Does the Nexus lag?

[Gunner]

There is obvious lag in some lwp's. Also some minor stuttering when scrolling through widgets in the app tray. Entering text on some webpages causes a slowdown. There is some lag when apps are installing in the background and you're trying to actively scroll or move around a page; the page will hang for a sec.

Depsite all that, I have no desire to return the GN.

 

[Grandmadroid]

hey guys!
some important info regarding this. with 4.0.2 update, it brought about some kernel changes. we're talking about this over on xda but basically the hispeed_freq was lowered for cpu load.

quoting mike1986
"In newest kernel Google removed go_maxspeed_load parameter (sys/devices/system/cpu/cpufreq/interactive/go_maxspeed_load). What was it doing? When set to XX value it means "rise CPU frequency after xx% CPU is loaded". By default it was 95 so "go to higher frequency when CPU is 95% loaded". In my custom ROMs I always tweak it to 60.

Now - in latest kernel, google replaced go_maxspeed_load with hispeed_freq (sys/devices/system/cpu/cpufreq/interactive/hispeed_freq). This value means "Go to hi speed when CPU load at or above this value". By default hispeed_freq is set to 700000 (700MHz)."

Heavy sigh.....I'm just going to go shoot myself now.

 

[krouget]

Android has a severe problem with ListViews. There are many improvements (i.e. Contacts is pretty smooth), but it's not a consistently smooth device. If you're moving from Android 2.x over to 4.x, you'll be blown away. But if you've used the competition for any length of time and you value responsiveness and smoothness, then you may feel like throwing said Galaxy Nexus against a wall (I've come pretty close to it).

It sounds like you're being a bit dramatic, but your experience doesn't mirror mine. I have iOS devices in my household and think they are great-- however, I'd never use "severe" to describe the lag I've experienced on my device, and neither has it driven me to frustration. Honeycomb had a number of these issues, and the above comments may have applied to my tablet, however, it's very limited with ICS on my GN. Perception is reality, in this case.

To all you ALDs out there: ignorance is bliss - enjoy your handsets!

You can make your point without being patronizing.

We all have varying levels of tolerance for what we perceive as acceptable UI performance, and it's perfectly fine if Android doesn't serve everyone. We can quote numbers all day long, but at the end of the day, consumers have voted for Android, alongside iOS, for any number of reasons.

Is it as smooth as iOS? No. Is it terrible? Most certainly not (I'm not sure why everything has to be so polarized, so as to exist on extremes). I've dealt with UIs which were far worse, ranging from car nav systems, to various desktop software. There is certainly still room for improvement, but thus far, I'm really enjoying my device, with only a small list of things to complain about (relative to a much longer list of things which I do like).

 

[wedgemoose]

Lag????? I think you meant to type "lightning" and the auto-correct put in lag....HaHa

This phone flys. If there is any lag it's just normal I guess. But I couldn't be happier or more surprised with the speed of this thing. And I'm coming from some pretty powerful/fast phones....

 

[NextNexus]

There's definitely very little lag. The only time when it is noticeable is when I update the twitter Android Widget Pro, then when you try to scroll through the homepages it'll lag a bit until the update is complete.

 

[RageXicity]

I've failed to make this phone lag. Best Phone to date

 

[x25064]

Apparently several of you neglected to watch the first video that was posted.

 

[krouget]

Apparently several of you neglected to watch the first video that was posted.

I don't think it's a matter of neglecting to watch a video, so much as we're commenting on our actual experiences, some of which can vary or take precedence. That experience has shown us that the majority of time, the phone is smooth and not a chore to use.

Yes, lag exist...in that same video the iPhone lagged, too, and it has happened during my interactions. However, I know better than to suggest that because lag was present, that the device was somehow burdened with it. Thus far, my GN runs smooth and it's situational or the exception to experience lag. Saying it lags enough that I'd want to throw it against a wall? That's either a low tolerance for lag, or sensationalizing, relative to the device I'm holding.

