A way to conserve data and battery? - Captivate Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

So, after looking at my bill for last month... and the fact that my captivate dies within 1 day. (Actually yesterday, i went to a concert... for 12 hours, it died twice...). So here is my question.
How do i limit when and which each app fetches data from the internet? The way i see it, when an app has to do that, it uses data and battery... and its almost every 10 minutes or so.
The current apps in using that use data are :
AppBrain
Appsfire
Catch
Clock (the weather thing inside must use some data...)
FancyWidget (Also has weather in it...)
CNET News
Engadget
Evernote
Facebook
FMyLife Official
Game Time
Gmail
Market
My Account (A rogers tool to check your usage)
Plse
Twitter
Youtube
Those are all the apps i use. is there anyway i can limit them to refreshing every hour? or when i open these apps?
Thanks

supaphreek said:
So, after looking at my bill for last month... and the fact that my captivate dies within 1 day. (Actually yesterday, i went to a concert... for 12 hours, it died twice...). So here is my question.
How do i limit when and which each app fetches data from the internet? The way i see it, when an app has to do that, it uses data and battery... and its almost every 10 minutes or so.
The current apps in using that use data are :
AppBrain
Appsfire
Catch
Clock (the weather thing inside must use some data...)
FancyWidget (Also has weather in it...)
CNET News
Engadget
Evernote
Facebook
FMyLife Official
Game Time
Gmail
Market
My Account (A rogers tool to check your usage)
Plse
Twitter
Youtube
Those are all the apps i use. is there anyway i can limit them to refreshing every hour? or when i open these apps?
Thanks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Download "Super Power" from market. Set it to disable data, and set a schedule to allow data for 5-10 mins every hour. That should solve ur issue.
Alternate is to go into each app and set up its sync settings to match what u want.

Thanks
gonna give it a shot

Related

Nexus One uses too much data

Sorry if this has already been asked, I already searched in Google and in the Forums.
In Portugal we don't have unlimited data plans, actually they are really limited (mine allows only 150MB). Today I've used only the data connection for less then 2h and it used 4MB of data (430KB received and 3.5MB transmitted) and all this time the phone never left my pocket. With the G1 on a average day it used only 2MB.
Does anyone have a similar problem?
How can I track which app is using all this data?
I'm using CyanogenMod, but I have the same problem with the default firmware.
yes i have noticed this too. but here in USA we have unlimited data. the only suggestion i say is to turn of the data connection completely. that's the only solution that i know. it seems like android 2.1 OS is constantly sending data packets, even if you dont have any apps doing anything in the background.
Sorry to hear about the small data plan options, that just stinks
That sucks! Android without data connection looses the whole point, I'll check if there's any other bigger data plan that I can afford...
Still, if anyone knows a solution, please tell me.
Look through all the default programs to check for any syncing options.
News and weather defaults to pull stories every 12 hours I believe. If you don' use that, turn it all off(especially the news).
Check your E-mail frequencies as well if you added any pop/imap addresses. The defaults are 15 minute intervals.
Those are the two major things that pull data off throug default settings.
I already tried to disable "Background data" on preferences and it didn't solve the problem, so it's not gmail, calendar or any other gapp. I'll try to disable the weather (though, since most of the data was transmitted, not received, that shouldn't be the problem)
Haven't enable Latituded in Maps have you? That sends out a **** load.
I have latitude enabled, but I has it enabled in G1 too. I'll try to disable it anyway.
Most googles apps are push so they won't have large usage. When I said email I meant the email application.
No, I didn't use the email app, I've put my POP accounts on Gmail
After killing (almost) all apps using Astro it stopped using the data connection madly. Next I'll reboot and kill the apps one by one until it stops again, if I find anything useful I'll post it here.
System panel will tell you what you network usage is as well.
As far as I know...Maps and rest of Gapps are the cause for this "problem".
I´m not worried about using too much data, as my plan runs unlimited...but about my privacy!
Google is a MONSTER we are feeding each second...the most androiders...the most bigger the "Bicho" will be
Anyway, I just turn sync and any form of geolocation OFF and things get measured...
Netdroid from the market willl help you control your data connection.
I noticed that the "battery use" thing displays the data used by each app, but it only displays the most battery consuming apps. Would this be a way to go?
It's probably an app running wild, but it can be a bit hard to find out which. I installed the chess.com app once and without _ever_ starting it I found out it had used 40MB up/down in a rather small timeframe. Immediate uninstall for programs that waste my bandwith (have a 1GB plan, so not that big of a deal, but still).
That's what I thing, but how do I find out which app it is?
Need someone to confirm this but…
If you do the *#*#4636#*#* “trick” (type this into the phone pad). Then go to Battery History, then change the top drop down box to Network Usage, this appears to list all the apps using the network and how much they are doing so. If you click on an app it shows you how much data it has sent and received.
Is this useful for the OPs question? I’m suspicious because it is under “Battery History”, but it does appear to show which applications are using the most data…?
Yes, that's exactly the point of the Service Menu (it's no trick).
On Cyanogen the option is showing in Spare Parts.
I think your **** is porn-addict and browse youporn since we have flash on your phone when it's in your pocket

[Q] Bad setup? Datausage is through the roof!

