[vancomycin]

That was an extremely informative and helpful post Sharkie - thank you. I will have to go through it a bit more in detail, but it definitely gives a bit more insight into "what's under the hood"!.

I tried setting the backlight to turn off (in 1-2min) when on battery or charging - also checked phone to adjust backlight - but it seems that the backlight never turns off - I have some pending SMS's that I haven't checked (and that function now works as per your instructions now) and I'm not sure if that was what is causing it - or maybe I have to uncheck one of the "flashing" notifications... still searching the phone for what the specific feature is - I think that's draining the battery fairly fast.

I also tried pressing the power button (once) to turn off the screen - but it keeps coming back on - even if I have the phone locked. Any ideas what I am overlooking here?

* edit - I unchecked all the "flash for X minutes" options in the settings > sounds and notifications - but also went and read through all the pending sms's -
Hopefully it was the former option that kept the phone backlight on - will have to observe.