[Q] Good battery in Manhattan, Bad Battery in Queens - EVO 4G Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

I have been getting excellent battery life with my EVO running Baked Snack 1.7 and Netarchy's kernel. Typically I'll end the day with ~70% battery left.
Last tuesday however, I went out to the US Open in Flushing, and it was drain city. When I got home, I had ~20% battery left. Keep in mind, I had full or mostly full bars the whole time, so I don't know that it was really a signal problem.
Weds-thursday, my battery was fine as I stayed here on Manhattan and was back to getting my ~30% total drain in a day.
Last night I went back out to Flushing again for a Mets game, and came home with ~18% battery left.
WTF? Is there something wrong with my EVO? I had heard a rumor about these phones having trouble connecting to Motorola towers or something like that, but not sure if it's true. Is there anything I can do to fix this?

Stay in manhattan.
Sent from my PC36100 using XDA App

is 4g enabled while in flushing and not in manhattan?

If in Manhattan, your phone is connected to WiFi access points, it will favor that connection over 3G and its time syncing data using that lower power radio. When you are not around a WiFi point (maybe when you are in Queens), your phone is forced into 3G.
One thing that will help in general, is to make sure the following is set:
Settings / Wireless / Mobile Networks / (uncheck always-on)

Thanks - much appreciated. Unfortunately, I had wifi off, and 4G off as well, so I don't think it was related. I typically keep wifi off when not at home and don't see that much of a drain.
It happened again today when I was visiting a friend in Dumbo. It seems like the phone is constantly searching for towers, even though it has a connection. I don't know.

Related

Horrible Battery Life When I'm Not Even Using My Phone??

