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Hey all - I am VERY loath to ask any of these questions, as I pride myself on doing research and figuring things out for myself, but I've come to the point where I just need to ask this community. I purchased the Gtab as part of the Woot fiasco, and immediately replaced stock firmware with Vegantab. From a general perspective, it works fine, with all the know quirks. However, this is my first Android device. I've been modifying windows phones and working with jailbroken iphones and other fiddly things with computers for a long time, so I'm not faint-hearted at tweaking. Anyway, my questions are these:
Given the hardware this thing sports, the performance ROTS. Is it because the OS is just not polished? It's slow to shift from screen to screen. It often delays in recognizing my touch when trying to scroll icons that it thinks I actually am trying t launch an app. In general, it just feels inferior in speed and snappiness of, for instance, iOS (I understand it is much easier to have a single platform to put an OS on and optimize it). I get the program not responding screen, wait or close way too frequently for my tastes.
Then there's the fact that every app installed seems to want to run itself in the background at all times. I'm constantly using the task manager to kill everything, which frees up a ton of RAM and then the tab runs better for a little while. I can't seem to find a way to prevent these apps from doing this. There is probably something very obvious that I am missing, but Facebook should not just decide on its own to run in the background when I haven't launched it.
Any thoughts on any of these things, or can someone point me to an obvious FAQ that I'm missing that answers all my questions?
In theory Android OS should free up RAM as you need it. Google will swear up and down that task killers are unnecessary, and the user doesn't need to manage background processes. That said, I have advanced task killer widget on my home screen and use it whenever things get a little sluggish. I don't use the Facebook app, but most apps have the option in the in-app settings to disable background updates. There are task manager apps that claim to prevent other apps from launching at start up, or kill them automatically, but these will usually end up eating more resources than they save.
As far as home screen switching, I'm not a fan of the stock froyo launcher on a tablet this size. It always seems that the device is expecting a much larger swipe that should be necessary to switch home screens. I use Launcher Pro and it feels faster and more responsive than the iPad 2 for going between home screens.
The scrolling/ inadvertent selecting issue I can relate to. If your coming from iOS, there is this an expectation that the device will always tell the difference between a scroll and a tap. That expectation isn't unreasonable, because Apple is stellar at making scrolling interfaces feel perfect. They have whole sessions at WWDC about implementing scrolling lists into apps. Android on the other hand requires a more deliberate scrolling. Android has gotten a lot better over time, but it often requires a much more deliberate scrolling action by the user. "Flicking" like on the iPad usually doesn't register perfectly for me.
One thing you may notice on the G Tables is that pinch and zoom is wildly unreliable when pinching on the same x or y axis. I'm pretty sure this is a universal issue with the screen. It has trouble recognizing multitouch input when the points of contact are on the same axis. Pinching at an angle is the only way I can zoom reliably.
brettdwagner said:
In theory Android OS should free up RAM as you need it. Google will swear up and down that task killers are unnecessary, and the user doesn't need to manage background processes.
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It's like automatic garbage collection, isn't it? Really useful, but sometimes you want to explicitly free things.
There is a way to kill foreground apps on Android. Settings > Applications > Development > Stop app via long-press, will kill the foreground app if you "long-press" the Android back key. Background apps you can either kill using task-managers or not start at all using tools like Autorun Manager from Market.
One thing you may notice on the G Tables is that pinch and zoom is wildly unreliable when pinching on the same x or y axis. I'm pretty sure this is a universal issue with the screen. It has trouble recognizing multitouch input when the points of contact are on the same axis. Pinching at an angle is the only way I can zoom reliably.
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Yeah, I've noticed this too. Pinch-to-zoom at the same y-axis is hopeless. Same x-axis works okay, but, at an angle works best.
I actually appreciated your post. You knew the limitations of hte device before buying it...you didn't comment on the atrocious screen (and accepted what was to be)
The biggest downfall with the G-Tablet itself was it's software. You admitted that you immediately flashed VeganTab. When I bought mine, it came with TNT Lite, to which I then immediately also flashed to Vegan 5.1.1. I never experienced the stock rom, and actually considered myself lucky, due to the reviews I've read.
I think that some of our issues may actually be due to the fact that we're using software that wasn't specifically designed for OUR devices. Yes, they are all android, yes, they should all work fine, and do, at times, but if using a froyo or gingerbread rom, we're using software designed for phones. I haven't tried the Alpha version of HC (BOS) yet, but even in Alpha stages, people are raving about it, even with it's limitations.
I just recently started using Brilliant Corners. In the flash process, I had to have Stock 4349 (1.2 stock firmware) on the system. I can honestly say that it really wasn't that bad. The response seemed a tad better, I never got the "Forceclose : Wait" option when a process was "thinking." things would just pop up. I can only think that as bad as it is, it manages itself better than some of the ports and mod's we are using, simply becuase they were MADE for the G-Tablet. Yeah, it's ugly, and you can do half of what I can do on BC.
What I find intolerable at times is that Angry Birds: Seasons (only that one, no others) will have really choppy graphics. I haven't found a way to fix it, I've overclocked, though I didn't think that would help, I've uninstalled, and installed, I've recovered backups, etc...alas, rebooting will fix it...it's weird. Not one other game will do that, except for AB:S.
What I find intolerable at times is that Angry Birds: Seasons (only that one, no others) will have really choppy graphics. I haven't found a way to fix it, I've overclocked, though I didn't think that would help, I've uninstalled, and installed, I've recovered backups, etc...alas, rebooting will fix it...it's weird. Not one other game will do that, except for AB:S.
