Why the battery drains so fast...

[Zenmervolt]

I noticed that when I added some WIDGETS my battery started to go down very quickly. Anyone else have this issue?

In the settings, make sure that you don't have the widgets continuously polling GPS or network data. For example, some widgets (the Facebook widget comes to mind) are set to poll almost continuously in the background which means you have a live data connection running almost all the time; that will truly hurt battery life.

In my own experience my battery will last over 24 hours with what I consider to be normal use during a day.

Case in point:

9:00 am on Saturday: Took phone off charger with a 100% charge.
12:00 (noon) on Sunday: Put phone back on charger, charge was down to 30%.

With a bit of care, I probably could have made it through until Sunday night.

Between Saturday morning and noon on Sunday I browsed the web, posted a few times on some forums I frequent, kept the Weather Channel widget running, sent 15-20 texts, sat in a diner nearly continuously updating the SportsTap application during the Pitt - Notre Dame game, and had probably an hour of time on voice calls.

Even with heavier use I've never needed to keep the phone on a charger during the day; I've been just fine sticking it on the dock at night and keeping it with me all day on battery power alone.

 

[cereal killer]

cereal,

Any app that uses a lot of cpu cycles, network, etc will be the biggest drain. Games generally will use a lot because they run in a continual loop that crams as much as possible to provide a 30fps or so smooth game play. The more sophisticated the game, the more likely it's really taxing the cpu, memory, network, etc. Some games may not use the network, saving some battery drain there.

As for apps, the google maps for example would probably utilize quite a bit. Other apps that might utilize some power are those that run in the background as services and are doing things often. If you get a LOT of emails.. let's say you set up two google accounts, work email and 3 yahoo accounts (for whatever reason it may be that you have 6 separate email accounts)... and they are all syncing.. it could use a bit of power to keep on being updated, and it happens in the background. However, I would suspect most background services use very little power.. they are often there to listen for specific events that the android OS broadcasts, or they periodically poll a server if they have network access.

gracias...I knew email, maps etc etc but the game thing you summed up pretty well.

thanks again

 

[DuctTape]

In the settings, make sure that you don't have the widgets continuously polling GPS or network data. For example, some widgets (the Facebook widget comes to mind) are set to poll almost continuously in the background which means you have a live data connection running almost all the time; that will truly hurt battery life.

How do you find/modify these settings?

 

[Zenmervolt]

In the settings, make sure that you don't have the widgets continuously polling GPS or network data. For example, some widgets (the Facebook widget comes to mind) are set to poll almost continuously in the background which means you have a live data connection running almost all the time; that will truly hurt battery life.

How do you find/modify these settings?

It depends on the widget/app. For many apps, pressing the "Menu" button will bring up a list of options that will include a "settings" option. In there you can generally control things like update frequency and the like.

It seems that many (most?) widgets abide by whatever settings are used for their parent apps.

 

[Bhinderoid]

My battery was draining ridiculously fast, yesterday was the second time that I drained it entirely and then charged it entirely. Today I used the GPS to get home from work, played around on the browser for about 20 minutes and right now I'm at about 60%.

 

[Beachmammoni]

I really appreciate your explanation. I've read most of the threads regarding this issue, but still have a basic question. Does "turning on" the bluetooth on my phone drain battery even if I have no bluetooth device connected to the phone?

The reason I ask is that it is somewhat annoying to have to change the settings on the phone every time I enter my car and turn my bluetooth ear gadget on. My's wife's phone seems to autoconnect to her bluetooth whenever she turns it (the ear thing) on when she enters her car.

Thanks again for the post and hopefully some answers.

 

[DA717]

I really appreciate your explanation. I've read most of the threads regarding this issue, but still have a basic question. Does "turning on" the bluetooth on my phone drain battery even if I have no bluetooth device connected to the phone?

The reason I ask is that it is somewhat annoying to have to change the settings on the phone every time I enter my car and turn my bluetooth ear gadget on. My's wife's phone seems to autoconnect to her bluetooth whenever she turns it (the ear thing) on when she enters her car.

Thanks again for the post and hopefully some answers.

I have bluetooth running and I don't notice any battery drain. However, I do noticed a notable drain when Wifi and GPS is enabled as well as higher Brightness.

On the topic of the original post. I agree with having a task killer for battery purposes and not memory. Not sure what it is but I had 60% battery life before I uninstalled my task killer and rebooted the droid and sitting idle for 3-4 hours I noticed a drop of 30%. This is odd to me because it took a 9 hour day to kill my first 30%, so now I installed task killer again.

