Is all of this stuff really running? What to stop?

[Jason Paul]

Hi All,

Sorry if I'm breaking any rules - don't mean to. But I posted this question in the Galaxy S5 forum, and just thought it might make more sense here since it's a more general question.

I just got a Galaxy S5 a couple of days ago. To save battery power, I was told by my local Sprint store to stop apps by clicking "Recent Apps", then swiping them away, which I have been doing.

I was reading here about preserving the battery. I saw a couple of posts about apps that are running.

So, I checked Applications Manager>SD Card>Running and found what seems to be a lot of things running. I expect a few things running in the background, but this seems excessive. Here's what is running:

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It was kind of hard to screencapture these because they kept moving, but I think I got them all.

As you can see, some of them are showing multiple instances, and some seem to be using a lot of resources. And many just sound like stuff I don't need to be constantly running.

What can I safely stop?

How do I stop them?

Thanks,
Jason

 

[dibblebill]

You let Android manage them. It's a common fallacy to claim that swiping apps away saves battery- it really doesn't, unless the app is hung up or constantly downloading something. Android actually performs better when you let it manage its own memory. Just bear in mind that apps that are running/not paused when you exit them, or downloading data, do pull battery quick.

 

[dequelo]

You can stop the apps you don't use by tapping on the process and tapping stop. Smart Remote, Geo news, lumen toolbar, S health, S voice.

It won't gain you a large amount of RAM, but it will free up about 30MB. I have an S5 as well and mine has more than 50% used up also. A lot of this is the Touchwiz launcher and other Samsung/Google services. I never have any apps crash or any performance issues with 500-700 MB of RAM available.

I hope this helps.

 

[dequelo]

Trying setting your brightness to about 50% and turn off GPS, bluetooth, and wifi when you are not using these features. I get about 30-40 hours of moderate use on a single charge by doing this. I also never short charge my phone. I always let it get to 10% or less, then charge to 100% before removing the power cable.

 

[lunatic59]

Hi Jason,

The advice you've gotten is right on. Unless you've been seeing lag, severe battery drain or crashes, there isn't really any reason to be "swiping away" recent apps. Most of those apps probably wouldn't be listed under running services anyway as they are most likely cached. Killing cached apps in an exercise in futility, although if it makes you feel good, it won't harm anything. (It won't help, either, but hey, it's your phone ... you can put hello kitty stickers on it if you want to. )

I was told by my local Sprint store to stop apps by clicking "Recent Apps", then swiping them away, which I have been doing.

I hate when they do that, and in deference to Sprint, all the carrier store staff will do this. Here's what that advice does ... it gets you out of the store so they can focus on sales.

As for the services listed, like dequelo said, a good deal of them are for the benefit of TouchWiz. Without root you won't be able to totally remove them and knowing how Samsung integrates all the services co-dependently, you probably shouldn't be removing them anyway. You may be able to disable a lot of them in application manager, which will give you the opportunity to re-enable them if you find disabling it causes problems with other apps or services.

But, if you aren't experiencing any problems, as they say in England ....

Spoiler

 

[Jason Paul]

Thanks all. Sounds like I should just leave well enough alone.

The battery seems to be lasting all day, so no real complaints I suppose.

Normal usage is possibly a couple of phone calls and/or texts per day. I might pop online for a few minutes to check a forum or the news. My normal hogs are listening to a radio station through their app for 15-30 minutes in the mornings, sometimes watching Netflix on the bus home from work (maybe 25 minutes).

My previous phone (HTC Evo 3D) would do go through that usage (including Netflix) in a day, and when I'd get home, I'd be just dipping below 15%, so time to put it on the charger.

I haven't watched Netflix on the S5 yet, but just comparing where the use is similar, it looks like the S5 will probably be about the same as the Evo.

I guess I was expecting longer battery life since it's newer, and since I've seen people here posting about getting a full 24-48 hours out of one charge. Even with the radio app and Netflix, it seemed I might get more than 10-11 hours.

Again - no big deal, it just seemed like there were a lot of services running in the background that might not need to be.