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It works for me, although the birds do take off on their own from time to time. Have you tried downloading from a different source? I pulled my angry birds from Amazon. I'm running Vegan-Tabs 7.0.0
Please don't be offended, as I do believe your question is being asked in good faith. However, I have to admit that I haven't experienced any of the problems you're describing. I've had an iPod Touch since gen 1, and I haven't noticed any difference in the responsiveness. My g Tablet responds the same to flicks as it does to slower swipes, without interpretting them as taps.
I also haven't experienced the slow downs you're referring to when running multiple background apps, though that may have to do with the particular apps you have.
I have not had an issue with zooming in and out by pinching along either the x- or y-axis
Finally, I at least don't feel like the swipe to change screens is excesssive, but then again that could be personal taste or because I'm using a Gingerbread-based ROM.
The one issue I do have is with the on-screen touch keyboard. I feel sometimes that it fails to register letters if I type too fast; I haven't had this issue with iOS, but at least I think I can get used to it, and for serious typing I'll probably use a physical keyboard.
Incidently, I'm using Cyanogenmod 7, which seems to be the "pet ROM" of these forums, for better (it's a solid ROM with a large developer community) or worse (it's not nearly as innovative as mods being developed by some "other users" *ahem*roebeet*cough). I'm not saying this is the reason why I have not experienced these issues; maybe they aren't so striking to me or maybe I've been lucky?
EDITTED: Most typos are due to annoyances with using an on-screen keyboard with the g Tab.
Tablet has been fine to me. Screen responsiveness is on par with iphone/ipad/my htc evo screen.
Vegan tab rom is fresh...all .my functions work sure my wifi drops out after sleeping for a while (yes changed sleep settings) but hey I spent 250 not 500 and I have flash sd and usb....all of which I use everyday.
Thanks for all the responses. I rather expected to get somewhat of a range of replies from "I agree with you" to "you're crazy, mine is fine". To be very clear, I'm not trying to rip on the device at all. I knew I was rolling the dice a little and I know that Android really hasn't matured for a Tablet just yet (in my eyes).
I guess I've sort of had my questions answered to some degree.
scyld - I'm not offended in the least. I have an iphone 4 and many of my coworkers use iPads every day. They are definitely more responsive (to me). However, the stock iOS wasn't on my iPhone. Now that I have it jailbroken and can control which apps suck up memory, it behaves flawlessly. What I believe to be the scrolling/flicking issue is actually that the OS interprets spaces IN BETWEEN icons to be part of those icons, where Apple's OS does not. If I tap between icons on the Gtab, it will launch the one closest to my finger. iOS will not do this. That alone may be why the scrolling seems to be more accurate. I may well try Cyanogen. I mostly don't care about bells and whistles - just responsiveness and usability.
I wasn't aware that Google used the same line about memory usage that Apple swears - in fact, my friend and I stopped in the Apple store because she was having a problem with docking her iphone in her car... The tech ran a scan and told her incidentally that she was out of app memory and told her how to 'kill those pesky tasks' by tapping the little red minuses on all the apps in the app dock. I couldn't stop laughing.
I guess what we're dealing with is the result of an open source open hardware landscape. By having such a fractured base of developers, manufacturers, varying hardware specs, etc, it is much harder to optimize any particular build for any particular device. I did use the stock firmware for a few days and simply found it too limiting. Not to mention the lack of a market, etc. Apple's success is in large part due to the way it's app store works. Every device has it. The app warns you what it will work on and what it will not. Application updates tell you what the update fixes or adds (which Market does only very rarely). I appreciate that there are multiple markets for Android, but they should stick to some established rules for the information given.
I'm writing a novel - sorry - All this being said, I love the idea of Android (and hate iTunes with a passion) and I'm looking forward to a generation or two down the road of the tablet ROMs. I'll give the other ROMs a shot and see if there is improvement. I really appreciate the developers work on the platform thus far. I'll keep reading and messing with settings, tips, tricks to improve what I can.
A lot of complaints of lag and freezing seem to be due to not enough random access memory. Shame that a nicely built tablet with great specs (Qi charging, 64-bit processor, vanilla Android) would be useless to many because of this issue.
I got one for $133 new from the Dell outlet with a sweet case for $15 both in red and gave it to Mom for Christmas, knowing that for her use it would be acceptable.
Here's what I found and how I've gotten the tablet to work great and have none of the issues.
1. Stick with the stock KK launcher. Forget Google Now or Nova as these use up too much memory.
2. The stock browser seems to work the best. Dolphin, Boat and others have been reported to be problem free too. Chrome is a no go.
3. Under Developer options shut off the animations as well as limit the background processes.
4. Disable anything you'll never use, and only install the apps needed.
5. Under "Google" account and "search" make sure Google Now is off.
These things may be self evident to some, but you will notice a night and day difference in the way this particular tablet operates if you stick to those things. At $130 it can't be beat.
Apologies for responding to my own post, just wanted to update, apparently Dell pushed out a OTA update recently that updated the kernel and the thing is much improved if not downright zippy now. Still would stick with my suggestions as I've noticed while Chrome may be somewhat usable it will still freeze.
Thanks for the tips. Despite the horrible reviews, I just ordered one from Amazon Warehouse for $75 Very Good condition. At that price, it is worth taking the plunge.
Use the stock browser keep off any RAM hogging apps and you'll like it. For $168 total I got a red one , the official red case and the dell wireless charger. Can't beat that price. It particularly excels as a movie watching device for travel. Good size and format, great battery life and storage with an optional SD card, and a 1080p screen. Seems to handle video playback really well too, stutter free.
