Weak Bluetooth on I3 Solar

That's by design. The main selling argument for the Instinct series is very long battery life at affordable cost. That's why it uses BLE (Bluetooth low Energy aka Bluetooth Smart), and keeps its power at the lowest necessary level.

You can try increasing the broadcasting power by enabling the option "Maximize Compatibility" in the secret menu accessible after slowly pushing 4× the Light button while on the screen Connectivity » Phone, but the power consumption may increase, shortening the battery life (although the battery estimate will not reflect it).

5710347 said:

I would love if you can elaborate on how to access the secret menu

1. Long-press the Menu button (middle left)
2. Scroll down to Connectivity
3. Press the GPS button (upper right)
4. Select Phone & press GPS
5. Press the Light button (upper left) four times, letting ~1s between the presses
6. Change Maximize Compatibility to On
7. Press the Set button (lower right) till you get back to the main watchface

It does not work for me.  It turns the backlight on and off; and I let 1s between them, but no works.  I tried the process several times.

What other than 'Maximize Compatibility' options are there in the 'secret' menu?

Does it have an option for displaying a completely black screen? (for energy save purposes).

What is consuming less energy - a black screen or a white screen?

Does not work for me either, just turns the backlight on and off. 

Alexandre-PETRESCU said:

What other than 'Maximize Compatibility' options are there in the 'secret' menu?

Nothing else

Alexandre-PETRESCU said:

It does not work for me.

Hm, I have just checked it - unfortunately it only works on Instinct 3 AMOLED. It looks like I3 Solar does not have this hidden option.

Alexandre-PETRESCU said:

What is consuming less energy - a black screen or a white screen?

Both of them consume the same (almost nothing). Only changes of pixels from black to white or vice versa require some power. The consumption in steady state consumes close to nothing, regardless of the state of the pixels.

trux said:

Both of them consume the same (almost nothing). Only changes of pixels from black to white or vice versa require some power. The consumption in steady state consumes close to nothing, regardless of the state of the pixels.

Thanks, it is good to know.

I suspect though that when pressing backlight it would consume more if the screen had black features on a white background.

Alexandre-PETRESCU said:

I suspect though that when pressing backlight it would consume more if the screen had black features on a white background.

No, the backlight is a uniform light source, not depending on the displayed pattern

thanks