Bluetooth battery life question.

[Gibson88]

Hey guys i'm just wondering.

You know if you turn 3G or Wi-Fi on your phone it makes a big difference to your battery life, what will it be like with Bluetooth?

I'm thinking it wont be as bad, but i could be totally wrong. I want to start keeping Bluetooth on and set up a handsfree kit in the car so everytime i go in it they Sync but I'm worried about it having a big hit on my battery life.

So the question is will it? or will it just be a small amount.

Cheers.

 

[Digipimp]

bluetooth is said to use very little battery power where having your phone constantly searching for wifi hotspots uses more

 

[Gibson88]

Ah ok cheers

 

[bluenoise]

I leave my BT on for my car's HFL, too. It makes little or no difference in my battery life. In fact, the only thing that does make a noticeable difference for me is 3G. If I leave it off, I get very long life (a day or two). With it on, though, I may not make it through the day. Everything else is on (Location Services, BlueTooth, WiFi).

 

[Anuba]

The BT on my old phone had a 'power saver mode' that could be toggled on or off. Since the BT on iPhone has Apple's trademark 'one size fits all', a.k.a. 'options = poor design' mode, I wonder if it's the equivalent of my other phone's power saver mode or not... since there's apparently power to be saved here, there must be disadvantages to that, or else no phone would have two modes.

 

[bluenoise]

The BT on my old phone had a 'power saver mode' that could be toggled on or off. Since the BT on iPhone has Apple's trademark 'one size fits all', a.k.a. 'options = poor design' mode, I wonder if it's the equivalent of my other phone's power saver mode or not... since there's apparently power to be saved here, there must be disadvantages to that, or else no phone would have two modes.

I've not had the power save option on previous phones, but a couple of my old phones were real battery hogs when it came to BlueTooth. My guess is newer phones, like the iPhone, don't need the two modes as the chips have gotten far more efficient. I haven't tested much to see if turning off BT on my iPhone will make a significant difference, but I'm leaving it on all the time so it pairs automatically with my car when I get in.

 

[Anuba]

I've not had the power save option on previous phones, but a couple of my old phones were real battery hogs when it came to BlueTooth. My guess is newer phones, like the iPhone, don't need the two modes as the chips have gotten far more efficient. I haven't tested much to see if turning off BT on my iPhone will make a significant difference, but I'm leaving it on all the time so it pairs automatically with my car when I get in.

I keep BT enabled because I occasionally use my Jabra BT800 headset with the iPhone. It works well, the iPhone sends the caller ID to the Jabra's display and all that, but sometimes they appear to lose the pairing. Both devices still list the other as paired, and the BT icon on the iPhone indicates established contact but the headset no longer rings when I receive a call.

I don't know quite what to make of the BT on the iPhone. I tried pairing it with both my Mac and my PC to see what it does, but there just aren't any services at all. I didn't expect it to like the PC much, but I was surprised to find that there's absolutely no point in pairing it with the Mac, not even lowly contacts & calendar sync. Computers aren't even identified by their names, they're just listed as "Computer". I guess headsets are all it's good for...