Sent from my Nexus 6 using XDA Free mobile app
We're taking it on the plane for movies in 3 weeks, so that'll be perfect. Have you tried rooting and Greenify app? That could further help keep the background processes in check. I have a 1st gen; wife will get the 2nd gen, but if I like it enough, I might get another one for myself.
No I haven't mainly because of the amount of bricks being reported. Too much headache and since its my mothers there's no point. Lol. You'll love it for watching movies I swear they look better than on my Nexus 9. Maybe that Intel video enhancer or whatever its got really works well. The speakers are loud and sound great too.
Sent from my Nexus 9 using XDA Free mobile app
So I've had the tablet for a week now. The amount of bloatware pre-installed was insane. I was surprised since the 1st gen 3830 came with almost zero. After disabling all bloatware and all google apps, disabling animations, disable sync, disable backup & restore, it's running fairly well. Chrome browser is definitely not happening. Stock browser is good, but opening multiple tabs is still guaranteed to make the tablet lag.
All in all, this is a great tablet for someone who only does one thing at a time (No multiple browser tabs and switching back and forth between apps). 1920 x 1200 Screen is awesome, build quality fantastic, thin and fairly light, 802.11ac wireless, wireless charging, almost pure Android, and good enough battery life. This thing is perfect for my wife and was a steal at $75 from Amazon Warehouse. Got a $7 case from eBay and my wife is loving it. It's a big upgrade from her Nexus 7 2012.
That being said, I will not be picking another one up for myself unless we get a magic update that makes it as fast as my 3830. I like to multitask, so that's priority for me.
P.S. After all updates, I ran Antutu and the tab scored 33,000 vs 24,000 for my 3830. Sadly, real world experience doesn't reflect this.
waingro808 said:
So I've had the tablet for a week now. The amount of bloatware pre-installed was insane. I was surprised since the 1st gen 3830 came with almost zero. After disabling all bloatware and all google apps, disabling animations, disable sync, disable backup & restore, it's running fairly well. Chrome browser is definitely not happening. Stock browser is good, but opening multiple tabs is still guaranteed to make the tablet lag.
All in all, this is a great tablet for someone who only does one thing at a time (No multiple browser tabs and switching back and forth between apps). 1920 x 1200 Screen is awesome, build quality fantastic, thin and fairly light, 802.11ac wireless, wireless charging, almost pure Android, and good enough battery life. This thing is perfect for my wife and was a steal at $75 from Amazon Warehouse. Got a $7 case from eBay and my wife is loving it. It's a big upgrade from her Nexus 7 2012.
That being said, I will not be picking another one up for myself unless we get a magic update that makes it as fast as my 3830. I like to multitask, so that's priority for me.
P.S. After all updates, I ran Antutu and the tab scored 33,000 vs 24,000 for my 3830. Sadly, real world experience doesn't reflect this.
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Lol, my mother went from my hand me down N7(2012) to this and so far, with the way I've set it up, she likes it for her style of use. It really is a shame as if the darn thing had 3 (gasp!) gigs of Ram it would be a killer little tablet, the fact that you can pick them up so cheap is another huge plus.
Hi! CJ, I have a Dell Venue 8 3840, and for some reason I'm unaware of, it's WIFI, & BLUETOOTH, have completely being "lost", I.E. the icons, the Settings options etc.... Have " disappeared ".
I would be most grateful for your advice on it's recovery.
Thanks & regards,
Mahil.
Hmmm, never heard of that happening before. I could ask you a bunch of questions to see what may have caused it but instead my advice would be do a reset. Under settings/back up & reset/ factory reset. Back up whatever files you don't want to lose, the cloud works great for that, and then reset. See if that brings it back.
Venue 8 touch screen freezing issue
I had bought my tablet online. It was working well initially. Then suddenly from one day the screen started to freeze once it was not in use for minimum 7-8 seconds although the tab was not hanging, just the tablet touch screen was not responding to touch.
my dell venue 8 3840 has kitkat 4.4.4. WiFi Bluetooth is not working at all. when i press on in the WiFi option, it goes to on but color doesn't change, i mean it keeps grey and it doesn't scan any WiFi signals. nothing happens on the screen. its like frozen. add device and reset options on WiFi menu are also freeze. when i come out of WiFi menu, it automatically turns off. i have already reset my tab 2 3 times to check if the issue resolves but the prob persists. advanced options are working. when i go there, it says mac address and IP address unavailable. and these options are also freeze. am not getting a clue of what has happened and how to get it fixed. plz help.
Dell Venue 8 8340 slow fix
Hey guys,
I have found a solution for the extremely slow performance of the Dell Venue 8 8340. You must disable wi-fi optimization in settings --> wifi --> advanced. After disabling this feature, the tablet runs fairly smooth with no crashing or delays. This may be a temporary fix; however, it does seem to affect the tablets performance. Also, I did not have the time to check if this fix has been posted, sorry for the repeat if it has. Please update on whether or not this tweak works for others.
Setting 'Developer Options' -> 'Background Processes' to 'At most 2 Processes' seems to help with performance. Reboots and updates sometimes reset this to the default though.
Sent from my VS990 using XDA Free mobile app
So far the memory leak in this tablet has led me to the worst experience ever of any tablet. Every app resumes by restarting as it has been purged from memory. Home screen redraws everytime. Just browsing web kills services like music. Cmon Google this is just sad.
Yep. Apparently some people enjoy the experience but this tablet is just fail. I have high hopes it can be fixed but have been waiting for a patch near on six months. It is pathetic and a clear signal to me that the nexus line is dying.
try out some ROMs and or kernels
they fix a lot of problems
The real problem here is not the N9, but 5.0.1.
