Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion The Water Cooler Help understanding smartphone data usage

I see what you’re getting at here but it might not be as simple as turning off your network. When I have the WiFi on my phone enabled it defaults to it when available but automatically reverts to G3 or regular cell if the WiFi drops out because say I hit a dead zone in my house or walk to the mailbox down the street. I forgot which phone you are using Cam but it may have an icon at the top which shows how you are sending and receiving data, my Galaxy S does.

Sorry I can’t help you with any advice Cam since my data usage option only has unlimited data so I don’t worry about usage. I just use WiFi at home because it’s usually faster if I’m not using up my bandwidth doing other downloads.

Great point about the Wifi dead spot. Worth a look.

I live in the US, have an iPhone4, and thusly use AT&T for data. So my experience with Bell is non-existent, and I don't know a lot about Android phones. But I have been a smartphone user since when blackberries had black & white screens, and I've had a lot of discussions with AT&T on behalf of my company's corporate accounts regarding data on smartphones, so I've been around the block on some of this topic.

That said...

Regarding that data usage that you're seeing early in the morning. It is very likely that this is Bell's system aggregating your data from the previous business day. It is (likely) not the case that your phone actually doing something at 3am when it's turned off. AT&T's system does the same thing. This is probably a good thing, as if you received a line-item review of every data session, your phone bill might be hundreds of pages long.

The Bell rep is full of it regarding your data question. As others have said, when you're using any WiFi network, the data is flowing through the ISP that's 'driving' that WiFi hotspot. It has nothing to do with the data from Bell, and consequently should not impact your Bell data bucket.

I don't know how exactly what options Androids have, but on an iPhone, you can explicitly turn off the cellular data. Sounds like you've got a similar option on your 'droid. With that disabled, your Android should not be accessing Bell's data network and you should not see any data charges (queue Mythbuster Jamie Hyneman, "Ever!"). If you do, then something isn't working correctly. Either Bell's system is screwed up, or your phone isn't obeying its settings. If this is the case, you need to talk to Bell again. Keep asking for a rep that has a clue. They exist. Somewhere.

If you've left the cellular data on, then the phone will occasionally still use cellular data, even when connected to WiFi. Cellular data uses less power than WiFi, so as others mentioned, many smartphones (the iPhone4 and iPad 3G included), will shut down Wifi while sleeping and revert to cellular data. Like at home when you're not using the phone. I suspect this is where your data usage is coming from.

Pay close attention to oldskool's first point... There is a significant difference between a 'Disable 3G' and 'Disable Cellular Data' setting. Disabling 3G will just revert your phone to slower cellular data (EDGE, even GPRS). The key here is that you'd still rack up the same amount of data usage, it'll just take longer. If you're in a 3G coverage area, I would leave 3G enabled.

It depends on how much email you receive and how the 'droid is managing its connections, but if you get "some" email while the phone is sleeping, then 6MB/day isn't an unreasonable amount of data.

Am I missing something here? If you used 211 MB and you have a 500MB data cap, did you get charged extra or something?

Hey guys, thanks for the advice and input, it's very appreciated. Also, sorry for my late reply, but I was up today.

I'll do my best to respond to your questions and suggestions.

-My phone is a Samsung Galaxy S
-I have an app called Quick Settings that allows you to turn data off. As far as I know, if it's functioning properly, it turns all data off, not just 3G.
-I do have an app called 3G Watchdog that monitors and displays how much data you've used. I don't check in regularly, but every time that I have, it indicates that I haven't used any data whatsoever.
-I do have some apps, like a weather and o'clock widget, along with a YouTube widget which require some form of data to update.
-As far as my phone going to sleep and not using my WiFi-I'd never heard of this until now, and if there's a chance that I don't have the data turned off correctly, this would be the only way I can think of that I would accumulate data. As an example, my phone was on every day last month (like every day) solely because I use it as a backup phone with my bluetooth speaker phone connected. It's literally sitting right in front of me and not in use, so I assume it's technically in "sleep mode" all day long.
-My phone is basically set up to prompt me whenever I receive an e-mail, and on average I would say that I receive 12 emails a day.