 

[BringTheRain403]

Android has a severe problem with ListViews. There are many improvements (i.e. Contacts is pretty smooth), but it's not a consistently smooth device. If you're moving from Android 2.x over to 4.x, you'll be blown away. But if you've used the competition for any length of time and you value responsiveness and smoothness, then you may feel like throwing said Galaxy Nexus against a wall (I've come pretty close to it).

Intel actually conducted a study into the success of the iPad:

Intel: Windows 7 tablets can outperform iPad 2 | News | TechRadar

They basically reverse engineered the iPad user-experience and concluded that the success of the iDevices is largely thanks to two main attributes:

1. 15ms response time (compared to Android's 150ms+).
2. Consistent 60fps smoothness (compared to Androids erratic refresh rate which is up and down like a yo-yo).

Other experiments have been conducted which show (what some have termed) 'micro-lag' - the small 'lag' (if that's the right word for it) that occurs when the Dalvick Garbage Collector kicks in.

You've really gotta ask yourself why Android tablets are not selling well (Android Tablets Not Selling as Well as Claimed - Yahoo! News) while Apple can't seem to make enough iPads. Could it be because of this issue? IMHO, I point the finger firmly at this issue and Google for burying their heads in the sand and pretending it doesn't exist. Android is synonymous with 'lag', and with good reason.

I'd like to point out that I am NOT a 'hater'!!! I have spent over

 

[JC13]

I have had a few screen re-draws coming out of an app again. It did it last night after being in Facebook. Makes me shutter as it reminds me of my OG Droid. Nothing too worisome though as for the most part it's smooth!

 

[Cassull]

I have actually experienced some VERY bad lag, but I think this is due to my using LauncherPro. I'm coming from a Droid X that was rooted and it was having similar issues that I'm seeing on my GN, so I'm thinking it has to be an app that I have.

Currently, my GN is rooted and bootloader unlocked, but has no custom roms. The lag I'm seeing is when I'm opening up the app drawer, there is very noticeable stuttering, though scrolling is still smooth. Sometimes switching between home screens, there is considerable lag, as in you'll see the animation get 'stuck' for a second or two before completing. EDIT: I wanted to make clear that the lag from the app drawing and changing home screens isn't constant; I'm not sure how to trigger it, but it has happened on numerous occasions.

Another recent issue was being unable to change the wallpaper; I could change between a few of the live ones, but changing between the normal ones sometimes does not work. For instance, my wallpaper will become entirely black OR I'll be stuck on the current one, which seems to me that it could be trying to change the wallpaper and simply failing which in turn could be affecting the performance.

I also use Beautiful Widgets and I have seen when suddenly, ALL the widgets on all home screens suddenly crash (it'll give me some error message like 'problem loading widget'). I haven't been able to find a resolution for that aside from rebooting.

 

[yawdapaah]

What would you prefer? Continuing your applications pausing so you can scroll smoothly?

I'd encourage you to read this link:
https://plus.google.com/100838276097451809262/posts/VDkV9XaJRGS

I can deal with some stuttering but disagree with Android being, inherently, laggy.

 

[eagle17]

having had an iphone 4, and many android devices I can say that lag on the gnex is extremely small... yes there are some problems but to claim it is an overwhelming issue is going a bit too far...

as for the first video .. I see some lag, on all the phones... I do not experience the same degree of lag on my gnex (lte from vzw) as is on the phone in the video... I can see lag on the iphone also.

as for a google problem with lists and lag... i tried my corp mail, gmail, contacts and google music... no lag on any of those lists... and they are all huge... to test I flicked down a few pages to get away from an end of page then i put my finger on the screen and moved up and down rapidly (as in video one) the point on the list I was touching moved with my finger with no lag whatsoever...

 

[Techno Tonis]

Apparently several of you neglected to watch the first video that was posted.

