Incredible Timer inaccuracy

[c_aus]

I had the timer running on my phone this afternoon and went back to open it to see how much time was left. There was a certain amount of minutes and about five seconds remaining and I noticed it skipped four seconds after that and moved on to the next minute. After watching for a few minutes, it repeated on every minute ranging from 5-20 seconds early. See the video below for what I am talking about, you can see it reach 7:15 then it goes to 6:59. Sorry for the poor video quality, my camera does not record the screen very well. However, you can see the 16 at the top and 14 below when it switches to 6:59.

I guess I won't be counting on this timer any longer.

YouTube - Droid Incredible Timer

 

[smile44]

Wow, that's pretty wacky. Will have to try that out on mine when I get it. Luckily, I think there are timer apps on the market you can get for free as a replacement.

 

[Member138406]

Was there something else running that was slowing the phone down? I just watched mine for like 3 mins, all went well.

 

[hovercraftdriver]

I had the timer running on my phone this afternoon and went back to open it to see how much time was left. There was a certain amount of minutes and about five seconds remaining and I noticed it skipped four seconds after that and moved on to the next minute. After watching for a few minutes, it repeated on every minute ranging from 5-20 seconds early. See the video below for what I am talking about, you can see it reach 7:15 then it goes to 6:59. Sorry for the poor video quality, my camera does not record the screen very well. However, you can see the 16 at the top and 14 below when it switches to 6:59.

I guess I won't be counting on this timer any longer.

YouTube - Droid Incredible Timer

Yeah, just happened to me when I tried it. My range was between 2-6 though.

 

[Mskgreenel]

All this time I was blaming the washing machine,lol. I have a tendency to put a load of laundry in the machine and forget about it or I'm lazy and don't want to go all the way upstairs and there's like 10mins left.
Since I had my Eris I'd set the timer for the load and I've noticed a few times that it would go off and there would be 3-5 mins left of the washing machine..... Never made the connection...

 

[contagous]

mine just also skipped from 08 to 00 so defo something up with that lol, nothing running at same time, and did it on 1st minute of countdown

 

[c_aus]

All this time I was blaming the washing machine,lol. I have a tendency to put a load of laundry in the machine and forget about it or I'm lazy and don't want to go all the way upstairs and there's like 10mins left.
Since I had my Eris I'd set the timer for the load and I've noticed a few times that it would go off and there would be 3-5 mins left of the washing machine..... Never made the connection...

That's exactly what I was using mine for, to remind me I have laundry going. I had noticed that my laundry wasn't always completely dry. I realize why now.

Nothing else was running at the time, I even rebooted the phone before taking the video.

 

[ajiamarie]

mine just also skipped from 08 to 00 so defo something up with that lol, nothing running at same time, and did it on 1st minute of countdown

Wow. Mine just did the exact same thing. It jumped from 08 to 59. I hope that will be fixed in a future update.

 

[justbrae1]

Mine does goes from 08 to 59 as well.

 

[ttamnedlog]

So the next question...

Is there a good timer/stopwatch app?

 

[sabrewings]

Just let mine count down from 10:00, sync'd with a stop watch. No issue.

 

[necosino]

I don't have any issues at all with my timer. I use it while cooking, laundry, poker breaks, etc.

The first thing that came to mind is is you're using an auto killer, setcpu, or alternative kernel which might cause a read error.

Sent from my HTC Incredible using Tapatalk Pro.

 

[contagous]

I don't have any issues at all with my timer. I use it while cooking, laundry, poker breaks, etc.

The first thing that came to mind is is you're using an auto killer, setcpu, or alternative kernel which might cause a read error.

Sent from my HTC Incredible using Tapatalk Pro.

I dno about others but i'm running everything stock, with no special apps installed. and my timer has issues now and then, but tbh I don't use it so its not that bad...

 

[chris61292]

Mine does this as well, it just went form X:03 to X:59

 

[ajiamarie]

I don't have any issues at all with my timer. I use it while cooking, laundry, poker breaks, etc.

The first thing that came to mind is is you're using an auto killer, setcpu, or alternative kernel which might cause a read error.

Sent from my HTC Incredible using Tapatalk Pro.

My phone is 100% stock. No auto killers, no setcpu, nothing. It doesn't happen every minute but about every 3 or 4 minutes, it skips a few seconds. I would never had noticed with out OP's post.