Thanks again,
Jason

 

[Stuntman]

I guess I was expecting longer battery life since it's newer, and since I've seen people here posting about getting a full 24-48 hours out of one charge. Even with the radio app and Netflix, it seemed I might get more than 10-11 hours.

My impression is that phone makers tend to not make newer phones with a longer battery life than older phones. They want to make phones as thin as possible, so minimising the battery size is usually a priority over battery life. Most consumers will be drawn to a thinner phone than one with a longer battery life, but thicker.

It is just really hard to guage battery life based on other people's usage. Everyone's usage is different. I found the only good way to get a sense of how good the battery life is to just use it myself. I have not seen anyone describe their usage to be anywhere similar to mine.

For most modern smartphones, you can expect it to probably last a day or so for the average person. I don't really see this trend changing much. If your normal usage does not last an entire day, you will have to find some means to top up your battery some time in the middle of the day.

 

[dibblebill]

My impression is that phone makers tend to not make newer phones with a longer battery life than older phones. They want to make phones as thin as possible, so minimising the battery size is usually a priority over battery life. Most consumers will be drawn to a thinner phone than one with a longer battery life, but thicker.

It is just really hard to guage battery life based on other people's usage. Everyone's usage is different. I found the only good way to get a sense of how good the battery life is to just use it myself. I have not seen anyone describe their usage to be anywhere similar to mine.

For most modern smartphones, you can expect it to probably last a day or so for the average person. I don't really see this trend changing much. If your normal usage does not last an entire day, you will have to find some means to top up your battery some time in the middle of the day.

Every time batteries improve, the phone hardware gets more demanding. Very important to remember

 

[Jason Paul]

Makes sense - thanks again all.

Jason

 

[Stuntman]

Every time batteries improve, the phone hardware gets more demanding. Very important to remember

They could have made the phones thicker and stick a bigger battery. None of the manufacturers are willing to sacrifice thickness for bigger batteries.

 

[dibblebill]

They could have made the phones thicker and stick a bigger battery. None of the manufacturers are willing to sacrifice thickness for bigger batteries.

Neither are most customers.

 

[Stuntman]

Neither are most customers.

Many will by a phone because it is thin and then complain about the battery life later. When it comes time to buy a new phone, they again will by a thin phone and again complain about the battery life later.

 

[Jason Paul]

Well, as a quick update - yesterday I had a day where I watched about 25 minutes of Netflix on the bus heading home (classic Twilight Zone thank you very much).

It actually did better than my old phone. As I said earlier a normal day's use including a short show on Netflix on my old phone ended with me at about 15% when I got home.

Yesterday on the S5 with similar usage ended with me at 46% I think it was. So, actually quite a bit better.

Thanks again all.

Jason

 

[BethRogers]

Do you actually use and/or want all of the apps that show up on your list of apps that are running?

When I got my new S4 there were a Lot of new built-in apps I didn't want (like S Health, Story Album, Trip Advisor, Yahoo Finance, etc.), but you can't uninstall built-in apps. You may already know this, but you can disable unwanted built-in apps using the "Turn Off" option in the application manager. This is different from the Stop option, which doesn't prevent the app from restarting on its own later.

To turn off an app completely go, to the list of running apps, then click the app name. A new window will open, and you should see the Turn Off option if it's a non-critical app. ** Note- You still need to be Careful deciding what apps to turn off. Be Sure you know what the app is and what it does Before you turn it off completely.

After that, the app should appear in the Turned Off list. The app will then be unable to restart on its own. The app's icon will also disappear from your apps pages, home pages, widgets, etc. You won't be able to launch the app again unless you go back into the app manager & select Turn On.

 

[kate]

To turn off an app completely go, to the list of running apps, then click the app name. A new window will open, and you should see the Turn Off option if it's a non-critical app.

Depending on your phone model the option can also be called Disable instead of Turn Off.

 

[dibblebill]

Many will by a phone because it is thin and then complain about the battery life later. When it comes time to buy a new phone, they again will by a thin phone and again complain about the battery life later.

I haven't had to compromise the two with the Z3,thankfully