DA

 

[dajakal]

Just curious, in the battery usage part in settings, what would running apps show as? I ask because my top 4 are 85% of the usage, and they're display, phone idle, cell standby, and browser. Are apps rolled into other categories or are they their own items in the usage numbers?

 

[flyingdroid]

I just use facebook, gmail, and ebuddy to chat every once in a while -- I'm guessing the ebuddy running kills battery -- and synching also kills battery -- I guess I should just kill ebuddy and turn synch off if I want my battery to last and I'm not near power for a while? Any other apps out there that can manage this? Make it configurable? Say update every 2 hour or something? Or when I get to half battery power turn synching off, and just try to conserve as much power as necessary? That would be great. It's annoying not being able to go more than 2-3 hours without your phone dying...esp when it dies at night and if someone needed to get a hold of me, my phone is dead...not cool...esp in an emergency....

thoughts.
Thanks everyone.

 

[flyingdroid]

one question, I have a Bose iPod docking speaker on my bedside table and I put the phone right next to that when I sleep -- sometimes charging but last night not -- do you think that has anything to do with it....mag interference - it wasn't on -- but it might have been charging? I know there are magnets in the Bose unit..

just a thought...???

 

[Zenmervolt]

one question, I have a Bose iPod docking speaker on my bedside table and I put the phone right next to that when I sleep -- sometimes charging but last night not -- do you think that has anything to do with it....mag interference - it wasn't on -- but it might have been charging? I know there are magnets in the Bose unit..

just a thought...???

No. There's not enough signal interference to make any real-world differences.

 

[skerm8]

We have only had the Droid for a week, and noticed that battery life is Ok at best. Today, I left the phone signed in to Google Latitude, then watched it several times today from another phone. Battery only lasted half a day. Not sure if it is coincidence or not, but it sure seems like Latitude burns it up fast.

 

[cknight91]

Droid battery

I have noticed that the droid battery isn't the best. The longest I have lasted is 13 hours, but that was with wifi, GPS, bluetooth off, I even turn syncing off when I don't need it, and put the brightest completely down.

I will browse the web 1.5 - 2 hours a day roughly, do play some games. I use advanced task MANAGER, and I kill all apps when not using them and I do think that helps a bit. However, my question is, what PROCESSES need to be left running.

Right now, if I go to the processes tab for advanced task manager, I have the following processes running:

Dailer Storage
Dailer
Adroid System
Checkin System
Sync Feeds
Settings Storage
Gmail
Andriod Keyboard
Gmail Storage
Google Settings Prov...
Google Talk Storage
Google Search
Google Talk Service
Weather Widget Forecast
Weather Widgets
Alarm Clock
Corporate Calendar
Calendar Storage
Calendar
Settings
Messaging
Quick Search Box
providers.applications
providers.userdictionary
Home
Contacts Storage
Retro Clock

I understand that a lot of these are needed and start up automatically. But can anyone shed light on whether some of these are not necessary and might be draining the battery? Thanks in advance for any advice/tips!

 

[keiichi25]

I have noticed that the droid battery isn't the best. The longest I have lasted is 13 hours, but that was with wifi, GPS, bluetooth off, I even turn syncing off when I don't need it, and put the brightest completely down.

I will browse the web 1.5 - 2 hours a day roughly, do play some games. I use advanced task MANAGER, and I kill all apps when not using them and I do think that helps a bit. However, my question is, what PROCESSES need to be left running.

Right now, if I go to the processes tab for advanced task manager, I have the following processes running:

Dailer Storage
Dailer
Adroid System
Checkin System
Sync Feeds
Settings Storage
Gmail
Andriod Keyboard
Gmail Storage
Google Settings Prov...
Google Talk Storage
Google Search
Google Talk Service
Weather Widget Forecast
Weather Widgets
Alarm Clock
Corporate Calendar
Calendar Storage
Calendar
Settings
Messaging
Quick Search Box
providers.applications
providers.userdictionary
Home
Contacts Storage
Retro Clock

I understand that a lot of these are needed and start up automatically. But can anyone shed light on whether some of these are not necessary and might be draining the battery? Thanks in advance for any advice/tips!

First guess... The following:

Checkin System
Sync Feeds
Google Talk Service
Weather Widget Forecast
Weather Widgets
Corporate Calendar

Sync being on... Possibly GTalk being active, and the Weather Stuff. Don't kow what Checkin System is, but Sync is probably what is pinging your Corp Calendar at the moment, If Gtalk is logged in, there is a SLIGHT chance you are pinging a little with that, but not too sure. Weather Widget is probably pinging for updates on weather status.

 

[Terminator]

Droid died!

My Droid just died, won't charge. Is there a reset button somewhere? ANy steps I should try. With Thanksgiving weekend on, I am in a Fix.

Terminated!