Help Memory and task management

[jerofld]

I had a link in the FAQ that went to some article about why task killers should be avoided, but I think that gives a bit more information why and delivers the message a little better.

 

[EarlyMon]

Both are good to include.

Remember archoille is an Android dev, so I'd personally like to see this thread first, it's certainly first-hand info and without doubt, up-to-date, but it's your FAQ, do as think best.

Either way - this is in the forum guide and SirSlayer's thread is referenced. Can't get too much info out about task killing!

 

[cordog1]

Automatic task killer from android market works very good with EVO 3D and i get about 14 hrs now before charge, before i used to get 8hrs and all my freinds allso get better battierry life now also.y

 

[EarlyMon]

Automatic task killer from android market works very good with EVO 3D and i get about 14 hrs now before charge, before i used to get 8hrs and all my freinds allso get better battierry life now also.y

Welcome to the forums!

It's a placebo, you have something mis-configured.

Please read this thread and its links.

ATK is the worst thing you could for your 3vo or any phone - friends don't let friends use it.

I'm getting over 50% battery left over after 16 hours of light-medium use - no task killing at all, no special tricks - just sensible configuration.

Nothing personal - but you're doing it wrong.

 

[jerofld]

Likely all ATK is doing is killing your apps that sync often. You can tell them to not sync often, or control when you sync manually with a widget (that HTC provides). One thing I've noticed with my 3vo is that it loves to sync and use background data. And it doesn't care if it uses 3G to do it, either.

 

[ardchoille]

I wrote an article explaining why task killers are bad for android devices, you can find the article here.

 

[thefley]

Welcome to the forums!

It's a placebo, you have something mis-configured.

Please read this thread and its links.

ATK is the worst thing you could for your 3vo or any phone - friends don't let friends use it.

I'm getting over 50% battery left over after 16 hours of light-medium use - no task killing at all, no special tricks - just sensible configuration.

Nothing personal - but you're doing it wrong.

so where is this magic "sensible configuration" you talk about?

 

[EarlyMon]

Pretty good place for a commercial about fixing sync issues, dontcha think?

Question / answer 2.02 here - http://androidforums.com/htc-evo-3d...aq-having-trouble-your-evo-3d-click-here.html

I'm using none of the old Evo data/sync tricks, fwiw, and no power/config-controlling widgets. (I put the sync widget and shortcut on my desktop when I got this thing - have never used it - glad you mentioned it, I'm so used to seeing it on my desktop I didn't notice it was there. Two slots free - w00!)

 

[ardchoille]

Pretty good place for a commercial about fixing sync issues, dontcha think?

Question / answer 2.02 here - http://androidforums.com/htc-evo-3d...aq-having-trouble-your-evo-3d-click-here.html

I'm using none of the old Evo data/sync tricks, fwiw, and no power/config-controlling widgets. (I put the sync widget and shortcut on my desktop when I got this thing - have never used it - glad you mentioned it, I'm so used to seeing it on my desktop I didn't notice it was there. Two slots free - w00!)

Excellent link! Thank you

 

[EarlyMon]

so where is this magic "sensible configuration" you talk about?

It's not magic, just decent practices per Gingerbread.

You are right - we do need a thread on it, but I've been waiting for most of the early return issues to die down.

I have 4G turned off when not in use. I don't use Gmail/push, I use the HTC Mail app and config my many email accounts (including Gmail) to poll at rates that make sense for my use. I've cleared out data on Gmail and set it to NOT sync email from Accounts & settings (and to not sync anything I don't actually use).

I do not let instant messaging apps auto-start and auto-login. That includes twitter, and apps like news-readers that want to take over.

I don't use the stock messaging app, I use Handcent and configure it so it's not wanting to be in my face at all times. (And power re-start after re-configing Handcent, that's a new bug I documented here.)

I don't let every app that can notify me when it can - I check settings in every app I get and pay close attention to that.

