The Battery Sucks or Does it?

So, you got a phone with huge horse power and now you're mad cuz it guzzles the gas???

I come from a D1 and have had treos, bb's etc. The D2G is the best phone I have ever had.

Lets see if we can help you improve your battery life.


Disclaimers

Every phone is slightly different, just like your car - the same model, year, engine size and even color that your friend owns might get better or worse gas mileage than yours. Just a fact.

Every user uses their phone different even if using all the same apps, home, etc.

I am not responsible for what you do or don't do to your phone, the following is just what I did.


Btw, I'm not an engineer or software genius - anyone can do what I did with the D2G.


Each of these methods and apps were tested (except breaking in the bat) on their own and then in conjunction with what else I knew worked.

From my experience, these batteries need to be broken in like a new car engine and there are two trains of thought on this. 1. be gentle and take your time 2. beat the crap out of it but stay under the rev limit for the first few thousand miles (yes, I use car analogies a lot).

I go with method #2 and always have and have never had an issue - with cars or phones.

Settings, whether the phone is rooted or unrooted.

1. in data settings, uncheck "data roaming" - just dont forget to check it if you go on a trip

2. under accounts, uncheck "sync gmail" this is a huge energy hog and always has been with Droid phones, I also uncheck "sync calendar.

3. in call settings, uncheck "voice privacy" you get better sound anyway

4. in sound settings, use vibrate only in silent mode
a. I dont use this but you can also disable the haptic feedback and sd card notifications

5. in display settings - I use auto brightness But you can set it at 40% or under and gain some battery life... I compared 30% to auto for 24 hrs each of heavy use and I did notice extra battery life set at 40% than auto.

6. screen timeout, I use 2 minutes but usually shut it off when Im done messing with it but cant stand when it goes off by itself.

7. animations, I left it set to "all animations" for this whole test... meaning all week.

8. Use wifi instead of 3G when you are at home or work or where ever you will be for more than 10-15 minutes. wifi is faster and eats less battery.

Task Killers and Virus Protection. - like waterproofing water. Dont use these, they dont do what you think... Learn More Here

Now a word on specific battery Hogs...

live wallpapers, very brightly colored wallpapers, social apps that connect and transfer data every 10 seconds, games - online or not, visual screen crap while playing music, having it "talk" when I get a text, anything GPS, anything pulling data from the web. its your phone so do with it what you want - this post is just to help those who freak out about battery life and some simple ways to make it better.


ok now for the fun stuff.

The following apps allow me to alter settings that an unrooted phone wont.

Root - if you dont know what it is or why we do it please look it up Here. most of the tweaks below are apps and settings that require it.
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$Titanium Backup - so I can Freeze apps that try to connect to the web mostly the blur stuff.

$Juice Defender - I like it because I can set certain parameters and its solid.

$Root Explorer - Imo its the best

$Droidoverclock - fine tune the speed and the voltage of the processor (all of the gains I have experienced have been at the phones stock settings, I under and overclock for specific things but again, they are all set at factory settings for this but by changing your clock speeds and voltage you will see more improvement granted you do it right.)


$SetCPU - like the app above only this one is better at managing the settings created by overclock


It should be noted that the largest gains I have experienced have come from changing my data settings, then using Juice defender, then freezing apps with Titanium Backup.


its a phone, the way I see it its a tool, to be used when I want to use it. you dont leave your car running in the driveway all night long or for 20 minutes while you're in the store why would you do that with a phone? if you're not using it (as in pulling up a website or checking your email) dont make the phone run all the time and you will see much improved battery life. also, it comes with a charger for a reason, this phone has an extremely fast processor and some of the technology just hasnt caught up with other aspects... such as the battery.

if it stills sucks down a battery in less than 10-12 hours you may have a lame battery... verizon will replace it if you make a big deal about it.





Jameson

D1 rooted, hacked, twisted etc...

D2G rooted and tweaked, waiting for the SBF - now my favorite phone.

Very good write up

Sent from my DROID2 GLOBAL using DroidForums App

"So, you got a phone with huge horse power and now you're mad cuz it guzzles the gas???"

Well said my friend!

After a brief break-in, my new D2G averages a full 18 hours up-time before I need to charge it.

No root.
No task killer.
Average voice and data usage (110870 kb usage in one month).
15 min. sync on my 5 email accts
3 weather apps running in background
No WiFi except in evenings
No GPS, usually
CDMA Location tracking is on.

I'm really pretty pleased overall with its battery performance.

Mike
OakridgeBBQ.com

The display is going to eat up all your battery. The first day I had this phone it barely lasted for 5 hours. I've had it unplugged for >5 hours now with the display on almost 2 hours and im at 50% battery. And you can always get another battery unlike the iPhone.

