This morning an uproar was caused when it was reported by WMPoweruser that HTC confirmed that they had no plans to deliver a high-end flagship device for Windows Phone this year. I admit my first reaction was a mixture of smug “I thought as much” and “truly a sad day”. Then my curious nature came to the surface. I started to follow the digital source trail until I landed at the original article. The original article paints a slightly different picture than the above referenced article produced by WMPoweruser.

The article is basically dealing specifically with the Android platform and the difference between last year’s One Series of phones launched (One X, One X+, One S, One V) and whether or not HTC might follow up with a “+” version for this year’s one. So there you have it folks. I know it seems like HTC has mailed it in when it comes to Windows Phone commitment but until we get to the fall and still not see any indications of a follow up to the HTC 8X I’d encourage you to step back from the ledge.

Here is the link to the original interview posted by Omio if you’d like to read it: HTC Talks To Omio

Sources: WMPoweruser; Omio

We’ve started a new weekly series App Effect to promote awesome apps and games that our staff of writers and editors use in our personal lives and also what we think can add real value to our readers lives. We’ll do our part to promote the awesome work that is going on across the board. We need your help to make this not just another series, who needs that?

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The Mobility Digest staff

A few days ago I purchased a few songs from the Zune Marketplace and as usual I received a purchase confirmation detailing the transaction. Who charged my account? Zune. Well today something caught my eye. I bought a song today from the Zune Marketplace but it wasn’t Zune who charged me. The purchase was charged as Xbox Music! We know that the changeover to Xbox Music is coming but now we get confirmation that the backend changes have already started. On a humorous note I couldn’t help to see the old Windows Phone logo being used and the tag Windows Phone and Zune Better Together.

This week in “really? Why did this take 2 years?!” JP Morgan releases their banking app. I’ve never been a a fan of these apps, I just go directly to the full website via the browser, but I suppose the iCulture has taught us, if it ain’t an app, it ain’t real.

Check out the list of new features:

• Monitor your account
• Perform transactions
• Transfer funds between accounts
• Make check deposits via Chase QuickDeposit
• Send wire transfers
• Send/request money with Chase person-to-Person QuickPay
• Find locations
• Find out how to contact Chase
• View alerts history
• Manage your Chase credit card.
• Let’s dig in and see what Chase Mobile does for you.

source wmpoweruser

AccuWeather

Version 2.2.0 includes numerous performance improvements and bug fixes to provide an even more consistent and enjoyable weather experience.

MSN Money Stocks

***What’s New in Version 1.8 (Mango)***

- Improved news feed&  Bug fixes

LevelUp

Unfortunately the change log is not included.

Lyrics

You can now scan your entire library and match lyrics. Includes a profanity filter. Displays artist biographies, twitter handle and lyrics catalogue artist by artist.

PayPal

New “Local” feature where you can find local merchants who are using our PayPal Here™ service and pay them with PayPal.

You would think with 100,000+ apps in Marketplace there would be enough of everything by now. Not talking about those popular titles like;Instagram or Pandora. Personally, if these big titles don’t think Windows Phone is important enough to invest  a few thousand dollars on an app, because market share has not reached critical mass despite the fact that their entire existence (back end) most likely depends on Microsoft, I say to hell with them. There are alternatives. But I digress. No, I am talking about useful apps from indie developers. Those little things that help to make your life a bit easier. Maybe that’s why an App Store needs a half million offerings, so that you can find the 100 or so that will work for you. Not sure.

Pretty certain if I gave this some deep thought I could come up with a slew of projects to keep developers busy for months. But here are two that are so close to being “available” I can taste them (and have).

App # 1 – Not sure what you want to call this one. Catalog app, my stuff app, remember stuff app, whatever.  I need an app that will allow me to do the following; Take a photo of an item, give the photo a title, add some additional comment in a separate field, organize said objects in self-titled folders, backup the data to the cloud. That’s it. Seems simple enough. Good luck finding it. What would you use something like this for? Well, say you are at Sam’s and you see a big bag of dog food, or maybe some Canon inkjet ink. If you don’t already know, a very large percentage of SKUs at warehouse club stores (and Walmart) are customized for that particular chain, which happens to drive up the price for everybody btw. Could be the net weight or maybe the way a combination of items are packaged. This of course makes it hard to compare apples to apples, which is “exactly” what the retailer intended. But wouldn’t it be nice to photograph the description placards for these items and add additional comment, so the next time you are at PetSmart or Staples, you can compare products and make an “educated consumer” decision. I know, I can scan the SKU and then spend 10 minutes searching for the best deal, filtering out incomplete entries. But shipping a 25lb. bag of Iam’s from Amazon is not exactly an optimal idea. This is but one example of how this kind of app could be used. I am sure there are many others.