I turned off notifications in Google+ because I'll visit it when I please and get notifications from the main screen of the app.

~~~~~

I'm typical of a certain class of user - but not all. I don't need push mail, I don't need constant connection in social networking (those are the real hogs).

When I've downloaded bad apps that weren't that great and correlated to a drop in battery life, I've done a factory reset to clear out every vestige of them if an uninstall / power re-start didn't clear things up.

Otherwise, I've left the phone as-is.

If you're heavy into social networking, 3D gaming or lots of movie watching, expect your battery to drain more quickly.

If you're a heavy nav user, if you're using in a car, use a charger.

And whatever you do - pay close attention to the permissions you give on apps you install. You'd be surprised how many indicate that they might not let your device sleep (when competing apps may not have such an issue).

And I never use a task killer unless I'm trouble-shooting beta software. Otherwise, at the first sign of things being hosed, I do a power re-start and monitor if I've snagged a rogue app.

Otherwise - really, just common sense practices and common-sense expectations based on what I use the phone for.

 

[HankAtrix]

Is it a bad idea to have a task killer from market along side the native task killer? I dont see any settings on the native task killer to kill tasks when I turn the screen off like there is on market task killers. Will they interfere with eachother?

I use ATK over the standard task killer that comes with my phone. I think ATK is more efficient, has a do not kill list and will do auto-killing. ATK has really help me in performance and battery life.

 

[EarlyMon]

We were all new to Android once. Sprint used to insist at many stores not letting you leave until ATK was installed and they even recommended on their support website.

Truth is if you go deeper you'll find ATK is using more power than it's saving you. We're all converts, and I hope you'll follow the links in this thread and join us!

 

[Mauddib]

Have to agree with the no task killer people. I have used them and used them smartly but the phone always ran better when left alone. The EVO 3D has the built in task manager which should be enough for anyone and really only needs to be used if an app is acting up. Guarantee that if you quite worrying about which apps are "running" in the background you won't really see a difference between using one and not using one.

Really the best thing you can do is just manage how many times your apps try and connect to something. Almost everything i have is auto refreshed except for GMail which I use with push.

 

[6sigma]

Not to hijack this (incredibly useful) thread, but as a rookie with Android, I have even more basic questions: Is the 1GB internal memory analogous to RAM on a PC for programs and data and is the 8GB microSDHC card analogous to an external drive?

If I am buying/downloading apps from the Market and I elect to save them to the SD card, does that provide any performance benefit for the phone? Also, if I use the BACK button to exit any app I use before returning to HOME or the APPLICATIONS list, am I freeing up memory that was in use?

NOTE: If all of this is clearly explained somewhere, just point me there. Thanks! Loving this EVO 3D, my first Android product.

 

[EarlyMon]

Welcome to the forums! And Android!

This phone has 1 GB of ram, in addition to the internal storage, and the 8th GB sd card is exactly analogous to a hard drive - or - a USB stick.

The SD card and internal storage will perform so closely for load times that I doubt that you could see a difference. Everything executes in ram, regardless of where it started out from, so once loaded, all apps are the same and equal in that sense.

 

[6sigma]

Welcome to the forums! And Android!

This phone has 1 GB of ram, in addition to the internal storage, and the 8th GB sd card is exactly analogous to a hard drive - or - a USB stick.

The SD card and internal storage will perform so closely for load times that I doubt that you could see a difference. Everything executes in ram, regardless of where it started out from, so once loaded, all apps are the same and equal in that sense.

Thanks for this (and your other very thorough) answer(s). In light of the negligible performance difference:

• Is there a recommended place (internal vs. SD) for "frequently used" vs. "infrequently used" apps? Or, big vs. small?
• Do I even need to be concerned with where apps and data are located?
• Will having them one place vs. another make it easier to switch to the next Android phone?

Again, many thanks.

 

[EarlyMon]

No worries about where to put your apps on the sd card, that's handled automagically. There is a minor bug right now - apps on the sd card that you place a reference to on your desktop will lose their proper desktop icon but that should be fixed fairly soon, HTC knows all about it. They still work tho.

You can choose whether to put apps on the sd card or not for the most part, although some are restricted to only store internally - not lots tho.

No worries about phone replacements either. If you accepted the default setup to back up your phone to Google, then your apps will download automatically to your new phone. You can check that by desktop, menu settings, Privacy. And you'll find a record of your apps on the the Market on the web. If the auto stuff ever fails or gets buggy some day, you can go to the web Market and push your apps to your new phone from there. Apps you pay for associate with your Gmail id, and those are yours from phone to phone without needing to repurchase.

 

[curiousmileo]

which one is right in telling you how much ram is available cause they both have different numbers. and there seems to be more you can stop in running services than in the task manager so wat giveS?

 

[EarlyMon]

Moved your post here.

What gives is the ram report is appropriate and ram is being used by any app reporting it. No two will never agree - they can't.

To see why to stop task killing, read this thread.

Hope that helps.

 

[curiousmileo]

Moved your post here.

What gives is the ram report is appropriate and ram is being used by any app reporting it. No two will never agree - they can't.

To see why to stop task killing, read this thread.

Hope that helps.

ah ok. but lets say im playing a game and i press the home screen. its still running in the background right? or if i have the browser open with 3 tabs, dont both use battery even if they are not on?

 

[EarlyMon]

True but frustrating answer is depends.

Play something with your music app. Niw, while music playing change apos. Music still plays.

Now open some YouTube in your browser, while playing, switch to something else. It goes quiet instantly.

Both are using the same audio service to play sound. (Android is way like a PC and way not like other phone systems.)

First point is, programs use resources or not when viewing them or not by design specific to each apo. On that account, you can't just say they'll all behave X way.

Second part is easy and addressed above - most apps sleep when not in active use. Sleep means zero cpu use.

Your battery life will tie to three fundamental things for 99% of what's going on: processing, radio use, and display.

Android is most effective and efficient with processing use and knows more of what your phone needs in real time than a user with a task killer ever could.

Folks coming from other phone types are used to task killing. Don't bother with Android, it's already happening.

PS - try listening to a YouTube in a web window, then switch windows. See what happens - try the same task switching.

By the way, games using juice when in the background - bet you'll find they're configured to notify you when a bud elsewhere moves. Turn that off, watch battery lifetime increase.

 

[outkast25]

Is there an way to have certain apps exceptions so the native task killer leaves them running when I click kill all? For ex. My I want my widget locker to always be on and running. But when I kill all apps I want it to remain running and let task killer to kill everything else. Thx!

 

[EarlyMon]

No, there's no way to do that.

I'm not sure why you want to kill apps, so I moved your post here, to the thread listed in the forum guide, stuck at the top of the thread listings.

The information here may prove beneficial to you.

 

[stridelied]

So I just got my HTC Evo, and noticed when I go into task manager that my Total memory is always being used up even though the only tasks are usually settings/people which take up 22 and 14 mb. It says I have used 663 MB with only 145 MB free. Why is it so low? What could be using up all of my total memory? Then, when I go to advanced options it tells me that 231 MB of RAM is being used out of 515 MB, which seems a lot better. Is there a difference between these two? And why is my total memory so low if I have only a few apps and am not running anything? Any help is appreciated.

 

[Cavemansol]

Purely speculating, I assume the ram is taken up by Android/Sense. How the two (total memory/Ram) correlate, i havent the slightest. Either way, is the lack of memory space noticeable? Ive only once used my task manager, and that was just to force quit facebook. I dont ever really notice any lag or any other reason to use it. Just askin.