[Q] Battery drain, baseband and home lag: is that the real S3?! - Galaxy S III Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

Hi all,
first of all, I'm not a fan boy of any kind. I've been using so many android devices in the last years, I'm more of a tech fanboy then a <brand>fanboy.
Given that, I'm not soddisfied at all with S3: reading and viewing so many preview and review of this phone, I though it will last more than one day and that it would be fast as hell and lag free, at least, this is what everyone is saying in every damned review I saw/read.
I had in these passed 6 month: gaalxy s2, sensation, galaxy note, sensation xe, galacy nexus and right now htc one x and sgs3.
Well, the sgs3 is not so much better as everyone is saying, in particular, is not better at all of htc one x as every comparison review is stating.
What's up? Is that just me or what? My sgs3, with the same operator's sim is lasting less than htc one x and it's not fluid at all, at least while scrolling through homes!!! Of course, even the one x has some microlagging while scrolling through homes, but I though sgs3 would have no lag at all.
Does anyone else see it?
What it's really strange dealing with battery drain, is that the phone drains a lot even while in standby. The first voice in my battery stats is phone cellular stanby? How can it drain more than the screen???
Any "smart" answer is very appreciated, but please, avoid phrases like "you got a lemon, change it": what I'm saying it's not that it lasts me4 hours, I can get through the whole day with sgs3. But it does not last more than one day as everyone is stating! I mean: I get 17h unplugged with 3h screen on, it's on par with all the other phones I had...but not with Galaxy note or One X, they really last more than one day.
Thanks

Can you make a video of the lag so that we can see what you're experiencing? because I and most people have a smooth interface so maybe an app or your setup is causing problems?
Regarding the battery life, I got something like 22 hours with 5 hours screen-on (screenshot in battery life thread in general) and that was with pretty heavy usage - games, videos, web browsing. But you're right there's definitely high cell standby drain in the current firmware. Hopefully it can be fixed. Also, there's an led notification app, can't remember what it's called, that has a bug that drains the battery on the gs3. See the battery life thread in general for more info.

jonathanyong said:
Can you make a video of the lag so that we can see what you're experiencing? because I and most people have a smooth interface so maybe an app or your setup is causing problems?
Regarding the battery life, I got something like 22 hours with 5 hours screen-on (screenshot in battery life thread in general) and that was with pretty heavy usage - games, videos, web browsing. But you're right there's definitely high cell standby drain in the current firmware. Hopefully it can be fixed. Also, there's an led notification app, can't remember what it's called, that has a bug that drains the battery on the gs3. See the battery life thread in general for more info.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hi, first of all, thanks for your answer. I'm not talking about huge lag, but the tipical microlag that you get while scrolling through homes in every android phone up to nowdays. I got some microlag while scrolling on HTC One X too.
If I can I will upload something tonite.
Your battery stats is great: 22h with 5h screen-on is a very good result. Do you use data connection always on? How many charge cycle did you perform?
Anyway, no, I'm not using light flow as my phone is still on stock rom, no mod yet!
TIA

Yeh wifi and 3g always on. here's a link: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=26864539#post26864539
But even with the good results I'm getting, I don't think the phone would last 2 days because of the high cell standby drain. Its definitely a problem that needs to be fixed.
Regarding the lag. I get UI framerate drops in the following:
- Task switcher if there are a lot of apps open
- Browser bookmarks with thumbnails enabled
But they're the only areas that I've noticed have noticeable fps drops. Another annoying thing is for example the ABCDEF... list to the right of the contacts list, it seems to take a second or so to become responsive when you start dragging your finger down it, kinda spoils the experience.
Also, touchwiz launcher seems to need to reload when RAM gets used up.
So yeh it's not perfect but overall it's lightning fast and battery life is superb. Will be even better with software updates

I'm getting 1day 5 hours with 7 hours screen on and minimal standby drain.
The only lag I experience is 'sticky' vertical scrolling.
I did drop touchwiz in favor of go launcher but that was only because I found it too boring.
So far this phone has more than lived up to my expectations.
Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk 2

jonathanyong said:
Yeh wifi and 3g always on. here's a link: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=26864539#post26864539
But even with the good results I'm getting, I don't think the phone would last 2 days because of the high cell standby drain. Its definitely a problem that needs to be fixed.
Regarding the lag. I get UI framerate drops in the following:
- Task switcher if there are a lot of apps open
- Browser bookmarks with thumbnails enabled
But they're the only areas that I've noticed have noticeable fps drops. Another annoying thing is for example the ABCDEF... list to the right of the contacts list, it seems to take a second or so to become responsive when you start dragging your finger down it, kinda spoils the experience.
Also, touchwiz launcher seems to need to reload when RAM gets used up.
So yeh it's not perfect but overall it's lightning fast and battery life is superb. Will be even better with software updates
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Do you mean you have no lag at all (neither a micro lag) when scrolling through homes?
Yes, noticed the launcher reload sometimes.
I don't know, maybe it's just me 'cause I had so many phones and in particular an HTC One X to compare it with? I don't find it any faster than one x but in web browser, nor it lasts more than one x! :/

corrsea said:
I'm getting 1day 5 hours with 7 hours screen on and minimal standby drain.
The only lag I experience is 'sticky' vertical scrolling.
I did drop touchwiz in favor of go launcher but that was only because I found it too boring.
So far this phone has more than lived up to my expectations.
Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk 2
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Wondeful battery stats. Lucky you or unlucky me?
Do you use 3G data always on?
Just curious: which mobile phone do you have before buying the s3?!?!