I've been using a Desire and then later a Desire HD - both great phones!
I've been on a 1Gb a month dataplan and i think when i really went wild i hit about 600Mb for one month. That said i do most heavy download over wifi.
Now, i got my LG 2x 3 days ago and now, the 11th i get a mail warning me i'm at almost 1Gb and that my speed will be dropped to 64/64 when it hits that.
What i observed is that my phone - while on wifi but when the screen is off, it's doing a 10Mb data transfer now and then - often with short intervals and *almost* the same amount of bytes (perhaps 50 bytes difference).
In three days i spend more data on my 2x than i EVER did in a month on my Desire or Desire HD - what's up? I didn't install any programs i didn't already have on my DHD - except Advanced Task Manager - which i uninstalled again last night - so what's on my phone was either on my previous phone or is part of the stock software package.
Anyone observed this as well?
At first I read the title as 'data sausage'.
Kendoji said:
At first I read the title as 'data sausage'.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I wish
mmm sausage....
Considered getting an app for monitoring what uses data 'n such stuff?
Asides from that, i'm thinking that it's the weather widget on the home screen.
LordGabriel said:
Considered getting an app for monitoring what uses data 'n such stuff?
Asides from that, i'm thinking that it's the weather widget on the home screen.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Good points. I did remove the weather widget last night when changing to Launcher Pro - and actually data transfer kinda died around 23:30 last night... i just remembered changing to launcher pro earlier than that...
After all, if it retrieves a bunch of weather data, for an entire week at a time, once an hour, that could easily shoot data usage through the roof. So yeah. I'm pretty sure it's the weather widget.
No way a weather widget can pull that amount of data in three days unless theres somthing extremely buggy with it.
Try to install "Spare Parts" from the market and then check Battery history and Network usage from the top dropdown and Total from the second dropdown. I belive it will be able to extract some usage history even if it was not installed when you had the issue.
I found out that my exchange email app is the culprit. There are no new emails but i have push on (also tried with 15min update) and still its downloading 10megs frequently. i think ill disable exchange email for now...
Sent from my LG-P990 using XDA App

[Q] One of these apps is killing my battery, which one?

