We arrived home from Hawaii Thursday night, and I have to say I miss the Hawaiian weather. Perfect every day; even in the winter rainy season, the temperatures are comfortable, the rain is gentle, and the sun shines part of the day. As I said, perfect.
Being away from home for so long made me more aware of the inherent battery drain problems on my iPhone smart phone. We used my phone as a GPS as we traveled around the island of Oahu, and earlier this week when we spent four days in San Diego, and the inevitable battery drain made me think about ways to mitigate the problem.
No matter which type of smart phone you use, optimizing battery usage is something everyone needs. While the steps I am outlining in today's column are intended for the iPhone, they are applicable to the iPad, and most of them can also be used to optimize a Droid phone battery.
Turn off Push Mail – When push mail is enabled, the phone is constantly checking for new mail, which is a major battery drain. To change the setting on the iPhone go to Settings > Mail, Contacts, Calendars. Scroll down to Fetch New Data and turn it off, then set the schedule for each individual email account to Manual. Finally scroll to the very bottom and set Fetch to Manually. With these settings the phone will only check for new email when the Mail app is opened. If you are using a Droid phone, you will have selected how often check for mail when you set up your email account. The longer the interval, the less drain on the battery.
Limit the use of Location Services – Many apps need location services turned on in order to work, and in some cases when the service is turned on, the app is constantly accessing the web, even when the app is sleeping. To avoid possible over usage, go to Settings > Privacy > Location Services and scroll through your apps. Only leave Location Services on for the apps that you use all the time. For other apps you can turn the services on and off as needed. When you finish, scroll to the bottom of the screen and select System Services. You can comfortably turn off Diagnostic and Usage, Location Based Ads, Popular Near Me, and, if you don't travel out of the Eastern Time Zone, Setting Time Zone. Finally scroll to the very bottom and turn Frequent Locations off and Status Bar Icon on.
Diagnostics & Usage – the iPhone is preset to constantly send a steam of diagnostic information to Apple. To turn it off, and conserve battery use, go to Settings > General >About > Diagnostics & Usage and select Don't Send.
Close Out Apps – It is good practice, every couple of days for both iOS and Android devices, to close out apps that are not being used to avoid having them run in the background. In iOS 7, double tap the home button and swipe up on the running apps that appear. On Droid devices you may need to use an app that kills running apps – follow the link at the bottom of column for more information.
Shut Down the Phone Once-a-Week – A smart phone, or tablet, is a small computer, and when you turn it off and back on, several processes will reset and run more efficiently. For the iPhone, hold the button on the top of the iPhone for a few seconds, then slide the Power Off slider. To turn the phone back on, press and hold the same button. On a Android phone, use the power button to turn the phone on and off.
Turn Off Auto-Brightness – when Auto-Brightness turned on, the phone is using sensors to constantly evaluate the surrounding ambient light, which in turn uses battery power. On the iPhone, go to Settings > Wallpapers & Brightness and turn off Auto-Brightness. When you need to manually change the brightness settings, swipe-up the Command Center from the bottom of the screen (iOS 7 only) and make the necessary adjustments. On an Android phone, go to Menu > Settings >Sound and Display. Scroll down to Brightness and turn off Auto-Brightness.
If you would like to read more about optimizing your smart phone battery usage, read www.payetteforward.com/why-does-my-iphone-battery-die-so-fast-heres-the-real-fix (iPhone) or www.payetteforward.com/why-does-my-android-battery-die-so-fast-heres-the-real-fix (Android). Until next week, visit onmouseclick.blogspot.com for the online version of OnMouseClick.
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