New User Wants to Thank Group - Barnes & Noble Nook Tablet

I've been quietly lurking on this site for about 2 weeks since I got a nook tablet (16GB) with an N2A card (which was horrible). I came to this site looking for a way to mod my device and ended up learning a lot more than I intended. I have sampled quite a few ROMs on here and am astonished at the amount of work that has gone into these ports. I have a device that is so much more functional it's not even funny. Already I've reclaimed the space that BN had partitioned from users. I still have a lot to learn but I wanted to express my thanks to all the developers who work hard on these. I am very appreciative that a device which is technically 'obsolete' can be revitalized and turned into something very usable. I am still trying out various ROMs to try to see which is giving me the best stability and RAM use. So far the one I am using I unfortunately forgot the name of. Any way of finding out which ROM you might have flashed? What I like about it is most of the ROMs use so much RAM I am left with around 200MB of RAM without anything running. One particular ROM I'm using consistently gives me around 400-450 MB of free RAM even with some background apps running. A HUGE improvement. A couple ROMS literally left me with less than 100MB. Anyway if anyone has any advice or happens to know how to determine which ROM I might be using I'd be very happy. Mainly I wanted to introduce myself and thank the developers. GREAT STUFF!

Some info that most Android users are not aware of, as its a bit non-intuitive:
Having less memory (RAM) available is actually a good thing. Apps can be "running" in the background without actually using the processor or other resources. They are cached via the RAM in order to allow you to relaunch them quickly. Android's memory management is quite good, albeit different from say Windows.
This is why Task Killers are generally a bad idea. I used to use them as a means to kill apps when they froze or whatever, but now, with the roms I have on my devices, I have set long-press of the back button to kill the current app, should I need to do this.
Read this article for a bit more info.
tl;dr less memory available is not necessarily a bad thing on Android.

Sorry for delayed reply
Forgive my tardy response. Our internet was out for 2 days. I understand what you are saying but what I was noticing was a huge number of active programs that were not in use, nor are commonly in use enough to justify their being cached. One particular ROM was leaving me with less than 200 MB of RAM with the same processes referred to above being inactive as well. A 200MB difference with the same stuff running. The particular one I'm on now keeps a number of things running in the background and still leaves me with well over 300MB with 4-5 programs going at the same time. So while I agree with you that some might be doing more cache than others, my experience is telling me the build with the most RAM (ie whichever one I am using...I unfortunately forgot which I installed...a CM10 but not sure if it was the cherry pick or chris'.) is the one that is managing the memory the best. I can figure out no other explanation for the same number of programs using an extra 200 MB of memory over another rom and thinking that is a good thing. For example, the ones I am thinking of are running stuff in the background I don't even use. Power Amp is a huge offender for whatever reason. I see no reason to have it running 24/7 but it does!

Related

Has v2.0.71 improved on the small 256MB RAM?