Aratheba said:
Do you mean you have no lag at all (neither a micro lag) when scrolling through homes?
Yes, noticed the launcher reload sometimes.
I don't know, maybe it's just me 'cause I had so many phones and in particular an HTC One X to compare it with? I don't find it any faster than one x but in web browser, nor it lasts more than one x! :/
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No noticeable fps drops when swiping through the home screens no. I only have widgets on 4 pages though so will try adding more and see if that makes a difference.
I also owned a hox (tegra3) but returned it because of the bad battery life and laggy browsing (tried lots of 3rd party browsers too) and ui fps drops, overheating and screen flex.

I had a hd2 and had managed to get pretty good battery life on it as well.
I find a lot of little things add up.
I let very few apps sync.
I have black or dark backgrounds wherever possible.
I don't use haptic feedback.
I only use gsm unless I'm actually doing something that requires more speed but I do have data always on.
I switch WiFi and GPS off when not in use.
I use auto brightness.
I use betterbatterystats and battery monitor pro to keep an eye on things.
I avoid battery savings apps like the plague as they invariably increase battery drain.
Hope some of these help.
Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk 2

jonathanyong said:
No noticeable fps drops when swiping through the home screens no. I only have widgets on 4 pages though so will try adding more and see if that makes a difference.
I also owned a hox (tegra3) but returned it because of the bad battery life and laggy browsing (tried lots of 3rd party browsers too) and ui fps drops, overheating and screen flex.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's funny, I have a tegra 3 One X and I have none of the problem you had, or, at least:
- first one x rom was quite laggy, now it's much better, on par with s3, but always with some microlag
- no overheat but when playing heavy games like shadowgun, while s3 gets really hot even when just surfing
- very decent battery life, better than s3
- no screen flex
- no laggy browser until flash player is on demand
Oh well, maybe my One X is an S3 and the S3 is a One X!?!?
Joking apart, you can notice microlag when you scroll very fast through homes both on One X and on S3. I have 5 pages and widget on every page on both phones.

corrsea said:
I had a hd2 and had managed to get pretty good battery life on it as well.
I find a lot of little things add up.
I let very few apps sync.
I have black or dark backgrounds wherever possible.
I don't use haptic feedback.
I only use gsm unless I'm actually doing something that requires more speed but I do have data always on.
I switch WiFi and GPS off when not in use.
I use auto brightness.
I use betterbatterystats and battery monitor pro to keep an eye on things.
I avoid battery savings apps like the plague as they invariably increase battery drain.
Hope some of these help.
Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk 2
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have several app syncing (4 gmail account, 1 yahoo account and 1 exchange account, everyone along with its calendar part), twitter every 30 min, beautiful widget weather every 1h. GPS always on, 3g data always on. Auto brightness on all the time.
I see, using gsm only, no gps and few apps syncing really extend battery life, but I want to be able to fully use my phone. Moreover, both One X and S3 have the same apps, the same account synced and almost the same widgets (sense one apart), but One X last longer!

jonathanyong said:
Also, touchwiz launcher seems to need to reload when RAM gets used up.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
For those who are rooted, just go to /system/build.prop and change the dalvik size from 256m to 128m
Seems that it helps to solve this issue...

Aratheba said:
Joking apart, you can notice microlag when you scroll very fast through homes both on One X and on S3. I have 5 pages and widget on every page on both phones.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have widgets on all 5 pages and absolutely no at all (scroll it fast or slow or go superfast, no lag whatsoever!)

123shree said:
I have widgets on all 5 pages and absolutely no at all (scroll it fast or slow or go superfast, no lag whatsoever!)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Do you only have 5 pages? Why have I got 7?
Anyway I placed widgets on all 7 pages and swiped really fast and have no lag or fps drops whatsoever. Maybe a particular widget is causing the problem?

I found using the live wallpapers caused my home screen to reload and caused lag. Since changing to a static wallpaper everything has been nice and quick with no re-drawing

Sorry, double post!

Oli2k said:
I found using the live wallpapers caused my home screen to reload and caused lag. Since changing to a static wallpaper everything has been nice and quick with no re-drawing
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Of course, I've already tried everything I could in order to lessen the lag: I'm using a static wallpaper, but micro lag is there. Maybe it's ust a matter of defying what microlag is: if I do scroll fast through home pages I have some microlag, I can see the animation is not completely fluid.
I have the following widgets: beautiful widget clock 4x1 (but I tried even with samsung standard plain digital clock), google search widget, music widget, stock ics calendar widget, plume (but I even tried with the static official twitter widget), photo gallery widget, weather pro widget.

Aratheba said:
Of course, I've already tried everything I could in order to lessen the lag: I'm using a static wallpaper, but micro lag is there. Maybe it's ust a matter of defying what microlag is: if I do scroll fast through home pages I have some microlag, I can see the animation is not completely fluid.
I have the following widgets: beautiful widget clock 4x1 (but I tried even with samsung standard plain digital clock), google search widget, music widget, stock ics calendar widget, plume (but I even tried with the static official twitter widget), photo gallery widget, weather pro widget.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Personally worked for me so I thought I'd see if it helped

Aratheba said:
That's funny, I have a tegra 3 One X and I have none of the problem you had, or, at least:
- first one x rom was quite laggy, now it's much better, on par with s3, but always with some microlag
- no overheat but when playing heavy games like shadowgun, while s3 gets really hot even when just surfing
- very decent battery life, better than s3
- no screen flex
- no laggy browser until flash player is on demand
Oh well, maybe my One X is an S3 and the S3 is a One X!?!?
Joking apart, you can notice microlag when you scroll very fast through homes both on One X and on S3. I have 5 pages and widget on every page on both phones.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
My phone is stone cold while surfing
Sent from my GT-I9300 using xda premium

One more thing: using SpyCPU I saw that sgs3 it's for 70% of its total standby time in deep sleep, while one x it's for 80%. Moreover, one x has more states with low CPU freq (100mhz, 70, 50) while sgs3 has 400mhz as lower freq used state, 300 and 200 are unused. :/
I guess that the Tegra companion core going so low in frequencies...

