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Hello...
I recieved my MDA last saturday, and since then, have been trying to figure everything out. After multiple calls to tmobile, and even a trip back to the store, i'm still stuck with a few questions that i cannot seem to get answered.
1. The MDA came with the default Tmobile theme which works fine in portrait & in landscape, as well as the default blue Windows theme.
However, I have tried to install multiple themes(including some from microsoft themeselves) and i have one annoying error! Whenever I use an "installed" theme, the portrait screen looks fine, but when I open the keyboard...there are two large greyish/white gaps on the side of the theme.
Ex: I'm using a green theme. When in landscape mode, i have a single green square in the middle of the screen with a strip on either side(left or right)
2. My phone is HORRIBLY slow when and if ANYTHING 3rd party is installed. I've tried today plugins that control the memory usage(figured that would help)...however, it just slowed things done. My phone usually runs at about 14mb Free Program Memory, out of the total 44MB(This seems horrible...with just the default programs installed*for the most part* and maybe agile messenger running.). If i install a today plugin, or a game...this drops below 10mb. Therefore, phone usage can be very aggravating. I cannot think of any other way to increase this memory expect for ONE thing. Would it be possible to transfer ALL programs, applications, etc to the miniSD Card(i have 1gb now, with a 2gb in the mail). This way...i certaintly would not be topping out the usage of the card, and hopefully I can free up alot of space on the phone.
3. As we all know, the packaged IM programs are AWFULLY slow and inconsistent. After a bit of research and trials, I have settled on using Agile Messenger. I'm loving it...expect for a few things.
The MAJOR problem I have with it, is the pop up notification. Its annoying to be surfing the web or playing a game, just to have a pop up tell you that you have recieved a message, EVERY TIME you get a new message(which can amount to a great deal in a short time). I've looked all over for a setting, so unless I missed it, is there any way to shut this off?
A side issue with this program, and also the connectivity of the phone is...:
(even WITH the GPRS hack*always on*), I still lose connection(with 2-4 bars of signal) and therefore i get signed off of Agile, rather often. This isnt' such a problem with me, as seeing it takes a short time to log back in. However, when you look at the conversation from another person's point of view...all you see is
"Soandso" Logged off
"Soandso" logged on
etc
etc
(not sure if that last part was a question or a statement, but if theres an answer, i'd like to hear it!)
4.
My girlfriend has a sidekick, and I LOVE the feature of being able to set phone profiles for specific times of the day. Especially during school, it'll go silent, and the second we are out, its back on normal. I have downloaded PZP to try and fix this loss of luxury. However, I personally don't find the program to be very consistent. Sometimes, it seems as if say my "school" profile is fully functioning, while other times, it really doesnt. Call me crazy, but I have taken a shot in the dark and ventured to say that if one touches the volume button on the phone while the phone is on a specific profile...it will throw it out of its cycle. If anyone has some hints/comments/suggestions of their own on this program or other favorites...I would love to hear from you.
5. After I went about and downloaded the Eten dial pad skin, I noticed that all of my contacts were unable to receive contact photos. I quickly realized that any contact that was saved on my SIM card from my previous phone was stuck in this predictament. However, if i were to create a new contact account, it quickly allows me to customize them alot further. Therefore, i was curious if there was any way to transfer my contacts on my sim card>my phone in a fashion that the phone will accept them.
I'm sure i'll think of more questions(these are just the ones that I havent been able to answer after days of searching :-D)
Thank you so much in advance!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Hi,
the speed of the HTC Wizard is very slow. That was my problem too.
for question no. 2:
Moving the apps to the card will result in more free space on the phone, OK, but running the apps from the card will also result in low speed, because the card is slower than the main memory. So I think you won't get more speed by this.
Try to overclock the device with OmapClock. My device works like a charm with 264 MHz (original was 180 MHz).
Use a tool like FreeUp RAM, which is part of the SK-Tools-package.
Running OmapClock and freeing up the RAM from time to time brings significantly much more speed. There is almost no waiting time if you click on an icon. You can even run Skype with OmapClock (many other users do so).
HTH
I have seen tidbits about overclocking through my endless searches the last few days. I've always heard that you have to be careful if you overclock a device, such as a phone. Has anyone had any known issues with the overclocking? Are there risks in having the phone run at that speed all the time?
The Wizard isn't slow. Install a Qtek rom without branding, and it will be much faster.
even the sales associate at tmobile seemed to think it was slow. Upgrading to a different ROM sounds ok, but i'm trying to keep everything via tmobile. thaks for the tip though.
Hi,
Im looking to get the Tmobile USA MDA, but after reading posts like this Im alittle afraid.
I need to run TOMTOM on this device and thinking that this might bring the device to a halt. Now Im starting to think that maybe I should get the 6700. Please let me know what you found out about making MDA faster. Thank you.
