How to get Android to connect when it needs to only

[tbessie]

Hey all...

This is probably a common Android question, but I couldn't find the answer with some searching.

Basically - my old Nokia N85 could be configured to turn wifi and/or 3g on or off, depending on if it was needed to be used or not.

Eg. I could configure my RSS feed reader to have a an ordered set of "preferred" networks to get its data via - I could say "1st, try my home wifi; then, try the cafe across the street's wifi, then try 3g". That way it would use the fastest available network.

It would also be able to turn wifi on when it was checking if a network was available, and off when it was done.

I can't seem to find a way to get Android on my Nexus One to do something like that. Wifi is either ON or OFF (and I have to manually turn it on or off).

Is there anything that can control network usage on a "turn on only when needed, then turn off" way, like I describe above?

- Tim

[Hook]

As far as I know, there is nothing built into Android that does exactly that. Yes, that was a handy feature of S60. Now, God knows I haven't been through every app in the Android Market, so there might be something there I missed.

Android does use the rule that, if there is a memorized wifi network available, it will try to use that before 3G. What I do is, using an app called Quick Settings, is keep 3G turned off unless I need it and keep wifi on at all times. I do not see any big battery hit from having wifi on-- I get the impression that, just as Android does a great job dynamically allocating resources without a task killer, I think it runs wifi at a very minimum level unless it is being used, but I have no idea. I just know I get great battery life.

Not what you were looking for, sorry.

[tbessie]

As far as I know, there is nothing built into Android that does exactly that. Yes, that was a handy feature of S60. Now, God knows I haven't been through every app in the Android Market, so there might be something there I missed.

Android does use the rule that, if there is a memorized wifi network available, it will try to use that before 3G. What I do is, using an app called Quick Settings, is keep 3G turned off unless I need it and keep wifi on at all times. I do not see any big battery hit from having wifi on-- I get the impression that, just as Android does a great job dynamically allocating resources without a task killer, I think it runs wifi at a very minimum level unless it is being used, but I have no idea. I just know I get great battery life.

Not what you were looking for, sorry.

Interesting! I would have thought that keeping wifi on all the time would drain the battery like nobody's business! I'll have to experiment.

- Tim

[Hook]

Interesting! I would have thought that keeping wifi on all the time would drain the battery like nobody's business! I'll have to experiment.

- Tim

Actually, poking around, I found a setting i didn't know about for wifi. If you go into settings->wireless & networks -> Wi-Fi Settings, then hit the menu button, you get an "Advanced option. There you will find a Wifi sleep policy, which by default is set to "sleep when screen is off." That may be why battery life is so good with wifi is on, especially if 3G isn't on to switch to (3G does not sleep).

[questionfear]

I've also heard that wifi is a lesser drain than 3g, so leaving it on means the phone will automatically move to wifi where available, thus using less battery.

FWIW, I can make it from 6am to around 5pm without a charge in between with GPS, BT and wifi on [usually down to around 40%], and from car charging on the way home all the way to about 10pm. [also down to around 40% when it goes on the charger overnight.]

[tbessie]

I've also heard that wifi is a lesser drain than 3g, so leaving it on means the phone will automatically move to wifi where available, thus using less battery.

FWIW, I can make it from 6am to around 5pm without a charge in between with GPS, BT and wifi on [usually down to around 40%], and from car charging on the way home all the way to about 10pm. [also down to around 40% when it goes on the charger overnight.]

Mine drains a lot faster than that, when used regularly, and with most things turned off, I've found. Gets down to around 20% after a day where I don't use it TOO much (compared to maybe 50-60% for my older phone).

Kind of annoying. I'm looking forward to newer, low-power technologies and better batteries.

- Tim

[questionfear]

Mine drains a lot faster than that, when used regularly, and with most things turned off, I've found. Gets down to around 20% after a day where I don't use it TOO much (compared to maybe 50-60% for my older phone).

Kind of annoying. I'm looking forward to newer, low-power technologies and better batteries.

- Tim

Are you typically in a good signal area? Poor signal sucks the battery dry dry dry...as I learned earlier this week in a meeting with poor signal. At one point I had my poor droid hooked up to my laptop on the floor so it could trickle charge.

Otherwise maybe try lowering the brightness?

[Hook]

Yes, that's part of why I keep 3G turned off. It's not just that I don't use 3G often, it is also that I work 9 hours a day in a building that gets no cell reception-- I don't want my Nexus looking for a signal fruitlessly.

[tbessie]

Are you typically in a good signal area? Poor signal sucks the battery dry dry dry...as I learned earlier this week in a meeting with poor signal. At one point I had my poor droid hooked up to my laptop on the floor so it could trickle charge.

Otherwise maybe try lowering the brightness?

That might be part of it - in my apartment, reception sucks terribly. At work it's not so bad. But there's a million dropouts in the naked city (San Francisco). :-)

- Tim