I'll do you one better.

Not only did I watch the first video and the other two videos, I went to multiple upon multiple sites trying the exact same test as the youtube poster performed, without being to replicate a single ms of lag.

Then, I decided to look even further - and noticed two things. A. The youtube poster posted her video on Dec 4th, which means this was a GSM variant. The poster also was using a site as a test with a .uk address, leading me to believe she is British. B. This also means this video was posted before the 4.0.2 update was released, and even furthermore - have no clue what build of ICS she is running (Although it is likely vanilla 4.0). It could have been a store unit build

Now, if you're having lag problems with YOUR phone, please post up video so the whole community can see your issue. I will gladly post up a video of my phone on any website and show it side by side with an iphone4s to show you there is literally zero lag, and I'm not making this up out of some bias fanboyish love.

Maybe your phone is glitchy, but promise me when I say to you that I have run into literally zero lag while browsing - as I'm sure many others haven't had an issue as well.

The issue seems to be with your (or whoever is reporting lag) phone, and not ICS or the Galaxy Nexus as a whole.

My .02

 

[pedromartinez]

God bless you. Covered it better then i could have. I find the epic touch has no lag, bei g an amdroid device. I know i bring it up a lot here, but i find it to be the standard for android phones.

Also, youve got to.be a total and complete herp durp to not see the lag in the nexus in that first video.

If you all mean a lack in smoothness of the UI when you say lag. That is also the same as saying a noticeable drop in framerate. Yes the Galaxy Nexus does lag.

Now if you mean lag in terms of locking up, freezing, or long pauses in activity. No the Galaxy Nexus does not lag.

 

[scott.deagan]

@krouget - you are right, I should have kept it polite, and I apologize for my patroniszing remark. I just go a little crazy whenever I buy expensive Android handsets, 'feel' that it's not PERFECTLY fluid, and then have other people more or less tell me I'm imagining a problem that doesn't exist.

As someone mentioned above, 'lag' is probably the wrong word to use here. I should say that it's 'non-fluid' in many areas. The problem I have is the experience isn't consistently buttery smooth throughout. The moment I experience a 'glitch', the device loses its magic. I have been following this issue since Android Issue 6914 was posted way back in January 2011:

Issue 6914 - android - Make android use the GPU (if available) for UI and browsing. - Android - An Open Handset Alliance Project - Google Project Hosting

I've always stated that it probably bothers some people a lot more than others. When I put on my consumer hat, I have zero tolerance for such issues (especially on a handset I paid

 

[pragmatous]

No lag here. I just got my Galaxy nexus today.

I updated my phone and after update I wiped my phone before usage. Phone works great.

 

[Zeas]

I thought I was the only one that had noticed. Everyone just says how smooth it is, but all I see is a bunch of stutter everywhere. The phone itself doesn't lag much, however it's not smooth by far. My Nexus S running GPA19 is actually a lot smoother. I was expecting it to be faster and smoother than my RAZR, however I was left deeply disappointed. I've overclocked the phone, and even tried running it at performance, but the stutter is still there. I've come to the conclusion that it's probably just ICS. I hate to say it, but to me ICS feels like the first release of Vista, and can't wait for it to be updated. The update to 4.0.3 helps a bit, so maybe by 4.0.5 it'll be less noticeable. I tried ICS on my Nexus S and it just makes the phone slower and stuttery.

I've used over 10 different phones this past year, and even though I had my expectations set low for this phone, I was still pretty disappointed. I thought it would be at least as fast as the RAZR, but with a smoother browser. To give a simple example, when I scroll through wallpapers on my OG, Nexus S, or any other phone with Android 2.3.7, it's smooth and fast as can be. However, on the Galaxy Nexus you can see an immediate stutter and drop in frame rate. How can something so simple not perform properly on a brand new phone that's supposed to offer the best of the best.