Related

[Q] Screen on battery life

Just curious as to what other folks are getting for actual screen on battery time, as in, what do you think you would get in constant screen on usage?
I don't suffer from really bad battery drain, I think I could get a couple of days of light use from it.... but it does fair chomp the battery in use.
I reckon I could completely drain the battery in 3 - 4 hours of constant use of say web browsing, the odd game, texting etc, and am just wondering how that measures up with others; with talk of this device having iphone 4 levels of battery life, my last daily driver was said iphone, and that device managed about 50% longer screen on time, so it doesn't quite match that, but some are saying theirs is better?
I don't have the brightness cranked or anything, and I'm not exactly unhappy, but it probably matches my Incredible S for battery life, and both phones are perhaps slightly better than the Nexus One or Desire, which I didn't think were amazing in that department...
tameracingdriver said:
Just curious as to what other folks are getting for actual screen on battery time, as in, what do you think you would get in constant screen on usage?
I don't suffer from really bad battery drain, I think I could get a couple of days of light use from it.... but it does fair chomp the battery in use.
I reckon I could completely drain the battery in 3 - 4 hours of constant use of say web browsing, the odd game, texting etc, and am just wondering how that measures up with others; with talk of this device having iphone 4 levels of battery life, my last daily driver was said iphone, and that device managed about 50% longer screen on time, so it doesn't quite match that, but some are saying theirs is better?
I don't have the brightness cranked or anything, and I'm not exactly unhappy, but it probably matches my Incredible S for battery life, and both phones are perhaps slightly better than the Nexus One or Desire, which I didn't think were amazing in that department...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Speaking of battery life while browsing,
http://blog.gsmarena.com/showdown-s...ng-battery-life-championship-not-so-brightly/
Keep in mind the screen is a great deal larger than the iphone 4.
3h of intranet browsing is max for me
Sent from my GT-I9100 using XDA Premium App
maybe an hour of max, 3 of lowest
Sent from my GT-I9100 using XDA App
I also got about 3-4 hours with brightness set to 20%. I originally wonder if it's my problem only, as most of you say the battery can easily last for more than 1 day.
In my case, most of the battery is used by the display, given I used each about 1.5 hour before and after work during travel (with display turned on). So 3 hours of display on + some phone call and sms, that will drain the whole battery for me within one day. I think I need to buy a 2nd battery when it is available in Hong Kong.
winst said:
I also got about 3-4 hours with brightness set to 20%. I originally wonder if it's my problem only, as most of you say the battery can easily last for more than 1 day.
In my case, most of the battery is used by the display, given I used each about 1.5 hour before and after work during travel (with display turned on). So 3 hours of display on + some phone call and sms, that will drain the whole battery for me within one day. I think I need to buy a 2nd battery when it is available in Hong Kong.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah same here. Display takes almost 50%. I have automatic brightness set on. I could of course set it to minimum brightness and it would decrese the battery consumption but I think it is ridiculous that I first buy a phone which is praised for its bright display and then I turn it to the darkest. Completely stupid. I tried that quickly and even my old Desire looked better then.
But then I read results like this:
http://blog.gsmarena.com/samsung-i9...minutes-of-video-playback-on-a-single-charge/
And I just keep wondering that wtf is wrong with my phone.
CandyAndy said:
But then I read results like this:
http://blog.gsmarena.com/samsung-i9...minutes-of-video-playback-on-a-single-charge/
And I just keep wondering that wtf is wrong with my phone.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Exactly. I want my phone can have this battery life too.
Same juice hungry Screen here. :-( I never use automatic brightness either. It's set to a really low brightness, byt it's still chewing away on the battery like there's no tomorrow.
Sent from my GT-I9100 using Tapatalk
To shorthand it for everyone, the SGS2 came in fourth out of four when using web scripts until the battery dies utilizing the stock browser. Results are:
Web browsing battery life test:
Apple iPhone 4 – 7:40 h
Sony Ericsson Xperia Arc – 5:25 h
Samsung I9100 Galaxy S II – 4:59 h (Opera Mobile browser)
LG Optimus Black – 4:30 h
Samsung I9100 Galaxy S II – 4:22 h (stock browser)
Samsung I9000 Galaxy S – 4:06 h
So since the SGS sucked more, I guess it's the Amoled screen doing them in. They should have used black web pages and the SGS2 would have won.
Actually, if you think about it, the SGS2 is pushing more pixels and has a dual-core processor with hardware acceleration to feed. So at least beating the SGS shows some progress.
Thanks for the comments guys. Good to know it's not just me. It'd be nice to get the same as the arc... So maybe there is room for improvement, but all those who say it can match the iphone are living in dreamland! Saying that, I'll still take the bigger screen, ta! However, certainly reviews like techradars are a little misleading imo.
Sent from my GT-I9100 using XDA App
tameracingdriver said:
...but all those who say it can match the iphone are living in dreamland!
Sent from my GT-I9100 using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It'll be interesting to see how the iPhone 5 performs with a bigger screen and dual core processors. At least we don't have to send our phones back to the mother ship to get the batteries replaced when they discharge for $150. Come to think of it, with a pocket full of extra batteries, we'd be able to go 24/7 with a couple of pit stops.
BarryH_GEG said:
Come to think of it, with a pocket full of extra batteries, we'd be able to go 24/7 with a couple of pit stops.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Luckily, the battery is so light that possibly having 1-2 extra batteries won't feel any weight inside the bag. If Samsung can release a "battery" direct charger (instead of charging through the phone itself), it will probably make my life easier.