How did I come up with such exact detail for for my imaginary app? Well, I had it on my phone way back in 2011. It’s called Remember All and has a whopping 3 reviews, including mine from 3/2/2011.  The app does everything described. Plus, as a bonus, it also records the exact location the photo was taken. So you will know where you were when you snapped that whatever. So what’s missing? How about a backup solution. I used this app for several months and collected nearly two dozen entries. Then I needed to hard reset my Surround. Guess where all my effort went. That’s right, into that magnetic alternate dimension where all lost data gets stored.  After starting to collect info again, and again needing an hard reset (back when I was tinkering with Registry Endpoints) I gave up on this app. Tried contacting the developer but got nowhere. As the app has not been updated in more than a year, the project appears dead in the water. I have searched and searched for alternatives and downloaded a few, but they all lack a backup solution. Something that is absolutely necessary for any app that will be collecting a large amount of user data. I did find a Home Inventory app that does most of what I have described above, and does have a backup solution, but it is so customized for its purpose I couldn’t use it for my needs (ok, where did I put the dog food photo, in the Kitchen or Living Room). Maybe my request is just to niche though, and I will forever be stuck without a viable solution.

App# 2 – This is an app that would compile expiration dates for; your passport, license, registration, anti-virus subscriptions, app and magazine subscriptions, XBox, Zune Pass, MagicJack, App Hub, domains, etc. You could see them all listed alphabetically or by expiration, and add/edit as needed. Then when an entry was coming due, you would get a notification reminder. Now wouldn’t this be a good idea,

So good that someone already thought of it. That’s right. It’s called Expiry Date Pro, the app with the most horrendous app icon in Marketplace (can’t be more than 2×2 pixels, taken with a blurry cam). Another app that’s more than a year old , and abandoned. Although the app design is a bit odd (this developer never read any Metro guidelines) I had everything I needed, including a backup solution. Well, sort of. When I first downloaded the app, I noticed there was no link to SkyDrive or Dropbox for backing up, so I had to ask. The response from the developer was that he was using some Azure platform thing and his backup was more secure than any other alternative. Right. While not perfect, the app worked. Prior to picking up my Lumia 900 on pre-launch day, I got all of the apps that provide for Cloud backup and did a sync, so I would be all set when I installed everything on my new device the next day. But when I tried to backup EDP, I got a failure message. Thinking it was a temporary thing I proceeded to install all my apps the next day, but couldn’t find Expiry Date Pro in Marketplace. Only Expiry Date, a free version (which does not include backup) released a few months after the paid app. So I downloaded Expiry Date and found a link within the app to upgrade which brought me to a hidden link for Expiry Date Pro. Downloaded ( I already paid for it) and tried the backup/restore function again without any luck. So there I was transferring about 35 entries from my Surround to L900 manually. That was almost five months ago and the backup feature is still dead, as are these apps. So much for that Azure solution. Dropbox would still be working, even with an app no longer receiving updates.

There are a couple alternatives in Marketplace, but none include a backup solution. And there are several that keep track of expiration dates for things in your refrigerator (would someone actually take the time to record the exp date for a bottle of salad dressing), but again no backups. I am thinking of maybe using the new web interface for Clever-To-Do (task app) and entering all of my expiration dates as tasks. I could categorize them all in a different context or project to keep them organized. At least I would have a viable backup for transitioning to another, or multiple devices. But this app just handled this function so well. I would miss it.

While on the subject of backups, I know WP8 is supposed to offer some type of global backup solution, probably to SkyDrive. But honestly, unless there is some type of “app specific” restore/sync function, it won’t work as well as you may think. Several of my apps not only backup, but sync data to the Cloud. So I can keep multiple devices up to data with my SkyDrive or Dropbox app specific backups. And what about app deletions/reinstalls. We have all encountered an app that needed to be uninstalled/reinstalled for new updated changes to take effect. How will data from a global backup be restored to that specific app? Lots of questions.