I returned my A101 a few weeks ago because memory would get down to 50MB or so after a while, and the whole tablet would then become quite sluggish.
I liked everything else about it, though. I wonder if the new firmware manages memory more efficiently and allows free RAM to stay at 80MB+ or so, or perhaps keep apps from loading themselves for no reason.
I'm afraid it's a hardware issue (simply too little RAM to start)... but you never know. Surely the Archos people by now have had an earful of complaints about this issue...
Free RAM on my archos 101 is constantly at 30Mb and I have no problem with sluggish performance.
I never kill apps unless they misbehave badly (badly written apps).
You can not maintain a 80Mb free level unless you don't use the device.
Killing apps just to free memory is a big nono.
Android uses a method to kill background apps automatically when space is needed in RAM. So effectively it cleans up after itself.
Here is a fairly good explanation of how the system is designed.
http://android-developers.blogspot.com/2010/04/multitasking-android-way.html
and
http://lmgtfy.com/?q=android+why+you+don't+need+a+task+killer
argie said:
I returned my A101 a few weeks ago
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Why return it? They are selling on eBay for more than MSRP right now. LOL I would have sold it if I was you...made a little profit in the process.
ExploreMN said:
Why return it? They are selling on eBay for more than MSRP right now. LOL I would have sold it if I was you...made a little profit in the process.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
lol, that wont last....
Not saying it will...but for now...right now...he could have done that.
wdl1908 said:
Free RAM on my archos 101 is constantly at 30Mb and I have no problem with sluggish performance.
I never kill apps unless they misbehave badly (badly written apps).
You can not maintain a 80Mb free level unless you don't use the device.
Killing apps just to free memory is a big nono.
Android uses a method to kill background apps automatically when space is needed in RAM. So effectively it cleans up after itself.
Here is a fairly good explanation of how the system is designed.
http://android-developers.blogspot.com/2010/04/multitasking-android-way.html
and
http://lmgtfy.com/?q=android+why+you+don't+need+a+task+killer
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
When I first got my Archos 70 IT 250GB, I was constantly killing apps! Didn't seem to do any good, but I kept killing those apps ... I almost sent my Archos 70 back too. I even got the RMA from J&R. I don't think I'll be returning this beauty any time soon .... Also have a 3-year extended warranty.
Until I learned that it isn't necessary. I quit killing apps several days ago, and my Archos is running more smoothly. Still sluggish at times, but I have 12 folders on the desktop, along with 9 shortcuts! Most of those folders have lots of apps in them. I'm guessing that is why the desktop is so sluggish.
I can have Internet radio running while doing other stuff. The radio cuts out sometimes, but isn't much of an issue.
Internet runs smoothly about 1/2 the time. I didn't get my Archos 70 for high-end usage though, mostly just for reading, and watching short videos, and listening to Internet radio and playing music when I'm out and about (riding the bus, riding my bicycle, shopping).
Really comes in handy for having my shopping list with me, listening to my favorite tunes while walking around! I also have sticky notes with daily journal reminders that I'll transfer to my MacPro. Also use the calendar for appointments and events.
Some interesting reading in those 2 links. Thanks.

Still no 512 MB ram in any rom.. curious why?