Well everynight before I go to sleep I charge my phone fully and unplug it before I sleep
Usually I would only lose about 1 % or 2% overnight
But this week I would lose over 60% over night! Its outragous!
I looked at what was killing my battery and "Cell Standby" and "Phone idle" were both over 45 - 49% !!
Anyway I can fix this problem??
Thank You
Sent from my HTC Vision using XDA App
There may be some random issue with your nearby cell tower, causing the signal to be weaker than normal (particularly 3G). This might cause your phone to be constantly looking for the tower, and killing the battery. I've noticed this to happen at my house, although the difference in battery usage is not as severe as what you describe.
If you haven't changed anything on your phone, I would just leave it be for a few days and see if improve on their own.
redpoint73 said:
There may be some random issue with your nearby cell tower, causing the signal to be weaker than normal (particularly 3G). This might cause your phone to be constantly looking for the tower, and killing the battery. I've noticed this to happen at my house, although the difference in battery usage is not as severe as what you describe.
If you haven't changed anything on your phone, I would just leave it be for a few days and see if improve on their own.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I Havent changed anything at all
ok but if things dont get better ill have to flash a new radio to fix it
Okay well my phone's battery is still pretty bad so
Does anybody know what Radio is known to save battery?
XxFerociouS said:
Okay well my phone's battery is still pretty bad so
Does anybody know what Radio is known to save battery?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
As redpoint73 said .its probably because of weak 3g signals ,set your phone to "2g only"
overnight and see if it make any different. i dont think different radio will help ,different kernel might do .
bahmanxda said:
As redpoint73 said .its probably because of weak 3g signals ,set your phone to "2g only"
overnight and see if it make any different. i dont think different radio will help ,different kernel might do .
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
My phone has always been on 2G and it still kills my battery pretty quick
I have everything turned off at night and still battery dies very quick
Sent from my HTC Vision using XDA App
Your not alone ferocious. I have the same issue its driving me nuts. Mine's skyrockets to damn near 50 percent. I'm living in california. But running sense seems to fix it for some reason.
Shaquiel Harris said:
Your not alone ferocious. I have the same issue its driving me nuts. Mine's skyrockets to damn near 50 percent. I'm living in california. But running sense seems to fix it for some reason.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah its really killing my battery overnight!
Im Also in California
as of right now here is what is killing my battery
Cell Standby- 47%
Phone Idle- 44%
Voice Calls- 8%
Display 3%
Im Running GingerVillain 1.5 with Stock Radio
Its overclocked to 1.2ghz and has profiles with SetCPU
Wifi Only on When im using the phone
gps is off
Screen brightness is very low
only using 2G
this is very frustrating
Turn off data completely and see if it still drains. If that stops the drain, change your radio.
Remember you must be radio s-off to do that. Root with gfree (you'll need the cm 6.1.0 kernel or stock).
XxFerociouS said:
Okay well my phone's battery is still pretty bad so
Does anybody know what Radio is known to save battery?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
There's no good answer to that. What radio is the "best" varies by geographic location. The best way to find out is by trial and error, although the newest radio tends to be the best place to start. Some people seem to be having some decent luck with the latest AUS radio. But like I said, its all just trial and error. I remember on my last phone (Touch Pro 2) people sometimes reported better battery life and reception by flashing older radios.
EDIT: I just noticed this thread: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=990860
Some people claim EXCESSIVE battery drain using the newest AUS radio, while others do not. So it still goes back to my statement that trial and error is your best bet.
funkeee said:
Turn off data completely and see if it still drains. If that stops the drain, change your radio.
Remember you must be radio s-off to do that. Root with gfree (you'll need the cm 6.1.0 kernel or stock).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Okay I just turned off all my data and I will report back with the results
I'm already rooted
Sent from my HTC Vision using XDA App
XxFerociouS said:
Yeah its really killing my battery overnight!
Im Also in California
as of right now here is what is killing my battery
Cell Standby- 47%
Phone Idle- 44%
Voice Calls- 8%
Display 3%
Im Running GingerVillain 1.5 with Stock Radio
Its overclocked to 1.2ghz and has profiles with SetCPU
Wifi Only on When im using the phone
gps is off
Screen brightness is very low
only using 2G
this is very frustrating
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Im running on GingerVillain 1.5 with stock radio as well
I don't use the profiles on setcpu, they're confusing and annoying. I don't even keep it overclocked much, only when I use my phone alot. When my phone is idle I set it back down to 806, sometimes even 700.
Wifi is on all the time when I am at home
GPS = on for me (at home)
screen brightness is like 40%
I keep 4g on all the time as well
At night, I keep my phone unplugged at 100% than the next day its at 99%
Ill use it for maybe 20 minutes and its at 90%. After about an hour and a half it goes to like 75% than ill put it back on standby for maybe an hour than its at like 73%
To sum it up, if its in standby, its fine
If im using it from 100% to 0% it lasts a good 3-5 hours depending on if im streaming vids, listening to music, and browsing the internet.
Im testing the waters with different settings and roms as of now..
GingerVillain is my favorite so far.
melodicjunkie said:
Im running on GingerVillain 1.5 with stock radio as well
I don't use the profiles on setcpu, they're confusing and annoying. I don't even keep it overclocked much, only when I use my phone alot. When my phone is idle I set it back down to 806, sometimes even 700.
Wifi is on all the time when I am at home
GPS = on for me (at home)
screen brightness is like 40%
I keep 4g on all the time as well
At night, I keep my phone unplugged at 100% than the next day its at 99%
Ill use it for maybe 20 minutes and its at 90%. After about an hour and a half it goes to like 75% than ill put it back on standby for maybe an hour than its at like 73%
To sum it up, if its in standby, its fine
If im using it from 100% to 0% it lasts a good 3-5 hours depending on if im streaming vids, listening to music, and browsing the internet.
Im testing the waters with different settings and roms as of now..
GingerVillain is my favorite so far.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah gingervillain is also my favorite rom
I have no idea why when my phone is on standby the battery dies pretty quick
It has pretty good life when I use it but when I don't the battery seems to die pretty quick
And my phone tells me that cell standby is always using aroun 40% of my battery and I just can't find a way to lower it
Sent from my HTC Vision using XDA App
funkeee said:
Turn off data completely and see if it still drains. If that stops the drain, change your radio.
Remember you must be radio s-off to do that. Root with gfree (you'll need the cm 6.1.0 kernel or stock).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Okay I turned off all data but it didn't seem to do anything at all to my phone
Sent from my HTC Vision using XDA App

[Q] Which way will I save more battery?

Hello peeps, so I always have 3g on 24/7. I don't like turning it off lol.. My question is, will I save more battery with 4g on 24/7 or with 3g on? from what I can see 4g always goes to sleep. Is this true sleep? Judging by this I was assuming 4gwill save more battery. What do you guys think?
4g is treated like wifi, it hs a sleep policy, but once asleep 3g kicks in if I'm not mistaken, either way 4g is a batt. Killer even if you have good signal, leave it off unless needed. If you are at home and have wifi, set wifi to never sleep, I've seen the best results from this.
I dont see the 3g logo tho when 4g is asleep.. i get all 3 bars in my house lol
y2bangali said:
I dont see the 3g logo tho when 4g is asleep.. i get all 3 bars in my house lol
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I may be wrong about it switching back to 3g, but this is what happens when using wifi set to sleep after 15 minutes or when screen off option in froyo. So maybe not for 4g. I still say leave it off, but do some testing and let us know.
Leave it on if your in a 4g area! Only turn it off when its continuously disconnecting and reconnecting as that is what kills the juice. Better to have a second of 4g usage for an autosync then to have 3g dial up for ten. Just my observations, of course. However, wifi beats both in terms of battery saving so try to use that if you have it at home.
Cd's or tapes?
have a black background... works much better for me
4g will be less stressful with your data syncing/apps updating on your batt's life. As long as you're good with 4g, you'll be fine.
SchizioPunk's Epic Experience 2.1 Eclair -> Odin to EC05 Froyo. Rooted. Bloatware Removed. Voodoo Sound V9 Module Loaded. TouchWiz4. Enjoying my Customized Stock Experience.