TazMan1688 said:
I have seen tidbits about overclocking through my endless searches the last few days. I've always heard that you have to be careful if you overclock a device, such as a phone. Has anyone had any known issues with the overclocking? Are there risks in having the phone run at that speed all the time?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
There have been long discussion about what is safe with the Wizard on this forum.
See, for example, http://forum.xda-developers.com/viewtopic.php?t=40284
Also, the SmartsKey app automates startup of OMapClock.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/viewtopic.php?t=41060
(It has a number of other uses as well.
Hope this helps.
TazMan1688 said:
My girlfriend has a sidekick, and I LOVE the feature of being able to set phone profiles for specific times of the day. Especially during school, it'll go silent, and the second we are out, its back on normal. I have downloaded PZP to try and fix this loss of luxury. However, I personally don't find the program to be very consistent. Sometimes, it seems as if say my "school" profile is fully functioning, while other times, it really doesnt. Call me crazy, but I have taken a shot in the dark and ventured to say that if one touches the volume button on the phone while the phone is on a specific profile...it will throw it out of its cycle. If anyone has some hints/comments/suggestions of their own on this program or other favorites...I would love to hear from you.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
There is a known problem with backlighting. See http://zendrui.free.fr/PZPForum/viewtopic.php?t=197
Also, check to see what events PZP is handling for profile-switching. For example, if you have calendar-based or time-based rules, they may switch your profile without you doing anything. Go to Settings, Control to see what you Switches you allow. Or check Time and Calendar for your profiles under the Configuration option.
As much as i'm sure overclocking the device may help, especially in my case. I'm just not sure if its worth the risk. Kind of hard to explain to Tmobile why the phone decided to overheat. Seems overly risky to make such an expensive device, run at higher speeds than its DESIGNED to do. But i'm still not sure, it almost DOES seem worth it...decisions, decisions...
Yes, Thank you for clarifying that...I mostly meant, the inconsistency of PZP with the timing of profiles. It seems as if the program will "switch" to the correct profile, but i don't always see a change in the operation of the device itself. Ex: I have it set to go to school mode at 7:30am, this past week(since its spring break, i've noticed that my incoming calls all had the normal ring volume, as well as system tones, etc...
Although it "says" ""School"" i don't really know if its truely in that mode?!
On this note, i have a question about setting the times(which is what i really want to accomplish). My phone goes to LOUD around 5:30am, School at 7:30 am, Normal at 1:55pm, and Quiet at 4pm.
Nooow, do i have to put two times in the school profile such as 7:30 am-1:54(5)???? so that it has an entire time interval...or can i just tell it when to start, and the next profile will automatically kick in and stop the previous.
Also, does putting the phone in standby or shutting it down have any effect on the profile??
I'm sorry in advance if i'm asking very basic questions, i've just been searching for a long period of time, and i usually can't find a specific answer to my question. So I decided I would spend the time to actually discuss MY problem, with hope someone can help. Again, sorry for any inconvienence or redudant questions.
TazMan1688 said:
As much as i'm sure overclocking the device may help, especially in my case. I'm just not sure if its worth the risk. Kind of hard to explain to Tmobile why the phone decided to overheat.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have a german T-Mobile MDA Vario (= HTC Wizard) and I'm overclocking it permanently with OmapClock and SmartSKey. There is no overheating as far as I can say/feel. I can speed up to 264 MHz (original = 180 MHz). If I try more, the device softresets itself without any damage or loss of data. It's a kind of security mechanism. Of course, battery life is a little bit shorter when overclocking it. But I'm sure, slightly overclocking doesn't damage the device! Maybe the lifetime of the device will be a bit shorter, lets say 6 months in 5 years, but you won't realize that, because you won't be using your device in 5 years. You will sure own some other phone when the CPU dies. Together with the tool "FreeUp RAM" (comes with SKTools), I can reach a comfortable speed for everyday use. But never forget: The Wizard IS quite slow, compared with other devices. You can find smart workarounds for that, but don't close your eyes on that fact.
For running any GPS navigation tools I would consider buying not a Wizard, but a much faster device, if you would ask me. I'm using my Wizard only for addresses (~ 700 items), calendar (~ 1200 items) etc., and without overclocking and using a program like Pocket Informant 2005, that would be an annoying, maybe impossible thing. At the beginning, I had to wait almost 10-15 seconds until e.g. the month overview was created. Switch to the following month - wait again. Choose a specific day - wait again. Oh my god! That needed more patience than I had.
Are you running a basic install without all the phone networks customisation bloat?
you can do this by hard resetting (you will loose data doing this) and then doing a softreset when the customisation dialogue pops up after setting time zone etc.
this will speed things up over an install with tmobiles bloatware. I run tomtom and my device is in general as reponsive as the magician it replaces.
good luck with your phone
R
So guys based on your opinions and experience is it worth for me to get the MDA or should I go with a different carrier and a XV/PPC-6700 ?
