Droid X Battery Life

[JMac]

My Dx arrived last week and I have to say that I am thrilled.  I love this phone and everything it does.  I have had virtually no issues setting it up (I always have some issues, but easily navigated with the help of Motorola).  The only minor issue I have is with battery life.  Everything I read before I bought it said the battery life is amazing and not an issue.  I use about 10% of the battery every hour when in use.  If not in use, I consume about 10% every 2 hours.  That means I have to plug it in 2x a day.  Any thoughts on conserving?  Is it better to have both satelite (cell) and wi-fi activated or just satelite?   I turned off the wi-fi when in my home to conserve battery power but wondering if that will help.

[firstlady09]

You can try the following tips to help you with your battery life.  Hope this helps!

• To turn off the screen, press the Power/End button. The device will continue to function.
• To manually manage the brightness of the screen, navigate to Settings > Sound & display > Brightness, uncheck Auto brightness. This will disable the auto backlight sensor. The customer can then manually adjust the brightness and modify the backlight setting as desired.
• Turn Bluetooth, GPS and Wi-Fi off when not in use.
• Close any third party applications running in the background that are not needed.
• If using push email, change settings to download email less frequently. Press Menu > Email Settings > Email delivery > Fetch schedule.
• Log out of Google Talk or other IM/chat applications when not in use.
• Under Settings, use the Battery Manager to optimize device battery use profile.
  
  

• If a device is being charged, a task management application or accessing Menu > Settings > Applications > Manage Applications can inadvertently shutdown the Battery Manager charging service.
  
  
• Menu > Settings > Battery Manager > Battery Profile: Smart Mode and Battery Save Mode may impact email syncing and other data connections
  
  

[JMac]

Thanks.

[BluestarNEO]

I was honestly quite worried about the battery life after reading all the gloom stories some seemed to be having. After having the phone for 3 days now, I can happily report the battery easily lasts me a day and a half.  The tips posted above are really helpful as well. 

Settings I use to help save power:

Wi-fi instead of 3G

Turn the backlight off when not needed

GPS turned off

Bluetooth turned off

These are just my normal settings and are adjusted as needed of course.

[NYsMissingStar]

When my Droid X is off the charger.. I go into my Data Manager... Than Data Delivery... and turn off Background Data... this way the battery lasts longer....

[crb79]

Sounds like you need a good Task killer.  I use Advanced Task Killer and set it for Auto Kill, Crazy, when screen turns off.  With that setting I end the night (7am-10pm) between 40-60% battery left with mild use.  Mild use consists of about 45 mins talk time and 20-30 txt messages, and 5-8 facebook checks through the day.  I even managed to make it home on day 2 of a single charge before the phone turned it's self off.

If I use the phone for viewing streaming video such as youtube, or continuous web use I will have to put it onto the charger.  There's no getting around plugging in if you're giving your phone heavy usage.  Near equivalent smart phones to the Droid X such as the smaller HTC Incredible give you 10-12 hours charge at best with mild use.  With the HTC Evo you have to be very crafty to get a full days charge out of it, most people must carry a charger with them.

[JMac]

Thanks, I didn't realize I was running background data. That should help. I'll also try the task killer. I appreciate the insights.

[JenP]

Installing a task killer is a must. There are a few in the Market. I have a free one called 'Advanced Task Killer'. Its great! Once you install it on your phone, you can configure the settings to kill your apps running in the background. I have mine set to one of the highest frequencies, every half hour. You can also choose to kill apps every time your screen goes off. This is handy during the day, but you can sometimes wake up to a drained battery if you leave it off the charger overnight. I wish there were day/night settings available...someday... You can also choose which apps you don't want the task killer to kill, such as any messaging, weather, email, antivirus, and alarm clock if you use that. Haha, and, of course, you don't want to kill the Advanced Task Killer itself. I have found this app to be very helpful in my battery conservation and I hope it helps you too. Also, don't ever have your Wi-fi or GPS running if you aren't using it at any moment, because those are both battery drainers. One more thing, which you may already have put on your phone, is the Power Control bar. This is a quick way to control Wi-fi-, Bluetooth, GPS, Sync, and Screen Brightness. The Droid X came with some of those controls already on one of the screens, but I took them off and added this bar, which is smaller in size and tidies things up a bit. Find and empty strip size area on any screen, touch and hold. Select 'Android Widgets' and scroll down to Power Control.

Happy Droiding, Jen