Improving Battery Life & Signal on the Verizon GNex

Hello everyone.
So I bought this phone this past Friday and been having a blast with it. I bought the 2100mah verizon/samsung extended battery yesterday to have a bit better battery life with it. I have patience with battery life, so I'm ready to try anything.
Here's part 1 of my post (radio): So I'm on 4.0.4. I have the radio that comes with it. I noticed I can only get 1-2 bars (rarely 3) of signal at times. I read that the best way to post about this is in dBm so here are mines: -100 to -120 80% of the time. This is on 3g/4g/wifi. And it's rarely on 4g, it is always jumping to 3g. My mom has a thunderbolt and to test, I saw the thunderbolt had better dBm and always had a 4g signal, 3-4 bars constant, rarely 3g. I'm in Miami, Florida if it matters, which is a strong 4g area. When it's on 3g it gets very good signal, 3-4 bars and -80 dBm. Though sometimes I noticed my wi-fi gets 4 bars for like 10 minutes and returns back to 2 bars.
Anything I can do as far as the Radio, some people have fixed it with a new sim card but before I go get one (are they free?) let's see what I can try? Perphaps a new radio?
Part 2: Alright now as for the battery life. Here are my phone "stats": (screenshots are posted at the bottom of post for battery)
-4.0.4 Stock ROM nothing changed, just an unlocked bootloader.
-WiFi on when at home, off when using 3g/4g.
-NFC On.
-No syncing, everything updates when I open app (twitter, weather)
-Gmail is set to push, atleast I think so. It notifies me of a new email every time.
-48% Screen Brightness
-Signed OFF from Google+
That's it I believe, if anything else is needed let me know.
I have the XDA version of BetteryBatteryStats, so I guess I have the tool to fix it just need to pinpoint what the problem is. I'm draining at 2%-3% per hour with wi-fi, and no usage, just idle. Again this is with 4.0.4 update. I'm seeing people's battery life becoming awesome with some tweaking, so would like assistance on that.
Here are my screenshots:
Day 1 with ext battery on 4.0.4:
Day 2 with ext battery on 4.0.4:
Have you confirmed that you have the new radios installed?
I515.09 V.FA02 / I515.FA02 (or could show as I515.10 V.FA02 / I515.FA02)
You probably did that, but just wanted to be sure.
I have: I515.09 V.FA02 / I5I5.FA02
I appreciate the help!
How far off are you on strength from the T-Bolt? I think it's the 4.0.4 radios and I'll get into why I think that. Note that the following isn't scientific and I haven't really tested it, so don't spread this like it's fact. I live in a really strong 4G area, so in general I haven't noticed a difference with any of the various modems (I've tried them all). I will say that I worked for a week once in an area with poor Verizon coverage, and I noticed that the 4.0.2 radios worked better for me than the 4.0.3. Like, no coverage with 4.0.3 after upgrading to it, so I whipped my laptop out and pushed the 4.0.2 radios and got from zero bars w/ coverage to 1 bar. I don't know how the 4.0.2 radios compare to 4.0.4, but you might give that a whirl.
In general, I think that radio hype is just that, hype, and there's a reason why a slew of radios never make the final cut, but with Verizon trying to patch 3G/4G connectivity, I do think it's worth trying some other radio's out to see what they do in your area.
I hesitate to say the following because I have NOT paid that much attention or done significant testing on our radios, which is something I've done with previous devices. So do NOT take this as gospel, rather with a healthy dose of salt.
In my limited observation with 4.0.4, at least in my neighborhood/area of Birmingham (I have an LTE tower practically in my back yard), the 4.0.4 radios ARE weaker. With 4.0.2 radios for example, I want to say I got -70dBm on CDMA/1X in the house and usually -72dBm to -75dBm on LTE in the house. Right now, typing this thread on 4.0.4 with the phone showing 5 bars, I just checked my strength on LTE and it was registering -94dBm here at the house when I rolled onto CDMA, it showed -75dBm. When I rolled back onto LTE, it showed -75dBm (displaying 5 bars the entire time) then went to -87dBm a few minutes later. This is with the phone sitting on it's normal spot on my desk.
Random, first thoughts with 4.0.4:
1) We know that Verizon requested "updated" display bars for 4.0.4
2) There could be an issue in 4.0.4 with dBm updating/display. I haven't been at the house all day, I have roamed around, but I doubt very seriously that my real signal strength on LTE was really -94dBm here at home. When I say I have an LTE tower in my backyard, I'm literally talking about 1/4 of a mile away, on top of a hill.
3) 4.0.4 is not always registering/reading signal strength correctly, which is causing devices in a weak area to fall off of 4G and onto 3G when the issue isn't really with the tower, physical hardware, or the modem package, but on the way 4.0.4 is interpreting the signal information it's pulling in (based SOLELY on watching the signal range I just observed on LTE). That said, it easily could just be the tower this afternoon. AGAIN, take it all with a grain of salt.
I recommend trying the 4.0.2 radios, at a minimum. I would list them, but I don't know our radios off the top of my head yet (too much Vibrant info is still in my brain). Search for them, they're easy to find. BE SURE to push the CDMA/LTE radios paired together. Like, the 4.0.2 radios together, 4.0.3 radios together. Do NOT mix and match.
Generally speaking for people in good LTE areas, I think the 4.0.4 radio package is GREAT. I've noticed zero slow down. Yeah, -87dBm (which is what I normally see here at the house) IS "weak" and it SUCKS to have wrong bars displayed but I haven't noticed any slow down on the network. I think slightly scaling down LTE strength is what has helped improve battery life. CDMA radio strength does not appear to have been affected, which is what you're gonna be on in rural areas anyway so unless you're on the fringe of LTE signal like the OP, I don't think this radio package is anything to complain or be worried about.
---------- Post added at 03:17 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:06 PM ----------