Hi yozh,
I don't know the 6700-device at all. Maybe we don't have it here in good old Germany, or maybe under a differnt name. Does it have a bigger display (better for navigation)? Does it have a faster CPU? Then take that one! In my eyes I would never like to use the Wizard for navigation. It's only a better phone, not more, not less. For all other purposes I would buy a bigger machine. I do not want to talk bad about my own device, I have bought it and I use it and it's OK for the everyday things I do with it. It has nothing to do with "I'm proud of my device", like some people seem to be here. It's a phone, man, not a Ferrari or a Rolex. You would tell yourself lies, if you would call the Wizard a powerful device. I had a Palm Tungsten T5 before, and THIS is a powerful device. 2600 items in the calendar (true!), and the reaction time was half a second if you tap on the screen! You can go and have a coffee if you do that on a Wizard.
Just think about it. If you buy a Wizard, try it for a day and then write to me what you think about that phone.
Mh. My english should be better, I know.
Just my 2 Cents!
Hi well the 6700 is the apache I belive and the CPU is 416mhz but its not a "dual core" everything else screen adn such is pretty much the same. Thanks for the reply
SO any one on this forums can recoment apache over MDA ?
yozh said:
Hi,
Im looking to get the Tmobile USA MDA, but after reading posts like this Im alittle afraid.
I need to run TOMTOM on this device and thinking that this might bring the device to a halt. Now Im starting to think that maybe I should get the 6700. Please let me know what you found out about making MDA faster. Thank you.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
See my posts on http://forum.xda-developers.com/viewtopic.php?t=48448 regarding processor speeds and TomTom.
Wow really TOMTOM runs better on the MDA then on a 400mhz DELL ? Then Im set defenatly getting the MDA, I like GSM network provide3rs better anyway and plus there are so much choices with the phones. I wish I was able to aford the JASJAS that looks really good.
Also don't forget that when you 'close' an appliation it does not really close, it just goes in to background, thus slowing the system down.
Check out your running processes and close all the ones that are not needed or load an app that really closed things.
TazMan1688 said:
1. The MDA came with the default Tmobile theme which works fine in portrait & in landscape, as well as the default blue Windows theme.
However, I have tried to install multiple themes(including some from microsoft themeselves) and i have one annoying error! Whenever I use an "installed" theme, the portrait screen looks fine, but when I open the keyboard...there are two large greyish/white gaps on the side of the theme.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Themes built for portrait screens look wrong in landscape view. Easy solution: build a theme that works in landscape view. The Guava Bubbles theme works fine in both because the background image is larger than portrait size.
TazMan1688 said:
4. My girlfriend has a sidekick, and I LOVE the feature of being able to set phone profiles for specific times of the day. Especially during school, it'll go silent, and the second we are out, its back on normal. I have downloaded PZP to try and fix this loss of luxury. However, I personally don't find the program to be very consistent. Sometimes, it seems as if say my "school" profile is fully functioning, while other times, it really doesnt. Call me crazy, but I have taken a shot in the dark and ventured to say that if one touches the volume button on the phone while the phone is on a specific profile...it will throw it out of its cycle. If anyone has some hints/comments/suggestions of their own on this program or other favorites...I would love to hear from you.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I use PPC-Profiles-Pro, but you can't slave this to a time. Besides, I'd rather just put it on Silent mode by holding the connection manager button for three seconds (top left side button). Otherwise I use PPC Profiles to switch from Work (BT) to Home (Wifi, no BT) to Sleep (No Wifi, no BT, no email alerts or reminders, just ringer). Walking into a theater, I just go to silent mode.
bilbo_28 said:
Also don't forget that when you 'close' an appliation it does not really close, it just goes in to background, thus slowing the system down.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I know. I'm using MagicButton. And OmapClock with SmartSKey. And FreeUp RAM. In deed, I do almost EVERYTHING to make my device run faster.
At Christmas I will receive my HTC Touch HD and this is why I have started reading all the Blackstone thread since a month.
That is what I understand so far(correct me if I am wrong):
-Hardware: big screen,a bit less contrast than Diamond, but impressive resolution and really (probably for the first time) user-friendly device
-Battery: better than Diamond's one..up to 2 days of normal use
-Video performance: still a lot of work, but coreplayer works fine with low size movies or videos. At the moment there is no access to the internal GPU and only WMP can play smooth .mp4...big hopes for the future. People disappointed due to high hardware capability not used
-Audio performance: quality comparable to Ipod/Iphone, but TF3d interface has still some bugs to be fixed..however, a lot of 3rd software to choose the software we like most ( S2P for example)
-Camera performance: still a bit confused, it seems to be a "standard" 5mp compared to the level of other devices (nokia or sony-ericsson)...however there is no thread that show exactly the power of this camera with lot of pictures in different environments
-Navigation GPS: few bugs to be fixed, but we can use igo8, Navigon 7 and Tomtom 7 in high resolution
-Customization: like the other wm..you can do really what you want (change today, apply tons of software, etc etc)..there are no limits so far, except the hardware's ones.