I do believe this is a good example of YMMV. I have been wanting for quite a while to get a new tablet and settled for the Nexus 9 whereas I have always been a Samsung fan. I am tired of their politics, slow updates, etc so decided for jump to the Nexus line. I have had it for about a month now and use it a few hours daily for various tasks ranging from the simple reading of a book to remote desktop/VDI work, video watching, streaming music most of the day, games, etc and have not had an issue beyond once or twice getting fairly warm.
I am a bit irritated that I moved to the Nexus line and now am left waiting like everyone else for the 5.1x - that was one of the big reasons I made the change. But, looks like that is on the eventual horizon. However, I am quite happy with my purchase. :good:
Whether a product "sucks" or "rocks" is very subjective because it's based largely on your own expectations. I personally ditched my iPad 2 Mini for the Nexus because I couldn't stand how locked down and limited iOS was, plus the ridiculous jailbreak cat-and-mouse game. I have been using my Nexus 9 LTE for a month now and couldn't be happier. There are no build quality or screen issues at all (and I had to get my iPad replaced twice when I bought it as they had yellow/pink screens). I have not experienced the infamous "memory leak" either, but then again I reboot my devices once a day.
siraltus said:
Whether a product "sucks" or "rocks" is very subjective because it's based largely on your own expectations. I personally ditched my iPad 2 Mini for the Nexus because I couldn't stand how locked down and limited iOS was, plus the ridiculous jailbreak cat-and-mouse game. I have been using my Nexus 9 LTE for a month now and couldn't be happier. There are no build quality or screen issues at all (and I had to get my iPad replaced twice when I bought it as they had yellow/pink screens). I have not experienced the infamous "memory leak" either, but then again I reboot my devices once a day.
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I think maybe you are going to find that you hit on something quite important - the rebooting of your device. Many people feel that you shouldn't have to do that and would suspect that a failure to do so could be causing some of the "Memory leaks". I too reboot it frequently as a matter of principal. Devices require reboots from time time - hence the legend of the tech support first question "Did you reboot?". Fact of life.
I am sorry you think the Nexus 9 sucks. I agree with some of your points, but I really enjoy me Nexus 9. I would suggest that you install the Lollipopalooza ROM. It is extremely fluid and stable. Give it a try.
gonzoks said:
I think maybe you are going to find that you hit on something quite important - the rebooting of your device. Many people feel that you shouldn't have to do that and would suspect that a failure to do so could be causing some of the "Memory leaks". I too reboot it frequently as a matter of principal. Devices require reboots from time time - hence the legend of the tech support first question "Did you reboot?". Fact of life.
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That's exactly why I reboot my devices, just like I reboot my computers when something hiccups. Software is written by humans and humans make mistakes, so I always expect there to be some issues that slipped past QA testing.
The old "did you turn it off and back on again" adage holds true even today. It's just part of owning any kind of electronics. Just like you try again when your car doesn't start the first time. I love my Nexus 9, it's so much better than my iPad was.
I don't need to reboot mine, it will happily do that itself on a regular basis for no reason whatsoever. I was so excited when I jumped to a nexus device at last, expected the world - not unreasonably for 400 quid I might add - and actually regret not buying a tab s or the Sony.
Never thought I would be saying that out loud but here we are.
Gotta love all these people complaining about a memory leak, who don't even know WHAT A MEMORY LEAK EVEN IS, or HOW Android memory management works. Yes, it is possible for poorly written software to consume memory, for example, by spawning shell daemons that eat ram. Fact of life. Quit running garbage on your device and the memory won't get eaten up.
We have a few N9's, uptimes countable in *months*. No constant reload issues. Some slowdown from time to time when under heavy I/O strain, but that's what you get with swcrypto. With that different of an experience compared to "complainers", it is quite obvious that the difference is something that YOU ARE DOING WRONG. Time to take a very careful look at what software you are running.
Man you just troll this forum day and night. Just because you don't have issues doesn't mean others cause their n9 issues.
doitright said:
Gotta love all these people complaining about a memory leak, who don't even know WHAT A MEMORY LEAK EVEN IS, or HOW Android memory management works. Yes, it is possible for poorly written software to consume memory, for example, by spawning shell daemons that eat ram. Fact of life. Quit running garbage on your device and the memory won't get eaten up.
We have a few N9's, uptimes countable in *months*. No constant reload issues. Some slowdown from time to time when under heavy I/O strain, but that's what you get with swcrypto. With that different of an experience compared to "complainers", it is quite obvious that the difference is something that YOU ARE DOING WRONG. Time to take a very careful look at what software you are running.
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I, for one, do appreciate your comments. Here and on the N6 forum.
:good:
doitright said:
Gotta love all these people complaining about a memory leak, who don't even know WHAT A MEMORY LEAK EVEN IS, or HOW Android memory management works. Yes, it is possible for poorly written software to consume memory, for example, by spawning shell daemons that eat ram. Fact of life. Quit running garbage on your device and the memory won't get eaten up.
We have a few N9's, uptimes countable in *months*. No constant reload issues. Some slowdown from time to time when under heavy I/O strain, but that's what you get with swcrypto. With that different of an experience compared to "complainers", it is quite obvious that the difference is something that YOU ARE DOING WRONG. Time to take a very careful look at what software you are running.
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Stock 5.0.1, unrooted, chrome, google play music, sheets, docs, drive, keep, inbox, hangouts.
Oh, and occasionaly some google maps, g+/photos.
There, explain me how my daily "wtf, why is this stopped... oh, it's rebooting itself" is caused by my bad software usage.
---------- Post added at 04:36 PM ---------- Previous post was at 04:34 PM ----------
Oh, ****, wait, you are right, I installed a weather app from google play store and also the NBA app.