Sent from my Droid 2 Global running Fission 2.4.3

Excellent post. Worded very well. I've had my D2G for 3 weeks now. I noticed the OTA last week helped extend battery life. Something I stumbled across last Wednesday morning that really gave me great battery life was to simply power off then on. I left the house at 9am with GPS and Wi-fi on (I mistakenly left wi-fi on). Didn't look at the phone until around Noon and to my surprise the battery gauge widget indicated 90% battery life still left! I repeated this on Friday but this time remembering to turn wi-fi off and I got similar results. I don't know why powering off then on helps but I will be testing this tomorrow with more usage (talk, bluetooth, GPS, mp3, 3G web surfing)

Sent from my DROID2 GLOBAL using DroidForums App

Ok, today with GPS on, about 20 minutes of 3G web surfing, read a short document in the isilo app, bluetooth on for 30 minutes, and no talk time... from 9am-3:50pm I had 80% battery life left. All stock. I'm quite pleased.

Sent from my DROID2 GLOBAL using DroidForums App

Well, at least number 8 was correct. I think I disagree with just about everything else on this write up. Screen brightness, perhaps I'd agree there.

1. Data Roaming. That doesn't happen unless it's necessary.

2. Sync Gmail. Show me in battery usage where this is a major resource hog.

3. Uncheck Voice Privacy. Again that only comes on when you're using the phone.

4. Vibrate. Yes, uses more battery but once again it's only when you get a call.

5. I agree with this. Sort of.

6. Screen Timeout. I kind of agree with this except that 2 minutes is too short of time when you're using the Droid. I say get Screebl from the Market and let that handle that for you.

7. Animations. Interesting. I don't understand what that's doing in there.
8. WiFi. Yes, total agreement here.

The problem I have with all these suggestions is that they really have a minimal effect on the battery, and keep you from enjoying the Droid the way it was meant to be enjoyed.

I say accept that it is indeed a battery hog, buy a spare battery from Amazon for $8.00, a wall charger from eBay for $5.00 a charging cradle and enjoy your Droid. Don't even worry about the battery, just have a spare ready.

I've read a bunch of your posts and while I agree with most of what you say...

As I said in my op, this is from my experience. I have 3 druids, all mono and these settings increased bat life... gmail? If its set to factory settings it pulls data constantly...

I enjoy the he'll out of my phone and I use it for work so when I get 60 or 70 calls a day and more than that in texts yes the vibrate runs the battery down.

Back lit... um, the screen and what its running pull the battery down...

Etc, etc.

No disrespect meant Hb but I wouldn't have posted it or spent my time had these things not affected my battery life. What do you notice sucks the life out of your battery?

Sent from my DROID2 GLOBAL using DroidForums App

One thing I have noticed in my new DG is when the battery is fully charged I must remove it from the charger or it de-charges. I can't stick it in the charger asnd go to bed. Does anyone else have this happen? What are we supposed to do, sit by it when it is charging?

I can tell you that while the display is at the top of the list in Battery Manager, it is NOT what is running down your battery. I am currently running my D2G deactivated so there is no syncing, pretty much running constant airplane mode, and it is lasting beautifully. Yes, the display has been running on mine for a total of two and a half hours, but since nothing is trying to get info over 3g, it has been on for 17 hours and is at 30%. I am going to follow the tips in the beginning of this thread and reactivate my D2G tomorrow. We will see what the results are.

I can tell you that while the display is at the top of the list in Battery Manager, it is NOT what is running down your battery. I am currently running my D2G deactivated so there is no syncing, pretty much running constant airplane mode, and it is lasting beautifully. Yes, the display has been running on mine for a total of two and a half hours, but since nothing is trying to get info over 3g, it has been on for 17 hours and is at 30%. I am going to follow the tips in the beginning of this thread and reactivate my D2G tomorrow. We will see what the results are.

Greatly appreciate this article. I too am a heavy phone user (20-60 calls a day) and email user (though I only care for it to sync when I'm reading it).
I'd be happy to take the advice here about getting a spare battery (and will once I'm convinced this is indeed a great phone) but honestly, one of the reasons I bought the phone is it was advertised as having a long battery life/talk time. My experiences from this week show something that can't even keep a full charge through the day. (One reason among several why I got rid of my iPhone). And frankly, you shouldn't have to tweak it, shouldn't have to root kit it, or anything else special to at least get a semblance of 'as advertised'(keep in mind, one of the two days I'm talking about was a holiday here in the US).
My next step is to replace the phone and hope that's the case. Thanks.

can you please test different voltages and post your own voltages here? thanks