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Turn 3G off till you need it????

WhySoSerious

WhySoSerious

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Jun 30, 2007
1,460
97
Dallas, TX
I hear people saying that, but did you ever think that the reason you are turning 3G off in the first place is because it WASN'T working to begin with.

So, when you do "need it" and turn it back on.....guess what, it still won't work.

I don't know, just sorta found it funny how i read all these posts about turning it off till ya need it.....when it really doesn't matter. :D
 
hexonxonx said:
I simply turn off 3G so that my battery life lasts two days. When I turn it on, my 3G works, plain and simple.
Click to expand...

Ditto... Not terribly sure what the OP means... Phone calls are fine with 3G off, so I only turn it on when I am going to use the internet off wifi. Just like I only turn bluetooth on when I am going to use my headset. Then, I don't have to charge every day...
 
Well, maybe people would leave it on all the time along with blue tooth if the battery technology was really good. But because we do not have the untimate battery in our phones a lot of people just turn it off to save that.

I leave mine off for many reasons and well getting better battery time is one advantage to doing this. When i need 3g I simply turn it on. Its not a problem for me to do this.

Also when i do have 3g on, i get dropped calls all the time. So until they get that fixed it makes sense. :p
 
Cynicalone said:
What I find funny is people upgrading to an iPhone 3G and not using the 3G. :D
Click to expand...

Yeah, because upgrading just for the option of using 3G apparently is stupid.:rolleyes:


Like others here, I keep mine off most of the time as I don't really need it. In fact, I rarely need the 3G with wifi so common. It's nice to have when I need the speed, though, and I'm not near a wifi connection.

I have a feature request idea based on this: I'd like to be able to set the 3G to only enable when I am running Safari and I don't have wifi access. After leaving Safari, switch back to EDGE automatically to save battery power. Either that or put the 3G enable switch on the first page of the preferences.
 
I don't get 3G in the area of San Francisco that I am. It's pretty annoying actually how spotty the service is in this city. But at least I have wifi while at home, so it's not a big deal.
 
Can I ask a dumb question?

Thanks.

So, at my house, IN my house, I rarely if ever get a 3G signal.

It pretty much just stays on EDGE.

So, my question is, does it really save me any battery to "turn off 3G" if the phone never connects to 3G anyway?

Also, doesn't it seem to kind of defeat the purpose of having all these features if you have to keep turning them on and off just to make the battery last a day?
 
Rat-Boy said:
Can I ask a dumb question?

Thanks.

So, at my house, IN my house, I rarely if ever get a 3G signal.

It pretty much just stays on EDGE.

So, my question is, does it really save me any battery to "turn off 3G" if the phone never connects to 3G anyway?

Also, doesn't it seem to kind of defeat the purpose of having all these features if you have to keep turning them on and off just to make the battery last a day?
Click to expand...

Yes. Turning it off especially when you don't have a 3G signal will save battery life. If not, the 3G radio will still look for signals which will drain the battery faster.
 
I have WiFi and no 3G where I live so I turn it off at home. At work, I get a strong 3G signal and no WiFi, so I switch it on when I am there. It doesn't take long to switch it on or off so it isn't an issue for me.
 
^ Same with me. At home, I get full EDGE signal, WiFi, and sucky 3G. At work (or anywhere else that's not home), I have excellent 3G but no WiFi.
 
so on average how much more battery life does this save you or give you when 3g is switched off?
 
hexonxonx said:
I simply turn off 3G so that my battery life lasts two days. When I turn it on, my 3G works, plain and simple.
Click to expand...

Agreed. For those occasions where I don't have Wi-Fi, I usually find what I need on just a page or two of the web. The wifey has the original iPhone and she is a heavy web user and it is good enough. I turn on 3G if I need some speed and then shut it off when I'm done. Probably not necessary but I never saw the need for constant 3G. Not sure about saving battery though... My four year old plays games on it all the time so I am never far from the charger. :D
 
Well, I upgraded too and use 3G only when I need to get online. But I also upgraded for the following reasons:

My original was a 4GB and I wanted more space (got the 16GB)
The speakers on the 3G are MUCH better...I use them a lot
It's nice to have a headphone jack that's not recessed

So it's not JUST 3G.
 
WhySoSerious said:
I hear people saying that, but did you ever think that the reason you are turning 3G off in the first place is because it WASN'T working to begin with.

So, when you do "need it" and turn it back on.....guess what, it still won't work.

I don't know, just sorta found it funny how i read all these posts about turning it off till ya need it.....when it really doesn't matter. :D
Click to expand...

believe it or not, 3G works for some. hard to believe i know :D
 
It boggles the mind that people can be so limited in their thinking. How hard is it to understand that having the option of using 3G is a good thing, and that *option* means that we can enable or disable it to suit our needs.

I guess those same people would wear a winter coat during the summer because they can't comprehend the option of not wearing it when it is not necessary.

EVP
 
Cynicalone said:
What I find funny is people upgrading to an iPhone 3G and not using the 3G. :D
Click to expand...

i completely agree with you...but i find myself doing this exact thing...only using 3G when i need it. i keep second thinking my upgrade...the GPS addition is great but, i loved the fact that on my 1st gen phone, i could toss it on a table and not worry about the tiny scratches that would appear as they do now. but, i'm a sucker for new things, so i can't be too mad :D
 
I am just the opposite, I keep it in 3G unless the 3G is having a hard time connecting, then I turn it off and go to Edge.
 
I don't feel it is necessary to turn off 3G when not in use because it doesn't directly affect battery life when not surfing the web.

I found "Push" notification to be the largest battery killer. It really destroys your battery life if you work in a corporate environment with incoming emails (to/cc) every few minutes.
 
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