Also, in my experience as someone that travels all over for work, the only time that "weak" signal drains battery is when you're on the fringe of no connection and the OS is boosting power to the cell antenna's. On the old/real signal indicator, this was when you had a connection to Verizon with 0 bars and it was boosting you to 1 bar. I'm not comfortable stating a -dBm range because I can't remember what I observed and I didn't write it down. If you already have 1 or 2 bars (again, on the "old" signal indicator) you really don't see a boost given to the radios. By "boost", I mean you can click on the battery graph and see where signal strength went up and battery consumption did too, while your phone sat in the same place. I have a screen shot of this that I will try to find, and update this post with.
Looking at your screen shots, I don't see that affect. In general terms, your battery life looks "fine" "normal", whatever we want to call it. Bear in mind that our LTE GNex's don't get the same life as our GSM counterparts.
Edit:
Found the screen shot I was talking about. This was on stock 4.0.2 in my hotel room one night in a rural area. The night before I had data/sync on and noticed that when I woke up my battery was about dead. I knew it was due to signal strength since I was used to losing about 8% over night. So the following night I turned off data/sync and let it run over night, not wasting the opportunity to watch what would happen to battery life with and extra boost to the radio to get improved signal strength along with removing app/data activity from the battery consumption mix by keeping data/sync off. If I remember correctly, I went to bed @ 100% and woke up 7 hours 44 minutes later with something like 72% battery. Not only did the phone boost the power to the cellular antenna, but this activity also kept the phone from sleeping properly. I'm GLAD smart phone's can do this, but at a minimum, it turned a roughly 8% battery drain over X period of time into a 28% battery drain.
I hope my info/experiences haven't confused things further for you.
CDMA Input
So what have others found about CDMA battery life?? Mine is poor no matter what ROM or Kernel I seem to try to run. I also have attempted under voltages in SetCPU to see if that helps. Any feedback is greatly appreciated. Peace.
photolarry said:
So what have others found about CDMA battery life?? Mine is poor no matter what ROM or Kernel I seem to try to run. I also have attempted under voltages in SetCPU to see if that helps. Any feedback is greatly appreciated. Peace.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You need to define "poor". Everyone's use is different as are their apps. If you truly have poor battery life no matter what, look at the three things that are always probably the same. 1) Your physical battery. Is it defective? 2) The apps you use. Perhaps you have an app that is acting up and syncing like crazy or wasting CPU cycles. 3) The area you live in. Do you have poor signal strength?
The biggest drain on your battery is ALWAYS going to be your screen, and data/sync. In my personal use, my biggest drain is: Screen Brightness 100%, Netflix running, Audio 100% through the speaker. This equals about 30% per hour with the Verizon Extended Battery depending on what all else syncs in the background...with a live wallpaper.
Undervolting is a misleading thing. People will disagree with me, but when you look at power consumption tables, undervolting does very little. When our phones display battery % remaining, it's not based on the actual juice left in the battery. It's a calculation based on charts that the phone manufacturer (probably Google in our case) took from the hardware manufacturer and put into play that basically says that at this Processor Speed (X), this Level of Power Consumption Occurred (Y). It happened for this Amount of Time (Z) and then it compiles that data and solves for an amount of power used giving us a percentage of remaining battery life. In general, this is VERY accurate. However, there are no values programed in to account for undervolting...or OVER clocking for that matter. For example, if you're overclocked to 1350MHz, then Android is going to use the values for 1200MHz. If you put a timer on your battery life, you'll see a longer run if you run your phone until it shuts itself off. But it's not THAT big of a difference. All the while when your watching how quickly your battery bar drops with your use, you can't see a a measurable difference.
In my experience with undervolting, doing so got me maybe an extra 5% boost in battery life. I can't equate that to a time because again, usage is different. In general, a 5% swing in a charge cycle can be easily accounted for by other things. Does your processor use more juice @ 1200MHz with normal volting compared to 1200MHz undervolted? Absolutely, but undervolting isn't going to get someone hours of extra battery life, especially when our screens usually account for 60%+ of our battery consumption. All said and done, undervolting results in gaining us very few percentage points in terms of what percentage of battery life our processors consumed.
Seems like the kernel and rom do make some difference not just apps. I use AutoStarts to prevent a mess of them starting upon boot. I am sure the screen takes a ton of it. But I am convinced that it depends on voltages and kernels too. Since I notice differences.
I recommend trying the 4.0.2 radios, at a minimum. I would list them, but I don't know our radios off the top of my head yet (too much Vibrant info is still in my brain). Search for them, they're easy to find. BE SURE to push the CDMA/LTE radios paired together. Like, the 4.0.2 radios together, 4.0.3 radios together. Do NOT mix and match.
Generally speaking for people in good LTE areas, I think the 4.0.4 radio package is GREAT. I've noticed zero slow down. Yeah, -87dBm (which is what I normally see here at the house) IS "weak" and it SUCKS to have wrong bars displayed but I haven't noticed any slow down on the network. I think slightly scaling down LTE strength is what has helped improve battery life. CDMA radio strength does not appear to have been affected, which is what you're gonna be on in rural areas anyway so unless you're on the fringe of LTE signal like the OP, I don't think this radio package is anything to complain or be worried about.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ok KWK, but there's a trade off here. If I try the 4.0.2 radios, that some people reported bad battery life on, it's just because it had a bad trade off for SOME
