How can I get my tf300 working it's best?

[tds73]

Hello,

Let me start with a brief history.
I have had my tf300t for a year now. It gets very little use. Mainly because I think it is slow and sluggish. It just seems easier most the time to put it down and grab the laptop. That kind of defeats the purpose of why we purchased this tablet. We were hoping to basically have it sitting on the coffee table most of the time and just grab it periodically to check emails, do a quick internet search, jump on facebook, etc. Being it is smaller and easier to handle than the 17" laptop. We would also like to be able to take along on trips for use in the hotel room for similar things.

With that being said, I am looking for recommendations to optimize this tablet.
Looking to make it quicker and more user friendly for the activities I listed above.
From research I have done, it sounds like the "cromi-x" may be a good way to accomplish this.
The problem is, I am computer stupid. I can follow directions, but do not really have an understanding of things like rooted, ROM, flashing, etc.
Is there somewhere with instructions on how to accomplish suggestions that you may have? shoot, I don't even know how to backup, or if I really need to since I don't really have anything on the tablet that I would be afraid to lose.
But if before I were to make changes and needed to have a backup of the system in case something happened, I do not know how to do this.
Any help/ideas would be appreciated. Just please remember to keep it "dumbed down".

FYI, I think tab is up to date. android version 4.1.1

 

[hchen42]

Let me see if I can help you out here...

Have you ever wonder what happens when TF300 is powered on, how the device know what to do? Below is a sequence of instructions that TF300 follow when you press the power button

1) bootloader "program" is executed.
2) depend on the version of bootloader and your boot up instruction, the bootloader will boot into one of the following (or do some other instructions) :
2a) custom recovery (think of this as diagnostic tool)
2b) your regular Android (aka the rom roms).

Hence, from the above, you need to perform THREE BIG STEPS.
If you have never root/unlock/rom your device, your very first step is to "unlock the bootloader", second step is to install recovery and third is to install rom (and/or kernel).

Step 1) unlock (bootloader). You only need to do this ONCE in your TF300 device's life time. Basically, once it's unlocked, you don't ever need to do it again. If you do this correctly, you'll see a message indicate the tablet is unlocked whenever you reboot the tablet.

Step 2) install custom recovery - this often is done with "adb" tools where you connect your device to your laptop.... You need to "boot into recovery" in order to install roms. This is arguably the trickiest in rooting/rom an android device.

Step 3) once step 2 is done, you "reboot" into custom recovery, and install the roms you donwloaded. Once this is done, reboot and enjoy.

For details of each steps, there is a huge section on xda-developers.

My recommendation is to google on the topics, watch some youtube (warning, can get boring). Read until you are comfortable.

Good Luck.

 

[powell]

@tds73 If you are "computer stupid" as you said, I would not bother to root the tablet. First, you will likely loose your warranty. Second, rooting is for people that have time to make backups, reinstall everything, configure everything, play with new ROM over and over again. Once you start rooting, you will probably have to install several ROMs before you are satisfied with the performance AND everything actually works. Third- why is your TF300T slow? Maybe you should start from doing cache cleaning and uninstalling unused apps, that run in the background?

 

[tds73]

Powell,
I would like to try your suggestion first. Problem is, I cannot figure out or find how to clear cache. Or is it as simple as a cold boot/hard reset.

I have just done the cold boot.

Also, I cannot find out what the most up to date "updates" are. Is there somewhere that list this info?
my tab is android version 4.1.1
and the build number is JR003c.US_epad-10.4.2.20-20121228
does the 10.4.2.20 in the build number mean it is JB 4.1?

 

[peterc10]

4.2.1 is the latest version available for the tf300t. Try settings > about tablet > system update, then click on the check update box. The build number is different depending upon your tablet. Yours is one designed for pads sold in the USA. Mine is in the UK so is different.

However the tablet should be fast enough no matter what Android version you have. Mine was when I used to have 4.1.1, although 4.2.1 did improve it a bit.

To clear caches try settings > Apps > then click on each app in turn and then click on its "clear cache" button. If you do that one by one and after each one see how the tablet performs, you should be able to find what is slowing it all down.

 

[tds73]

Peterc10,
I finally got the tab to find the update. I had tried many times before and it kept saying up to date. Now I am at version 4.2.1.
I went thru and cleared cache on apps like you explained.

Things seem to be much better now. Tablet responds faster and is easier to use.
Thanks for the help.

 

[peterc10]

Glad to be of assistance. Did you do as suggested and removed them one by one so you could find what was causing it? If you did what was it so other can benefit?