Those damn dev bastards who ruined my N9!!
EDIT: my usage was not always this one. I've also used it for gaming (real Racing 3, Limbo, etc), multimedia (Plex, ArchOS for smb streaming), and many other stuff. It was unbearable to be in the middle of something and see "unfortunately XPTO app has crashed", and the overheating, the lag, etc etc... some kernels and custom roms helped a lot at first but after a week of usage the same behavior would be back... So it's now a very basic usage device. I actually use my N4 for almost everything... even to remote desktop to my home servers (coupled with a chromecast that I plug wherever I can).
And still reboots out of nowhere, in the middle of nothing, while draining battery like a athlete on steroids.
While I do love my N9, the wait for updates is absolutely unacceptable. This is supposed to be a flagship Google device and the flicking Nexus Player gets updated before our tablet? Come on Google, support the people who support Google. Get it together.
FrankBullitt said:
Stock 5.0.1, unrooted, chrome, google play music, sheets, docs, drive, keep, inbox, hangouts.
Oh, and occasionaly some google maps, g+/photos.
There, explain me how my daily "wtf, why is this stopped... oh, it's rebooting itself" is caused by my bad software usage.
---------- Post added at 04:36 PM ---------- Previous post was at 04:34 PM ----------
Oh, ****, wait, you are right, I installed a weather app from google play store and also the NBA app.
Those damn dev bastards who ruined my N9!!
EDIT: my usage was not always this one. I've also used it for gaming (real Racing 3, Limbo, etc), multimedia (Plex, ArchOS for smb streaming), and many other stuff. It was unbearable to be in the middle of something and see "unfortunately XPTO app has crashed", and the overheating, the lag, etc etc... some kernels and custom roms helped a lot at first but after a week of usage the same behavior would be back... So it's now a very basic usage device. I actually use my N4 for almost everything... even to remote desktop to my home servers (coupled with a chromecast that I plug wherever I can).
And still reboots out of nowhere, in the middle of nothing, while draining battery like a athlete on steroids.
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Ouch. I would be pissed as hell too
Considering buying n9
Hi I'm considering buying a N9, since I like stock android and really dislilke ios. I have a N4 that is still doing fine for my usage (social media, browsing, email...) and suppose i would like the n9, but i've seen quite a few comments on it having bad performance. How is it doing after the 5.1.1 update?
I intend to use it for viewing docs/pdfs, email, browsing and watching videos, nothing too demanding, I don't usually play games.
lucena said:
Hi I'm considering buying a N9, since I like stock android and really dislilke ios. I have a N4 that is still doing fine for my usage (social media, browsing, email...) and suppose i would like the n9, but i've seen quite a few comments on it having bad performance. How is it doing after the 5.1.1 update?
I intend to use it for viewing docs/pdfs, email, browsing and watching videos, nothing too demanding, I don't usually play games.
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Those are all working very well on mine. I've not had a problem. I also don't play any games.
lucena said:
Hi I'm considering buying a N9, since I like stock android and really dislilke ios. I have a N4 that is still doing fine for my usage (social media, browsing, email...) and suppose i would like the n9, but i've seen quite a few comments on it having bad performance. How is it doing after the 5.1.1 update?
I intend to use it for viewing docs/pdfs, email, browsing and watching videos, nothing too demanding, I don't usually play games.
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On the whole, I've really enjoyed using my N9. Yes, there have been problems, but then there always are with new hardware and software.
The tablet is great, especially now with 5.1.,, it's a great size - which I see sammy are now copying after everyone slagged off Google/HTC for producing a tablet with 4:3 screen.
I'd recommend it to anyone :good::good::good:
lucena said:
Hi I'm considering buying a N9, since I like stock android and really dislilke ios. I have a N4 that is still doing fine for my usage (social media, browsing, email...) and suppose i would like the n9, but i've seen quite a few comments on it having bad performance. How is it doing after the 5.1.1 update?
I intend to use it for viewing docs/pdfs, email, browsing and watching videos, nothing too demanding, I don't usually play games.
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I like mine a lot - great tablet (and I've had a lot of them). Running the AICP ROM. My only complaint is that it only has 32GB of storage with no expansion. If it were 64GB it'd be perfect.
Has anybody else experienced or is experiencing rather poor ram management on their S6e?
I'm finding app refreshes really quite abundant. Yes they refresh quickly in most cases but they are refreshes nether the less.
Worst are apps that dump you out of what you are doing like Tapatalk.
System manager tells me I gave 400mb free and yet app refreshes are a common occurrence.
My nexus 6 rarely has to auto refresh - indeed conversely I can open Tapatalk on that and have to manually refresh to get content. But at least I never get dumped out of a thread and taken back to menu.
The Galaxy S5 was poor enough with memory management, I hoped the 3gb in the S6e would put an end to forced reloads & refreshes but nope.
I have a sim free factory unlocked model, no carrier bloat and have factory restored and still same issue persists.
Its as if Touchwiz despite certain improvements is as memory hungry and uncouth as it ever was.
I know how you feel. RAM is always almost full even if there are no apps running. I can multitask without refreshes if I go to an app for a few seconds. But if I spend like even just a minute then I get a refresh. Even with just one tab on Google Chrome, I get a refresh immediately by just using Facebook for a while. I mean wtf?
I believe it's due to the memory leak on 5.0.1 wait till we get 5.1 to see if they fix this issue
mellomelon45 said:
I believe it's due to the memory leak on 5.0.1 wait till we get 5.1 to see if they fix this issue
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No memory leak is only on nexus devices and related to its particular bootloader - something Samsung device doesn't have. It won't improve if it's not good now.