Anyway, though the battery life is not as good as I originally expect, I still consider this phone as my best phone, EVER.
BarryH_GEG said:
To shorthand it for everyone, the SGS2 came in fourth out of four when using web scripts until the battery dies utilizing the stock browser. Results are:
Web browsing battery life test:
Apple iPhone 4 – 7:40 h
Sony Ericsson Xperia Arc – 5:25 h
Samsung I9100 Galaxy S II – 4:59 h (Opera Mobile browser)
LG Optimus Black – 4:30 h
Samsung I9100 Galaxy S II – 4:22 h (stock browser)
Samsung I9000 Galaxy S – 4:06 h
So since the SGS sucked more, I guess it's the Amoled screen doing them in. They should have used black web pages and the SGS2 would have won.
Actually, if you think about it, the SGS2 is pushing more pixels and has a dual-core processor with hardware acceleration to feed. So at least beating the SGS shows some progress.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
not really, the SGS2 has less pixels than the iphone 4 in that test, for example. and the iphone 4 also is hardware accelerated for browser and all UI elements, so its kinda a close match. smaller screen, but more pixels, but SGS2 has larger battery and AMOLED, so really its matched up.
Galaxy S2 Battery RESPONSE
Hey Guys,
I sold my iphone 4 to purchase the galaxy s2, never owned an Android phone before, I posted a post on the forum about rooting methods for the S2. Before I purchased the phone i did research on batter life and I read most users could do a full day or close to 2 days without charged. They said it had a better battery than the iphone 4 this was the decisive factor which lead me to buy the phone. To come to this post and read that the pone battery last only 4 hours for browsing this is childs play. I feel somewhat cheated and deceived.
Has anyone in the forum here achieved the 24 hour battery best while using the phone in full capacity ? How is this acceptable to you guys, 4 hours ? This is unacceptable.
Thanks
RedCell X
redcellx said:
Hey Guys,
I sold my iphone 4 to purchase the galaxy s2, never owned an Android phone before, I posted a post on the forum about rooting methods for the S2. Before I purchased the phone i did research on batter life and I read most users could do a full day or close to 2 days without charged. They said it had a better battery than the iphone 4 this was the decisive factor which lead me to buy the phone. To come to this post and read that the pone battery last only 4 hours for browsing this is childs play. I feel somewhat cheated and deceived.
Has anyone in the forum here achieved the 24 hour battery best while using the phone in full capacity ? How is this acceptable to you guys, 4 hours ? This is unacceptable.
Thanks
RedCell X
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes, I too read of the great battery life of this phone - but not on here - but on reviews from the likes of techradar etc. Very deceiving. That said, I can get through a typical day quite easily on a charge, but it's never going to take on the iphone on battery life no matter what they say.
That said, I think (hope) the situation will improve with more mature firmware.
It is a shame, but for me, its not a dealbreaker, especially as I am always near a power source.
Hello,
Yes I was deceived !!! I feel robbed and cheated. I simply don't know what to say.
RedCell X
tameracingdriver said:
Yes, I too read of the great battery life of this phone - but not on here - but on reviews from the likes of techradar etc. Very deceiving. That said, I can get through a typical day quite easily on a charge, but it's never going to take on the iphone on battery life no matter what they say.
That said, I think (hope) the situation will improve with more mature firmware.
It is a shame, but for me, its not a dealbreaker, especially as I am always near a power source.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
most iPhones do not truly multitask, so they do not waste power. it is also a walled garden, with fewer freedoms, and fewer possibilities to mess up admittedly highly tuned and optimized power management scheme. Remember it is one OS on one piece of hardware, with every component tested and tuned to near-perfection.
and yes, if you set your SGS2 browser at 100% brightness, auto-enable Flash (that will waste power on all those moving ads etc that you are not even looking at), turn on music in the background streaming it to your Bluetooth headphones, enable Gmail sync, Exchange sync, Facebook, GVoice, GTalk, Yahoo Mail, Yahoo Chat, AIM, Twitter, etc, and browse (read mostly black text on mostly white backgrounds) for 2-4 hours, your battery will drain.
redcellx said:
Hello,
Yes I was deceived !!! I feel robbed and cheated. I simply don't know what to say.
RedCell X
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You do not really have to say anything - just return it. Vote with your dollar (or pound, or rupee)
kreoXDA said:
You do not really have to say anything - just return it. Vote with your dollar (or pound, or rupee)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This is to KREOXDA,
Hello,
Can you or have you used the sgs2 for 24 hours or more of heavy useage? Can you provide testimony for those who feel limited to the 4 hours of browsing others experience. In respect to your prior post, using your sgs2 surfing with flash OFF, twitter OFF, exchange sync, OFF,Google Voice OFF, BlueTooth OFF, Can you get a full 24 hours usage out of the phone ?
CandyAndy said:
Yeah same here. Display takes almost 50%. I have automatic brightness set on. I could of course set it to minimum brightness and it would decrese the battery consumption but I think it is ridiculous that I first buy a phone which is praised for its bright display and then I turn it to the darkest. Completely stupid. I tried that quickly and even my old Desire looked better then.
But then I read results like this:
http://blog.gsmarena.com/samsung-i9...minutes-of-video-playback-on-a-single-charge/
And I just keep wondering that wtf is wrong with my phone.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think the difference may be in scrolling. It doesn't sound like the test included scrolling of web pages - just loading. And I suspect that the super smooth scrolling you get on the SII gives those dual cores a good workout.