 

[regnak]

I didn't watch it but I ran a ten minute test synced with an online flash timer; they both went off at the same time. For those that have noticed this problem: I'm thinking it could be a display glitch, but the actual timing for when it goes off is right.

Those who have noticed it (contagous, ajiamarie, c_aus, et al.) have you guys cross referenced with another timer to see if they go off at the same time?

 

[c_aus]

I didn't watch it but I ran a ten minute test synced with an online flash timer; they both went off at the same time. For those that have noticed this problem: I'm thinking it could be a display glitch, but the actual timing for when it goes off is right.

Those who have noticed it (contagous, ajiamarie, c_aus, et al.) have you guys cross referenced with another timer to see if they go off at the same time?

Interesting...I just ran the test with a kitchen timer where I set both for 3 minutes (because I'm tired and don't feel like staring at timers for an extended time). The DInc reached 0 about 25 seconds before the timer but then sat at 0 and the alarm went at the same time as the other timer.

 

[pdavey]

Interesting...I just ran the test with a kitchen timer where I set both for 3 minutes (because I'm tired and don't feel like staring at timers for an extended time). The DInc reached 0 about 25 seconds before the timer but then sat at 0 and the alarm went at the same time as the other timer.

Mine has no problems. Keeps time just fine.

 

[mrlanrat]

Just to put this out there, my phone has this issue too.

I do hope that HTC will fix this.

 

[cp1]

Weird, mine does it too. I use "ultrachron lite" -- I never tried the stock timer.

 

[jfunk]

As was mentioned above, I suspect the graphic might be the problem, not the timer itself.

Test against a known accurate timer. Variations on how off the time display is from phone to phone are probably based on current software configuration.

I just checked mine and it's blatantly obvious just from watching it that the each second tick is not accurate. They don't tick down consistently. In my case, mine were ticking down way too fast. 3 minute timer had the display tick down to 0 after about 2:45. However, the alarm didn't sound until the accurate three minutes was up.

So, what we're seeing here I think is that the timer is accurate. The graphic display, however, isn't based on the actual clock I'm guessing. It probably varies in speed depending on how fast your CPU is currently running (your CPU clock speed changes dynamically based on load).

Would be nice to see a fix, however I think it's probably safe to use it assuming you are waiting for the timer to go off and not checking it constantly to see how much time is left.

Note that there could be consequences for fixing this. I would assume this isn't really an "error" as much as it was a design decision (that many may disagree with). I bet if the app checks against the real clock for time often, it will prevent the phone from sleeping. Thus, if you set a timer for 1 hour, your phone will be awake that entire hour. Not a big deal for those using it as a timer for a couple minutes, but may have a negative impact on battery life for those using it as a longer timer.

 

[ajiamarie]

I didn't watch it but I ran a ten minute test synced with an online flash timer; they both went off at the same time. For those that have noticed this problem: I'm thinking it could be a display glitch, but the actual timing for when it goes off is right.

Those who have noticed it (contagous, ajiamarie, c_aus, et al.) have you guys cross referenced with another timer to see if they go off at the same time?

regnak, good call! I set them both for 5 minutes and at the dinc sat at zero for about 24 seconds and then beeped exactly with the other time. The timing is exactly right but not the display. Thanks for the tip!

 

[jfunk]

Further followup.

You only see this behavior when you sit there and watch the timer. If you close the timer window or shut your display off, it will check for the accurate time when you reopen it or turn your phone back on. It will be accurate at that moment when you first open it again.

So basically, the entirety of this problem is that the graphic of the ticking clock is not actually synced to the real clock. It's just a pretty picture running on a set "delay" that is affected by your current CPU speed. Has nothing to do with the actual time.

As I mentioned above, this is probably how it should be unless you don't want your phone to ever sleep properly when you have a timer running.

Basically, don't stare at the timer...it will only drive you crazy. ;-)

 

[c_aus]

Basically, don't stare at the timer...it will only drive you crazy. ;-)

And that it did!

 

[mike95465]

It is just a graphic glitch. Tried it 3 times from 10 minutes comparing to a different reference digital timer.

When screen is left on for duration, countdown graphic reaches 00:00 and does nothing until actual timer is complete then alarms. Perfect sync with reference digital timer

When screen is is turned off, then brought back up, Graphic is reset to correct time, then continues to studder around the 14 sec mark. Again does nothing until actual timer is complete then alarms. Perfect sync with reference digital timer

When screen is turned off for the duration, Perfect sync with reference digital timer



So basically like the previous guy said, don't stare at it, it doesn't mean anything.