Graffiti Exploit said:
I know how you feel. RAM is always almost full even if there are no apps running. I can multitask without refreshes if I go to an app for a few seconds. But if I spend like even just a minute then I get a refresh. Even with just one tab on Google Chrome, I get a refresh immediately by just using Facebook for a while. I mean wtf?
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Yep exactly as you describe and it's really quite annoying. Feels like the phone is being gimped by its OS Skin. We shouldn't be having this issue on a 2015 3gb top of range device.
nookcoloruser said:
No memory leak is only on nexus devices and related to its particular bootloader - something Samsung device doesn't have. It won't improve if it's not good now.
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Ah I didn't know that. Thanks for correcting me. I also have this issue as well and hoping this issue is fixed soon from Samsung.
I have this issue too.. Anoys the heck out of me;.. I can pause pandora, and then open another app, and pandora lost its place!
happens a lot more then it should.
eatonjb said:
I have this issue too.. Anoys the heck out of me;.. I can pause pandora, and then open another app, and pandora lost its place!
happens a lot more then it should.
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Yep. How come all the so called in depth reviews never mentioned this issue. To me aggressive memory killing and excessive ram usage is far more detrimental to user experience than the odd bit of lag, yet the only thing we kept getting told is how lag free this device would be and how super fast the ram is.... And yet it can barely keep 4 apps in memory for 5 minutes. Its really frustrating.
nookcoloruser said:
Yep. How come all the so called in depth reviews never mentioned this issue. To me aggressive memory killing and excessive ram usage is far more detrimental to user experience than the odd bit of lag, yet the only thing we kept getting told is how lag free this device would be and how super fast the ram is.... And yet it can barely keep 4 apps in memory for 5 minutes. Its really frustrating.
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ikr.. they didnt mention this ram thing at all. are they even used this phone at all to post those reviews?!? I was using an iPhone 6 Plus before, and I never had this issue at all. I hope they can fix this as soon as possible.
I don't think the reviers use it really all that much. I don't think they load a lot of apps like most us users.. Idk it is sad. I also think Pandora for example is weird. Once you hit pause the icon disappears on top. So it's free to get killed. When songza for example, just pauses and keeps an icon on top. I'll almost chalk that up to bad programming. But fb, chrome and whatever, yea.. Sucky
It's really irritating. My 6 plus with 1gb of ram is better than this. What I don't get is you can have 400mb plus of ram available and stuff starts closing. Makes no sense.
I had this issue with my nexus too, and my s5 with lollypop.. I wonder if there is a settinf
americasteam said:
It's really irritating. My 6 plus with 1gb of ram is better than this. What I don't get is you can have 400mb plus of ram available and stuff starts closing. Makes no sense.
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Yep... I have less refreshes with my 6+ too.
The 400mb free ram available thing irks me too - if it's free why isn't it being used ? And what the heck is using up the 2.4gb before it ? Even when I tell it to close all my apps the most I have free is around 700mb which soon drops back to the 400-480mb mark. It's crazy how memory hungry and inefficient it's being.
holy crap! finally!
I've been searching for a thread like this for a week. Just got my phone a few days ago and man the ram management is piss poor. My HTC M7 doesn't have this issue. And yes I've wondered why no review site has mentioned this at all. I mostly noticed it on Chrome.. or even the stock browser. But yes it does this auto refresh crap on other apps as well. I don't know about you guys but I have the AT&The variant non edge and I have 5.0.2.
t0md0 said:
I've been searching for a thread like this for a week. Just got my phone a few days ago and man the ram management is piss poor. My HTC M7 doesn't have this issue. And yes I've wondered why no review site has mentioned this at all. I mostly noticed it on Chrome.. or even the stock browser. But yes it does this auto refresh crap on other apps as well. I don't know about you guys but I have the AT&The variant non edge and I have 5.0.2.
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Yeah I have a stock UK/Ireland factory unbranded handset, so its not carrier app fault either unfortunately.
The M7 & M8 are both excellent indeed - with near stock android levels of memory management, which only goes to prove an android skin doesn't have to suck the life out of a device, which is exactly what Touchwiz feels like its doing.
The S5 wasn't great memory management wise, the Note 4 was good but no where near as good as the Note 3 memory wise and sadly the S6e seems very poor especially when you consider it has 3gb. So it seems to me since the Note 3 Samsung's flagships have been getting worse ram management wise rather than better.
I have a €950 flagship phone which handles memory about as good as a Moto G with 1gb.
nookcoloruser said:
Yeah I have a stock UK/Ireland factory unbranded handset, so its not carrier app fault either unfortunately.
The M7 & M8 are both excellent indeed - with near stock android levels of memory management, which only goes to prove an android skin doesn't have to suck the life out of a device, which is exactly what Touchwiz feels like its doing.
The S5 wasn't great memory management wise, the Note 4 was good but no where near as good as the Note 3 memory wise and sadly the S6e seems very poor especially when you consider it has 3gb. So it seems to me since the Note 3 Samsung's flagships have been getting worse ram management wise rather than better.
I have a €950 flagship phone which handles memory about as good as a Moto G with 1gb.
