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New Speed Fix = Quadrant > 2000

keredini

Member
Jul 16, 2010
88
15
STL
DISCLAIMER: I, nor anyone else at these forums / XDA / MoDaCo are responsible if you brick your phone, lose that smoking hot girl's (or guy's) phone number you got last night, etc. If you're not familiar with root, ADB, and don't have reliable backups (Clockwork, Titanium, etc.), I wouldn't recommend this.

Just applied the new speed fix detailed at XDA...this is creating an internal partition (in other words, you don't have to repartition your external SD card). It more than doubled my Quadrant scores, I'm over 2000 now. In real world use, it's hard to tell the difference between this and the other lag fix (the one where people scores averaged 950). Once I applied that i didn't have much lag when opening programs. But I can see improvements in certain apps (FB, Twitter, processing images on larger web pages) and swapping home screens and using the pull down notification.

snap20100809132019.png


Here's the MoDaCo link, which was copied by the OP from XDA.

New (very fast) lag fix using internal memory and playlogo1 hack - Android @ MoDaCo
 
Okay, I did this, and holy crap! Being pretty new to Android, I wasn't sure how the pretty bars above would translate to actual user experience. I made the change, though (after reading through the scripts to make sure they weren't doing anything unexpected). I thought I saw some improvement in speed pulling down the notification window, or switching homescreens, but it could've been wishful thinking.

Then I launched the Marketplace, and did a double-take! It pulled up instantly, instead of the usual chugging pause. Ditto for other apps. I didn't realize how much I'd already become used to the delays in switching between apps. I can definitely say this made a big difference - and well worth the sacrifice of 1GB on the /data partition.
 
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It's an easy fix if you know what you are doing. No computer needed.

1. Make sure you are rooted, have Busybox 1.17.1 (not 1.18), Root Explorer, and Android Terminal Emulator installed. If you have updated to Busybox 1.18, get a copy of the version 1.17.1 apk file, and manually reinstall it first. I also recommend downloading ROM manager and doing a nandroid backup before attempting this, just in case anything goes wrong. If it does, simply reboot into recovery, apply packages to start clockwork, and restore. No chance of losing anything or bricking if you do this first.

2. Make sure to remove any previous similar lag fixes off the phone.


3. Extract all the files from the phone only zip files on the root of the internal sdcard (i.e., in /sdcard and not in / or /sdcard/sd). The zip file contains everything inside a directory and you must move everything out on to the root of the sdcard.

4. Start terminal emulator and run the script by entering the two simple commands in the readme file. All they do is ask for root privileges and then invoke the script you just unpacked on the root of the sdcard. If you make a typing error, nothing will happen and you can retype the commands correctly. I recommend switching the input method to something other than swype before you start Terminal Emulator, because the backspace key in swype does not work while entering commands, but the backspace key in android keyboard (and probably any other one you use) does.

5. Enter the command to reboot, run quadrant, and get blown back. Mine ran at 2200. I know that doesn't necessarily mean anything in the real world, but I can tell the phone is really flying now with some noticeable real world gains. For example, try to open the application drawer for the first time in touchwiz before the doing the fix. You will see a 1-2 second lag. Try the same after the fix and reboot and the icons will appear almost instantaneously instead. The phone will also boot much faster, and will give you control sooner. This is a very measurable improvement that is quantified by the jump in the quadrant score.

With this fix I now officially claim to have the fastest android phone in the world, bar none.

It is even easier to get rid of the fix if you ever need to. The removal script is also included in that zip. Just run it using terminal and it'll go back to the way it was.
 
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I understand these "fixes" are partitioning some SD storage as an ext2 or an ext3 filesystem. Any issues with those FS getting corrupted with a sudden power down (like running out of battery? Does Android do a preemptive proper power down at some low level point on the battery?

it creates a virtual ext2 file on the RFS. ext2 isn't journaled (where as ext3/4 are) which is one reason why it's so much faster, but also why if you take your battery out randomly you have a chance of corruption. as far as I know, on low battery the phone automatically shuts it's self down in a safe way.

I did the fix this morning and it does feel a bit faster, I think the slight risk is worth the reward in this case.
 
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Just a disclaimer, read thoroughly before you attempt it. It does give big jumps in quadrant scores but not much noticeable difference in the phone. Plus, EXT2 has some "issues" long story short, when you power down the phone it's the equivelant of yanking the power cord on your PC. You will corrupt your file system eventually. It's a given. May take a while, may conceivably never happen in the life of your phone. But people will have problems with this. I've tried every one of these fixes and the only one that showed noticeable real world improvement was the overclock kernel.

I'm not trying to tell you what to do but educate those who have no clue as to what this does. For more information read this thread, towards the end.

