[AvinThat]

Wirelessly posted

Hi,

Over the last couple of weeks I've been trying the Bold without 3G turned on.

Interestingly the web speed is not much different (I live in a good 3G area) however the battery performance is so much better.

ie with 3G I got 1 day

Without 3G 3 days

That's a big difference considering I still have Bluetooth and WiFi on all the time.

[david9962000]

No 3G is EDGE right?

[AvinThat]

Wirelessly posted

Yeah, EDGE & GPRS depending what's available

[dankarlinski]

Wirelessly posted (My Bold)

I have noticed that there isn't that much of difference between 3g and edge if you have full bars for both. If u use opera, it is notigable or if u teather... Other than that, edge seems to be better overall... Weird

[Snoopy92]

I agree, no big improvment between 3G and EDGE, except when multitasking (bb messenger + email + phone call).
I have switched back to EDGE only because of the better battery life

[darkdragoon]

Wirelessly posted (Bold 9000)

I think the only difference is when you do video calls or media streaming.

[Damaged7]

Wirelessly posted (Bold 9000)

I get better life with 3G off. I also live in an area with poor 3G reception though.

[JBDowd]

I get better battery life with 3g off as well. That said as new os's have come out, specifically .237 I just leave it on now. Battery life is very good.

[alexvega]

and if you have an ATT bold, you dont get the option to toggle 3g.... right? or is there a workaround?

[thekoolninja]

I personally see a big improvement from EDGE to 3G, however that is only on data extensive sites like crackberry.com or digg.com, but in mobile sites the difference is barely noticeable.

[steveoevets]

You probably wouldn't see very much difference with apps that are more text driven like email, twitter, bbm and the like. Since there is compression on the network, text gets squished pretty tight. Apps with lots of video, images audio and the like clearly require more BW so you are likely to experience slowdowns on EDGE.

Just some thoughts

[sOysaUC3]

There is an improvement, you will get that extra hour or two with just EDGE then with 3G.

[raynicolini]

I.ve had the Bold since August amd I never 1 had an area where I lost 3G, but last week I switched to Edge (2G) only for 1 reason, BATTERY.

If I am going to be browsing the web or have my Garmin Mobile GPS on, then I will switch to 3G, just so that I continue to receive my emails, other then that I will keep it in Edge mode so that my battery will last past the one day mark.

[zkyevolved]

I've had my bold for a little while now, and I can say I've only kept it in 3g for the FIRST day I had it. I don't browse the web, all I do is respond to IM's and emails, so I need a long battery life cuz my screeeeeennn isss onnnnnnnnnn alllllllllll daaaayyy loooooooong! hahaha. :D ;)
3G = Good for browsing, Bad for long days
2G = Good for Emails, Texting, Chatting, Bad for browsing!

[sheldonbk]

I'm in a good 3g area but have been curious about this alternative as a battery life trade-off. I choose instead to buy an extra battery.

[urbanite]

Turning off 3G made a big difference in battery life for me ... I spend most of my day in an office with wi-fi where my phone was constantly searching for, finding, and then losing 3G ... turning it off has worked wonders. Also my wi-fi seems more stable ... far less likely to lose my connection during the day since I switched to 2G only.

Between using wi-fi in the office and then latching on to my home wi-fi network, I'm rarely using the cell data plan. And with 2G my battery life is now 3+ days.