I wonder what is the connection that uses more battery, 2g or wifi.
I only use the internet to update the app lockmix, then the 2g enough for me, but I was wondering which spends more battery if it is 2g or wifi
2G uses very little power in the background, but it's very slow so transferring much data over it will use a lot of power because the radio will need to be on constantly.
WiFi uses a significant amount of power even on standby - that's why WP8 defaults to turning WiFi off when the screen is off - but it's probably worth using when available if your only other option is 2G.
BTW, are you sure you meant 2G? That's archaic; 3G has pretty much entirely replaced it and 4G is become more and more common.
I only use the internet on your phone to update the lockmix application (for screen lock), the 2g is enough. I have to have an active connection, my doubt is on wifi or 2g due to battery consumption. my wifi router this to 2/3 meters away and have speed of 30 mb.
But obviously, battery drain's on 2G network, & no issue about Wi-Fi distances, but it also drain's down when background searching & attempt to connect to the network at multiple times.
Related
Hello fellow XDA's,
I've found a way to save the battery in CM7 in a huge way. You must have CM7 for this (maybe Miui will work also, but I can't guarantee that). This enables the 2G Only setting automatically when the phone is asleep to save battery and when you wake up the phone, it will automatically (or manually, you can choose this) turn back to 3G.
1. Go to: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=739530
2. Download: Toggle2G-Update.zip
3. Install Toggle2G-Update.zip through recovery
4. Open the app and turn on the following options:
- Auto Manage 2G/3G
- Manually Activate 3G
- Activate with Notification
- 2G when sleep
- Sleep delay, set to 2 minutes
- 2G when low battery
- Battery Level: set to 20% (you can choose the % level yourself)
- 2G when wifi enabled
- 2G Network, set to GSM Only
- 3G Network, set to WCDMA preferred
- I choose manually activate 3G, because sometimes I Just want to check notifications or the time and I don't want my phone to switch to 3G every time I wake it. I think that will eat battery life.
- I choose Activate with Notification because I want to be able to switch to 3G "on the fly" (without going through the settings) when I need 3G.
- I choose 2G when wifi enabled because it is useless to have a 3G connection (for your calls/text) when wifi is enabled, 2G is good enough for that.
These are the settings I've made for my O2X and it looks like it is working wonders. After 18h, 6m, 36s my battery level is 42%. So I guess I could make it to around 34-35h till the battery dies. I've made a few calls (about 15-20 min), about 20-30 text/whatsapp, checked Sygic a few times (to see if GPS was getting a fix), some browsing (5-10) min and updated a few apps from the market. (browsing and updatings apps was with wifi enabled, about 10-15 minutes)
I'm using CM Nighlty#101 with BB/Ril 0725.
Testing it out right now. Seems like an alternative to Juice Defender.
When i am in 2G, data is off as well?Mine seems off.
sorry but can't use this trick.. My operator is 3, so 3G is the standard network. When selecting 2G, no network is found (--> no service)
zhehao said:
Testing it out right now. Seems like an alternative to Juice Defender.
When i am in 2G, data is off as well?Mine seems off.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
For me data is on with 2g. For example: whatsapp messages (which needs data connection) are coming through
Sent from my Optimus 2X using XDA Premium App
Akela80 said:
sorry but can't use this trick.. My operator is 3, so 3G is the standard network. When selecting 2G, no network is found (--> no service)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
They used to fall back on Orange 2G, until they decided to shaft us customers in poor signal areas & save some money by canceling the network sharing. So I took my money elsewhere.
Great find! I installed this and everything went smoothly. I then went through and applied the settings exactly as you recommended. Only problem is, nothing happens. Zip, zelch, nada. I've left the phone laying for 30 minutes, picked it up and discovered it never even went to 2g at any time. This is just an idea, but perhaps my 2G and 3G network settings at the bottom are off. I'm in the U.S. with a Droid 1. Any ideas?
is it working for all cm7 nightly?
this is great, thanks!
Wi-fi (always on) + 3g drains 1% per hour for me. Under 2% per hour with 3g and data controlled by JuiceDefender, no wi-fi. Not sure what more you could want for idle power drain.
Is there an app that can not only switch off my data but also switch to 2G while i am connected to wifi or my screen is turned off (i have better 2g signal in my area)?
the ideal app should be able to switch between these settings
screen off
2G, data on at xx min intervals (for sync,similar to 2x battery), no wifi.
screen on but locked : as above
screen on unlocked
search wifi - if available connect and keep 2G. If not available, switch wifi off, turn on 3G+data.
Well... yes:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=739530&highlight=toggle+2g+3g
But you need a modified rom for that. Either you modify it yoursef (see thread) or use a pre-modified one. Some people say, it's quite good, some say it makes the phone a bit instable.
I used it myself with a gueste ROM and was satified with the funktions. It really worked. But I had some problems with wifi then. Well, you could give it a try.
Cheers
Thanks for the thread.
At first glance the CM6 people seem to have problems. I am running CM7 temasek KANG 204-20 with vadonka's kernel. I'll download the zip and try it via CWM. Will report back
i think the mobile network settings get ignored when wifi is enabled, whe i have it disabled and use 2g only i always have max connection but when wifi is enabled or 3g network i have very low connection when it changes to 3g wcdma...
i searched for an app to display the status of whe network and tried hidden menu but it seema its not getting updates while wifi is enabled:/
anyone experiencing similar behaviors?