people right? So that means 4.0.2 radios could be good for me and result in better battery? Can I be on 4.0.4 and have the 4.0.2 radios?
Anyone know where to find these 4.0.2 radios and how to flash?
As for the battery life part of my post, what do you guys think I should try doing in betterbatterystats? A recent thread on here: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1483829&page=3 (Go to page 3 and last post) He got his life fixed. So that's nice to know there's tweaks that can be done. Any suggestions? Look at the http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1488680&page=6 thread too. "draining at 1% per hour in sleep mode & how are you doing it?"
I disagee with your comment about old 4.0.2 radios since 4.0.4 (FA02) radios have improved signal reception. It is possible that maybe it affects battery, but I kind of doubt it. Based on all the research so far, seems mostly screen eats it a lot as well as how you use all the apps on the phone as mentioned above. I mean isnt this a matter of some electrical engineering info (ie voltages etc) and how to tweak such things? I have CS degree but admit my hardware knowledge is not greatest.
Ugh, I'm in a mess now, lol. I called Verizon yesterday and followed their usual "signal solution" got me to 4 bars of 4g. Turned on WiFi - 2 bars, turned it off, back to 1-2 bar 4g that last for 30 seconds.
I'm starting to think it's the sim card.
Any suggestions for battery life? Seems my phone can't sleep. It's down to 83% after 5 hours. And all I've done is send 2-3 text messages. Do I turn off NFC for a start?
edit: Now I'm at 4 bars wifi. Goddam radios, they are so random, we'll assume the phone is trolling and continue to the solution.
bump for the night scary how fast it got to page 2.
let's get these issues fixed!
If your phone is searching for signal, then your battery life is already sucking it up. A "stronger" radio that uses a little more juice won't cause more drain than your phone will cause by throwing everything it can at the phone antenna. Just look at my screen shot from before...28% battery drained in 8 hours...an additional 20% due to the phone trying to keep a signal.
Like I said about your original screen shots, your battery life doesn't seem to be that "off to me". Just push different radios, and try them for at least a day.
Okay will do. Where can I find these other radios and how do I flash them?
Lastly, anyone here an expert on fixing phone isn't sleeping? Seems to be my major idle battery drain.
Icey34 said:
Okay will do. Where can I find these other radios and how do I flash them?
Lastly, anyone here an expert on fixing phone isn't sleeping? Seems to be my major idle battery drain.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You can find the radios here:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1481095
If you have the 4.0.2 radios, you can flash that ZIP in Clockwork Recovery Mod.
It will take a few minutes so leave it be and don't do a battery pull.
Well I have the 4.0.4 radios, does that change anything?
edit: after looking at that link you provided, are those even radios only? Seems like a bootloader & radio update from 4.0.2 -> 4.0.4. And I'm already on 4.0.4. But with horrid signal.
I have had the best results with the 4.0.4 radios but you mention you are already on them.
You can try flashing some older radios but I am not sure that will help your signal issues.
As far as finding out why you are having deep sleep issues, you can use Better Battery Stats to narrow down wakelocks.
With that said, if the phone is constantly in an area with poor signal, that will cause unnecessary battery drain as well.
Where can I find these older radios?
edit: I'd like to try the 4.0.2 radio.
Update 1: So today I powered it on after having it off from 7:00 AM to 2:45 PM. It's been idle, checked email for replies on this post and this is my battery:
Something is eating up it's idle time.
I noticed on the way back to my House it picked up a strong 4G signal for 5 minutes or so. Still looking to find where the 4.0.2 radios are. Noticing a stronger WiFi signal though, and the usual 4bar 3g. All I can find is the post from adranalyne about the radios from 4.0.2 -> 4.0.4. Something I was thinking about: If I flash 4.0.2 radios, say they are bad and I need to go back to 4.0.4 would that require a whole new flash of 4.0.4 or are there seperate radios?
Here are the betterbattery screenshots: (I have for last unplugged and charged not sure where it needs to be)
I too have an LTE Galaxy Nexus and have been switching from franco's and lean kernel in an attempt to gain battery life. I have a feeling you're not going to get much better battery life with LTE turned on. I've turned off sync and LTE overnight and the best I've gotten in deep sleep is about 1-1.5% an hour. That's all after hunting down all my unnecessary wakelocks and shutting them down (GTALK_asnyc, etc) and keeping my running programs to a minimum (email, lightflow, and weather1 are the only ones ever running besides stock apps with sync on weather1 on a 6 hour cycle)
All of the two day battery life posts I've seen all seem to be GSM phones, and typically I've been getting a full day pretty comfortably...
8 hours while sleeping + 8-13 hours of light to moderate usage (1-3 hours of screen time generally)..all with about 10-25% remaining at the end of my long days
That's excellent. But one problems: (1) I can't even get a 4g signal, at most for 5 minutes in an area that I regularly get it. I have a thunderbolt next to me running 3-4 bars. I know the GNex has a bad radio, but sheesh I atleast want to have SOME 4g.
Been trying to find a radio, can't find one though, if you can link one that'd be appreciated.
Anything you see there in betterybatterystats I should shut down, and do they start backup after boot? I see the GTALK thing you were talking about on mines too, how do I get rid of it?
edit: just a few hours after my first post today:

Cell Standby Battery Life

Hi,
I'm sure this type of question has been posted here before - I've seen a lot of the posts. However, I'm having lots of trouble finding a good answer for my problem.
I'm using a Verizon Galaxy Nexus with a custom JB ROM and the latest radios. My problem seems to be that Cell Standby takes up a ton of my battery. This problem existed in ICS (stock and custom roms/kernels) and with JB (several custom roms/kernels). I've noticed if my WiFi is left on, the problem is immensely better. It's 3:20PM and I'm sitting at 87%. I'm on about 6 hours standby and that's all on WiFi, no use. If I'm on WiFi, that'll be about 60%.
It varies of course depending on what I'm doing. I've noticed that phone calls use a ton of juice and the screen obviously uses a bunch, too.
Also, it doesn't make too much of a difference if I'm running on 3G or 4G. I prefer 4G as it seems a lot more consistent in staying connected, but I've opted for 3G to keep my battery at a decent level.
OH! And the only thing I have running on my phone right now is an Exchange account, Gmail and Google Voice. Google Now is turned off.
Has anybody experienced this sort of thing? I just can't understand how the iPhone can sit idle for days and my phone can't make it past 24 hours unless it's on WiFi.
Thanks,
Jack

[Q] Poor Battery Life on CM10.1 (RC2)