-Games: let's say that the TOUCH HD is more a "business device" with media specifics...but still far from Iphone games. Let's hope in the future like for the video performance.
-Development: HSPL not yet released (after we would have a huge choice of ROMs!!!..)...hopefully a christmas gift
worksofart said:
-Battery: better than Diamond's one..up to 2 days of normal use
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That astonishes me. I never get more than about a day with only sending SMS and nothing else. Whoever comes up to two days please tell me (and perhaps others) how to achieve that. I even stopped active sync and used the trick (empty active sync server) to not let it start automatically. Is there anything (perhaps obvious for others) I missed?
I think you just about summed it up.
It is a really nice device with lots more potential.
I'm sure you won't be disappointed this christmas!!
How do you stop the activesync?
well, im looking for a better solution on the high quality video playback capability lol
something wrong
alex3683 said:
That astonishes me. I never get more than about a day with only sending SMS and nothing else. Whoever comes up to two days please tell me (and perhaps others) how to achieve that. I even stopped active sync and used the trick (empty active sync server) to not let it start automatically. Is there anything (perhaps obvious for others) I missed?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
there's probably something wrong with your device cause i always get over a day and a half at least i mean have a look this has been covered several times snd most members appear to agree that the battery has improved especially in comparison to the kaiser and diamond both very loved handsets
I must confirm, marvi0 is right. The battery should last for over a day to two days when the device is sporadicaly used.
What I see as potentional problems could be these:
1) bad radio version (i remember these issues on HTC Hima with old ROMs, they could drain battery twice fast than usual).
2) some creepy app, that takes too much CPU use. Remember that the more the CPU is used, the more batt is spend. The power-off works that way: it not only turns off screen, it also sends windows to some sort of standby mode, when most of the apps are suspended. But - if some app could not get to this state, it runs on full throttle on the background. I remember such issue with playing with WM5 screensaver and MortScripts. Check your taskbar, what is running there.
My battery now lasts up to 5 x days max if I use Tweak HD suggested settings throughout! This is an excellent App. As per the camera I wish this could be fixed / replaced with something like I originally used on my Trinity since the adaptive zoom/focus causes rapid movement to alwas go blurred, whilst static images or landscapes are fine.
Battery Last 1 n half day
After lots of phone calls, average sms and few songs...Battery Last 1 n half day...
Which is fine for me
max i got from the battery was 3 days only doing a couple of calls and some sms, i don't use any massive tf3d personalization only changed the background image, installed s2u2, crystal clock and optimized the phone cache, but usualy it's around 1 and half, 2 days
My battery went from 100% to 48% in the space of about 8 hours on Sunday as I was doing lots of stuff on it, trying to get apps working, trying things out, installing, uninstalling etc.
I then had the phone on standby all night (was 48% before bed) and it has been on standby most of today with 1 phone call and a bit of video and calculator, and still on 48%
Okay, I now got my battery life up to about two days with some telephony and SMS and bluetooth always turned on by switching of the light sensor and using a fixed setting of two bars for the light when using battery. This is enough (at least for me) to see everything well on the device in every lighting condition.
alex3683 said:
That astonishes me. I never get more than about a day with only sending SMS and nothing else. Whoever comes up to two days please tell me (and perhaps others) how to achieve that. I even stopped active sync and used the trick (empty active sync server) to not let it start automatically. Is there anything (perhaps obvious for others) I missed?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm surprised with your short battery life. I used it almost non-stop and still had 50% left a day later. I find the battery life of HD amazingly good. However, I did took the pain to charge it properly before starting to use it. Although the manual said we need only 3 hours to charge it, I kept unplugging the power when the charge indicator turned green, then plug it in again. I kept repeating this process for about 2 hours after it first turned green. This might have something to do with the long battery life I'm getting, perhaps.
ScarySquirrel said:
My battery went from 100% to 48% in the space of about 8 hours on Sunday as I was doing lots of stuff on it, trying to get apps working, trying things out, installing, uninstalling etc.
I then had the phone on standby all night (was 48% before bed) and it has been on standby most of today with 1 phone call and a bit of video and calculator, and still on 48%
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This is very much in line with my own experience so far.
HTCzar said:
How do you stop the activesync?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Have a look at this post http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=3036421&postcount=12
I think, for internet reading this is a good test and producing the results we might expect, but for more general purposes this test is flawed. http://blog.laptopmag.com/android-b...d-handsets-trail/comment-page-1#comment-50669
Method:
"
First, we download My Settings and Advanced Task Killer, two free apps that are useful regardless.
