Does enabling wifi improve battery life?

[Mojary]

i can't believe there's even a discussion about this. look, i've tried both evdo connection and wifi. and from my experience, my phone's battery drain was faster when i connected to my home's wifi compared to when i was downloading the same files using my phone's regular evdo internet connection.

and eschelon is correct. regarding batter life on the iphone/palm pre using wifi and comparing it to the tp2 that runs on WM. that's like comparing apples to oranges.

[MrGoodCat]

would signal quality matter at all, ie less 3g signal drains faster than better 3g signal? that might matter as well

[Mojary]

^+1 on the signal quality. just like your phone just constantly trying to make sure it has signal has an affect on your battery life, im pretty sure the same goes when you're on surfing the net on your phone and it having to find a good 3g signal.

hmmm...im wondering if it's the same when you connect to your wifi at home and the bandwidth is minimal. meaning that if everyone in your house is connected and downloading something, and then you connect your phone, does fighting for more bandwidth also have an effect on batter life?