does tethering overheat/ruin your phone

[OBLAMA2009]

someone else said that when they did tethering with their phone, it would overheat after about an hour and become unstable. has this been anyone else's experience. does it make your phone overheat, or ruin your battery or otherwise put a lot of wear on your phone. i have droid x so if anyone has a comment about that particular phone that would be appreciated

 

[vshah]

i've used tethering as my main connection for a few computers for a few days at a time...never run into any issues. Under heavy use, I do need to be connected to the AC adapter instead of USB or the battery does drain slowly. The phone gets a bit warm, but i've never experienced any instability as a result of tethering. I have a nexus one.

Have you tried tethering yet?

 

[Bateluer]

I've gotten my Droid pretty toasty before, while streaming Hulu and OC'd to 1Ghz. That drains the battery unless I'm connected to AC. Doesn't seem to affect stability though.

I've never had a problem with tethering it, usually see it get slightly warmer but nothing serious. Admittedly, I don't tether for very long periods though.

Droid 1.

 

[Demo24]

No, it's not going to do that unless its well overclocked, plugged in, in the sun. I've taken my D1 up into the upper 50c range and while it wasn't happy about it it still works fine.

 

[OBLAMA2009]

i've used tethering as my main connection for a few computers for a few days at a time...never run into any issues. Under heavy use, I do need to be connected to the AC adapter instead of USB or the battery does drain slowly. The phone gets a bit warm, but i've never experienced any instability as a result of tethering. I have a nexus one.

Have you tried tethering yet?

no i havent tried it yet. im trying to decide whether to 1)root my dx and tether 2)pay $20 to tether with dx 3)get a virgin phone just to tether 4)get a usb modem

it sounds like you guys are saying it works fine so ill probably do 2) or 4)lte

thx

 

[gorcorps]

Most electronic devices I've used lately actually have some sort of thermocouple or temp limit built in. If it gets so hot that it may be bad for the phone, it should automatically shut off and probably even with a warning message upon boot. I've left my mp3 player in my glovebox before (by mistake) on a hot day. When I tried to turn it on the screen flashed "overheat" and shut itself off. I think you'll be pretty safe. That said when tethering I do notice the phone getting quite warm, so it is a little frightening... but they're built well on the inside so don't worry until you start seeing warnings.

 

[vshah]

also, i have my phone set to a sleep profile in setCPU that helps keep it cool. 460mhz is more than enough for tethering to work well. i don't use the phone itself while i'm tethering.

 

[AznAnarchy99]

no i havent tried it yet. im trying to decide whether to 1)root my dx and tether 2)pay $20 to tether with dx 3)get a virgin phone just to tether 4)get a usb modem

it sounds like you guys are saying it works fine so ill probably do 2) or 4)lte

thx

Huh? It works fine why would you pay $20 for something you can do for free.

 

[OBLAMA2009]

Most electronic devices I've used lately actually have some sort of thermocouple or temp limit built in. If it gets so hot that it may be bad for the phone, it should automatically shut off and probably even with a warning message upon boot. I've left my mp3 player in my glovebox before (by mistake) on a hot day. When I tried to turn it on the screen flashed "overheat" and shut itself off. I think you'll be pretty safe. That said when tethering I do notice the phone getting quite warm, so it is a little frightening... but they're built well on the inside so don't worry until you start seeing warnings.

im a particularly worried about overheating because i keep it in an otterbox.

 

[dpodblood]

No. Logically tethering should not cause any more wear on your phone than using 3g/4g on the phone itself.

 

[OBLAMA2009]

Huh? It works fine why would you pay $20 for something you can do for free.

to do it for free do you have to root your phone? i need my phone for work so i need it to be reliable and dont want to modify it too much

 

[OBLAMA2009]

also, i have my phone set to a sleep profile in setCPU that helps keep it cool. 460mhz is more than enough for tethering to work well. i don't use the phone itself while i'm tethering.

where is setcpu ? is it available on an unmoded droidx?

 

[vshah]

where is setcpu ? is it available on an unmoded droidx?

you can find it on the market. you need to be rooted for it to work. i believe there's an app called z4Root that provides a 1 click root for the droid x.

not that with just root, you will only be able to underclock. you won't be able to overclock without a custom kernel...and i'm not sure those exist yet for the droid x.

 

[Kaido]

I've read with a jailbroken iPhone, the power load for 3G tethering is more than the A/C and battery both provide, so it drains the battery even while plugged in. Never been tethered long enough to see if that's true or not, but the phone does get pretty warm. I believe the official tethering method is via USB, not 3G-to-Wireless as a hotspot (at least with AT&T - Verizon does mobile hotspot, I think?)

 

[AznAnarchy99]

to do it for free do you have to root your phone? i need my phone for work so i need it to be reliable and dont want to modify it too much

Then root it and use the stock rom. Rooting is basically unlocking administrator. Then just download wireless tether and you're good to go.

 

[gsaldivar]

Any overheating can damage your phone, and permanently reduce the life of the battery.

Most phones have a sensor to cut power in the event of overheating. However it's always a good idea to watch closely to make sure that the device is kept cool especially when doing processor intensive tasks like tethering.

 

[Anonemous]

Been tethering for many years now. Phone does heat up a bit and power drain is increased while tethering. As others have said before me, it's best to have the phone plugged in (to wall or computer) while tethering. And yes I have ran out of battery while tethering even when the phone was plugged in (through usb) during gaming. It seems any streaming/online gaming drains the phone's power like crazy while web browsing doesn't.