I've had my vibrant since it came out. They have 512 of ram hardware. I know we've gotten up to 344 or so with tweaking, but why can't we get the full 512 at all?
I have a feeling it has to do with Samsung or drivers, but with everything I've seen devs overcome I can't see why this is still a problem.
I have a nook color which has inferior hardware overall, but the biggest reason I see it as more stable is it never has memory management issues(running any rom). My biggest reasons to dump my vibrant for a Hercules or comparable is because of the constant ram issues the vibrant has that they wont, along with better hardware.
Maybe the answer is out there, but I haven't seen it in a whole year(so answers could be outdated), nor it brought up for a very long time.
Sent from my NookColor using Tapatalk
That 512 MB is shared ram. So some of it is dedicated to the video processor which is built into CPU. Phones have to be slim and light I don't think well be seeing dedicated videocards and soundcards anytime soon.
Sent from my SGH-T959 using XDA App
The simple answer is that our system needs to set aside a certain amount of ram for the actual OS to use, nothing that we can necessarily touch. Certain apps occupy memory at all times and we're left with whatever memory hasn't been allocated by OS. I'm not the most technical but that's the general consensus from what I've read over the last 2 years of running Android.
If you want to really push the limits of what free ram you can achieve, I would highly suggest reading the OP of this thread. In there you'll see how you can adjust the way your system handles recently opened and closed apps. My phone feels a million times better, just using those simple to use tweaks/scripts.
Let me know if you need any help.
- Mat
dardani89 said:
That 512 MB is shared ram. So some of it is dedicated to the video processor which is built into CPU. Phones have to be slim and light I don't think well be seeing dedicated videocards and soundcards anytime soon.
Sent from my SGH-T959 using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I know the nook has no dedicated gpu, but it makes use of most if not all of that ram.. unless I am playing a graphically intensive game, it rarely drops below 100mb available ram, usually staying around 150+ until I've opened a ton of apps. Oh, and many phones that are coming out have a dedicated gpu, such as all of the variants of the samsung galaxy S II. it has a Dual-core 1.2GHz ARM Cortex-A9 proccessor, Mali-400MP GPU, Exynos chipset.. and awesome battery life I have heard.
Either way, my nook color doesn't experience the laggyness that my vibrant does until I have used so much it makes sense, but considering my vibrant stays around 60mb of available ram +/- most of the time..
Mattymat said:
The simple answer is that our system needs to set aside a certain amount of ram for the actual OS to use, nothing that we can necessarily touch. Certain apps occupy memory at all times and we're left with whatever memory hasn't been allocated by OS. I'm not the most technical but that's the general consensus from what I've read over the last 2 years of running Android.
If you want to really push the limits of what free ram you can achieve, I would highly suggest reading the OP of this thread. In there you'll see how you can adjust the way your system handles recently opened and closed apps. My phone feels a million times better, just using those simple to use tweaks/scripts.
Let me know if you need any help.
- Mat
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You have no idea how hard I have been trying to find that app, I was going to try it when I was running simply honeyv5 because the memory issues were so horrible, but I couldn't find it again, and minfreemanager was the next best thing.. so I am VERY glad you posted it.