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so you're telling me that the S5 for a year now still has crappy ram management??? that's just crazy and boggles my mind. i seriously don't want to keep this phone for 2 years of this nonsense (i get a new phone every 2 years). if that's the case i might just return this phone. as good as it is, that's almost a deal breaker to me. i always multitask switching from web page to messenger, to camera, sports apps etc.. etc.. then back to web page just to see it auto refresh every time! if i'm just bouncing back and forth between a couple apps within a min or so it doesn't seem to do this but after about 5 mins.. it never fails.. auto refresh is a certain. so sad. i don't want to go back to apple, but right now, i might have to return this phone and wait for iPhone 6S.
what also baffles me is that i don't seem to see much people talking about this issue considering this is a flagship phone and millions have already been sold worldwide.
t0md0 said:
so you're telling me that the S5 for a year now still has crappy ram management??? that's just crazy and boggles my mind. i seriously don't want to keep this phone for 2 years of this nonsense (i get a new phone every 2 years). if that's the case i might just return this phone. as good as it is, that's almost a deal breaker to me. i always multitask switching from web page to messenger, to camera, sports apps etc.. etc.. then back to web page just to see it auto refresh every time! if i'm just bouncing back and forth between a couple apps within a min or so it doesn't seem to do this but after about 5 mins.. it never fails.. auto refresh is a certain. so sad. i don't want to go back to apple, but right now, i might have to return this phone and wait for iPhone 6S.
what also baffles me is that i don't seem to see much people talking about this issue considering this is a flagship phone and millions have already been sold worldwide.
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I think because the phone is otherwise very very fast some folks may not be noticing the refreshes. Its certainly more noticeable on apps that drop you out of what you were doing back to a previous menu screen like Tapatalk.
I think people genuinely want to believe the
Hype that the S6 & S6e are the nirvana of android...
I must admit I too am shocked folks aren't complaining more or are giving the device an easy pass on this issue, but for me its a total PITA.
I will keep the S6e until the next update and hope that has some memory tweaks, but if it doesn't I'll consider just selling it on.
I tiped phonearena about this issu and they announced it today so maybe this will open some eyes in Samsung dep.
http://www.phonearena.com/news/Galaxy-S6-exhibiting-overzealous-RAM-management-report-users_id68745
now also up on Sammobile
http://www.sammobile.com/2015/04/28/poor-ram-management-affecting-the-galaxy-s6-and-s6-edge/
So far, ive had issues of battery drain with bundled apps such as the AMAZON app store, as most of us here are already aware. I wonder if this ram issue has to do with the same preloaded apps causing issues? What about people who rooted and reinstalled all Play-Store-Reinstallable apps, through the Play store, has that cleared this issue? Maybe the misbehaving apps are taking their system-level privilege a little too far?
Glad some review sites are taking an eye on this. It's actually really annoying. Even my music app constantly shuts off and I have to force it to cause a wake lock for it not to shut off (poweramp has this option)
Sent from my SM-G925T
This is a new 2048x1536 clone from Best Buy. It has Rockchip RK3288 processor with a Broadcom BCM4350 WiFi AC/BT4.0/FM radio. It came with Android 5.0.1. As usual from the Chinese, the SW leaves much to be desired. In fact the Regulatory Information page is for the N9. It went the FCC as MID7802 and pictures and user manual are post there. I grabbed one for $150. I was interested since it supports HEVC/H.265. It plays them flawlessly. It scored 785 on AnTuTu video test v3.0. The speed test was 38005. Screen looks good. Now for the bad.
1. Won't turn on when off and charger connected.
2. Adaptive brightness doesn't use the control. Really bright and drains battery.
3. SDcard only accessible for stock apps. ES3 or Kodi can't see it. Probably mounted root only.
4. Camera app is really primitive. No option to record as HEVC even though HW encoding supported.
Any thoughts on this tablet and how easy or hard it would be to get a good ROM on it?
Hmm, the bad looks like stuff that could be fixed with a software update. Though I've yet to see an adaptive brightness option that was any good. I almost always adjust manually. I never really use camera functions on my tablets. The part where it won't turn on while charging is a bit disturbing though.
Battery drains while screen sleeps like crazy
decent tab
I managed to pick the flex elite 7.85" tablet up @ my local Best Buy yesterday for a discounted price of only $90 and so far very happy with it for the cost. Not sure I would be so happy at the full $150...maybe so though.
Battery life isn't the greatest even with a good battery saving app. Doesn't bother me to much though because I usually have my tabs plugged into the wall outlet.
Some things I like are the beautiful display and greatly bright lighting, makes it easy to use outside or in. Also like the quick responsiveness and sensitive touch screen. It's not so sensitive that you're accidentally hitting things you don't want to but plenty sensitive to pick up on the intentional hits. I like the thin style (only 0.3" thin, I think). Although it's plastic it feels solid and higher end in the hands. All in all it's just a decent tab for the average user...although maybe not so much for the enthusiast.
A couple things I don't like are that there are no accessories available for it at all. I'm rough on electronics (drop alot) and a good, solid case is near necessity for me. Still ticked off about dropping my Sero 7 PRO and killing it last year...man, was that ever a nice tab?!
Another thing I am a bit disenchanted with is no root instruction yet available and no ROM that I know of...been searching and hoping. I also read somewhere that it's not possible to write to the micro SD card from the tablet...if true, that really sucks! Though I rarely use a micro SD card with tabs, it's nice to be able to use them to keep onboard space freed up. I still need to buy a micro SD to test this last statement for myself, so can't guarantee the accuracy of the statement.
Anyway, decent tab that will probably fulfill my web browsing, shopping and WordPress needs for the next year so can't complain for a $90 investment. I don't expect any updates to the firmware over it's lifetime and really not to hopeful for a root instructional to be written but still pretty decent out of the box so far....I'll let you know about the possible microsd issue once I find out for myself.
OK, so I found out that the microsd card is difficult to get mounted and working correctly on this tablet (unfortunately I'm no geek). But I was finally able to use an app to xfer files after formatting the SD card to ntsf instead of fat32. Still a pita but got it working.