I have been using CM10 for awhile and usually find it to be great. However recently I have noticed my phone doesn't seem to last a full day anymore and this is minimal screen time. I updated to CM10.1 (RC2) when it was released, I'm not sure if that contributed or if there's something else I'm missing. I have found the best performance by disabling LTE and using WiFi whenever possible. Still though it lasts 9 hours with about 1h30m screen time. If I use it anymore the battery may only last 5 or 6 hours, and this is just using it for occasional web browsing and some texting.
My service provider is Koodo (Telus) and I live in Burnaby BC, so I usually have a pretty good cell signal.
I have attached some screenshots of my battery usage. This was on a day with only light usage and no music or media used; LTE was disabled and WiFi was on.
Any ideas as to what could be causing this, or if this is normal would be appreciated.
Thanks!
smcw said:
I have been using CM10 for awhile and usually find it to be great. However recently I have noticed my phone doesn't seem to last a full day anymore and this is minimal screen time. I updated to CM10.1 (RC2) when it was released, I'm not sure if that contributed or if there's something else I'm missing. I have found the best performance by disabling LTE and using WiFi whenever possible. Still though it lasts 9 hours with about 1h30m screen time. If I use it anymore the battery may only last 5 or 6 hours, and this is just using it for occasional web browsing and some texting.
My service provider is Koodo (Telus) and I live in Burnaby BC, so I usually have a pretty good cell signal.
I have attached some screenshots of my battery usage. This was on a day with only light usage and no music or media used; LTE was disabled and WiFi was on.
Any ideas as to what could be causing this, or if this is normal would be appreciated.
Thanks!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Did you update your bootloaders? If so, you probably have the LK4 modem, I'd try flashing the LL1.
Also, you can download BBS (BetterBatteryStats) from here to help narrow down what drains your battery.
It has been known that CM10.1 has been giving poor battery life ever since the Linux 3.4 kernel rebase. I'm not sure if there is a fix, or if the CM guys are working on it at all... It has been 7 days since the last kernel commit for d2.
smcw said:
I have been using CM10 for awhile and usually find it to be great. However recently I have noticed my phone doesn't seem to last a full day anymore and this is minimal screen time. I updated to CM10.1 (RC2) when it was released, I'm not sure if that contributed or if there's something else I'm missing. I have found the best performance by disabling LTE and using WiFi whenever possible. Still though it lasts 9 hours with about 1h30m screen time. If I use it anymore the battery may only last 5 or 6 hours, and this is just using it for occasional web browsing and some texting.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I can support this, I am getting about the same battery life as you. Ever since updating to RC2 I have noticed that my battery life has diminished. I have a spare samsung battery, and normally I wake up, boot and go to school and use my phone a fair amount for texting, researching, and music. A full charge will usually support this until around 10-12 hours later, then I change batteries in the evening play more music and web browse. I took a screenshot of my battery history a few days ago, you'll notice that the graph increases without the phone ever being connected to a power source.
Has anyone checked their "Cell Standby" to see if there is any time without signal showing?
If you haven't toggled your LTE off, have a look sometime and let me know. If it is showing a percentage of time without signal, go back to your battery life graph and see if there is any RED in your Mobile Network Signal. If you see time without signal but no red in the bar let me know.
I've got some ideas on why battery life isn't great and I'm trying to build a case for it. Guys who frequent locations with poor LTE (4G) signals are who I'm mostly looking to get data from.
Any information that you guys might have would be very helpful to me. Screen captures are welcome. I've uploaded a couple of myself to show what I am talking about.
Cheers.
flexfulton said:
Has anyone checked their "Cell Standby" to see if there is any time without signal showing?
If you haven't toggled your LTE off, have a look sometime and let me know. If it is showing a percentage of time without signal, go back to your battery life graph and see if there is any RED in your Mobile Network Signal. If you see time without signal but no red in the bar let me know.
I've got some ideas on why battery life isn't great and I'm trying to build a case for it. Guys who frequent locations with poor LTE (4G) signals are who I'm mostly looking to get data from.
Any information that you guys might have would be very helpful to me. Screen captures are welcome. I've uploaded a couple of myself to show what I am talking about.
Cheers.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Poor signal is one hell of a battery drainer. I would suggest trying different modems to find one that works better in your area.
BWolf56 said:
Poor signal is one hell of a battery drainer. I would suggest trying different modems to find one that works better in your area.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No no. Modems do not affect this issue at all and with the new phones now a days modems don't play as big of a role as they used to with signal strength. Anyway this issue is bigger than that. CM10.1 isn't reporting 4G low signal strenght correctly. It jumps from -115 at one bar to 0dBm no bars instead of switching over to a 3G signal or showing a value that is accurate like -117dBm.
Flashing back to the M1 release of CM10.1 or even to stock and the handoff from 4G to 3G is seamless. We aren't seeing that anymore with the later released even as early as RC1.
Here is my JIRA report.
https://jira.cyanogenmod.org/browse/CYAN-1209
You can see I've put some work into it. Trust me, this isn't a flash a different modem, change network preferences or anything type of issue. I've tried all that before finally starting to gather some screen captures and information on the way the phone is handling it's network signals.
I've also talked about it extensively in the CM10.1 Nightlies thread in the dev section over the last week or two.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=41931891#post41931891