SGS II Vs. myTouch 4G Slide?

I'm a T-Mobile US suscriber and after what feels like ages I'm finally due for a free upgrade on my myTouch 3G. The new offerings from T-Mo aren't really all that great. I already own a Sensation and I'm not terribly fond of it, not to say I don't like HTC phones, as I've been to hell and back with my G2 and myTouch 4G. The Samsung Galaxy S II and the myTouch 4G Slide are the two currently best available phones. Premium hardware on both. Keyboard isn't that much of an issue as I have phones with and without. Both have GB for now with plans for both to upgrade to ICS soon. What's the custom ROM development look like, though I don't think it will be too much of a concern on this phone, curious in particular about the SGS II because of the whole CIQ thing, I'm troubled to say the least by it. I want user opinions, feedback, or stories, preferably from people who've had the phone, or if there are any must see reviews those work too.
Sent From My GhostChilli G2 using XDA App
I own the SGS 2 which I moved to from the Nexus S. It's a great phone which surpassed my expectations - I was worried about the custom ROM having only owned "vanilla" nexus devices. The touchwiz ROM is actually quite nice and has some helpful features such as putting settings controls in the notification pull down menu. I did try a few other ROMs (villain) but found myself going back to stock.
The phone itself has a great screen and is really thin and light. The battery also lasts a solid day with quite a bit of use. I'd definitely recommend it.
mscwd said:
The battery also lasts a solid day with quite a bit of use.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Could you elaborate a bit more? I know I wont be stressing the phone anywhere near what I do to my G2 or MT4G, but I'd imagine that I'd be texting heavily, occasional game use (i.e. Uno, Angry Birds), occasional Facebook use, and possibly as a default media player on occasion. Slight OC at most for a snappy feel.
For Comparision: I pull about 16-19 hours out of my G2. My G2 is OC-ed to 1.5GHz On Demand, GO Launcher EX (7 screens, widgets on all 7), daily texting in excess of 500 messages, email checking, moderate Facebook checking, browsing XDA, as well as some media and gaming use (Gameboid)
MT4G: Sees about 5-7 hours of life. OC-ed to 1.8GHz On Demand. Heavy texting usage, heavy media usage, a lot of web searching, as well as moderate forum browsing on the ROMs I follow, dosn't get to sleep for awhile as I like to show off the phone a lot.
prztruspaz said:
Could you elaborate a bit more? I know I wont be stressing the phone anywhere near what I do to my G2 or MT4G, but I'd imagine that I'd be texting heavily, occasional game use (i.e. Uno, Angry Birds), occasional Facebook use, and possibly as a default media player on occasion. Slight OC at most for a snappy feel.
For Comparision: I pull about 16-19 hours out of my G2. My G2 is OC-ed to 1.5GHz On Demand, GO Launcher EX (7 screens, widgets on all 7), daily texting in excess of 500 messages, email checking, moderate Facebook checking, browsing XDA, as well as some media and gaming use (Gameboid)
MT4G: Sees about 5-7 hours of life. OC-ed to 1.8GHz On Demand. Heavy texting usage, heavy media usage, a lot of web searching, as well as moderate forum browsing on the ROMs I follow, dosn't get to sleep for awhile as I like to show off the phone a lot.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
My normal usage pattern consists of playing games for probably 45mins-1hour a day (admittedly these are not processor intensive games). I send about 10 texts a day and maybe talk for 10-15 minutes which is not much. Most of the use is web browsing and news reader apps. I have long commutes so I probably end up browsing for a few hours each day. If you add all that up it does amount to quite a bit of use. By the days end I have about 15% battery left, once it falls below 10% though it seems to fade fast. Charging seems really quick too if you connect it to the mains (not usb).