Now if only someone would make an easy root instructional for this thing I might actually keep it for a while
Alrighty, got one of these and so far it's been good for its price.
I can turn it off and on while charging, both sleep/wake and full power off/power on.
The brightness seems fine to me, but again I've not used adaptive as I've never had a tab with a worthwhile adaptive brightness, and I've had Nexus 7 and 9, Galaxy Tabs pro and S, and a half dozen others.
Getting an SD later today for it.
Battery life isn't great, but I'm not seeing the sleep drain I keep reading about.
As has been mentioned the SD is only visible to system apps. Unless you format it NTFS, then it can be found by other apps. Need to figure out how to make shortcuts/symbolic links so it can be reached from areas other than /mnt as I think some apps expect it to show up in the storage folder and other places.
It's fast and snappy. Display is crisp & nice and bright and is the perfect size. I too am seeing unexpected battery drain overnight (losing 50% of battery) while the tablet is sleeping. I wish the battery lasted longer on standby as my needs are to read to fall asleep and then wake up and study - the Tab A has a longer lasting battery than this. Takes a long time to boot up if it's entirely shut down. It refuses to run Netflix either in the Netflix app nor in the browser. I have all the latest updates of the OS plus Netflix but it's not working. It's a shame but I am today returning it to BestBuy due to the Netflix issue which I consider a core app. WINS: Display is awesome and CPU speed is very good! CONS: Won't play Netflix, battery life is weak, takes long to boot up.
still no sign of 4rd party rooms?
in the market for something to replace my POS dell 8 tablet. can anyone say how insignia is on updates? will this get 6?
Oma has made a rom for it at arctablet.com
bbobb said:
Oma has made a rom for it at arctablet.com
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link?
cannot post links.
google 'insignia flex elite oma root'
should be top result.
Got to page 4, post 49.
micro sdcard should be formatted ntfs
i just bought this tablet used
i think my rom is hosed, it has a system process kill at startup and it is very laggy. it also shuts down is left to sleep for more then 5min. a factory reset doesnt change anything... but ive seen this before... nothing short of a full rom wipe fixes it. that's the real danger of chinese tablets, if you hose the os there is no way to fix it...
im trying to root it and put oma rom on it, to see if that fixes the software issues. i dont think its hardware, because once im in a game or app it runs lightning quick. even games like mortal kombat with their high end graphics run smooth... its really somethin on this screen.
boot time SUCKS on this tablet. like, 4min or something. what the hell insignia? you cant optimize this rom even a little bit?
I like the tablet. I have seen several software updates (didn't check the build numbers) before I flashed Oma's ROM. It still has a long boot time, but if you go to the developer options, and turn off the animation options, it feels pretty fast (definitely faster than anything that is even close to this price range). Oma's current rom doesn't fix the Netflix app issue. Maybe an update can figure out what the conflict is?
superhumvee said:
I like the tablet. I have seen several software updates (didn't check the build numbers) before I flashed Oma's ROM. It still has a long boot time, but if you go to the developer options, and turn off the animation options, it feels pretty fast (definitely faster than anything that is even close to this price range). Oma's current rom doesn't fix the Netflix app issue. Maybe an update can figure out what the conflict is?
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I just got one yesterday. I didn't update to the December update, but I flashed oma's rom (pretty sure I did?), rooted with king root and then replaced with super su and the boot up time is much much faster than stock. I want to say less than a minute vs. close to 3 or 4 before.
I bought two of these used off eBay, both seem to suffer from sound stutter/slight freeze ups once in awhile. I've reset both and made sure they are running the current OTA update.
It seems to mostly do it for Youtube and YouTube for Kids, but notice it once in awhile during some more graphic intense games. Which surprises me as from the specs at least this should be a pretty decent budget tablet.
I just picked up a "seller refurbished" on from Ebay -- there are a *ton* of them up there at the moment. It actually looks pretty decent. The battery life is *horrible* (about 4 hours of SOT for reading or web surfing), but the rest of the flaws can be worked around.
First off was setting the window animations to zero, as suggested here earlier, followed by KingRoot and SU substitution (also as suggested). Then, from the Store:
- SDFix:KitKat Writable MicroSD and
- Folder Mount
combined to let me store app data on the microSD.
- FlashFire did a great job of installing Xposed Framework and from there I can tweak to my hearts' content (Greenify, GravityBox, and XSSID Indicator so far)!
Right now, it looks like your best bet would be Oma's rom that someone mentioned earlier, which would be rooted and let you do some customization. I don't use KingRoot because there's some report that the software collects data on you without your consent. What with all the rumors about Xiaomi snooping on you and China's officially-sanctioned practices in cyber space, you don't want to assume unnecessary risks. Bad enough that Uncle Sam is looking over your shoulder, but China?? Do the math!
Back to the matter at hand. Looks like your tab will be stuck with Lollipop forever (1) because the sales of this model is low enough not to stimulate any interest in developing custom roms; (2) manufacturer's support is non-existent (I mean literally non-existent); (3) if you get a representative to answer, the person doesn't know enough to say anything beyond what's in the manual; and (4) they categorically refuse to release even a stock rom for the user to restore where the tab is bricked by their own OTA updates!!! What sets them apart is that I know of no other reputable manufacturer that would so adamantly oppose such potential remedies. Unbelievable! The only recourse is warranty - which means if you're outside that period, you're toast, even if the hardware is in perfectly working order.
To recap, absolutely no support and no update. Promulgating a policy that drives away consumers is of course their prerogative, but why they care so much about losing business is beyond me. So think hard before shelling out for their products. Low prices and enticing specs ain't worth crap if the tablet doesn't work at all.