Also my original post was asking for anyone who has seen a time with signal recorded under cell standby BUT NOT showing any red in the mobile network status graph. Different than just no signal at all and red showing meaning you have no connection to the carrier at all.
flexfulton said:
No no. Modems do not affect this issue at all and with the new phones now a days modems don't play as big of a role as they used to with signal strength. Anyway this issue is bigger than that. CM10.1 isn't reporting 4G low signal strenght correctly. It jumps from -115 at one bar to 0dBm no bars instead of switching over to a 3G signal or showing a value that is accurate like -117dBm.
Flashing back to the M1 release of CM10.1 or even to stock and the handoff from 4G to 3G is seamless. We aren't seeing that anymore with the later released even as early as RC1.
Here is my JIRA report.
https://jira.cyanogenmod.org/browse/CYAN-1209
You can see I've put some work into it. Trust me, this isn't a flash a different modem, change network preferences or anything type of issue. I've tried all that before finally starting to gather some screen captures and information on the way the phone is handling it's network signals.
I've also talked about it extensively in the CM10.1 Nightlies thread in the dev section over the last week or two.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=41931891#post41931891
Also my original post was asking for anyone who has seen a time with signal recorded under cell standby BUT NOT showing any red in the mobile network status graph. Different than just no signal at all and red showing meaning you have no connection to the carrier at all.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well then, I stand corrected. Great work, thanks!
flexfulton said:
Has anyone checked their "Cell Standby" to see if there is any time without signal showing?
If you haven't toggled your LTE off, have a look sometime and let me know. If it is showing a percentage of time without signal, go back to your battery life graph and see if there is any RED in your Mobile Network Signal. If you see time without signal but no red in the bar let me know.
I've got some ideas on why battery life isn't great and I'm trying to build a case for it. Guys who frequent locations with poor LTE (4G) signals are who I'm mostly looking to get data from.
Any information that you guys might have would be very helpful to me. Screen captures are welcome. I've uploaded a couple of myself to show what I am talking about.
Cheers.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I can probably come up with some data, when I'm at work I generally get a low signal, I never toggle LTE, though I live in a town of ~8000 people, far from major centres. I believe we have HSPA+, but I'm generally connected to 3G. Right now, I've had normal battery life, (no increasing), and 0% time without signal, should I ever have <0% I'll message you some data. Thanks for your work!
I can confirm that I'm having this issue as well. I live in a 4G city (Boston), but my high school has practically no 4G reception. I noticed that unless airplane mode is enabled in the school, I have a battery drain of about ~1 per 5 minutes. The battery stats shows certain red areas when the signal is close to 0.
I'm running the latest nightly (5/29), but I'm flashing back to the M1 ROM until this is fixed. If I encounter any issues with this ROM, I'm probably going to flash back to stock.
Hopefully the devs can get on this when they have time.
Piegoodman said:
I can confirm that I'm having this issue as well. I live in a 4G city (Boston), but my high school has practically no 4G reception. I noticed that unless airplane mode is enabled in the school, I have a battery drain of about ~1 per 5 minutes. The battery stats shows certain red areas when the signal is close to 0.
I'm running the latest nightly (5/29), but I'm flashing back to the M1 ROM until this is fixed. If I encounter any issues with this ROM, I'm probably going to flash back to stock.
Hopefully the devs can get on this when they have time.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Battery life has actually improved quite a bit since rc2, but when I'm at school, where the signal is bad (most of the time I get "emergency calls only"), I see faster than usual battery drain as well. I think that this is normal though, because even my old dumbphone drained battery quickly when there was no signal.
Sent from my SGH-T999 using Tapatalk 4 Beta
klin1344 said:
Battery life has actually improved quite a bit since rc2, but when I'm at school, where the signal is bad (most of the time I get "emergency calls only"), I see faster than usual battery drain as well. I think that this is normal though, because even my old dumbphone drained battery quickly when there was no signal.
Sent from my SGH-T999 using Tapatalk 4 Beta
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Emergency Calls Only and Red in the mobile network history aren't what I'm referring too with my issue.
Those two things would indicate you phone had no cell signal at all to your carrier. I'm talking about being on such a poor 4G signal but still being connected to the Roger's network. It's hard to explain.
Anyway I appreciate your input.
There has been a lot of discussion on this in the CM10 Nightlies thread in the dev section if anyone is interested in reading or check out the JIRA report linked on the first page of this thread.
flexfulton said:
Emergency Calls Only and Red in the mobile network history aren't what I'm referring too with my issue.
Those two things would indicate you phone had no cell signal at all to your carrier. I'm talking about being on such a poor 4G signal but still being connected to the Roger's network. It's hard to explain.
Anyway I appreciate your input.
There has been a lot of discussion on this in the CM10 Nightlies thread in the dev section if anyone is interested in reading or check out the JIRA report linked on the first page of this thread.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm still connected to the AT&T network, but it's a very weak signal when I'm at school.
Just flashed back to stock, and the draining issue disappeared. I guess there's still some issue regarding cell signal that's draining the battery.
I've got the same issue, I thought it was just me. I'm on Rogers
I even lose battery (about 1% every 30 minutes) while plugged in and charging, if I'm listening to music, and checking my phone once every half hour for texts or emails.
The other day at the gym while listening to music and using 1 note taking app, it went from 95% to 15%. When I checked, it said the phone was active for 1 hour and 5 minutes even though I never used the phone.
I'm going to install that bettery battery status app now.

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