[LAG FIX]Another alternative to the I/O issues - xda-developers
 
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Just a disclaimer, read thoroughly before you attempt it. It does give big jumps in quadrant scores but not much noticeable difference in the phone. Plus, EXT2 has some "issues" long story short, when you power down the phone it's the equivelant of yanking the power cord on your PC. You will corrupt your file system eventually. It's a given. May take a while, may conceivably never happen in the life of your phone. But people will have problems with this. I've tried every one of these fixes and the only one that showed noticeable real world improvement was the overclock kernel.

I'm not trying to tell you what to do but educate those who have no clue as to what this does. For more information read this thread, towards the end.

[LAG FIX]Another alternative to the I/O issues - xda-developers

I'm going to have to call you on this. While there are inherent risks with any mod that involves file caching, this mod made a VERY NOTICEABLE improvement for me. I am no nooby and this is no placebo. Almost every aspect of the phone is noticeably faster. Menus, apps, the app drawer, everything is snappier and with virtually no delay.

The bottom line, I wouldn't recommend this for anyone unfamiliar or unwilling to reload the ROM if something bad happens. For those of us who are completely comfortable with that, this mod is worth it for sure.
 
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After giving it some thought I've undone the ext2 fix and am going to wait until a kenel based fix which supports a proper file system apprpriate for flash cards is developed. Ext 2 has corruption issues under the inteneded usage, Ext 3 and Ext 4 are not appropriate on the internal flash, as they increase the wear due repeated writes to the same block. We are on the right track, but a fix that properly balances performance and reliability is not quite here yet.

The good news, the script to undo the fix works just fine as well.
 
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After giving it some thought I've undone the ext2 fix and am going to wait until a kenel based fix which supports a proper file system apprpriate for flash cards is developed. Ext 2 has corruption issues under the inteneded usage, Ext 3 and Ext 4 are not appropriate on the internal flash, as they increase the wear due repeated writes to the same block. We are on the right track, but a fix that properly balances performance and reliability is not quite here yet.

The good news, the script to undo the fix works just fine as well.

how does EXT2 have corruption issues under the intended usage? the only corruption issue is lack of a journal which means when powered off incorrectly, the file system may have registered incomplete writes leading to corruption. incorrect power offs are not the intended usage. if anything, ext2 has less wear and tear than RFS since less is being written as overhead.

I agree that this isn't the perfect solution. what needs to be developed is a custom kernel with support for yaffs and to reformat the RFS partition as yaffs. that would give the speed increase of a better file system while retaining reliability. but until that is available, I'm perfectly happy with the slight risk of ext2.
 
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Because android doesn't unmount the drives, which means even a "correct" power down is "incorrect" as far as the file system goes.

And I'm not saying this won't make a noticeable difference for everyone, but it didn't for me. And the risks far outweighed the numbers. Quadrant is a VERY inexact benchmark when it comes to real world usage.

Again, I'm not saying don't do this. But everyone should be aware that there are risks involved. As there are with ALL the "fixes" out right now.
 
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I'm going to have to call you on this. While there are inherent risks with any mod that involves file caching, this mod made a VERY NOTICEABLE improvement for me. I am no nooby and this is no placebo. Almost every aspect of the phone is noticeably faster. Menus, apps, the app drawer, everything is snappier and with virtually no delay.

The bottom line, I wouldn't recommend this for anyone unfamiliar or unwilling to reload the ROM if something bad happens. For those of us who are completely comfortable with that, this mod is worth it for sure.

I'm also curious, what other "fixes" are you running if any and would you mind installing Benchmark and running it and posting your results?
 
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I'm also curious, what other "fixes" are you running if any and would you mind installing Benchmark and running it and posting your results?

Well, because of my inability to leave well enough alone, I restored JM2 from a Nandroid backup and tried this fix on the Euro ROM. I just installed benchmark and here are the results (I have no comparison to AT&T ROM):

Graphics:
Total: 31.584438
Draw opacity bitmap: 9.561158
Draw transparent bitmap: 9.757027

CPU:
Total: 776.5078
MWIPS DP: 57.803467
MWIPS SP: 61.124695
MFLOPS DP: 6.9527354
MFLOPS SP: 9.504827
VAX MIPS DP: 40.30546
VAX MIPS SP: 40.062656

Memory:
Total: 665.3567
Copy memory: 604.5949 mb/sec

File System:
Total: 259.0038
Create 1k empty: 0.435 sec
Delete 1k empty: 0.269 sec
Write 1M into file: 163.93443 M/sec
Read 1M from file: 357.14285 M/sec

I should add that I just completed restoring and doing this mod so haven't tested much yet.
 
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