Are you using a specific set of pre-made settings, a specific script, or some custom setup, and which?
I am just trying to get my vibrant as usable as possible until the hercules and other comparable phones come out, so I can weigh them against each other. I don't regret my vibrant, but I wish I had waited a little longer so I had made a more informed choice.. if I can make it kickass again, at least for a few months, I will be a happy guy. Thanks again.
Silentbtdeadly said:
I know the nook has no dedicated gpu, but it makes use of most if not all of that ram.. unless I am playing a graphically intensive game, it rarely drops below 100mb available ram, usually staying around 150+ until I've opened a ton of apps. Oh, and many phones that are coming out have a dedicated gpu, such as all of the variants of the samsung galaxy S II. it has a Dual-core 1.2GHz ARM Cortex-A9 proccessor, Mali-400MP GPU, Exynos chipset.. and awesome battery life I have heard.
Either way, my nook color doesn't experience the laggyness that my vibrant does until I have used so much it makes sense, but considering my vibrant stays around 60mb of available ram +/- most of the time..
You have no idea how hard I have been trying to find that app, I was going to try it when I was running simply honeyv5 because the memory issues were so horrible, but I couldn't find it again, and minfreemanager was the next best thing.. so I am VERY glad you posted it.
Are you using a specific set of pre-made settings, a specific script, or some custom setup, and which?
I am just trying to get my vibrant as usable as possible until the hercules and other comparable phones come out, so I can weigh them against each other. I don't regret my vibrant, but I wish I had waited a little longer so I had made a more informed choice.. if I can make it kickass again, at least for a few months, I will be a happy guy. Thanks again.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No problem man. I'm actually using option #9 in V8 right now and it's been a dream. It stops holding apps in memory after not using them a few seconds, which is great for what I'm looking for. What you'll find is that it manages the memory and how quickly things are slotted around (different priorities that android gives particular applications; Launcher, Dialer, Messaging, etc.). You can actually try every option and see which you find the best.
I started out with option #2 and then moved all the way down as I found things I didn't like in some, but liked in others.Give it a shot man!
- Mat
Mattymat said:
No problem man. I'm actually using option #9 in V8 right now and it's been a dream. It stops holding apps in memory after not using them a few seconds, which is great for what I'm looking for. What you'll find is that it manages the memory and how quickly things are slotted around (different priorities that android gives particular applications; Launcher, Dialer, Messaging, etc.). You can actually try every option and see which you find the best.
I started out with option #2 and then moved all the way down as I found things I didn't like in some, but liked in others.Give it a shot man!
- Mat
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm actually using number 2 now in the allandroidv8 script, and if anything maybe it is too aggressive, but it has it's snappiness back. Looking at how they set the rom I'm using and the one before it, it looks like they didn't tweak it at all from stock cm7.. if anything I think they've made tweaks it more recent nightlies better than those roms! Simply honey(who brags about how great they are) and Biff ron both need some tweaking.. I'm gonna play with it, but thanks for posting what I was trying so hard to find
Sent from my NookColor using Tapatalk

Might the X2 have a memory leak?