Then, we open My Settings, and do the following:
Turn screen brightness to 40%, and turn off auto brightness.
Turn off Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, GPS location, cell location, and auto sync.
Deactivate screen timeout; that is, make sure the screen stays on indefinitely.
In the Web browser, we turn off Flash support and plug-ins.
We placed the phone in an area that was receiving at least 4 bars of service."
I'm not trying to overly just support the device because I have it, I think many of us knew we wouldn't have great performance when reading black text on white background. So, this only tests on LCD's strength and AMOLED's weakness. Next, the SAMOLED specifically is way to bright to be reading indoors at this % brightness, LCD maybe not quite as much so it'd be best to have like either most common setting (you'd actually need to have devices report this for something accurate, not going to happen), auto brightness would've even been better even though you have manufactures (I think) being able to have too much control over 'perceived' best practice. They removed plug-ins, something I think the Streak might struggle with next to the mighty decoding ability of the hummingbird.
Also, one important thing to note is, they didn't make note of the fact that the Galaxy phones have independent brightness control within the internet browser, perhaps this was set too high/low, I'm not sure how it plays relative to the general brightness (e.g. does it add to the setting to make it even brighter within the browser? Does it override the setting for the browser?). Them not acknowledging this setting gives me some pause, even though it could come at the cost of the battery life even more.
Last and most important, we do more than just browse the internet on our phones. We do need things like video tests, white text on black backgrounds, gaming, audio and other tests run.
In the end, this'll confirm what some users have complained about when it comes to their battery life.
Uhh, I cannot post this in development as I am still a newby :-(
However:
Hello,
I came from Symbian (Nokia C7-00) and liked the phone very much. Everything worked the way it should. (I was especially interested in office functionality.)
Now I bought a Galaxy Note and I really love the hardware.
But I discovered that it uses much energy and it doesn't like to sleep as often as it could. (I already returned to Android GB, which gives a better experience, but there still is room for improvement.)
1. Sometimes even though the phone simply lies around and does nothing, the last app that I forgot to close is hindering the CPU from sleeping. Why? The is no need.
2. At night I am used to turn the phone into flight mode. However I found out that this isn't the best thing for Android. In the morning, when the email app goes to push phase, the phone leaves sleep mode and seems to excitedly wait for the flight mode to get switched off. This uses *quite* a bit of battery!
These things seem strange to me. My impression is that Android is not really optimised for cell phones. If the screen is off, there is no need for CPU time, doesn't it? There is nothing urgent to do; everything could be done slowly; no hurry.
I guess the battery could last *much* longer if this would be improved.
Greetings,
corcov
corcovo said:
Uhh, I cannot post this in development as I am still a newby :-(
However:
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Which is handy, because this thread has nothing to do with development and thus saved you from some abuse!
Regards,
Dave
Sent from my GT-N7000 using Tapatalk 2
But I already know how to click the "thanks" button
corcovo said:
But I already know how to click the "thanks" button
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Doesn't matter.
Development, if you did not create IT, then it does not belong in development. Remember that. Otherwise you will get flamed.
Android is a mobile OS, so of course it is optimised for smart phones - not ordinary cell phones. Android acts like a computer and, if you keep a computer running Crysis 2 for example, it would burn more power than a computer just playing some music off of iTunes.
In terms of improving your battery, check your brightness. You can download widgets to adjust the brightness right from the home screens. I use these to set my brightness to its lowest whilst at home (perfectly adequate for night and indoor use away from sunlight) and turn it onto automatic when I go outside. This has saved my a bunch of battery.
If you are running a stock Samsung ROM, turn on power saving mode. I always leave it on and, frankly, I have no idea as to what it actually does. I haven't noticed a performance drop in the slightest, but if it saves a bit of battery it is worth it. Also, you could try Juice Defender or some other battery saving apps which work for some people - others not.
Finally, ensure you haven't left GPS, Bluetooth or WiFi on when not needed. Try downloading CPU Spy to check your phone deep sleeps, yet mine even without it ever deep sleeping gets around 16 hours of battery life which is still the best I have ever gotten on a smart phone. Bettery Battery Stats can show you wake-locks (apps that are keeping your phone active) also.
Brad387 said:
Android is a mobile OS, so of course it is optimised for smart phones - not ordinary cell phones.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I see. Well it might be a nice feature if one could add an "now be a cell phone"-option for energy enhancement, which means: if screen if off, sleep.
c.
corcovo said:
1. Sometimes even though the phone simply lies around and does nothing, the last app that I forgot to close is hindering the CPU from sleeping. Why? The is no need.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
There are some legitimate needs for keeping the CPU from sleeping for a short period of time - such as finishing a sync operation (otherwise, the radio power spent beginning the sync is wasted). Unfortunately, some poorly written applications (Facebook for example) abuse the wakelock mechanisms and hold wakelocks when it is not justified.