I got a new Captivate a couple weeks ago now. Since then my battery life has been less than 12 hours on stock 2.1, stock 2.2, Paragon RC6 and Serendipity 5.12.
Yesterday I decided to wipe the phone and start off with stock apps then slowly add them back in each day. So far, I'm 5 hours unplugged and still have 86% battery (stock apps) after using some GPS, some WiFi, 3 phone calls for a total of about 20 minutes, some browsing and some text messaging. THIS IS HOW THE PHONE SHOULD BE WORKING. Therefore, one of the apps I normally have installed is being an asshole. However, this is going to take me forever to slowly add each one back in and monitor them to see what is killing my battery.
Does anyone have an idea of what it might be from the following (I didn't list what comes on the default Serendipity ROM because it obviously isn't anything already on it):
3G Watchdog
Adobe Reader
Advanced Task Killer
Angry Birds
AppBrain Market
Barcode Scanner
Beautiful Widgets
BLN Control
Cineplex Mobile
ConvertPad
Documents To Go
Dropbox
Google Earth
Evernote
Facebook
GasBuddy
Google Goggles
Google Sky Map
Google Translate
GPS Test
KeePassDroid
Lookout
Mint.com
Rogers My Account
Google Reader (not setup to sync)
ShootMe
Google Shopper
Skype
SoundHound
Spaghetti Marshmallo
Spare Parts
Tip Calculator
Titanium Backup
Twitter
Unblock Me
morrty said:
*3G Watchdog
Advanced Task Killer
*AppBrain Market
Google Earth
*Facebook
Google Goggles
Google Sky Map
*Lookout
Google Shopper
*Skype
*Twitter
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
*=Suspicious. Any of these could be the culprit(s) since they access the internet/network, but ones like Twitter and Facebook that update regularly are most suspect.
Do you keep skype connected? I would imagine it would use a lot of power if left connected.
What is your refresh interval set for in facebook?
Have you made sure to flash or reset with a full battery? The first time i did a factory reset, i did it with a half battery and my captivate would only last about 6h with light usage. After resetting with a full battery I could go 14-16 hours with similar usage.
Another issue ive seen is if you are in a low signal area that can also cause higher battery drain.
I'd suggest installing osmonitor from market and see what apps are running and eating up resources.
I previously had appbrain issues where it was running constantly at 5-10% of the cpu's resources but just uninstalled and reinstalled and all seems ok now. ymmv...
sent from my captivate using the xda app
Miami_Son said:
*3G Watchdog
Advanced Task Killer
*AppBrain Market
Google Earth
*Facebook
Google Goggles
Google Sky Map
*Lookout
Google Shopper
*Skype
*Twitter
*=Suspicious. Any of these could be the culprit(s) since they access the internet/network, but ones like Twitter and Facebook that update regularly are most suspect.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
ones in red definatly, blue meh... with the built in memory management/ tweaked management in updated newer/custom roms, task killers use more power than they save.
Android has their own online market with push installs now. AppBrain not needed. https://market.android.com/
destrorox said:
I'd suggest installing osmonitor from market and see what apps are running and eating up resources.
I previously had appbrain issues where it was running constantly at 5-10% of the cpu's resources but just uninstalled and reinstalled and all seems ok now. ymmv...
sent from my captivate using the xda app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
see above...
The blue ones could also be battery vampires because they access the network/wifi. Depends on how often they are set to sync data.
Thanks for the suggestions, I think what I'll do first is install everything that isn't suspicious from what you guys advised against and monitor that. Then I'll slowly add back the suspicious apps.
By the way, I'm going on 12 hours now and only at 74%. Usually my phone would be dead by now. This is with moderate use too. I just got off an hour long phone call with my brother after we both put our phones in speaker phone mode and owned kids on Black Ops.
don't forget beautiful widgets. stock setting were to update weather every 15 min. that is a lot of data over the course of a full day.
i found that one would kill my battery.
Tenchuu said:
don't forget beautiful widgets. stock setting were to update weather every 15 min. that is a lot of data over the course of a full day.
i found that one would kill my battery.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
+1
weather apps are battery killers. I uninstalled mine and went from 10hours to two days between charges.
@morrty, be sure to let us know your results.
I definitely will, it just may be a little while because I'm calibrating the battery by doing a full run down and full charge. I'm actually having a hard time running down the battery now.
Currently sitting at 45% @ 29 hours.
Incredible, I can't wait to single out that asshole app.
So far, I've installed all of the non suspicious apps. My battery started draining a little bit faster but not to the point it was before. It still seems like normal use. 7% drain overnight. 4% more since waking up, showering and coming to work.
Latitude was a huge offender I found. Even with the auto check-in disabled, it kept the phone in a partial wake-lock.
I've still got more testing to do but I'll update when I find out more.
Looks like it was a mix of facebook, twitter, latitude and dropbox.
Thanks for the help guys.

