The fact our mobile devices offer various types of connectivity is a wonderful thing, since it allows us to connect to the web with relative ease, lessening the need to open a notebook or fire-up a desktop computer. The convenience doesn’t come without its drawbacks, however, and if, for example, you leave Wi-Fi connected indefinitely, you’ll find your battery isn’t as accommodating as it perhaps should be.
Before smartphones offered so many features, battery was of little issue, and one could leave a mobile phone without charge for several days before the dreaded warnings began appearing. Despite the obvious advantages of having the world at one’s fingertips, consumers – now more so than ever – need to be very economical with their battery usage.
Sentry, an Android app created by Aaron Dimet, attempts to reduce the severity of battery loss when connected to a Wi-Fi hotspot by offering a variety of useful management features. When arriving home, the last think we think about is how the Wi-Fi is affecting battery life, and if we forget to leave the device on charge, the next day then becomes a battle to survive with 17% juice left over.
Sentry is pretty easy to configure, and works in an automated fashion by cycling your Wi-Fi. If it does find a connection, then it remains turned on, but if not, it will deactivate Wi-Fi in order to conserve those valuable drops of battery. Even when Sentry is working its magic, though, you can still connect to – or disconnect from – your Wi-Fi at will, and the app will not get in your way.
You can set Sentry to check for connection based on a bunch of variables, including timed intervals, or device actions such as every time the device is booted up or unlocked.
It claims not to adversely affect battery life, which is just as well, since that’s the problem it purports to combat, and it’s absolutely free of charge over at the Google Play Store. The link is provided below, so download it, and let us know how it runs for you by dropping a comment on our Facebook or Google+ pages.
Download Sentry for Android [Google Play link]
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