So, any developers out there interested in taking on a challenging project? How about contacting these developers and picking up where they have left off. That would make things somewhat easier, wouldn’t it. Can’t offer much more than one guaranteed download and a good review if the app is deserving. Oh, and a Mobility Digest app feature of course. And for non-developers, any indie apps that you wish were available to you today? Some app categories are saturated with alternatives, while others are sparse at best. Give the coders something to think about.

Been living in Florida for almost two years and this will be my first close encounter. While there is only one path in the spaghetti scenario at right that would have an impact on me, a co-worker who has lived here most of his life, and spends hours mulling over this stuff, predicts that’s where Isaac will go, ala Charley in 2004. While the chance of this storm adversely affecting Central Florida is low, those living along the west coast of Florida or southern Mississippi and Alabama better hold on to their hats. Even if this is only a fire drill for me, better to be prepared than sorry. Something I learned from the Boy Scouts I think.

First piece of advice will be to have a fully charged phone if (or when) the power goes out. Probably wouldn’t hurt to turn on the Battery Saver feature (both options) to eliminate any unnecessary syncs. If power or your broadband connection does go out, turn off your WiFi as it will have nothing to connect to. Beyond that you will be at the mercy of the fury of the storm and the preparedness and responsiveness of your utility company. Here are a couple more things to consider though.

Battery Backup

I will have a total of 9,000mAh of backup power available to me via four USB backup devices; (2) at 3,000mAh each, (1) at 1,500mAh and a 1,500mAh Solar Charger which is getting a booster as we speak. These could give me a couple days of reliable phone service, assuming I have service, should things go bad. I usually keep one in my bag, the solar charger in the car, and the others around the house to give me a little boost if I need it before going to sleep. I used to have a AA Battery Charger (from Boxwave) that worked with my old PocketPCs, and later my phone, but it got misplaced during the move. I know it’s around, just don’t know where. Paranoia set in and I ordered a replacement from Boxwave while typing this article. Still the same $19.95 that I paid nearly 10 years ago. This one uses (4) AAs for 6v, where other only use a single or two batteries. Don’t imagine they are very effective.

Let There Be Light

Not directly related to mobility, but can’t argue these items help you to be mobile. Aside from essentials like; water, food and medications, light helps out when you have no power. Especially when nature calls in a windowless bathroom. A couple LED Mag Flashlights, the brightest lights on the planet, along with a fluorescent lantern or two will help you to navigate in the dark. Oh, and don’t forget those “D” batteries.

Apps, Apps, Apps……

While it might not be a good time to play Angry Birds and running down your phone’s battery, there are a few apps that you might want to have to keep you in touch with what’s going on nearby. Weather Channel, or the general weather app of your choice, will get you the basics. And it might be all you need, but there are a few more that go into more depth from a radar perspective. And who doesn’t like tracking a hurricane and watching that swirl on screen.

RAD Now! is a simple, free, radar app that I have been using since it was released. Opens quickly and give you the info you need. I like the way I can pinch to zoom in or out and navigate around the country. Good when the Yankees are in a rain delay so I can check the venues local radar and make the call long before MLB does. I am still evaluating a new app, RadarTile, which features an updatable Live Tile. It’s a simple, FREE, single screen app that will give you radar for the region you select. Sure, Weather Channel has radar on the back of their Live Tile, but it only provides about a 25 mile radius. So when it’s all green (or yellow, or red) I know it’s raining out but don’t know much else. RadarTile gives me a 250-300 mile radius so I can see what’s coming or how much longer the current wave of moisture will be around. It uses a Background Task so I assume it updates every 30 minutes or so. In honor of Isaac (gotta respect these storms) I purchased Hurricane Tracker yesterday. Provides a lot of valuable data and charts to give you an idea of what’s coming and what to expect. Living in Florida, it was a worthy $0.99 investment.

For those that are in the track of Isaac, here is hoping it passes by with no more than a few scattered deck chairs and fallen branches. Oh, and probably lots and lots of rain. Just remember to prioritize. When the power goes out, prep your phone and drink all the beer “quickly” before it warms. You should already have bottled water, and the ice might last for a day or two, so the hard stuff can wait till later. Stay dry my friends.

