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Explanation of System Services found under Location Services?

C

cfairbank

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Nov 12, 2006
406
33
Curious if anyone can explain the functions df some of the settings found under the advanced tab of Location services.

Items include, Cell Network Search, Diagnostics and Usage, and Time Zone Settings. If I turn these functions off will my 4s have limited usage but conserve battery and vice versa? Never noticed these settings on my 4 so wanted to now what settings to use to best conserve my battery without crippling the phone.

Thanks in advance.
 
JRoDDz

JRoDDz

macrumors 68000
Jul 2, 2009
1,927
183
NYC
I have iAds location OFF and Diagnostics & Usage OFF. I really don't know what the others are for so I left them on.
 
C

cfairbank

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Nov 12, 2006
406
33
I turned off the same and included the setting time zone and traffic. Would like to know what exactly the cell network search does.
 
forza69

forza69

macrumors 6502a
Jan 30, 2010
777
126
cfairbank said:
I turned off the same and included the setting time zone and traffic. Would like to know what exactly the cell network search does.
Click to expand...

It's probably what helps the phone switch between antennas to get the best reception.
 
T

thelookingglass

macrumors 68020
Apr 27, 2005
2,138
633
I actually find it a little sneaky of Apple to not provide a clear explanation AND to set the status bar icon to OFF as a default. They clearly want to track certain data from us (I'll give them the benefit of the doubt that it's all done anonymously) and to avoid criticism give us the ability, buried in a setting two layers deep, to turn off that tracking. But they leave it on as a default and hide the off button.
 
A

apprunner

macrumors regular
Jun 26, 2010
143
0
cfairbank said:
Curious if anyone can explain the functions df some of the settings found under the advanced tab of Location services.

Items include, Cell Network Search, Diagnostics and Usage, and Time Zone Settings. If I turn these functions off will my 4s have limited usage but conserve battery and vice versa? Never noticed these settings on my 4 so wanted to now what settings to use to best conserve my battery without crippling the phone.

Thanks in advance.
Click to expand...

Another poster found that the compass calibration is used to determine true north from magnetic north.
 
M

marktwothousand

macrumors newbie
Oct 19, 2011
22
0
apprunner said:
Another poster found that the compass calibration is used to determine true north from magnetic north.
Click to expand...
That was me. I am now trying to figure out what "Mobile Network Search" is. On my iPhone 4 it said "Cell Network Search" but my 4s says "Mobile Network Search".
 
W

whiskeyvol

macrumors regular
Mar 14, 2011
201
0
from the batterygate thread:

JRoDDz said:
From another thread this is what some of these system services do:


1) When device is first turned on, searches for cells/wifi + GPS for 30 seconds, batch sent later.

2) When searching for network after call dropped, cells/wifi are collected and later batch sent.

3) If diagnostics are turned on, cell/wifi coordinates are collected at start/end of call to look for bad cell spots. Batch sent later.

4) When an app requests the current GPS location, any visible cells or hotspots are immediately sent up to Apple along with GPS coordinates.

5) Otherwise, as long as an LBS app is running, it does an intermittent collection which is batch sent every 12 hours.

Seems like a lot of GPS turning on and off here. And if you are in a bad signal area and getting dropped calls it would be worse.
Click to expand...

if you're wanting to see when you're actually using the locator, turn it 'on' at the bottom of system services
 
B

BGTHEMOGUL

macrumors regular
Nov 12, 2010
249
1
Someone has to know what each one means and can run through them for us with a brief description. Anybody care to help us out?
 
JRoDDz

JRoDDz

macrumors 68000
Jul 2, 2009
1,927
183
NYC
BGTHEMOGUL said:
Someone has to know what each one means and can run through them for us with a brief description. Anybody care to help us out?
Click to expand...

I know what the traffic one does. It tracks you as you are traveling and sends speed and location info for traffic purposes back to Apple.
 
D

dunc5

macrumors newbie
Dec 5, 2011
6
0
I'd be really interested to know what these mean too ...

Diagnostics & usage

Location based IAds

Mobile Network Search
 
SR45

SR45

macrumors 65832
Aug 17, 2011
1,501
0
Florida
marktwothousand said:
That was me. I am now trying to figure out what "Mobile Network Search" is. On my iPhone 4 it said "Cell Network Search" but my 4s says "Mobile Network Search".
Click to expand...


The difference: One will be set up as (british english) and the other as (american english)
 
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