.

GO Switch Widget: I recommend downloading this widget from the app store. It is free and extremely useful. It allows you to control WiFi, Airplane Mode, Mobile Network, Battery, Brightness, Screen Timeout, Bluetooth, and several others directly from your homescreen.

Conclusion: Hopefully you find these battery saving tips useful on your Droid Bionic. After using my Bionic a few days after purchase, I thought I needed the extended battery. But, after using these settings for 3-4 weeks, I have found that I do not need the extra battery life, even though I am on my phone constantly.

Source

[Shadez]

Nice information!

[bluezdawg]

Great info Luke! Well done and thanks for sharing! Curious to see what you think about some of the battery conservation apps. I have had some good results with Juice Defender. Gonna go cruise some settings now

[bluezdawg]

Btw, Shadez, on my other post... You're brutal

[LukeH]

Nice information!

Thank you! This is my first thread besides my introduction thread, so hopefully it's not too bad.

[LukeH]

Great info Luke! Well done and thanks for sharing! Curious to see what you think about some of the battery conservation apps. I have had some good results with Juice Defender. Gonna go cruise some settings now

Ya know, I haven't had much luck with any battery conservation apps. But then again, I haven't really tried many other than Juice Defender. I uninstalled it as I thought it was ineffective, but I may go try some others!

[aaf709]

It's a good list, and I'm trying some of the suggestions, but I want to comment about Go Switch Widget. You have to install Go Launcher EX to make it work and while I really like Go Launcher, it won't work with the Favorite Contacts widget. Of course, if you have Go Launcher, then by all means use Go Switch Widget.

That being said, there are other widgets that'll do most of that. The stock Power Switch can do some, and I use SwitchPro (but that costs 99 cents).

[LukeH]

It's a good list, and I'm trying some of the suggestions, but I want to comment about Go Switch Widget. You have to install Go Launcher EX to make it work and while I really like Go Launcher, it won't work with the Favorite Contacts widget. Of course, if you have Go Launcher, then by all means use Go Switch Widget.

That being said, there are other widgets that'll do most of that. The stock Power Switch can do some, and I use SwitchPro (but that costs 99 cents).

Ahh I see. I forgot to take that into consideration. But you are correct. There are several other widgets that do the same thing.

Sent from my DROID BIONIC using DroidForums

[steamster]

Not pertaining to this, but this is urgent, can you go read my latest thread. THANKS ALOT GUYS

[LegalAmerican]

What does "Data Enabled" do?