I started my series of battery drain tests after reading countless theories and rumors about why our batteries lose juice. Don’t think I have solved every mystery, but I did separate truth from fiction in several areas. My BDOD (Battery Drain Obsessive Disorder) started back with my  Palm II. I still remember the panic that would come over me when I lifted the antenna on my Palm VII, knowing that my battery was draining like shotgunning a can of beer, while it searched over a very slow CDMA network for an answer to my query. The fact is that as soon as you take your phone off of a charging device it will being to lose power. Nothing can change that (until they perfect that solar charging cell built into your device display). To combat my BDOD, for every new device I purchased, I would also include; 1 or 2 spare batteries, an external spare battery charger and three AC chargers for; home, office and travel bag. And of course a car charger. It helped when there was some backward compatibility, but that didn’t happen often enough.

Website will give you helpful tips to save battery like the list below;

• Set your screen brightness to “low”
• Set your screen timeout to 30 seconds
• Turn off Location services when not in use
• Turn off unnecessary Background Tasks and Push notifications
• Turn off Bluetooth and WiFi radios when not in use
• Disable Find My Phone, Phone Update and Feedback
• Set email to manually update
• Remove apps that you don’t use
• Turn on Battery Saver Options 1 & 2
• Enough already………….

You might as well power your device down and call it a day. Your battery is going to drain but don’t let BDOD overcome you. Enjoy your device to the fullest and if you have to charge your phone a little more often, so be it. If you are concerned about your total disregard for phone energy efficiency and its effect on your carbon footprint here is a suggestion. Replace one 100w incandescent light bulb in your house with a CFL equivalent (23-30w-75% savings), or even better an LED (16-20w-80% savings), and you will be able to double your phone’s charging cycles and still save energy. See how easy that was.

You phone’s display is the #1 battery bandit, followed by your data connection (especially AT&T MicroCells and LTE equip phones) Your processer is probably #3, but I will let the experts fight that out. All of the inconveniences, err…helpful suggestions above may possibly gain you 20% over the course of the day. It it all worth it? All that for a 30-40 minute booster charge. Not for me.

Here is Jim’s list of suggestions to enjoy your phone while fighting back BDOD;

• Get a charging only USB cable for work. You can plug your phone into any USB port; pc, monitor, etc., and be juicing up without compromising security, privacy, etc.
• Get a micro USB charger for your car
• Use the charger that came with your phone. The mA rating is designed to work best with your device.
• Pick up a couple USB Portable charging units. They are cheaper than spare batteries and will work on your next device, and the one after that. The 1500-1800mAh models with built in AC plugs are nice, but the 3,000-5,000mAh models are worth every penny. Never be without power again. I keep 3 of them charged 24/7, plus a solar charger in the back window of my car. A good Scout is always prepared.
• Set your screen brightness to “high” and then set it to “automatic”. This will allow your phone to cycle from low to high depending on ambient light. (Sorry Rogers L900 users. I feel your pain. Keep it on medium for now. Shouldn’t be long).
• Set your screen timeout to 3 minutes, or longer. Let that Start screen shine for others to see and save some wear and tear on your Power button.
• Leave Location services on, unless you really have something to hide. In that case, get outta here.
• Turn on all the Background Tasks and Push Notifications that will make your life easier and more enjoyable
• If you use Bluetooth or WiFi 40-50% of the day, just leave the dang thing on. Not sure about Bluetooth, but WiFi uses almost no extra energy, even with persistent WiFi running.
• Turn on Find My Phone, Phone Update and Feedback. These are services to help you and Microsoft. Use them.
• Set email to “push”, or at the time frequency that works best for you. Automatically receiving email is a feature. Don’t disable it for a few percent of battery power.
• Install as many apps as you like. Only the app you are currently running uses any juice.
• Turn on Battery Saver #1 (when your battery drops to critical levels) but reserve Battery Saver #2 for special circumstances, like; natural and man-made disasters, camping in the wilderness, etc.

Cut yourself free from BDOD. Enjoy your phone and stop worrying about that battery icon. As a matter of fact, my phone is plugged into a DigiPower Power Plus right now.

Here are the Nine Simple Truths about Windows Phone battery drain along with the associated link to each article.