Sent from my Optimus 2X using XDA App
so. after some hours testing i can say that it works for me. i use it in conjunction with battery 2x.
when my screen is off toggle2g switches to 2G network and 2x battery enables data every 15min for sync.
when the screen is on battery 2x re-enables data but it remains in 2g network thanks to toggle2g (i have selected the option to manually re-enable 3g)
when i turn my wifi on toggle2g switches to 2g network (although it takes some time.. like 10-15s)
so.. these 2 apps seem to do the trick for me. Lost 9% over the night (still don't know if it's good or bad) and used to lose about 20%.
I live in an area with poor mobile signal and consequently use a Vodafone Suresignal box. This creates a a micro cell that allows my mobile to recieve a good signal. As you know these boxes rely on a broad band connection to make things work.
What this means is that the distance to the Suresignal box and the broadband modem differs by about 6 inches. For this reason I am perplexed at the significant difference in battery drain with and without WiFi on.
My phone is a Samsung Galaxy S using onecosmics release 4.2 of ICS with the devils 14.2 rom.
If WiFi is swithced off then I get about 8-12 hours of battery life in idle. I.e. the phone is connecting with the Suresignal box by 3G.
If I switch WiFi on then I get over 2 days of battery life with the phone in idle.
I have tested this several times and the result is consistent.
Why would this be the case? I would have expected that WiFI would have been the battery burner not vice versa.
Does this observation help anyone? Is there a techincal explanation for the above observation?
My cell phone with Team ICSSGS RC 4.2 behaves that way too. Is it normal that wifi is more economical than 3g?
ROM: Team ICSSGS RC 4.2
Kernel: Semaphore ICS 0.8.1
Modem: JVU
I believe wifi is a little less battery hungry than UMTS. I always keep an eye between the two whenever I change roms (Stock/CM7/MIUI/ICS) as I am a heavy data consumer. Also note that Wifi policy may have been set to turn off when the phone is idle, or never. If former, it will turn wifi on if your screen is on and will essentially not putting wifi to sleep and loose connectivity.
Here's how I scale the consumption, with topmost is the least battery hungry
1. E (edge data connection)
2. Wifi
3. 3G (UMTS/WCDMA data)
4. H (HSDPA/HSUPA)
JVU the modem is very heavy in battery, the modem JPY is less greedy. It depends on the modem. But 3G or HSDPA will always be more hungry than the wifi.
Indeed, WLAN is less consuming than 3g.
As a suggestion, when you are not using WLAN or you are not in range of it, you may switch to 2g connection ( Edge ). Although it's loading way more slower than 3g, if you use it mainly for emails and not for browsing, you will not see any difference at all.
slaycock said:
If WiFi is swithced off then I get about 8-12 hours of battery life in idle. I.e. the phone is connecting with the Suresignal box by 3G.
If I switch WiFi on then I get over 2 days of battery life with the phone in idle.
I have tested this several times and the result is consistent.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have the same results
offcourse 3G has more battery drain
Wifi is better on battery than 3g, if you are connected to 3G and not using Wifi Turn off the Wifi, because your phone keeps looking for a wifi signal and that drains battery faster. But if you are in a wifi range always use Wifi over 3g.
i had DesireHD i9000 i9001 in my hands to play with ... 3g is always the biggest consumption regarding internet connection.
I usually turn of my mobile data, and connect to just wifi when there a network available.
What consumes more battery? If speed is not an issue.
Thanks
Sent from my GT-N7000 using XDA
I had a Samsung Epic 4G (the first line of Galaxy S) and on that, wifi consumed less battery than data, but on the Note, I am experience the opposite.
I find that wifi drains my battery faster.
If I disable wifi and am connected to 3G, the battery lasts longer.
If you use wifi to surf net, battery time will last longer. If you use data mobile like Hspa, you can see the battery drain very fast. (6 months of monitor with this)
Sent from my GT-N7000 using XDA
WIFI always use less battery the radio doesnt have to do much work since the router is within a close range.... mobile radio does much more work and consume mote battery than wifi...
Wifi power usage depending of type of wifi (2.4G or 5G), router settings and signal.
2.4G is less then 5G type. This is because more power will need for higher freq.
Router setting will give impact on your connected device to your router. Go to the wifi advance router setting and set optimal for speed and less power usage wifi setting such as Beacon Interval, RTS/CTS Threshold,Fragmentation Threshold, DTIM. And last great signal great battery life.
I'm coming from a Note 2 and I'm somewhat confused as to how this phone handles everything network related. On the note 2 whenever I would connect to wifi, my LTE symbol would disappear and show only a wifi signal, and I THINK the mobile data was switched off until the wifi connection dropped (I'm probably wrong). I also wasn't as concerned about battery drain with that phone since I had a 7600 mAh battery.
On this phone, regardless of if I'm connected to wifi or not, the cell data (empty "bars") logo always shows at the top. Now normally this wouldn't really bother me, except "cellular data" is using nearly 5x the battery that wifi is using. Are phone calls/SMS also tied to the same data stream/radio as the LTE? I'm on wifi for around 80% of the day. I didn't know if disabling cellular data would stop me from getting phone calls/sms. Again, I'm not sure with the note 2 if that was just a touchwiz feature or not, but I was wondering if there was some way to automatically disable LTE radio (if it isn't tied into calls) when I connect to wifi. Cell standby is my number one battery drain after the screen.
Cellular data is off when on WiFi. The only time you'd see it on is when a MMS is coming through.
Cell standby is just your radio connected to the tower.