Saving battery

[Eugenious]

How can I save battery on my droid x?

Sent from my DROIDX using DroidForums App

 

[JayakamrdroidX]

1)turn the screen brightness down
2)Task killer use it!
3)take off live wallpapers
4)make sure gps an wifi are turned off

 

[igknight]

I wouldn't use a task killer. They actually will drain the battery. By killing tasks you use up battery time, and when the program restarts its uses more battery.

Outside of that, the other tips are good. I do not use the auto dim function, that helps conserve the battery. I have a widget installed so I can pick if I want it brighter or not.

Also if you are rooted you can under click your CPU. When I do this I find that it does help (not by much, but any little bit helps). I have profiles with setcpu that I can either pick from, or run depending on multiple options. For the most part I have it at 300 min and 1GHz max. If the bat is 50% or lower I drop it down in max speed. You can also drop it down to say 600 if the screen is off. Any slower than that the phone is to unresponsive for me.

I also don't allow for programs to auto update. Checking for them and updating can use up your battery too.

If you are in an area where you have WIFI a lot, use that instead of 3G. 3G sucks your battery faster, but if your not using WIFI, turn off the antenna.

 

[BodyBagz]

1)turn the screen brightness down
2)Task killer use it!
3)take off live wallpapers
4)make sure gps an wifi are turned off

1) Ignore numbers 2, 3,...aww hell, just ignore all of these cause none of them are exactly right...

2) Use Auto Brightness and see how your battery time vs screen brightness looks after a few days. I personally use this setting because I am indoors and outdoors on a somewhat regular basis and the phone adjusts accordingly...

3) DO NOT INSTALL AND USE A TASK KILLER!----> Click the first link down below in my signature and read what Google and Android Developers have to say about task killers and how Android handles memory and apps...well worth the read! Also, stay away from Antivirus apps...they are virtually useless unless you just want to waste battery life...

4) Live wallpapers will use some battery...but as long as the screen is off, they are really no more a battery eater than the screen itself.

5) GPS can be On, as long as there are no "background or foreground" apps that use it for updating purposes.

WiFi on the other hand, can save you battery as long as you are where you can connect and utilize the signal...it uses less battery when its connected than 3G. Now, if you dont have any WiFi spots to connect to, then you need to turn it off or it will be constantly "searching" for a signal which does eat into battery life.

6) Make sure you set Widgets that update to the longest possible times, or like myself, set them to Manual Update...that way they arent trying to update every 30 minutes or so.RSS feeds, Weather Widgets and FaceBook and E-mail, all can all be treated the same way depending on how much you need them to update...all of mine are set on Manual.

Doing items 2-6 can greatly add to your battery life. I personally get between 17 and 20 hours a day out of my rooted and ROM`d Droid X, just by doing what I outlined here...

Good luck, and remember, anything from 10-12 hours daily is actually pretty decent when talking about "smartphones" depending on what all you are doing with them...

 

[echonaut]

Right now I'm ending the day, after 16 hours of unplugged, at 50-60% battery. The Droid X has the ability to get some RIDICULOUS battery life. (Ridiculous in a good way.) This is even with wifi on.

Probably the biggest thing that will drain your battery are the apps that you run. If you've got a ton of apps running in the background, then you're going to want to check on that and make sure that there's nothing constantly pulling data down, or doing any sort of high-intensity polling.

Listening to music will generally drastically reduce battery life, as well.

 

[BodyBagz]

Right now I'm ending the day, after 16 hours of unplugged, at 50-60% battery. The Droid X has the ability to get some RIDICULOUS battery life. (Ridiculous in a good way.) This is even with wifi on.

Probably the biggest thing that will drain your battery are the apps that you run. If you've got a ton of apps running in the background, then you're going to want to check on that and make sure that there's nothing constantly pulling data down, or doing any sort of high-intensity polling.

Listening to music will generally drastically reduce battery life, as well.

Actually, it depends on how you are listening to music. If you are listening to MP3`s that you have loaded to the SD card, then that is not really even a small battery drain in my experience. I drive 1 hour to work each morning with my DX running to my car stereo player via Audio Cable, and from off charger at 100% when i leave, I arrive at work still sitting at 100% with just music playing.

Now, if you are streaming Pandora, then yes, you will burn through your battery, but that is more due to the app needing internet/data connections in order to work.

SD card stored music playback is actually not all that battery intensive..its a big reason why newer iPods have such great battery life...especially over their hard drive counterparts.

 

[drivinfocused]

anyone have any ideas what i could do, i use a lot of gps and navigation because of my job, when i get to a job site i close navigation and turn of gps a lot, and i am also on the phone a lot because of my job type....... but today. i was at 100% at about 2pm (now 830 pm) when i loaded Darkslide. and ofcourse that at up some battery. now my phone has been screen on/off and texting lightly since then... i am sitting at 50%. that is including downloading all the apps i had. is this kinda normal or am i just thinking that it is jsut really using a lot.... (more than normal)

 

[BodyBagz]

anyone have any ideas what i could do, i use a lot of gps and navigation because of my job, when i get to a job site i close navigation and turn of gps a lot, and i am also on the phone a lot because of my job type....... but today. i was at 100% at about 2pm (now 830 pm) when i loaded Darkslide. and ofcourse that at up some battery. now my phone has been screen on/off and texting lightly since then... i am sitting at 50%. that is including downloading all the apps i had. is this kinda normal or am i just thinking that it is jsut really using a lot.... (more than normal)

6 and 1/2 hours including loading a ROM? I am guessing you also did a back-up or 2 as well prior to loading the ROM...and then you did some texting and the like...

I wouldnt call that "bad" battery life. At least not yet. You are going to have to run it for a few days to get an idea of how your phone runs on the new ROM. Darkslide is supposed to be good with battery, depending on whether you went with the Blur version or the Blurless...Bluress will almost always be a better battery saver.

Also, if you are going to be using the GPS/Nav function while in the car/truck, then you will probably want to invest in the car dock and a car charger...no sense running the GPS/Nav in car and not have it on regular juice...thats just asking to burn through your battery.

 

[BodyBagz]

Just as a "check myself", I decided to see what impact PowerAmp would have on my phone today at work. I didnt use my phone on my 1 hour trip to work...actually listened to regular radio for a change. Attached below is a screencap I just did a few minutes ago...

This usage is from my 10 hour work day...minus a 30 minute lunch break, two 15 minute breaks, and about 30 minutes prior to work starting while I checked my corporate e-mail...so we`ll say 8.5 hours of constant music playback from the SD card while at work. I did however playback on my phone in the car on the way home, as well as during a 45 minute workout. I was quite impressed when I arrived home and was still at 50% battery remaining...not too shabby me thinks...