First truth: If you want to save battery (or don’t want to use any more), turn on that push email. And if you have mail checking set to 1 hour, change it. At least for now till someone can verify if there is really a problem. NOTE: This has been confirmed with Hotmail & Live “push” email. Yet to be confirmed for Gmail and Exchange accounts.

Second Truth: Turning both Feedback and Phone Update ON have virtually no effect on battery performance, and presumably transfer very little data (as they don’t impact the battery at all). But, turning these services OFF without following up with a soft reset (Power off/on cycle) will result in excess battery drain. Who would have thunk.

Third Truth: Enabling Battery Saver (both options) can save up to half the battery power your phone normally consumes when sleeping, and a smaller percentage when awake. But you do lose most of the functionality of your phone, like email updates and external Background Task/Push Tile updates. Marketplace App updates and internal background Tasks (those that don’t need Internet access) will continue to work.

Fourth Truth: Background Tasks do drain a little of your battery; with 8 active Background Tasks, typically about 0.5% per hour or 8% drain over the course of a 16 hour day.

Fifth Truth: Having multiple email accounts (I have 5) syncing via “as items arrive” or a timed interval will use some battery through the course of the day. But no more than about 6% per day on average. Note: if you receive hundreds of emails a day, your mileage may vary.

Sixth Truth:  The stand-alone Facebook app will not drain you battery just by pinning it to your Start screen, even with push notifications (it does not use a Background Task) turned on. Caveat: If you have 1,000 Facebook friends and receive 100s of notifications per day, then yes, this would probably have an impact on your battery life. But what else would you expect.

Seventh Truth: While it is “possible” that using an Edge connection vs. LTE can conserve battery power, it may require additional steps like rebooting your phone each time you suspect that you are accessing a different tower. Without performing this extra step, using Edge could actually consume significantly more battery power. Proceed with caution young grasshoppers.

Eighth Truth: Persistent WiFi does not only use virtually zero power while running in the background. Combined with a data connection, especially power guzzling LTE, it can actually save you battery power. Let me state that again, more slowly this time. “Persistent……WiFi………..saves…….you……..battery……..power”.

Ninth Truth: Keeping  IE Tabs or Tombstoned apps open in the background appear to have zero effect on your battery. So forget about that Back button and just keep opening whatever you want. Microsoft has you covered.

To conclude my Truths series for Windows Phone I wanted to check into an area that has bugged me for several weeks. Anyone who has been reading my test results knows that I have occasionally encountered anomalies, results that were worse than expected. I usually countered the odd duck result with a couple consistent values to be sure the exception was not really the rule. I still don’t know what’s responsible for these unusual drains, but one of the suspects have been open tabs in Internet Explorer. Before starting a test I would usually back out of all tombstoned apps and check IE for any open tabs and close them. Wanted to have that consistency between test results. A few times I did forget to check and left tabs open. On more than one of those occasions, the result turned out to be a higher than expected overnight battery drain. Coincidence, or a bug. Only one way to find out.

To recap, my phone (Lumia 900) is setup with the following:

• - Data (mostly LTE) and Wi-Fi ON – Bluetooth OFF

• - 8 Active Background Tasks (3 Internal)
• - Location Services ON
• - 5 Email accounts syncing (3 push, 1 every 15 minutes, 1 every 2 hours)
• - Phone set down and untouched for a 8 hour period

My previous baseline tests have resulted in an 16%, or 2% per hour, battery drain in an overnight 8 hour test. For clarification, my Background Tasks include; USA Today, Fox News, Weather Channel, Mehdoh, Urban Dictionary, Network Dashboard, Clever-To-Do and Battery Meter (a homebrew app set to update every 10 minutes).

Test 1 – Before setting my phone down for testing, I opened IE and opened 6 tabs. I tapped the Back button to remove the open pages from the multi-task view. I reopened IE one more time to verify that all 6 tabs were still active within the application. Backed out again and set the phone down. The results; 100% at 12:34AM / 80% at 8:34AM – Difference of 20% or 2.5% per hour. Interesting, a 4% higher result than my baseline. But one test is never enough.