I've had my suspicions about this since I first got the Droid X2. I think it may be possible for much of the lag many (most/all?) people experience at some time or another.
As a test, I can check free RAM in Advanced Task Killer when I first boot up the phone, and it will hover somewhere 150 megs with all user processes killed.
Then, when I check after 24 hours of constant use (with intermittent charging periods) I will struggle to get 100 megs with all user processes killed.
Finally, if I reboot the phone, I will be able to obtain a decent amount of freed-up RAM again.
Anyone experiencing anything similar?
Now, I must mention, I'm operating under the assumption that the X2 does not cache apps or files in the RAM. I suspect there is too little RAM at such a minimal speed to be able to clear RAM fast enough in the event that something non-cached is called on. I mean, even Microsoft was slow to use this cache method, as they first introduced it in Windows 7. A good example of this in Windows 7 is if you check the Task Manager, you will see that roughly only a quarter of your RAM is ever actually labeled as "free", even if you currently have no programs open or are using minimal amounts of RAM.
And it certainly doesn't feel as if the cache is working as intended if Motorola did infact implement it on our phones.
I have contimplated over this for quite some time and have also came to the same conclusion. But the real question is: What can we do about it?
Most likely nothing.
Not sure of this is actually the case but when V6 is ran for instance it does talk about cached apps and gives an "actual" free ram reading. I would guess that zepplinrox would not have worded it that way if it was not the case but I have no real evidence either way.
Sent from my DROID X2 using xda premium
This did happen to me when I ran Advanced Task Killer on cm7. I'd start with a very good 190 free ram (insane I know) and after a few hours I'd struggle to brake 110
Sent from my DROID X2 using Tapatalk 2
This is the nature of Android and Linux in general. When you start an app (or a process), it will remain in memory until it is cleared by the OS. The problem with task killers and Android 2.3.x and above is this: Android 2.3.x and above RESPAWN the killed task since the OS did not kill it. Plus, there is no way to FORCE to OS to kill an app that is in the background. What Android does is renice the process until it is a positive number, greater than 1, then it kills the process. Android 2.3.x was designed to "auto manage" those tasks. If you run htop from an ADB session and launch apps and use the back button to back out of them, you will notice that the amount of free memory diminishes. Then, after sitting for a time, the amount of free memory slowly begins to increase. When an app that requires a bunch of memory is launched, the Android will kill those background apps to free up more memory. In theory, it is a great way to manage the memory. In this respect, apps that have been launched in that past will start up faster. Personally, I like having control over things. You could possibly write a script that will renice a process to something like +20 and then Android will kill it automatically, but that would be a very risky prospect as it might kill RUNNING foreground apps as well.
Hope this little explanation helps!
Ciao!
DX2 Version History lesion / Android Process Cache
theredvendetta said:
I've had my suspicions about this since I first got the Droid X2. I think it may be possible for much of the lag many (most/all?) people experience at some time or another.
As a test, I can check free RAM in Advanced Task Killer when I first boot up the phone, and it will hover somewhere 150 megs with all user processes killed.
Then, when I check after 24 hours of constant use (with intermittent charging periods) I will struggle to get 100 megs with all user processes killed.
Finally, if I reboot the phone, I will be able to obtain a decent amount of freed-up RAM again.
Anyone experiencing anything similar?
Now, I must mention, I'm operating under the assumption that the X2 does not cache apps or files in the RAM. I suspect there is too little RAM at such a minimal speed to be able to clear RAM fast enough in the event that something non-cached is called on. I mean, even Microsoft was slow to use this cache method, as they first introduced it in Windows 7. A good example of this in Windows 7 is if you check the Task Manager, you will see that roughly only a quarter of your RAM is ever actually labeled as "free", even if you currently have no programs open or are using minimal amounts of RAM.
And it certainly doesn't feel as if the cache is working as intended if Motorola did infact implement it on our phones.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Your question is a bit complex. See back when Droid X2 first was released it had 2.2.3 for most users, and didn't have very good application memory management. This was the start of many applications such as "Advanced Task Killer" that you mentioned. These apps were supposed to help in closing apps that were running all the time.
Things changed a bit with the Gingerbread (2.3.3) release. This initial release made the Droid X2 useable. In my opinion the DX2 prior to Gingerbread was nearly a brick! I had many reboot issues, FC, connection issues, GPS issues, etc. With 2.3.3 many issues were eliminated, while others were reduced enough that they didn't bother me TO bad.
2.3.4 came out to fix battery issues largely...
Now I realize you weren't asking for a history lesion, but it is useful to know these things to know where things were and where things are today. I am currently running 2.3.5/412 and have been for months. I can say from experience, Android DOES cache background processes. I thought it did back in 2.3.4, but i can't remember... I don't think it did back in 2.2.x or at least the OS didnt' inform the users via GUI.
Your question about performance though? Yeah the DX2 is crap! I love the physical layout, but it has MANY issues with performance... some have been reduced by doing build.prop edits, yet I have realized that many who post these edits have posted wrong.... for example, they are increasing the buffer sizes thinking this will help internet speeds. This is super complex, but Google "Buffer Bloat" and you'll see how larger buffers often mean greater throughput, but MUCH greater latency....
simply put... big buffer == faster download of individual files.... smaller buffer == slightly slower download but MUCH more responsive
I'm not sure if that answered your question or not... let me know how I did or if I just rambled perhaps =P