Xperia S First Impressions From An Arc S User

Greetings. I've had an arc S since late last year and have been very active over in the arc forum. My lovely wife just switched contracts and got herself an Xperia S which she has kindly swapped for my arc S.
Here are my first impressions of the S after 5 days of use. Note that I do not plan to unlock the bootloader just yet so am living without root access (the GB -> ICS method looks too problematic to me so I'll live with this).
The first thing I did was update to ICS using Flashtool. I have since flashed the latest 6.1.A.0.453 firmware that was posted here a few days ago.
My very first impression was "I need my arc S back!". But I have warmed to this device after some use.
LIKES
The screen.
The speed. It leaves my arc S behind.
The Walkman app is fantastic. Coupled with the equalizer and sound enhancements it's by far the best music player I've used on Android.
The glowing strip. Very, very cool.
Lockscreen notifications.
Much better camera button than the arc. And opening the camera with the phone locked is very, very useful.
The unlock button is easy to press, unlike on the arc.
The widgets are very good - weather, toggles, Timescape, Top Contacts, etc.
I love the improved Contacts, Messaging and Dialler apps.
DISLIKES
The battery life is absolutely awful. If I don't touch the phone then I might get 12 hours. Usually I'm looking at 8 hours.
The soft buttons are terrible. I often have to tap them 2 or 3 times. Also, if I drag the notification bar down then I nearly always hit the Home button when trying to drag the bar back up.
The little flap on the USB port is a very bad idea. It won't last.
The Power Saver app is useless. The widget doesn't show the correct battery percentage and the option to turn it on when the battery level reaches a preset level just doesn't work! How did this get through QA? It's a great idea too and this phone needs it because of the shocking battery life.
Swype doesn't work in the Google Search app. Eh?
Where is the "classic" Timescape widget? Why was this omitted? I liked it! Why do companies have to make decisions like this without thinking about their users? Grrrr.
Long-pressing the home screen produces some crappy menu at the top - why?
The Widget Picker app takes a while to appear.
So a mixed bag. I learnt long ago that there is no such thing as the perfect smartphone - it's always a question of compromise. I like this phone, I like the design, I like the 1GB of RAM, the 32GB of storage is ample for me and I don't really mind the battery can't be removed. But the battery life is a killer and I can't see myself keeping this phone for long unless it's addressed.
As far as the capacitive buttons go, you kind of develop a new techniques which includes a small upwards slide.
Hitting home when you wish to slide notification bar up was a pain here too, but I haven't done it for a while now.
Battery is ok, I'll get from morning to night no problem. Tbh mine is no worse than my arc, and better than my wife's galaxy s2. My brother had a one x, terrible phone and battery life, he changed it for a galaxy s3,he says it's even worse lol
Rooting with locked bootloader was simple, just get the stuff you need ready and make sure you understand the instructions.
Went perfectly first time on both the phones I did.
Sent from my XperiaS via transwarp conduit.
I'd say battery life was twice as good on my arc S. I work in an area with a pretty crappy signal and this seems to cause the S real problems with battery drain. I regularly got over 30 hours out of my arc S (on ICS).
As this phone came with my wife's contract (even though it isn't network locked thankfully) I am not prepared to throw the warranty away by unlocking the bootloader. I'll happily root it once a better method appears but I'm not unlocking it ... yet.
If you don't like the battery life of ics then flash back to the latest GB Rom... My battery has been dire on ics and I got double the life on GB... And rooting is rather easy even without unlocking the bootloader
Not sure if it's all in my head but battery life seems too take a nose dive after flashing new firmware, it seems to settle back down after a few days. Also re-downloading apps/settings won't help.
Sent from my LT26i using Tapatalk 2
eazyrider said:
If you don't like the battery life of ics then flash back to the latest GB Rom... My battery has been dire on ics and I got double the life on GB... And rooting is rather easy even without unlocking the bootloader
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Will I lose the Walkman app if I go back to GB?
rec71 said:
Will I lose the Walkman app if I go back to GB?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes. But the only difference from the GB Music Player are the icon (GB icon is much better), and the fact it doesn't have the visualizer thingy.
8 hours? Damn you might want to get that replaced. I typically get about 2 and a half days.
Seriously no need to go back to GB... i get about a day and half of constant usage from mine, exchange emails going from work all day, it's an app or apps you have installed i'll bet, coupled with your heavy usage and with your phone trying to connect to 3g/2g every few mins that's probs causing the very low battery.
Set your mobile network preferred mode to wcdma only(or GSM only), remove any uneeded apps, apps with in app adds will always be updating the adds prior to opening the app, check your background running apps. Some apps are not properly optimized for ICS yet.
Constant Wifi scanning will have the same effect, switch off wifi when not in a wifi zone.
Agreed about the Power saving app it doesn't seem to auto kick in like it should, manually set this to on before you go to bed(I dont even use it).
Check the huge battery thread in the general section for more tips.
-smc
I dno what you're on about but the battery life with ics is so much better than GB, I recently updated to ics so I'm still adjusting into the battery usage, however yesterday I got roughly 6hr screen on time with 18-19hr total time on battery, as far as buttons go you'll settle in soon enough
Sent from my LT26i using xda premium
By far the biggest battery drain is the screen. I've lowered my brightness to 25% and it still uses approx. 20% for every hour the screen is on.
So when playing games, surfing, etc. the battery drains very quickly.
I'm sure I could get a couple of days out of the battery if I didn't actually use it!
It gets hot too - I just tried Temple Run Brave (awful game) and the phone got very hot very quickly.
I might give GB a go and see if it's any better. I'm certainly not alone in thinking the battery life is poor if this forum is anything to go by.
Hi.
Regarding to the soft buttons problem.
Take a try on this :
U do not use like arc s buttons. Use like a swipe. Use your finger and swipe from down to up direction on the place of the touch field. It will work!
I have had the same terrible unusability after Arc phone, but this method saves the Xps
Bye
Sent from my LT26i using xda app-developers app
Battery Life is ok. I've unlocked my Bootloader, rooted it with the Adv. Kernel.
After that i've charged my Battery to 100% and deleted with the "Battery Calibrator" from the Market the batterystats.bin. Now after the third charge it went up from 14h (100% to 5% Battery) to 17 h (100% to 6%) and now i've 17h 23mins (100% to 47%). Screen is attached from 5 Minutes back.
Battery Stats