2. At night I am used to turn the phone into flight mode. However I found out that this isn't the best thing for Android. In the morning, when the email app goes to push phase, the phone leaves sleep mode and seems to excitedly wait for the flight mode to get switched off. This uses *quite* a bit of battery!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This is not something I have ever encountered myself. "push" relies on the server to trigger something - in airplane mode, this trigger can't happen.
These things seem strange to me. My impression is that Android is not really optimised for cell phones. If the screen is off, there is no need for CPU time, doesn't it? There is nothing urgent to do; everything could be done slowly; no hurry.
I guess the battery could last *much* longer if this would be improved.
Greetings,
corcov
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Android is well optimized for cell phones - However, it assumes that third-party applications follow Google's recommendations for power management. Unfortunately, many of them do not. The number of IM applications which choose to use their own proprietary and poorly optimized network protocols (such as Skype, it's atrocious) as opposed to Google C2DM (optimized and efficient) is astonishing.
An interesting note was that I believe much of the focus at Google I/O was on reminding app developers that they need to play nice with the system and other apps.
There are some cases where there are device-specific nonoptimalities. Compared to most Nexus devices, Exynos devices have an absurdly long time to resume from wake (1000 milliseconds), and during that resume cycle CPU frequency is locked to 800 MHz and cpuidle is disabled. This is one of the #1 causes of power drain on our device. This is also exclusively a Samsung kernel/hardware architecture problem that does not affect the Nexus S (similar CPU, but completely different modem interface) or the Galaxy Nexus (different CPU/modem interface).
In the case of our device, the modem is hung off of the CPU on a USB bus - this makes for very long resume times.
Here are obvious reasons the CPU should occasionally turn on when the screen is off:
1) MP3 playback in the background
2) Handling of background syncs - e.g. when an email or Google Talk IM comes in, wake the CPU, handle it, and pop a notification sound, then go back to sleep. Normally, this means the CPU sleeps while waiting for an interrupt from the WLAN chipset or the cellular radio. Unfortunately, some apps drive incoming data to the device far too frequently. (See my above rant about Skype's network protocols being crap compared to Google's C2DM protocol.)
3) Handling of scheduled wakeups (alarms, calendar events, etc) - these are rare and almost never consume power
Most power drain is from item 2, with third-party apps frequently behaving extremely poorly compared to Google's own application suite and sync protocols.
Now this an extensive answer which is very informative and helpful for me since insights are always soothing. Love it. Thanks!
not much to add after Entropy, but if you feel the need to get some control over battery usage you could try betterbatterystats app (and the thread) to identify battery eaters, besides that, there are few apps to check what is going on with your system when it sleeps:
- CPU Spy to show cpu states time
- Autorun Manager or Autostarts to disable triggers causing apps like FB to run without reason (those which you will find with betterbatterystats)
- Battery Monitor Widget, to check battery current consumption (mA) - this app is generally not recommended, because Note's hardware does not report the actual current, so the readings are highly estimated and because when poorly configured it can drain your battery faster, BUT otoh with refresh rate set at 5 minutes or more, it can give you some approximate orientation on how much battery you lose (better than counting %/hour by yourself) at negligible battery usage
- also, if you feel the need to disable net and sync during night, you could automate it using "lama", which is free, and in my experience does not eat much battery by itself
- and last but not least, avoid taskillers, those apps may have adverse effect, i.e. self restarting apps (by the triggers mentioned above), will get killed then restarted and so on and so on, leading to much higher battery drain
[HOW-TO][NEWBIE GUIDE] Optimize & proper set up your Galaxy S6 Edge (stock firmware)
As I've read across this forum and on several specific threads related to usage, battery life and so on, as well as discussing with some of my friends having a S6 or S6 Edge, I realized that most of the people don't really know how to properly set up their phones or how to use them efficiently.
OK, I get it, this is a fancy phone, not every owner is a developer or tech guy so it might be that many choose it based on the looks and don't really know how to optimize it...then they start complaining about different things like lag or battery drain not knowing that most of the problems are caused by miss-usage or improper setup. Of course there are bugs too, nothing is perfect. Of course there are many firmwares available and some are market or carrier dependent so some features or settings might be missing from some of them or even work differently.
What I will try here is to provide some guidelines and tips for setting up various things on the phone in order to maximize it's battery life and for a better usage. I will also make some recommendations based on my experience, tests and usage that might not apply to everyone. Use common sense and logic to apply similar settings in your particular case. Don't come screaming that you made that or that and now something is not working.
And YES, I know there are similar guides like this posted over the Internet and I'll probably make similar recommendations here too but I couldn't find such a guide here on XDA that is particular to this phone (if there is a better one than you might as well ignore mine).