battery died overnight

I charged my phone last night to 100% and unplugged it.
When I woke up now it was off. So I turned it on. It went to the LG screen, then Rogers, then went black. Tried it again, same thing.
So I plugged it into the wall and the silver battery icon came up flashing. 5 minutes later now it has 1 red bar.
Why would it die over night? Nothing was running.
It might be because of a widget,not stock.
Yeah.....u definitely had something running in the background.
Make a list of all apps you have installed.
Sent from my Samsung Galaxy S II w/ CM9
Same happened to me about 4 times.
Its usually a sync process that drains the phone. I guess Exchange server sync.
well I recently installed Go Launcher. I always go application manager and stop all when I am not using the phone though.
Other than this the battery has been better on gingerbread.
ok there are a few apps that keep starting up even though I stop all applications.
- messaging
- rom manager
- youtube
- winamp
- google +
how can I stop them from constantly opening?
youtube and winamp are both widgets on my screens. but on stock froyo if I "stop all" they wouldn't suck up power or anything.
I never use google + so I don't know why it's there.
rom manager don't use anymore since I am not rooted.
If you dont hav titanium backup pro then get it its so worth the couple bucks u can freeze apps so they cant run or u can totally for the other apps u use not much u can do about them running in the background. What kills my batt the most is auto sync and auto baackground data i always turn them off when im not using them
xstokerx said:
If you dont hav titanium backup pro then get it its so worth the couple bucks u can freeze apps so they cant run or u can totally for the other apps u use not much u can do about them running in the background. What kills my batt the most is auto sync and auto baackground data i always turn them off when im not using them
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
titanium backup requires root. I just upgraded to gingerbread 2.3 so I don't want to play with root right now.
I need help though because only since I upgraded these apps keep coming up.
I am KILLING apps with application manager. These pop up like minutes later.
- email
- google plus
- winamp
- gmail
- messaging
why are these popping up constantly? I never had this with froyo 2.2.2
umirin said:
titanium backup requires root. I just upgraded to gingerbread 2.3 so I don't want to play with root right now.
I need help though because only since I upgraded these apps keep coming up.
I am KILLING apps with application manager. These pop up like minutes later.
- email
- google plus
- winamp
- gmail
- messaging
why are these popping up constantly? I never had this with froyo 2.2.2
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
the only way to do any thing about it is to root and task killers dont help any these things are accully worse cuz the os just opens the programs again and that uses cpu cycles
xstokerx said:
the only way to do any thing about it is to root and task killers dont help any these things are accully worse cuz the os just opens the programs again and that uses cpu cycles
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I know I read task killlers are not worth it.
But as I said, this did NOT happen with Froyo 2.2.2.
I don't even use google +, why would it ever open?
I didn't open my email, SYNC IS OFF. Yet it's there.
Messaging is open, not texting anyone. In froyo I always killed messaging when I was done. It never came back.
ROM manager has no reason to be open since I am not rooted.
apps like Rogers navigation - NEVER use just randomly pop up in the application manager.
Someone must have an answer for this.
My phone is NOT rooted. Stock gingerbread 2.3.
Hey umirin,
I too had noticed that the phone would constantly restart random apps that weren't being used, despite seemingly nothing happening. It pissed me off to no end, but the reason why it happens is because the programmers write in queues for the programs to start, such as 'screen on,' 'screen off,' and my personal favorites, 'wifi state change' and 'connectivity change.' There's an app called autostarts on the market (it costs about a dollar i think) that will let you disable all of these, so now I have no random apps starting and my battery life is much better There are free ones on the market you can try as well just to see, but they didn't give me nearly the access to all the queues that autostarts does. It's a damn good app. Also, if you want to freeze apps and you don't want to fork out for the paid version of Titanium Backup, AntTek App Manager can freeze all the apps you want for free good luck improving your battery life, I just bought a 3500 mAh battery on amazon to improve mine lol and now the phone is a beast.
the phone is just storing them in ram its not using cpu cycles or battery wile in ram its so if you do use the apps it loads faster
True, while it is in the ram it does not use CPU cycles. But when it loads them, it does. I've also noticed the phone slow down noticeably and even crash when there's tons of apps left in the memory. For some reason it just doesn't handle cleaning up the unused ones very well. But there are some apps that simply don't need to be loaded every time common events occur on the phone, such as changing connectivity from wifi to the cellular network. Consider this. You leave those (useless) background programs to load when the phone changes connectivity. Then you start your browser, which uses a considerable amount of ram. To make room for the browser, the operating system SHUTS THESE BACKGROUND PROGRAMS DOWN. Stay with me here. Later on, when your phone inevitably changes connectivity again, guess what those little background programs do? They start up again. And that consumes CPU cycles and battery. And they're used for nothing, which means all they amounted to is wasted CPU cycles and battery. In my opinion, it is sloppy programming by the app developers to require their apps to start every time an event like that happens. It consumes resources that are precious on a mobile system such as a cell phone. But it is very useful to leave commonly used apps such as your messaging service or browser in the memory. In fact, the messaging app was the only app I left to start on most of the events on the phone for that exact reason. It's just things like ROM manager and Titanium Backup starting themselves up just to hang out that is a waste.
Your right that's how it works but can't do any thing about it ecsept what was posted above
so strange i left my phone on all night just to see and i only lost 2 percent??
ok why does this do it in gingerbread 2.3 but it didn't do it in froyo 2.2.2?
Wait where did u get the update from. I goto update and it says its not avaia
Sent from my LG-P925 using XDA Premium App
-Epix- said:
Wait where did u get the update from. I goto update and it says its not avaia
Sent from my LG-P925 using XDA Premium App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I got the LG Updater tool from the LG website. As far as I know the update was for Rogers Customers. Updated from Froyo -> Gingerbread. But there are problems with the GB Baseband with ghost calls. The update here was released Feb 1, 2012. I'm just hoping they don;t say "We gave you the Gingerbread update so no Icecream Sandwich until 2013"
yeah figures att and lg couldn't do us all a favor

Battery being drained by apps I didn't open?