[Request] Kernel Dev's - Low memory issue

Hi!
Because of the low memory issue in the International edition, I request for all Kernel Dev's that implement the possibility of the use of Swap file.
There are programs that make and use this Swap file to get more free RAM, but this programs needs that the Kernel support it.
Like :
https://play.google.com/store/apps/...sMSwxLDEsIm9yZy5hemFzb2Z0LmZyZWUuc3dhcHBlciJd
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=lv.n3o.swapper2&feature=nav_other
What do you think?
Cheers!
P.D:sorry for my bad english.
I think you are in the wrong section. There is a dedicated section for questions and not in the Development thread
What Low memory issue??? We have 1GB of RAM (almost) on the device! Everything works smooth on the phone!
maybe he wanna say that free memories are from 2xx~3xx mb only, which is actually less than S2 even S3 also has 1GB ram.
If the files can increase more free ram, it would be good for some heavy games and softwares to run more smoothly.
Wrong forum, but indeed I agree.
It's virtually impossible to run 2 heavy programs at once. One of them will always close when it's in the background, even if it implements a Service.
For example, Waze - It closes whenever I receive a phone call.
Just annoying. Problems I never had on S II
eitama said:
Wrong forum, but indeed I agree.
It's virtually impossible to run 2 heavy programs at once. One of them will always close when it's in the background, even if it implements a Service.
For example, Waze - It closes whenever I receive a phone call.
Just annoying. Problems I never had on S II
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This is exactly that I mean.
Sorry for the mistake to put this topic in this subforum, please, any mod move it to the correct section.
Cheers!
Wow, I definitely want this! Kernel devs : please implement this!!!
------
Send from my Galaxy SIII going PARANOID
Swap will make the phone lag terribly since the ssd writing/reading speeds are far inferior to what you neel for normal operations.
It also makes sure the internal/external storage will not live very long.
While it's a good idea to combat memory issues, paging to disk is not suitable for normal situations.
Sent from my GT-I9300 using xda premium
Haha we have not needed swap since the days of the HTC hero
Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk 2
d4fseeker said:
Swap will make the phone lag terribly since the ssd writing/reading speeds are far inferior to what you neel for normal operations.
It also makes sure the internal/external storage will not live very long.
While it's a good idea to combat memory issues, paging to disk is not suitable for normal situations.
Sent from my GT-I9300 using xda premium
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Swap file to internal SD: max speed 26MB/s I think there is not a problem, but I prefer more memory. And I tell that implement the function and optional you can enable it, if you don't want you don't need to enable.
Cheers!
Can I ask you why you think you have low memory?
please select one of the following:
1) Phone going so slow it takes age to do anything I ask
2) Apps keep getting killed mid-use
3) I have looked at the numbers and they look low....
I can't choose any option. I want to explain:
-I open Internet Browser and open a Web with many videos, photos, etc, and browser closes itself.
-Open 1 game (NOVA3 for example), then put it on background to see a Web Page or check email... or open the Web browser, open 3 Webs then go to email to check, then go again to browser and all is closed, the phone needs to open all Webs again (in this case is your first option).
I think that you prefer a UNIX computer with 256MB of RAM than a UNIX computer with 16GB of RAM because you optimize the 256MB of RAM. I prefer waste memory (really don't waste it) because I want to RUN many programs at the same time.
Sorry for my very bad english, because I can't explain exactly what I want.
I'm SYSADMIN and I know what I say.
Cheers.
I understand where your coming from but I think you have failed to understand the purpose of multi-tasking on a phone (and the reason that not many phones have more than 1gb of ram yet).
Multi-tasking on a phone is designed to let you go from webpage to sms, or music to email etc, i.e. between smaller, less hungry apps.
Switching between a high ram usage game and other things is always going to be a problem, the phone was never designed to allow you to multi-task while gaming.
I know that this is a phone, not a Core I7 - 16GB RAM - SSD with Windows 7 Ultimate, but, Did you have a SGS2? with SGS2 you can make what you want and you don't have this problems off memory.
I said an example of a Web page with a lot of videos and photos that make Browser closed., not only with Games.
This is Why I want to try the Swap file. Off course if the phone goes slow down I'll prefer no Swap file, but I think that is a good idea.
Perhaps with a new firmware update Samsung solve this issue...
Cheers!
Off course if the phone goes slow down I'll prefer no Swap file, but I think that is a good idea.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Have you ever had your Windows computer have to heavily page to disk (aka swap)? Even with my OCZ Vertex4 it's unbearable.
Just get rid of all the background apps (such as AllShare) that the S3 has running and you should be better off, it got rid of any hint of memory underrun I my had.
Get Houmiak TaskManager from market, find out which apps are running and freeze them in Titanium Backup. Problem solved
Lennyuk said:
I understand where your coming from but I think you have failed to understand the purpose of multi-tasking on a phone (and the reason that not many phones have more than 1gb of ram yet).
Multi-tasking on a phone is designed to let you go from webpage to sms, or music to email etc, i.e. between smaller, less hungry apps.
Switching between a high ram usage game and other things is always going to be a problem, the phone was never designed to allow you to multi-task while gaming.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You are wrong.
