Mobile Phone standby Time: Often BS IMHO Sagem MyC2-2

- K
- Kate Fights, I Cry
  
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posted
17 years ago

Sat, May 21, 2005 9:01 AM

The panel on the box says 340 hours standby time
and 3 hours talk time.
You're lucky if you get 100 hours out if it on standby
though the talk time is pretty close to what they quote.
Why the huge quoted standby time and yet in practice
it's either half of that or barely so?

- A
- Andrew M
  
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posted
17 years ago

Sat, May 21, 2005 10:48 AM

The standby time is dependent on network activity. It is quoted under optimim network conditions (ie right next to the cell, low tx power etc).
If you're between cells, far away from yr cell or in a busy area your phone will be constantly talking to the base station. This reduces standby time from the optimum.
-Andrew M

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- Heywood Jablome
  
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posted
17 years ago

Sat, May 21, 2005 11:40 AM

Each network carrier polls your phone every once in a while too. Telstra polls your phone more than Vodafone, and Vodafone polls more than Optus. So for the greatest standby time, Optus is best. But because it polls least often, there is a greater chance of losing a call, especially when on the move.
BTW moving on a freeway causes your phone to keep changing towers,therefore decreasing standby time too.
Lots of factors.

- J
- John Henderson
  
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posted
17 years ago

Sat, May 21, 2005 9:04 PM

Agreed.

What's supposed to be the the reason for this greater possibility of losing a call? Are you saying that the location update procedure sometimes fails, requiring fallback to the T3212 timer to update the HLR? And if so, where's the fault, handset, network, or what?

And what's the reason for this? If these new cells have the same Location Area Code (LAC), I can't see how changes of serving cell in idle mode could affect standby time. If the LAC changes frequently, then yes (but that'd indicate a poorly laid-out network).
John

- J
- John Henderson
  
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posted
17 years ago

Sat, May 21, 2005 10:33 PM

Agreed.

If the signal's very weak or non-existent, then the phone will be busy scanning ("listening") for something better. The scanning activity level under these conditions can be configured on some phones, but would usually decrease when nothing's found in a reasonable time. Increased scanning activity does use more power.
But there's no need for the phone to transmit unless 1) a call is instigated, 2) it camps on a new cell with a different Location Area Code, 3) the T3212 timer (set by the network) expires, or 4) it isn't registered ("logged in"), and finds an opportunity to do so.
John

- K
- Ken Taylor
  
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posted
17 years ago

Sat, May 21, 2005 11:01 PM

Agreed, though if you are between one or more cells and they are busy then it's possible that your phone will be repeatedly camping onto a new cell.
Ken

- J
- John Henderson
  
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posted
17 years ago

Sat, May 21, 2005 11:18 PM

Camping on a cell in idle mode (no call active) is done without regard to how busy the cell is. Only when a call is instigated does this become inportant, and is catered for by the phone transmitting its measurements (Network Measurement Results) at that time so that handovers can be negotiated. NMR is done for the neighbouring cell list (it's been monitoring the channel list that's broadcast by the cell it's camped on).
In any case, frequent changes of camped-on cell (serving cell) consume no additional power unless a change of LAC is involved, and this should be rare.
John

- K
- Ken Taylor
  
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posted
17 years ago

Sun, May 22, 2005 12:37 AM

Fair enough. I thought that if the phone was re-registering it needed to transmit ('x' amount of data), and that a full cell would push it over elsewhere. But there's been a lot of water flow under the Wheatstone Bridge since I looked at the principles of cell hand-over. :-)
Cheers.
Ken

- J
- John Henderson
  
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posted
17 years ago

Sun, May 22, 2005 1:35 AM

I know what you mean. There's just too much to know, and it's all too easy to forget important bits. I've done it too often.
Those "primitive" GSM communications happen on a non-traffic channel.
John