Insanely Improved Battery Life Using Sense

I decided to give the standard Sense UI a go (even though the minor hickups and cube effect bug me) but I am astounded at how much more battery life I am getting.
I have used Nova Prime since I bought my DNA and got between 6 and 7 hours at the most.
Standard Sense (with root) and I am at 76% after 4 hours and 37 minutes.
Anyone else getting similar results?
I have been on Sense since I got this thing and have been incredibly impressed with the battery life. Hopefully this doesn't change if AOSP comes out.
I have also noticed the same thing. Also when I was using apex launcher it seemed like swiping between screens took just a little longer. I think that sense is just snappier.
Sent from my HTC6435LVW using xda premium
Have had the phone for two days now and have been impressed with the battery life. Based on all the negativity I was expecting a poor experience. I have been using it fairly heavily (initial set up, playing around with it, downloading all my apps, etc.), although not too much 3G/4G use.
battery life has been exceptional for myself. I'm comparing it to the galaxy nexus.
Sent from my HTC6435LVW using xda premium
I noticed the impressive battery life also, but I've been running ADW due to the familiarity of it and the customization. I'll have to give sense a shot for a few days and see if it gets even better! I noticed too, that non-sense launchers seem to run a lot slower. My Gnex is actually more responsive running ADW than my DNA. Only thing I can figure is that the sense we have was designed for the 1080 screen, and perhaps optimized to use the quad core proc better. Hopefully the other launchers will adapt to this in a timely manner.
#FirstWorldProblem - My screen has too many pixels
How to literally double your battery:
1) Add Facebook mobile site shortcut to home screen.
2) Disable built in fb app
On the Nexus/SIII I was one of the people who blindly said "FB just drains battery" but I decided to give it a shot. I shut all notifications and refresh and location off for the app from the getgo. I'm a student so I have similar usage patterns every day. With FB app installed I came out of school with somewhere around 45% left two days in a row. Today, with slightly less usage in the morning, only thing changed is no FB app and I had 83% left. Mind boggling difference. :/
Amphibliam said:
How to literally double your battery:
1) Add Facebook mobile site shortcut to home screen.
2) Disable built in fb app
On the Nexus/SIII I was one of the people who blindly said "FB just drains battery" but I decided to give it a shot. I shut all notifications and refresh and location off for the app from the getgo. I'm a student so I have similar usage patterns every day. With FB app installed I came out of school with somewhere around 45% left two days in a row. Today, with slightly less usage in the morning, only thing changed is no FB app and I had 83% left. Mind boggling difference. :/
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
you would think if that was the case, that FB would be number 1 on the apps list for battery usage. Maybe it just doesn't let the phone sleep properly.
CISGS said:
I decided to give the standard Sense UI a go (even though the minor hickups and cube effect bug me) but I am astounded at how much more battery life I am getting.
I have used Nova Prime since I bought my DNA and got between 6 and 7 hours at the most.
Standard Sense (with root) and I am at 76% after 4 hours and 37 minutes.
Anyone else getting similar results?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am rooted and am using Nova Prime. It has worked really well for me, and I find the battery life has been decent, especially after the first couple of days. I will say though that in the battery settings, under app usage, it shows Nova Launcher as the second highest app at 9%. Not sure if that is normal or not, but it does seem higher than I remember with my other phone.
I'm using Nova launcher and it's usually at like 2% on my battery usage list. My highest is "Kernel" with like 38%. I have no idea why Kernel is so high.
I also use Nova and will not go to sense because I like 6 rows of icons on the home screen. This phone is so long I hate wasting it. I'm getting 15 hours with 2-3 hours screen time with 15-20% battery
left the last 3 days. I can't ask for more. The battery is more than ample for me, and has exceeded my expectations.
Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk 2
trebb said:
I'm using Nova launcher and it's usually at like 2% on my battery usage list. My highest is "Kernel" with like 38%. I have no idea why Kernel is so high.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
38% does seem high. GSam shows around 15% for me. How long have you had the phone? Is it possible that it is still settling?
Thanks!
Amphibliam said:
How to literally double your battery:
1) Add Facebook mobile site shortcut to home screen.
2) Disable built in fb app
On the Nexus/SIII I was one of the people who blindly said "FB just drains battery" but I decided to give it a shot. I shut all notifications and refresh and location off for the app from the getgo. I'm a student so I have similar usage patterns every day. With FB app installed I came out of school with somewhere around 45% left two days in a row. Today, with slightly less usage in the morning, only thing changed is no FB app and I had 83% left. Mind boggling difference. :/
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I simply told the FB app not to automatically sync anything. I update manually if/when I want.
I noticed that Nova was 10-20% on the battery usage list as well for me.
I've also noticed the amazing battery life. At first I thought I might have been making a huge mistake by getting the DNA, but now I have no complaint whatsoever.
trebb said:
I'm using Nova launcher and it's usually at like 2% on my battery usage list. My highest is "Kernel" with like 38%. I have no idea why Kernel is so high.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Same. Been going for a week strong now and hasn't settled down.
Amphibliam said:
How to literally double your battery:
1) Add Facebook mobile site shortcut to home screen.
2) Disable built in fb app
On the Nexus/SIII I was one of the people who blindly said "FB just drains battery" but I decided to give it a shot. I shut all notifications and refresh and location off for the app from the getgo. I'm a student so I have similar usage patterns every day. With FB app installed I came out of school with somewhere around 45% left two days in a row. Today, with slightly less usage in the morning, only thing changed is no FB app and I had 83% left. Mind boggling difference. :/
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Wait, so you're saying that even though you always had all notifications and refresh off, the FB app still used up that much battery? I used to be one of those people too, and I always turn off everything from FB. My battery is doing quite well, but hey, constant improvement is always good right?
I've tried both nova and apex launchers on a previous phone and i found that nova is a battery hog. I was missing some of my options that i had set up on apex so i had to install it again, I'm enjoying plenty of battery life but i also only average 1-2 hours on screen on time.
also you can change animation speeds both in the dev option in ICS and in apex launcher settings
bwhite757 said:
I also use Nova and will not go to sense because I like 6 rows of icons on the home screen. This phone is so long I hate wasting it. I'm getting 15 hours with 2-3 hours screen time with 15-20% battery
left the last 3 days. I can't ask for more. The battery is more than ample for me, and has exceeded my expectations.
Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk 2
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm getting these exact same results.