Test 2 – Same setup as Test 1. The results: 100% at 1:16AM / 88% at 9:16AM – Difference of 12% or 1.5% per hour. Wholly mAh savings Batman! That’s the lowest result I have ever gotten in an overnight test. No idea how that happened. But I do have another suspicion, one that I may never be able to prove without picking a brain at Microsoft. I suspect that sometime between 12:00AM and 1:00AM, my phone does a sync with Marketplace to check for updates. With nearly 200 apps/games, I get updates at least 3-4 days per week, and they almost always appear by about 1:00AM. Presuming this is the case, and being that I didn’t take my phone off charge till about 1:12AM for this test, the Marketplace scan might have already concluded, hence the smaller overnight drain. Just a theory mind you. And with only 10 or 20 apps, a typical user might not notice the battery hit. Another Microsoft assumption would be that most phones are on overnight charge by 12/1:00AM. Of course, if app information is all stored and compiled on some server and only an update notification is pushed to my phone, then my theory is a bust. The other, less complicated, theory would be a simple variation in cellular signal on certain nights cause by the weather, or who knows what else.

With two odd results though testing was far from complete.

Test 3 – Same setup as Test 1, except I decided to leave five apps tombstoned; a couple IE pages, my Favorites folder app page and a couple others. Might as well kill two myths with one test. The results: 100% at 12:36AM / 84% at 8:36AM – Difference of 16%, or 2% per hour. Ok, now we are getting somewhere. Can I have another.

Test 4 – Same setup as Test 3. The results: 100% at 12:44AM / 85% at 8:44AM – Difference of 15%, or 1.875% per hour. That’s more like it. It looks like my IE Tabs theory, along with tombstoned apps, have no effect on your battery. Going to be hard to break my OCD habit of always backing completely out out everything. Time to make better use of the Start button. But while I am testing tombstoned apps, one more scenario wouldn’t hurt.

Test 5 – For this final test I opened five apps that generally use, or try to use Background Tasks; Skype, iHeartRadio, IMDb, SuperTube and Yelp. If tombstoned apps are really tombstoned, they shouldn’t use any battery power, right? Before starting the test I tapped the Start button to put all five apps in a tombstoned state. The results; 100% at 12:19AM / 85% at 8:19AM – Difference of 15%. or 1.875% per hour. So there you have it. BTW, Yelp did launch it’s Background Yask, without my permission. IMDb has done the same a couple times. Oh, and BTW2, with Skype and iHeatRadio both running in the background, persistent WIFi was active during the test.

Ninth Truth – Keeping  IE Tabs or Tombstoned apps open in the background appear to have zero effect on your battery. So forget about that Back button and just keep opening whatever you want. Microsoft has you covered.

I have enjoyed bringing you some insight into these battery drain myths and theories. But I honestly look forward to playing with my phone each night into the wee hours and then letting it charger properly overnight. Giving it up to the testing lab every night at around 10:00pm, till 8:30 each morning has been a real drag. Although this round of testing has concluded, don’t think for a second that I won’t continue to try and figure out what causes the occasional increases in battery drain. I can’t help myself.

Up until a week ago, if you asked 10 Windows Phone users why they didn’t have an option for persistent WiFi, at least 9 of them would have answered, “because it will kill you battery stupid”. I will admit that up until I found the iHeartRadio trick, I was one of those 9 people. But I can tell you as a matter of fact, it is simply not true and can be filed away with the likes of; if you don’t brush, all your teeth will fall out tonight. Or, if you don’t drink your milk you’ll get rickets.

I ran a series of tests on my Lumia 900 and discovered that, by a slim margin, keeping WiFi active persistently while your LTE data connection is also active, can in fact SAVE you battery power. The reasoning is simple enough. With persistent WiFi on, you LTE connection will remain in a idle state while your phone is awake or asleep. Sleeping LTE uses very little power and a reasonable WiFi connection uses much less power than active LTE, so one radio balances out the other. Almost sounds like it was meant to be.