I think I'm just one of those people that have an eye for these things, and I hate that I notice it so much every time I use the phone. Also the browser doesn't text rewarp properly, which can be very annoying. I just hope they release an update soon to fix all this. The smoothest and fastest Android phone I've ever used is the Galaxy S II, tough the RAZR came really close. In my opinion Google's poor attempt at Hardware Acceleration just made the OS stutter and perform slower to the eye. I'd rather wait an extra second and get fluid 30/60 fps than to save that time and get a choppy frame rate. I really hope developers can make this phone as smooth as my other phones.
-Sorry for the long rant.

 

[AndroidsOfTara]

I have actually experienced some VERY bad lag, but I think this is due to my using LauncherPro. I'm coming from a Droid X that was rooted and it was having similar issues that I'm seeing on my GN, so I'm thinking it has to be an app that I have.

Launcher Pro is awesome, but hasn't be updated since May, I believe.

 

[reisb]

The only lag I've noticed is when I back out of programs. When it gets back to the main launcher screen, screen will sometimes be blank and then fill in the apps on page. Not sure if that's the screen draw people are talking about, but it freaked me out because my Fascinate did that all the time when memory got too low.

 

[ZachMob]

I tried to duplicate the lag in the videos, but the Galaxy Nexus has been responsive to me and scrolled at a high frame rate on web pages that contain many pictures.

In the videos, it could be that the web page was running some scripts that cause the browser to slow down or there was something in the background running. Because of multitasking, it is hard to determine that performance of an Android device on a video without knowing what apps are installed and running.

The only thing that I find annoying is when zooming out, the web pages does not load until you lift your fingers. It disrupts the fluid motion of the browser in a major way.

 

[BringTheRain403]

Launcher Pro is awesome, but hasn't be updated since May, I believe.

The guy is completely rewriting the program. No eta on the rewrite though. He said a while back that updates would be few and far between until the rewrite was done..

 

[scott.deagan]

My favourite comment from Top Gear on:

Galaxy Nexus with Ice Cream Sandwich: pictures, video, and hands-on | The Verge

in regards to the post which mentions:

"...hat having been said, it unfortunately remains the case that Android
isn

 

[Appleanche]

The basic fact of smoothness with Apple is that they make large sacrifices to do it. Whether that's choice in devices (easy to tweak an OS with 3-4 phones to work with) or things like the page not loading when you're scrolling. It's also easy to notice the slower animations to mask a lot of loading and stuff.

Complete smoothness is largely a myth created by the iPhone.. why do we demand complete fluidness on a phone? Why do we even care if we occasionally get a stutter? Does that really impact consumers choice?

Largely I'd say no.. you can use the example of the Android tablets not selling as well according to one article but I can easily flip that over and say look at Android handset sales. Tablet sales have a lot of different factors, marketing is probably one of the biggest as well as price and being unique but this is for another topic.

Here's a fact - even my iMac and Macbook stutter at times on OS X, Windows 7 stutters, Linux stutters, hell my PS3 menu UI stutters. The occasional stutter on on my GN really doesn't make me bat an eye over it.

 

[cartman9090]

hey guys!
some important info regarding this. with 4.0.2 update, it brought about some kernel changes. we're talking about this over on xda but basically the hispeed_freq was lowered for cpu load.

quoting mike1986
"In newest kernel Google removed go_maxspeed_load parameter (sys/devices/system/cpu/cpufreq/interactive/go_maxspeed_load). What was it doing? When set to XX value it means "rise CPU frequency after xx% CPU is loaded". By default it was 95 so "go to higher frequency when CPU is 95% loaded". In my custom ROMs I always tweak it to 60.

Now - in latest kernel, google replaced go_maxspeed_load with hispeed_freq (sys/devices/system/cpu/cpufreq/interactive/hispeed_freq). This value means "Go to hi speed when CPU load at or above this value". By default hispeed_freq is set to 700000 (700MHz)."

What does this mean i practice?