All these things I'll describe below are applicable to any STOCK, NON-ROOTED 5.1.1 firmware and won't break warranty or your phone.
Now that was a long (and maybe unneeded introduction) but I thought to write this for everyone...let's start.
Model No.: SM-G925F
Android: 5.1.1 r2 (LMY47X)
Baseband: G925FXXU2QOI7
Kernel: 3.10.61-5672012
Build date: Fri Sept 4 2015
Carrier: Orange RO
DISPLAY
First I would like to say some words about the display. We have a great display, high resolution and it is most likely the biggest battery drain factor. There are two major things about it that you should keep in mind and will help you to get a better battery:
1. It's AMOLED...that means that the black pixels on it will consume no power because are not lit. Studies showed that even if not completely black, AMOLED displays use less energy if the displayed picture is darker compared to a lighter one.
2. The brightness level. Most people use it on "auto" or high level settings and this will be a major drain factor.
You can drastically lower the battery drain caused by your screen by selecting as much as possible dark (black) backgrounds and/or themes. There are some nice ones available in the Theme Store (my favorite is the Dalkomm Coffee Theme), that make most screens and menus dark/black. Also choosing a dark wallpaper for lockscreen/homescreens will help.
Don't use screen brightness at maximum...never. You don't need that in 99% of the cases. Also you won't probably need the automatic setting either since most of the people are spending most of the time indoors (either at work or home). A low manual setting will be fine most of the time, I have it set up at about 20% and only need a brighter one when going out. At that time I just tap on "auto" and it'll increase based on ambient light level. So you don't even need to tweak it alot every time. Find a low manual setting that's fine for your eyes and just tap on "auto" when you go out in sunlight.
CONNECTIVITY
Another battery drain factor is your multiple connection/radios features. In most cases you use just several: Mobile Data, WiFi, GPS/location and BT (when applicable). That means you should turn off all the others you don't use...NFC or BT (when not connected to a headset or car-kit or not listening to music). I don't listen to music and don't have a BT headset so I mostly not using BT (just when I'm in my car) and almost never use NFC so I have both disabled and I enable them only when needed via the Quick Settings.
WiFi
WiFi should also be properly setup otherwise it'll have impact on battery. It was incorrectly assumed or considered that keeping WiFi on all the time will drain battery faster. That was proven in different tests that's not true and in fact keeping WiFi on all the time won't make a big difference and in some cases was even better than to turn it off/on. I think is something similar with the car engines that suck more fuel when started that when running at idle. The major power drain is not when WiFi is running while is not connected to any network, but when the WiFi radio is powered up. When is on and not connected, it's going into a lower power state so the battery consumption is negligible.
I had a case with one of my friends that had WiFi setup to turn off when display was off...wrong choice, he got about 30% battery drain overnight because instead of having it connected to his home WiFi, the phone was using his 4G/LTE connection to make all the background sync/updates. That was eating his battery and also his data plan. After setting WiFi to "always" his overnight drain lowered to as little as 2-3%.
In some regions/carriers there are 2 other settings that were proven to help battery life: WiFi calling and VoLTE. I don't have either of them but based on different articles and what people say, they surely help with that so don't forget to turn them off if you don't use these features.
You might also want to try turning off "Always allows scanning" and "Smart network switch". I have the second turned off but I keep on the first one. Basically the first option tell the Location service to use WiFi for locating the device even if WiFi is switched off (by the on/off switch) so that means the radio is active. Second option should make you switch faster from WiFi to mobile data in case the WiFi signal is not strong enough or fluctuating. In my country there are plenty of WiFi hot-spots and they have mostly good connections so I don't use this feature.
GPS
Well here the opinions are split but I am currently having it ON all the time and Location Service is set to "high accuracy". I personally haven't noticed such a major difference with or without it so I preferred to let it on as it is used by many apps or services. You can try to set Location to "wifi and cell only" but don't think that will bring you a major benefit.
RUNNING APPS/PROCESSES
Well this is an important one. I've initially started to turn off/disable/uninstall everything I don't need or use. This can be done mostly from the Settings - Applications - Application Manager or if you want to go further, you can install Package Disabler Pro from PlayStore, about which I'll detail later.
Now why we should do that? There are lots of apps, processes and background services running on our devices that take care about all the things we do on the device. The problem is that ALL are using resources: processor time, memory, space and so on. In the end these are translated for a user in LAG or battery drain. Of course we cannot kill everything and I learned long time ago that installing Task or memory managers on Android it's the worst thing you can do. Android it's smart enough to take care better about it's resources and processes (at least to a certain point) and keep killing a certain process won't give you more battery life but will eat more of it in the end,
What I wanted to say is you shouldn't start disabling, killing or blocking everything cause you might end up with an unstable or not properly working phone (case in which only a factory reset might help). First of all look at the ALL tab in Application Manager and try to identify what you don't need or use. For example I'm certainly not using some things like: music, books, news feeds, Samsung's keyboard (I use SwiftKey), the TouchWiz launcher (I use Nova), health services or whatever, S-Voice, S-Health, S-Finder, I don't have any smartwatches so I don't use any Gear processes, fancy device wake-up functions (like wave gestures) or animated wallpapers either.