I also ran some tests with my non-SIM HTC Surround. As the phone has no access to a data connection it was easier to prove that WiFi was in fact working while the phone was asleep. I left WiFi running on my Surround for nearly 3 days, 71 hours actually. Total drain over that period was 86% or 1.21% per hour. Sounds like a lot, but take note of a few things. The Surround has a meager 1230mAh battery. So running the same test on a L900 would have dropped about 53% over three days. And that was with one “push” email account, two Background Tasks, Location services enabled, and a crapload of installed app updates (I still have 150 apps on my Surround) that Marketplace probably never got a chance to check as I previously only had my phone connected sporadically over WiFi. I ran one additional 24 hour test with my Surround, with persistent WiFi off and on to measure the difference. With WiFi turned off I dropped a total of 36% over 24 hours, or 1.5% per hour. Keep in mind that the Surround battery drains much differently than the Lumias. In previous tests I discovered that my battery would drain quickly from 100% to about 85-82%, level off over the mid-range, and then drain more quickly in the last 20% or so (with Battery Saver disabled). So ignore the actual number and focus on the difference. With persistent WiFi active, my Surround dropped 31% over the same 24 hour period. Yeah, a little lower with WiFi on vs. no connection at all. I’m confused too. Let’s just call this a tie.

So as we now know that persistent WiFi does not kill your battery, and may even help to extend your battery life, why don’t all Windows Phones have a option to keep persistent WiFi on. Why did we have to discover this via a bug in a few apps. I can only think of one possible reason. Carriers don’t like WiFi. They may talk about providing you with WiFi hotspots. and suggesting you connect to WiFi whenever possible. But the truth is all they are doing is trying to condition you to consume more and more data, so that when you don’t have a WiFi connection, you will be using more of your metered allocation (face it, unlimited is all but gone) and with any luck, may even go over your monthly limit. That’s good for Carriers and bad for everyone else.

When Windows Phone was released, Microsoft was fighting an uphill battle with Carriers. As much as Carriers desperately want a third ecosystem to keep Apple and Android in check (and use it against those mobile behemoths) they used their twisted reverse psychology to make unreasonable demands on the likes of Microsoft and Nokia. I can only imagine the 800lb Gorilla pounding its fists in private and biting so hard on its lower lip that it bleeds. And while my guess is all Carriers would prefer WiFi to be outlawed, only one or two would have the necessary clout to make unreasonable demands, even while portraying themselves as a premier partner. With one such Carrier having 15% of the World / 52% of the US Windows Phone Market, according to the Outsider app (previously I’m a Wp7, and I know, anecdotal), it starts to become clearer who is moving the levers behind the curtain.

So how would persistent WiFi work. This is how I would envision the new, improved Windows Phone WiFi. When there was no active access point available, WiFi would sleep as it does now, using virtually no power at all. If you woke your phone up and a WiFi access point was available, your phone would connect, and remain connected as long as you were within that access point range. Wouldn’t matter if your phone was awake, plugged in to a charger or sleeping in your pocket. For example, you are connected to WiFi at home, walk out the front door and get in your car. As you pull away, you lose your home access point signal and WiFi goes to sleep. If you turned your phone on in the car it would connect to your car’s WiFi access point (my future world), but otherwise you are at the mercy of Carrier data for your short trip to Target. After you walk into Target, you get a message tingle and turn your phone on to check the text or email. As soon as you do, you connect to Target’s free WiFi network, and will remain connected till you get out to the parking lot. Next stop or store, same scenario. Virtually connected to WiFi all of the time, so Skype and other VOiP services become more practical for everyday use. And good news for those pesky secured WiFi networks that require you to login each time you disconnect. Of course there will be instances where you will have a need for that 20Mbps+ LTE speed for whatever reason. So you override the current available access point with a simple tap. But the next time you turn your phone on in a new access point’s range, WiFi takes over again. Now that’s good for everyone, except the Carriers. Oh well.

Come on Microsoft, the cat’s now out of the bag. There is no place to hide. You have run out of excuses for not making persistent WiFi a feature on every Windows Phone, regardless of version. It’s time to push back and do the right thing. Carriers be damned. Customers deserve the right to maintain a constant connection to free, abundantly available WiFi signals. I challenge anyone to explain to me why a persistent WiFi option should not be made available, either via a Marketplace app (we already know that apps can inadvertently trigger persistent WiFi) or as part of the WP7.8/8.0 refresh. In yesterday’s Truth article, Joker added a comment indicating that Microsoft has rectified this issue with something called  “Connected Standby” for Win8 and WP8. Let’s hope that’s accurate. In the meantime, if an update for iHeartRadio does show up on your phone tomorrow, be sure to ignore it, unless you want to lose access to this newly discovered feature.