Some thoughts on G3

Overall I like the phone, but I have a few gripes. Maybe some of you agree, and maybe some of you know some solutions.
Much better than the Xperia z3v I had at first. The Xperia had a few odd things about it that bugged me, and the lack of root was getting to me. That is what made me switch.
But it did have much better battery life... I would have 50 to 60 percent battery when I returned home, the G3 will be below 20 percent most days.
The keyboard has a one handed mode, but its prediction and correction are not good. I somehow miss the space key and get run on words all the time, it's been a little frustrating. I know of no third party apps that have a one hand mode though.
The auto brightness is better than the Xperia but still not as good as it can be, it requires too much attention. It limits it's range and trays to be adjustable but it doesn't work well.
Its size has put it over my comfortable one handed use size. The one handed mode helps a bit though. Can't really do much about that. It seems to be the trend.
Its close to being a great phone but held back a bit. Maybe there are solutions to most of my woes.
Marine6680 said:
Overall I like the phone, but I have a few gripes. Maybe some of you agree, and maybe some of you know some solutions.
Much better than the Xperia z3v I had at first. The Xperia had a few odd things about it that bugged me, and the lack of root was getting to me. That is what made me switch.
But it did have much better battery life... I would have 50 to 60 percent battery when I returned home, the G3 will be below 20 percent most days.
The keyboard has a one handed mode, but its prediction and correction are not good. I somehow miss the space key and get run on words all the time, it's been a little frustrating. I know of no third party apps that have a one hand mode though.
The auto brightness is better than the Xperia but still not as good as it can be, it requires too much attention. It limits it's range and trays to be adjustable but it doesn't work well.
Its size has put it over my comfortable one handed use size. The one handed mode helps a bit though. Can't really do much about that. It seems to be the trend.
Its close to being a great phone but held back a bit. Maybe there are solutions to most of my woes.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Battery life for me is great. You might want to get Wakelock detector and see what is causing this. I can get 36 hours and still have 40% left. Also, it just depends on what you are doing with it. I send/receive text messages, make phone calls, surf the web, read news, etc. Usually, I have it charged before I go to bed and when I wake up 7 hours later, it's still at 100%. I leave it on all night as I use the phone as my alarm clock.
Now, I am rooted and I use Greenify to help hibernate a lot of apps. However, you don't have to be rooted to Greenify now. I don't hibernate any system apps and I don't sync a lot of unnecessary stuff either. I also have the Snapdragon Battery Guru app installed which works well. However, I will say, for a few days, I didn't root this phone, didn't use Greenify and used only the Snapdragon Battery Guru and I was still getting well over 24 hours of battery life.
I use Swiftkey and it has a one-handed/compact layout. It seems to be doing fine for me, but I don't use one-handed mode.
I feel you. Whenever I do any type of graphics intensive gaming (i.e. Real Racing 3) during the day, battery drain is crazy. When I don't use it as much, Ive had the phone go for two days. The phone seems to have great conservation when the screen is off, but that massive high-res screen has got to have something to do with battery drain. It's not the most convenient, but personally, I've found the best solution to be a quick mid-day charge. Phonearena did a charge comparison between phones, and the G3 is one of the fastest charging phones on the market right now. 2 hours for a full charge. Like I said, it's not the greatest thing to have to plug in your phone during the day, but I've found that even a solid half an hour charge makes a huge difference.
guitrsol93 said:
I feel you. Whenever I do any type of graphics intensive gaming (i.e. Real Racing 3) during the day, battery drain is crazy. When I don't use it as much, Ive had the phone go for two days. The phone seems to have great conservation when the screen is off, but that massive high-res screen has got to have something to do with battery drain. It's not the most convenient, but personally, I've found the best solution to be a quick mid-day charge. Phonearena did a charge comparison between phones, and the G3 is one of the fastest charging phones on the market right now. 2 hours for a full charge. Like I said, it's not the greatest thing to have to plug in your phone during the day, but I've found that even a solid half an hour charge makes a huge difference.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well, yeah. Games are going to drain it no matter what and it depends on how long you play. I've noticed even with Game of War, an hour of gaming will drain it maybe 8% or more. Just depends on what you do with it.
Any phone is going to drain like crazy, but yes, the Quad HD display definitely drains the battery more due to the higher number of pixels. But, for those with every day normal use (not gaming), this phone definitely lasts more than a day.
Whenever I play a game, if I'm at home, I plug it in if I know I'm playing for a long period of time. otherwise, if I'm away from home, I know I can still play over an hour of a game and still have plenty of juice to last me the rest of the day.
I would rather have better battery than the added resolution screen. 1080p is very good for a phone.
I watch youtube and mess around online a bit on breaks. Same behavior as the z3v and dramatic difference in battery life.
I never found one handed mode in SwiftKey.
Nvm... Found it
The screen is the biggest user of battery... 60% according to the battery use chart.
These past few devices I have had... Has lead me to a conclusion.
All this undervolting and CPU throttling is pretty much useless.
The processor in this device and my last few, has had very little load on it for the most part. Some games may push the system, but general use and some youtube barely has the device going more than a couple steps above minimum clock speed.
Background services and sync... Small effects overall on battery.
It's all about that screen and it's power efficiency. Resolution has something to do with it as well. As the GPU must run harder on higher resolutions.
Turn down the brightness... And then I can't see the video I am watching.
An android phone with a current SoC, a 3000mah battery, a 4.7-5 inch screen, and 1080p resolution... Should be able to get well over 10 hours of screen on time, running video...
The radios are power hungry as well, but mostly in prolonged use like video streaming.
This size and resolution war has prevented us from gaining what we want most... Great battery life.
Still the phone ain't too bad.
Marine6680 said:
These past few devices I have had... Has lead me to a conclusion.
All this undervolting and CPU throttling is pretty much useless.
The processor in this device and my last few, has had very little load on it for the most part. Some games may push the system, but general use and some youtube barely has the device going more than a couple steps above minimum clock speed.
Background services and sync... Small effects overall on battery.
It's all about that screen and it's power efficiency. Resolution has something to do with it as well. As the GPU must run harder on higher resolutions.
Turn down the brightness... And then I can't see the video I am watching.
An android phone with a current SoC, a 3000mah battery, a 4.7-5 inch screen, and 1080p resolution... Should be able to get well over 10 hours of screen on time, running video...
The radios are power hungry as well, but mostly in prolonged use like video streaming.
This size and resolution war has prevented us from gaining what we want most... Great battery life.
Still the phone ain't too bad.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
True with that. This isn't an 1080p resolution screen. It's more since it's a QuadHD, so that is definitely what kills it. But, I don't watch videos for 10 hours! LOL. But, I know what you're driving at.

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