So after all considerations above, you decided that you can safely disable some apps/processes. All good but you'll quickly learn that some of them cannot be disabled via Application Manager (the "disable" button is grayed out). Now what? Well here comes handy that Package Disabler Pro that I've told you about in the beginning. That app is able to disable ANY apps/processes on your phone, including those that are protected and cannot be disabled via the normal way (and yes it can do that without being rooted). The downside of it is that you must be careful what you choose to disable not to have something that is needed for the normal functionality or the apps you're currently using. The app has also a backup/restore function (via an xml file) for saving the list with apps you have disabled and easily import them back after a factory reset for ex. I've added to this thread my list of disabled apps as it is exported by the application (just unzip and copy the file on the root of your internal memory and it can then be imported in the Package Disabler app)
Another important thing is WHAT apps you're using. I know that socializing and social networking are some of today's most trendy things but keep in mind that some of the apps used for that are not so well made. An example could be the Facebook app/messenger which are reported to drain alot of battery. RSS feeds, news feeds, multiple weather apps or widgets, all contribute to battery drain and lag. Don't install several apps/widgets for the same purpose (like several calendar apps or weather apps). Each will take resources and won't have an added value. Want to use another weather app/widget than the one coming with the phone? Fine, install it...but don't forget to uninstall/disable the built in one or others that do the same thing. Same goes for keyboard for ex; I use SwiftKey for years and got used with it. For me it's better than any keyboard that Samsung might put on the device, therefore I've disabled the standard Samsung keyboard. I also don't like TouchWiz launcher and use Nova that offers me much more flexibility so...I've disabled both the "easy" and "regular" TouchWiz launchers. I went to the point that I've even disabled the different embedded font types, you have 5 of them and I doubt someone uses more than one at a time.
So as you all can see it's not only a matter of setup but also a matter of usage. When you have a device you have to use it properly otherwise it'll not perform as you expect. Imagine a car that has a manufacturer fuel consumption value of 5.5 liters/100 Km....that's under certain conditions not on ANY type of driving. Fly with 200+ km/hr on a highway and I'll guarantee you won't have 5.5 liters/100 km consumption. That doesn't mean the manufacturer has lied or mislead you. Same goes with a phone, if you don't know how to use it and optimize it, you'll have a bad experience.
I work in the IT industry for years and I mostly laugh when I hear someone advising somebody to reinstall the operating system to solve a problem. Same goes for "factory reset" for a phone. Yes, this method works some times but that won't solve the root cause of an issues if you're using it the same way. After several days it'll perform as bad as before and you'll just say that "factory reset" did nothing. Of course it didn't...YOU have to do something different, not the phone.
Now I apologize for the long post and I do hope that at least some will learn to better manage their devices and to understand what they're doing not just running certain commands or procedures blind. Both S6 and S6e are great devices but we should learn how to properly use them in order to benefit the most from them...otherwise we just come here asking for help or mumbling about what crap devices they are.
Thank you, I will check to see if I get an improvement on the standby battery drain.
Your part about not setting the screen to Auto is flawed. You mention that we are mostly indoors, and you don't need a brighter screen for that. Auto mode also knows that and sets the brightness lower. It already does automatically what you do manually.
Tnx. And yes....keeping screen at 20% brightness and just switching to auto when in outdoors works great for the battery life.
ArmedandDangerous said:
Your part about not setting the screen to Auto is flawed. You mention that we are mostly indoors, and you don't need a brighter screen for that. Auto mode also knows that and sets the brightness lower. It already does automatically what you do manually.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Not quite, I've tested it. If you're on "auto" and use a lower setting on the slidebar, in a dark room the screen is too dark, you'll have to turn off "auto" and the manual brighteness set on the same level will be much higher than on auto.
Now if you have such good eyes and you're able to use "auto" in all cases with the slider at 20% that's good for you...unfortunately I am not so that's why I use it as I've described. The point is that "auto" mode consumes MORE battery regardless of how it's set, than a lower 'manual' mode. So I preffer to have it like this than to use auto all the time.
Thanks for the awesome guide. I'll start disabling some useless processes and see how my battery life is working. Anyway without much editing the battery of S6Edge is pretty good. I can use it a whole day and still 19% remaining. As a comparison I wasn't able to do it with my S3 having to recharge it 2 or even 3 times at day.
Again, thanks for the guide!
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