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Reminders App Hard On Battery?

Futhark

Futhark

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Jun 12, 2011
1,238
179
Northern Ireland
This is the first time I've tried the iOS 5 reminders app, I can see how this might be useful but what I want to know could this be a battery killer?

I setup a reminder for tomorrow morning when I leave home to remind me to stop off at the shop for something. I noticed because I'm setting the remind by location rather than a day and time the location service icon is constantly up by the batter icon. Surely if this is a reminder that is hours away or days away and your not on charge your battery will be dead in no time?

Please correct me if I'm wrong in what I'm thinking.
 
I was under the impression it used cell towers to track your location rather than GPS. So the only power it would be using is when it checks into a cell tower (which it does frequently) and deciphers your location from there at no expense to the battery.

I could be wrong though
 
Bkfraiders7 said:
I was under the impression it used cell towers to track your location rather than GPS. So the only power it would be using is when it checks into a cell tower (which it does frequently) and deciphers your location from there at no expense to the battery.

I could be wrong though
Click to expand...
If this is possible then it is probably how Apple did it, considering they are all about battery life and all that.
 
I'd say it's safe to assume that it doesn't kick on the GPS until you're pretty close to your destination. Until then, it's just tracking you with cell tower triangulation, which as we recently found out, the iPhone has been doing in the background for a while anyway.

Shouldn't be a big battery issue.
 
mikethebigo said:
I'd say it's safe to assume that it doesn't kick on the GPS until you're pretty close to your destination. Until then, it's just tracking you with cell tower triangulation, which as we recently found out, the iPhone has been doing in the background for a while anyway.

Shouldn't be a big battery issue.
Click to expand...

Thanks for this info. I was scared to goto work this morning with the reminder set when I saw the location service icon as I didn't want my phone running low after a short space of time. I'll try it again and see :)
 
Just did a quick test with reminders. I set a reminder for me arriving at my wife's workplace 45 minutes away from home and on arrival it beeped the reminder the very second I stepped through her premises door, I didn't think it was working as nothing happened as we pulled up outside but as I said above it notified me the minute I was inside.

So for a 45 maybe 50 minute journey my battery went down to 94% a usage of 6% what do you think?
 
Futhark said:
Just did a quick test with reminders. I set a reminder for me arriving at my wife's workplace 45 minutes away from home and on arrival it beeped the reminder the very second I stepped through her premises door, I didn't think it was working as nothing happened as we pulled up outside but as I said above it notified me the minute I was inside.

So for a 45 maybe 50 minute journey my battery went down to 94% a usage of 6% what do you think?
Click to expand...

Thats lousy.
 
apprunner said:
Yeah but the reminders is supposedly dormant until called for. This battery drain makes it dramatically less useful. Too bad.
Click to expand...

Can you have the Reminders app notify you for a future date and location?

"Remind me on Friday when I get to work to print out my slides."

If so, is location only used when Friday comes around?
 
Badandy said:
Can you have the Reminders app notify you for a future date and location?

"Remind me on Friday when I get to work to print out my slides."

If so, is location only used when Friday comes around?
Click to expand...

Yes here's how it works

56964d25-73c2-3e94.jpg
 
I thought I would try this out today as I was curious as well. Using my iPhone 4 I set up a reminder to go to the store after I leave work today at 5PM. I set the reminder at 9AM and currently about 6 hours have passed.

The battery started at 99% when I set the alert and right now it is at 93% with less than average use throughout the day (checked one email and sent a couple of texts).

To be quite honest I think a loss of 6% is negligible considering how cool the reminders app is. I'll be especially excited to use this with Siri, as I find it time consuming right now to create reminders.

To the OP, I would point out that it would be silly to remind yourself of something on a future date without both selecting "remind me on a date" AND "remind me at a location"

The reminders App is smart enough not to start the GPS until the date of the reminder. If you want to get milk from the store by 5PM on Friday, you will set it up as such. Location services will not go on until Friday and you will be reminded either when you arrive at the store, or by 5PM at the latest.
 
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