Hey all - weird situation here. For the last few days or so my battery has been draining *really* fast and the phone is very warm. Yesterday I went to the battery settings to see what the culprit was and it was an Amazon app that I *never* open - so I disabled it. Same thing today. This time:
17% - Android OS
12% Amazon app suite
12% Email
11% DJI Go, a drone-control app.
I haven't opened anything Amazon ever (bloatware) or DJI GO in at least a month. How are apps I'm not even opening draining my battery? They're not running - at least not that I can see in the task manager. And e-mail? Nothing out of the ordinary.
I'm grateful for any theories as to exactly what the crap is going on with my beloved phone!!
thetastycat said:
Hey all - weird situation here. For the last few days or so my battery has been draining *really* fast and the phone is very warm. Yesterday I went to the battery settings to see what the culprit was and it was an Amazon app that I *never* open - so I disabled it. Same thing today. This time:
17% - Android OS
12% Amazon app suite
12% Email
11% DJI Go, a drone-control app.
I haven't opened anything Amazon ever (bloatware) or DJI GO in at least a month. How are apps I'm not even opening draining my battery? They're not running - at least not that I can see in the task manager. And e-mail? Nothing out of the ordinary.
I'm grateful for any theories as to exactly what the crap is going on with my beloved phone!!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Let's talk about that disabling in a minute. I'm confused about that. First, however...
Some apps run in the background even though you have not manually opened them or are using them. The developers do this so they will open VERY FAST when you do click on them and they don't care your battery is being used. This is why I use Greenify -- I can put almost all apps like that into forced hibernation. IF/when I ever do use the apps, I click, they open. When I close them, Greenify puts them back into hibernation. (I don't use the Xposed version of Greenify, just the Greenify app.)
Obviously you don't want to Greenify something like your email app, weather widget, Facebook or anything that needs to be running in the background so you can get notifications. The apps you Greenify are the apps which like to run in the background even though you are not using them.
By any chance are you using Amazon photos backup service? I do. It's like Dropbox or Google Photos backup service. Photos and videos you take are uploaded for backup. If you have that turned on, that could be why Amazon stuff is still running? Just a guess.
Now, you say you disabled Amazon? How? Freezing it through Titanium Backup? Because if you froze it, there's no way it should be running at all. Which is why Greenify is better than freezing in most cases. I only TB freeze something which may need to by physically present for my OS to run correctly but which I do not want to run. There's some redundant CM ROM apps I freeze, as I don't want to take a chance on physically removing them, only to find out stuff crashes because it was important in some way I didn't realize. Freezing totally disables the app, and it won't even show up in your app drawer. If you unfreeze it, then it's there again. So, how did you disable it?
Chazz, you seriously are a real life superhero of my phone. You helped me get my GF a Maxx a few months ago - man, thank you so much!
Yeah, so I "disabled" some of these apps by actually trying to uninstall them (like Amazon), realizing they're bloatware, and instead dragging the icon up to "App info", where I have the option to force-stop or "disable" - whatever that is.
Here are a few screenshots from today:
So Android OS, Email, and Amazon app suite, none of which I've spent any real time on using, are having a race to see who can meaninglessly drain my battery the fastest. DJI GO, which again I haven't opened in a month, comes in at a distant 4th. I barely used my phone today except for about an hour of Pandora and maybe 30 mins of browsing.
Greenify - gotcha! Downloaded it and trying to kill some of this stuff - but nothing Amazon even appears in the listing of all apps. And email? What the heck? I can't really lock my e-mail out. It's just so strange that apps that I'm not even using are the ones draining the battery - any chance this could be a virus? Last I was paying attention, that wasn't much of a concern on Android...have I just had my head in the sand?
Many thanks again - I really appreciate the help!
In Greenify app, hit the "+" sign (on upper right of the app display) and it will show you more apps you can hibernate. I have over 200 apps, so I actually had to hit the "+" sign a couple of times to see the complete list. I think the initial offering is the low-hanging fruit.
For instance it will show my my Flashlight app. Right. I don't need my flashlight app running unless I am actually using my flashlight! So, I "greenify" it. It hibernates until I open the app. Once I close the app, THEN it goes back into hibernation until I need it again.
Right, you shouldn't lock lock out email. Is that personal email or work? I notice it's not Gmail. What are your fetch settings on that app? I have mine set for every 5 minutes. On my work email, it's an Exchange push server based so it's instant, but on my personal email (not Gmail), I have the IMAP fetch settings for 5 minutes. On some email apps you can even set fetch/check for every 30 seconds. That's a lot of pinging and could be draining the battery. Just a guess.
Seems to be working great, Chazz - thank you so much!!!

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