PDA

View Full Version : live long and prosper (battery)

putkowski
12-23-2005, 05:35 PM
If you are usually in sight of your access point, you can prolong the experience by opening connection manager (and disconnecting) and picking

Menu/Tools/Connectivity settings...

then

Connections/<pick one>/Edit

Next/Next/Advanced/Other

change your radio output to 10mW...

Ok/Finish

If you're with me so far, you can go ahead and make two profiles: one for 100mW and another for 10mW. If no profile is checked "use without asking" you'll get to pick how you want to connect each time...

With my "Walmart-sourced" Belkin wireless G router I can go forty feet away (and through two open doors) and still have 3 of 4 bars of signal.
Mike Cane
12-23-2005, 05:38 PM
Nice tip.

Also, if you know you are not going to be using WiFi or BT for a while:

1) Power Button
2) Offline Mode
aflegg
12-23-2005, 06:34 PM
Unfortunately, reducing the power output from 100mW to 10mW won't give you longer battery life, and is included for countries with regulatory requirements on the power output of a wifi device:

http://www.internettablettalk.com/forums/showpost.php?p=1838&postcount=10

As for "offline mode", does it actually use less power if you're not using the Bluetooth connection or WLAN? Perhaps I'm odd, but my 770's only connected to my phone over BT whilst actually using a GPRS connection. It'd certainly be interesting to see what sort of gain it gets you (and the factors driving it would be fascinating)

And, of course, with the cover on the wireless and Bluetooth chips power down anyway (by default).

Cheers,

Andrew
aflegg
12-23-2005, 06:35 PM
Oh, and IIRC the 10/100mW setting, although under a connection specific "Advanced" panel, is system-wide...
putkowski
12-23-2005, 08:06 PM
Oh, and IIRC the 10/100mW setting, although under a connection specific "Advanced" panel, is system-wide...

Otay. I forgot. Linux: your perception may be stupidly trusting (remember linuxconf? yast2?)

I am wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong.

As my math teacher used to say: "absolutely, positively, NO, NO, NO !!"

Thanks. Really.

Paul
aflegg
12-24-2005, 03:41 AM
But user interface design isn't limited to Linux, or Nokia... :-(