 

[tds73]

Sorry, I was rushing so I just cleared them all. I did not read the entire post before I acted.

 

[Coping Daily]

Hello,

Let me start with a brief history.
I have had my tf300t for a year now. It gets very little use. Mainly because I think it is slow and sluggish. It just seems easier most the time to put it down and grab the laptop. That kind of defeats the purpose of why we purchased this tablet. We were hoping to basically have it sitting on the coffee table most of the time and just grab it periodically to check emails, do a quick internet search, jump on facebook, etc. Being it is smaller and easier to handle than the 17" laptop. We would also like to be able to take along on trips for use in the hotel room for similar things.

With that being said, I am looking for recommendations to optimize this tablet.
Looking to make it quicker and more user friendly for the activities I listed above.
From research I have done, it sounds like the "cromi-x" may be a good way to accomplish this.
The problem is, I am computer stupid. I can follow directions, but do not really have an understanding of things like rooted, ROM, flashing, etc.
Is there somewhere with instructions on how to accomplish suggestions that you may have? shoot, I don't even know how to backup, or if I really need to since I don't really have anything on the tablet that I would be afraid to lose.
But if before I were to make changes and needed to have a backup of the system in case something happened, I do not know how to do this.
Any help/ideas would be appreciated. Just please remember to keep it "dumbed down".

FYI, I think tab is up to date. android version 4.1.1

I have had very good results (so far) with an easy fix.
I downloaded and ran the free app 'Clean Master'.

 

[chrisgianti]

Just wanted to let you know that I was in the same situation (tried everything to speed it up as it became molasses after the update) and found that simply using the asus tool to unlock the bootloader worked and sped up the tf300t back to the way it originally was. This makes me think that is possible that this should have been the first step in troubleshooting rather than the last resort as the tech support would have you believe.

If that doesn't work for you then indeed find a custom rom and install it. Make sure to read up on the custom rom's known problems to verify it's satisfactory to you.

 

[donfrankmagic]

Hello,

Let me start with a brief history.
I have had my tf300t for a year now. It gets very little use. Mainly because I think it is slow and sluggish. It just seems easier most the time to put it down and grab the laptop. That kind of defeats the purpose of why we purchased this tablet. We were hoping to basically have it sitting on the coffee table most of the time and just grab it periodically to check emails, do a quick internet search, jump on facebook, etc. Being it is smaller and easier to handle than the 17" laptop. We would also like to be able to take along on trips for use in the hotel room for similar things.

With that being said, I am looking for recommendations to optimize this tablet.
Looking to make it quicker and more user friendly for the activities I listed above.
From research I have done, it sounds like the "cromi-x" may be a good way to accomplish this.
The problem is, I am computer stupid. I can follow directions, but do not really have an understanding of things like rooted, ROM, flashing, etc.
Is there somewhere with instructions on how to accomplish suggestions that you may have? shoot, I don't even know how to backup, or if I really need to since I don't really have anything on the tablet that I would be afraid to lose.
But if before I were to make changes and needed to have a backup of the system in case something happened, I do not know how to do this.
Any help/ideas would be appreciated. Just please remember to keep it "dumbed down".

FYI, I think tab is up to date. android version 4.1.1

Well I am like most of you, I love the design of this tablet, (tf300t). I do not want to root it because I have yet to see anyone who has had a definitive imporvement in performance. Usually they lose some features like bluetooth or something. When I first got the tablet, I purchased the 16 gig version, and noticed a slow start-up from the beginning. I took it back and shelled out the extra 20 or 30 dollars and got the 32 gig version. Well same problem. Put it away for a few years, then started to use it again. Here is how I solved the slow problem:

Most of us want this thing to boot up and sync right away so we can surf the net, make notes, etc. Well this tablet does stuff slowly in the background and we see the whole tablet as slow. I leave mine on all the time so all downloads, updates, and syncs happen thoughout the day instead of all at once at bootup. This has solved 90% of my speed problems. Heavier browsers are a little slow, so I use Opera Mini, most of the time. I am using Chrome on this forum because I had to sign in. It was a little slow, but it is what it is. I use this tablet for making notes (Supernote is great), light surfing, calendar, YouTube and checking weather. It is always on and comes up fast. Not like before, when it took 3 min to wake up from sleep. I am running 4.2.1. Letting it update apps and syncing thoughout the day is key to making this tablet 'seem' faster and useful. If I need to do heavier work, I just grab another tablet.