This is my 4th Android phone.
Multitasking between several Applications which implement the Service Android Class should be possible without any of the services being killed.
I don't care about the Activity. I care about the service.
Example :
I run Torque & Waze at the same time and tend to skip between them.
If I receive an incoming call, they are both killed because of low memory.
How do I know? when I go back to either of them, the state is not kept, and waze even complains about not being stopped correctly.
Believe me I removed ANY resident useless services, uninstall about 30 system apps from wanam lite using titanium pro, and still, no good.
These things used to work on older phones like SGSII and Galaxy Note and even SGS I with stock samsung roms.
There is no reason SGS III should suffer regression in this department.
It is very easy to understand that while samsung have added plenty of "Cool" features to the phone, they have left us with an overwhelming amount of garbage. I want smart stay, I want usb OTG, I want the camera app, I want Touchwiz dialer and I want HDMI,
But not at the expense of basic use-cases.
Hell, on the Galaxy Note I was sometimes shocked at the amount of Activities left in the ram, I was impressed. Having 10 apps running in task manager. And no, I never closed them. I don't used task killers, and I don't care about "Free" ram.
I care about my Applications life cycle which sadly sucks on SGS III.
BTW, Galaxy Note had the same screen resolution give or take as the SGS III.
Something is terribly under optimized.
600MB used just by core crap.
PS. I am angry at samsung, not at you, apologies if I sound harsh.
It's also aggravating when posters here instantly assume other posters only care about Free ram. HERE - TAKE MY FREE RAM.
About the swap to sdcard, I'm not sure that is the solution.
But I am sure we need "A" solution.
Edit:
If anyone knows how I can understand exactly which process/app/apk/activiy/service is taking how much, I would happily compare it to Galaxy Note. I'm sure we will find basic applications taking too much.
If it's the GPU reserving too much memory, I am willing to settle for less GPU ram while not running games. Hell, the Galaxy Note was not that slower then SGS III
It even preserved me a lot of time which I now waste on Navigating multiple times with waze when it is closed because of a phone call.
Don't know if this has anything to with it as I haven't received my S3 yet. With the HTCOneX I had this problem as well. Then I found out, that in the
"settings".
in the "development section"
"Don't keep activities" which is unticked by default. One has to tick it ( I went on recent apps to make sure it would be saved) and then untick it again. Afterwards the HTC1X was quite cabable of multitasking. The default setting seems to have some hybrid impact and has to be set straight by hand.
Hopefully this helps your issue.
eitama said:
You are wrong.
This is my 4th Android phone.
Multitasking between several Applications which implement the Service Android Class should be possible without any of the services being killed.
I don't care about the Activity. I care about the service.
Example :
I run Torque & Waze at the same time and tend to skip between them.
If I receive an incoming call, they are both killed because of low memory.
How do I know? when I go back to either of them, the state is not kept, and waze even complains about not being stopped correctly.
Believe me I removed ANY resident useless services, uninstall about 30 system apps from wanam lite using titanium pro, and still, no good.
These things used to work on older phones like SGSII and Galaxy Note and even SGS I with stock samsung roms.
There is no reason SGS III should suffer regression in this department.
It is very easy to understand that while samsung have added plenty of "Cool" features to the phone, they have left us with an overwhelming amount of garbage. I want smart stay, I want usb OTG, I want the camera app, I want Touchwiz dialer and I want HDMI,
But not at the expense of basic use-cases.
Hell, on the Galaxy Note I was sometimes shocked at the amount of Activities left in the ram, I was impressed. Having 10 apps running in task manager. And no, I never closed them. I don't used task killers, and I don't care about "Free" ram.
I care about my Applications life cycle which sadly sucks on SGS III.
BTW, Galaxy Note had the same screen resolution give or take as the SGS III.
Something is terribly under optimized.
600MB used just by core crap.
PS. I am angry at samsung, not at you, apologies if I sound harsh.
It's also aggravating when posters here instantly assume other posters only care about Free ram. HERE - TAKE MY FREE RAM.
About the swap to sdcard, I'm not sure that is the solution.
But I am sure we need "A" solution.
Edit:
If anyone knows how I can understand exactly which process/app/apk/activiy/service is taking how much, I would happily compare it to Galaxy Note. I'm sure we will find basic applications taking too much.
If it's the GPU reserving too much memory, I am willing to settle for less GPU ram while not running games. Hell, the Galaxy Note was not that slower then SGS III
It even preserved me a lot of time which I now waste on Navigating multiple times with waze when it is closed because of a phone call.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
+1
I'm completely with you on this.. .. I have had both the original galaxy, the s 2 the note and other Android phones with this one being my first where larger apps are closing due to low memory resources. I had Nova, my browser, videos, music, angry birds and other processes in the background on my s2 with only388megs used out of 863.... this phone, I load the browser and everything in the background closes with 675megs used out of 754.... not cool. There must be some kinda solution.. why is it that my note and s 2 have 140 more free ram anyways?