Here's the first page of my bill showing that data used. Hopefully you can read it. I included a link to the album below the picture, if that helps.



test

Because my phone is bricked and I'm waiting for a replacement in the mail, I don't have any way of checking my settings or apps. I'll definitely take all of your advice and make sure that my new Galaxy S is set up so all of the data is off, and I'll keep a closer eye on 3G Watchdog.



My phone is two feet from my wireless router when I'm in bed.



You're not missing anything, Ken. I just want to know why it shows on my bill that I have used 211 MB of my 500 MB data cap, when I have my phone set up to use my WiFi.

Here's what my bill says for my data usage-

Data
Windows Email & Int 500 MB Data Usage
@$.00/MB 211.8939MB

I am definitely going to contact Bell again tomorrow, and discuss this with some further.

Do any of you guys understand the time stamps on my bill? That's what really perplexes me, as they are all over the place and every day of the month, even though I'm not touching my phone; it's just on for my bluetooth capability and emergency backup.

Based on the info I've provided, are there any ideas about possibly what's going on, and any suggestions?

Thanks again for all of your help.

Cam

Yes. Your phone is hitting Bell's data network, or there's an error in their billing system. Your data usage looks 'normal' for someone with a smartphone that's using cellular data. They're 'chatty'.

Do you have your email set up on the 'droid? POP3, IMAP, or Exchange? If it's IMAP or Exchange (Gmail is), then your 'droid's email client is probably staying connected to the server all the time. It's constantly 'talking' to the server to make sure your email is up to date. It's not a lot of data at a time, but it's a constant drip. When you email yourself, do you *immediately* get a "you've got mail!" jingle on your phone? If so, then you do have some sort of 'push' type of email going on, and that's definitely going to smolder through data. Still, it should be WiFi, not cellular.

The kicker though is that 'do not use cellular data' option. Since your phone has that, and you're trying to use it, but the 'droid is still using cellular data, then something isn't working correctly.

Here's another test. Turn 3G off. Put your 'Droid next to or on top of a cheap clock-radio or on top of a headphone cable, even a speaker. Browse some websites. Email yourself. If you hear 'dit-ditty-dit-ditty-dit-ditty-bzzzrrrt-ditty-ditty-dit' noises from the speaker, you're hearing cellular data interference. 3G doesn't produce this interference, thus the reason for disabling it. But if your'e hearing it, your phone is *definitely* using cellular data. And to make sure you can hear the interference, call the 'Droid. It should produce a loud and long 'brrrzzzzzzzzzzzt' interference right before it rings. Similar to but different from the data noises.

Good luck!

Now, you're telling me you need a third party app to disable data usage on the phone? Perhaps there's a built in function for that? If not... uh...

Not I. I have no idea on a 'Droid. Wheelz says his phone has a "cellular data" toggle, and he's set it to "off". Therefore, he should not be seeing any data usage from Bell. Yet he's got the bill that says otherwise. A bit troubling, IMHO.

I use an iPhone4. It has a "Cellular Data" On/Off toggle built-in. I know for a fact that when it's set to "Off", it will not use any billable cellular data.

Hey Peter, thank you very much for those detailed and very informative suggestions. I'll definitely check things out when I get my replacement.



Ken, I don't necessarily "need" an app to disable the data usage, but the Quick Settings app is much easier to use, and a very quick alternative to going through a convoluted menu. It's a lot easier to have a shortcut for the Quick Settings app on my home screen, thus allowing me to have access to six or seven different settings on one screen instead of having to go through different areas of the menu for each setting i.e. brightness, data on/off, WiFi on/off, GPS on/off, and volume, ringer etc. adjustments.

It's one of the best apps available for android phones, and would be the same for the Iphone, but there's no such luck with that hunk of junk for a phone .

I obviously don't have my Galaxy S with me, but if I recall correctly, it also has a data on/off toggle button at the top of the screen when you slide the information bar down. I don't think this was available with the firmware prior to Froyo though.

I just got used to using the Quick Settings app because there's other features available with it.