There are many things about modern phones that get users all riled up. They don’t run fast enough, the screen freezes up, the screen is too small, the handset is too big… The list could go on and on and on but the most common gripe about mobile phones, and smartphones especially, is that the battery life is just not long enough. And indeed this complaint has been justified traditionally. What a lot of people forget is that smartphones are computers and they do the work that great big desktops were doing 5 years ago. Yet they fit in the palm of your hand. So why should we expect days and days of battery life? Because we’re human, that’s why, and we always want more. So how do we get more out of our smartphones?
The first thing to do before looking at apps to extend battery life is to see just what is eating your battery up. You can do this by checking your Battery Indicator (or something similar). The most common drainers are screen brightness and background apps (such as facebook) that are constantly checking and updating automatically. These can be easily remedied without using other apps, but once that is done and you want to save more battery power take a look at these two:
1. Green Power version 4.9 which is free of charge is a great place to start. It manages how your phone is accessing the network, either via cellular or WiFi connection. It switches between the two as they become available so you don’t have to constantly monitor and switch manually. The app itself doesn’t drain and is a good first step in reducing battery usage. There is also a premium version available that offers a slightly wider range of power saving options.
2. JuiceDefender does offer a free version but it’s the premium versions that are so good. There are 5 different power moderation options that run straight out of the box. The default option is Balanced and it does what it says on the tin. It maximises the battery life whilst maintaining a relatively low impact on the phone’s performance. There is then the Aggressive option that disables some of the connectivity features when battery power reaches a certain level. And Extreme is, well, extreme. It disables all of the connectivity options by default and the user has to manually enable them whenever you need them. When you get to Plus and Ultimate versions of JuiceDefender there are customisation options where the user can set night-mode, timeout intervals, alter the threshold at which the network disconnection occurs. These options are similar to Green Power but they are a bit more stylishly presented and better explained. One of the best bits of JuiceDefender (and there are many, many to choose from) is what’s called the periodic-connection schedule. It allows social networking apps like Facebook, Twitter and Google+ to sync with the network as determined intervals so they are not constantly connected which is a big drain on battery.
So there are 2 apps to get your teeth into if you’ve just recycled your mobile phone in favour of a great new smartphone and you don’t want to spend your life charging it up.