RAM

Is it just me, or does the phone use a lot of RAM? Mine seems to be using 2.7GB minimum at all times. Seems high.
Higher would be more ideal. The Windows mindset of "I'm running out of RAM!" doesn't get you anywhere here; in Android, empty RAM is wasted RAM. My Droid Turbo averages ~1.8gb used of 3gb. Seems Nougat tries to average 60%-70% usage.
When you switch out of an app, it's moved to the background and (usually) suspended, but kept in memory so you can switch back to it quickly. It's things like this that take up memory you think should be "free".
In the event that you need to load up a big app, stuff running in the background is quickly and gracefully unloaded.
Unless you're getting constant foreground app crashes - which might indicate that something is forcefully keeping itself loaded and starving everything else of needed memory - you shouldn't worry about it. Android is fairly good at handling memory these days.
Septfox said:
Higher would be more ideal. The Windows mindset of "I'm running out of RAM!" doesn't get you anywhere here; in Android, empty RAM is wasted RAM. My Droid Turbo averages ~1.8gb used of 3gb. Seems Nougat tries to average 60%-70% usage.
When you switch out of an app, it's moved to the background and (usually) suspended, but kept in memory so you can switch back to it quickly. It's things like this that take up memory you think should be "free".
In the event that you need to load up a big app, stuff running in the background is quickly and gracefully unloaded.
Unless you're getting constant foreground app crashes - which might indicate that something is forcefully keeping itself loaded and starving everything else of needed memory - you shouldn't worry about it. Android is fairly good at handling memory these days.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I notice this issue more on custom ROMs than stock firmware. On mine and my wife's Quarks (3GB RAM, as you well know), running Marshmallow and Lollipop versions of the same ROM, something causes the phones to just freeze up for about a minute, crashes, then RAM is released to use. It was happening at least once a day on my phone, then my wife said it was happening to her phone. (Our old phones, not the new LG V30 phones.) I've messed with the LMK settings, trying different combinations, to no avail. And I did report it in the Nougat ROM thread for that phone. (Marshmallow ROM thread no longer has support.)
So, while I totally agree with your answer, it is the technically correct answer, I do understand the OP's concern. I've gotten to the point where I like to see more free RAM, so I know my phone isn't about to freeze up. At least on my old phone.
I love custom ROMs, but the past couple of weeks it's been nice to run stock on my new LG V30 and have a very fluid experience. I've not disabled anything. I saw some others disable stuff and then got lagging. I've not touched a thing and my phone is very smooth.
Could a "theme" downloaded from play store take up a lot of RAM and/or slow things down, too?
This is my first experience with a theme.
coldbeverage said:
Could a "theme" downloaded from play store take up a lot of RAM and/or slow things down, too?
This is my first experience with a theme.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Possibly, but probably not. From what I've seen, LG themes seem to skin far less than say, substratum does, and even substratum is pretty lightweight unless you get into transparent themes.
Keep in mind the default theme is itself...well, a theme. You're not really saving anything by staying on it. If you see a skin you like, use it, if you're really worried use one of the LG-provided ones that come with the phone.
ChazzMatt said:
I notice this issue more on custom ROMs than stock firmware. On mine and my wife's Quarks (3GB RAM, as you well know), running Marshmallow and Lollipop versions of the same ROM, something causes the phones to just freeze up for about a minute, crashes, then RAM is released to use. It was happening at least once a day on my phone, then my wife said it was happening to her phone. (Our old phones, not the new LG V30 phones.) I've messed with the LMK settings, trying different combinations, to no avail. And I did report it in the Nougat ROM thread for that phone. (Marshmallow ROM thread no longer has support.)
So, while I totally agree with your answer, it is the technically correct answer, I do understand the OP's concern. I've gotten to the point where I like to see more free RAM, so I know my phone isn't about to freeze up. At least on my old phone.
I love custom ROMs, but the past couple of weeks it's been nice to run stock on my new LG V30 and have a very fluid experience. I've not disabled anything. I saw some others disable stuff and then got lagging. I've not touched a thing and my phone is very smooth.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Interesting. It does seem like stock ROMs tend to be more conservative with RAM usage, whereas custom ROMs will have less aggressive minfree settings in order to keep more stuff loaded up. "Unused RAM is wasted RAM", but only up to a certain point; in my experience (Maserati with its ancient kernel as well as Quark) approaching ~100mb of free memory in LP/MM/N can bring things to a crawl, and pushing it can cause a kernel panic :good:
The only issue I've seen in Quark RR has been with the Pixiv app, though, and it does exactly what you said. But...I'm fairly certain the app itself leaks memory, as it only happens after browsing a while and is perfectly fine for another stretch after it OOMs and restarts.
My experience with stock ROMs in the past - Quark included - has been "smooth but lacking in features/customization" --- I've never really understood the complaints that stock is slow and claims that custom is blazing fast in comparison. The OEM has a decided advantage in that they have all the tools they need to compile the ROM properly, with then-current driver and kernel sources and a deep understanding of the hardware...I'd be really surprised to find a stock ROM from the last few years to be slower than custom.
But to be honest, my sample size is pretty small. *shrugs* I stick by what I've said, though, if anything the V30 doesn't use its memory enough; some people have complained about apps popping out of memory sooner than expected. LG is still putting out updates too, if a memory-management problem is found, hopefully they'll get right on fixing it.

Categories

Resources