Database Users

GT-i9000m has been locking up recently to the point of removing the battery.

It went from extremely rarely doing it to three or four times just the other night in the span of a few hours. I can't reproduce it on command but it happens when I lock the screen and put it in my pocket. Then sometimes when I take it out it is entirely non-responsive, even the power button doesn't work. I have to remove and reinsert the battery.
It could be ADW Launcher or WidgetLocker since those are the only two programs always running, but I was hoping someone else experiences a similar issue. It hasn't happened when I normally lock it yet though, so it could also be the proximity sensor maybe?

Having the same issue (on Bell as well), but not running either of those two apps. Was almost to the point of returning the phone and then installed JM7 and it's been better, although not perfect. Last night it locked up with NoLED displaying an icon, so I've deleted that app to see if that's the issue. It hasn't locked up today, but it did reboot a few hours ago seemingly at random. :shrug:

Your internal sd card might be failing like all the other i9000m phones I see on this forum bricking themselves .

clubtech said:
Your internal sd card might be failing like all the other i9000m phones I see on this forum bricking themselves .
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Oh, that doesn't sound pleasant at all...
I'm outside of Bell's 30 day exchange period plus I've talked for over 30 minutes, so I'll have to go through Samsung if it completely breaks. On the plus side, a phone from them should be three button recoverable.
Although I can't be without a phone for weeks, I hope it's not the SD card.

Mine Lags like crazy once every few days till the point I need to restart it. Any idea why this is do?
Sent from my GT-I9000 using XDA App

Hold your horses people....
before you jump about the lag, and or one click lag fix and such
first you have to investigate what is running on your phone.
just over the weekend (since XDA was down) i stalled over 400 Apps
my phone slowed down to snail speed, then i ran my Startup Manager software (many to choose from)
I suggest Startup Cleaner 2.0 then uncheck everything, leave only the apps that you want to run during start up
reboot your phone and presto, fast as new!
if you can find version 2.1 of startup manager that one is even better
keep note, start up manager apps are not the same as task killer apps
it only run once during start up, and it helps you easily select what should and should not run during start up, so it doesn't stay in memory after it runs
on the same topic
you should also configure your Task Killer apps to kill everything, and add only the wants you want to be running to the ignore list.
that will keep the phone working smoothly even without the "one click lag fix"
i'm still running stock on my JH2 i9000m

AllGamer said:
Hold your horses people....
before you jump about the lag, and or one click lag fix and such
first you have to investigate what is running on your phone.
just over the weekend (since XDA was down) i stalled over 400 Apps
my phone slowed down to snail speed, then i ran my Startup Manager software (many to choose from)
I suggest Startup Cleaner 2.0 then uncheck everything, leave only the apps that you want to run during start up
reboot your phone and presto, fast as new!
if you can find version 2.1 of startup manager that one is even better
keep note, start up manager apps are not the same as task killer apps
it only run once during start up, and it helps you easily select what should and should not run during start up, so it doesn't stay in memory after it runs
on the same topic
you should also configure your Task Killer apps to kill everything, and add only the wants you want to be running to the ignore list.
that will keep the phone working smoothly even without the "one click lag fix"
i'm still running stock on my JH2 i9000m
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
All gamer has a good sugestion here BUT we are going to get people flaming the fact that Android shouldnt need task managers.....
Ho hum..
TBH in my experience, I have found (after a couple of hard resets) that there appears to be a size limit for installed apps. Once I get over this size limit, I get LAGTASTIC, phone slows to a snails pace, then I remove a few of the apps and I am back at light speed again....
I cant say what the limit is, but I know when I have hit it - I would then uninstall a lame app or two and get back running.

Yes a lot of people "claims" that, but yet you do a search in Android Market, you see LOTS of Task Manager / Killer apps for every phone.
they were not designed for Galaxy S, they were designed long ago for all the other phones that had and still have the same problems of memory management causing lags
Android is not robust enough to survive without one
heck not even Windows 7 or Windows Mobiles phone

I just read that possibly the phone freezes while trying to find a signal. As this problem has only recently started, and I just recently moved into university, and many buildings receive little to no wireless signal, I think it's more than a coincidence. I'll try going to plane mode before entering lecture halls and basements.

Frostshock said:
I just read that possibly the phone freezes while trying to find a signal. As this problem has only recently started, and I just recently moved into university, and many buildings receive little to no wireless signal, I think it's more than a coincidence. I'll try going to plane mode before entering lecture halls and basements.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i don't think that is the case with the Galaxy S
however back then my Treo 650 did suffer from that.
if you believe that is the problem then try this
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=7999389&postcount=28
more cool apps here http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=7999389

Rapidly losing patience w/ my Vibrant

I got my first Vibrant on launch day with high hopes. Two weeks later I had a new one due the phone freezing EVERY time I opened Google Maps. I've held on to this one now waiting for a GPS fix and JI6 worked great for me....for about the first week. Now its just as bad as ever.
I get an initial fix much quicker, but after about five minutes it loses GPS signal completely and indefinitely. In the past week my phone has begun freezing AGAIN, including three times today alone. Two of the times I would go to unlock my phone and nothing would happen. The screen would remain off, softkeys wouldn't light up, and a long press on the power button does nothing. I have to pull the battery out and reboot.
This is incredibly frustrating because this phone takes nearly 5 minutes to boot (never actually timed it but I have to imagine somewhere close to that). So its a long wait before I can do what I intended to do. I did notice that Shopsavvy was sucking on the GPS signal when I rebooted the phone so perhaps that's what was secretly crashing it (Needless to say, ShopSavvy got the boot after the second freeze).
I've tried uninstalling and re-installing the Maps updates w/ no change. I would bring the phone back but T-Mo doesn't have any other phones I want. My Touch 4G is hideous and I don't want another QWERTY like the G2.
So did I just end up with another dud Vibrant or is there a fix? Would rooting fix my problems? This phone has never been rooted or hacked in any way.
Any ideas???

Short answer: Yes.
Short but longer answer: At least install a LagFix. I got back and forth between stock JI6 and Fusion 1.1 a lot. JI6 with a custom kernel and LagFix is butter. Fusion is even better.
You may have a dud though. I haven't had that many problems except for things I did myself.

atvman29 said:
I got my first Vibrant on launch day with high hopes. Two weeks later I had a new one due the phone freezing EVERY time I opened Google Maps. I've held on to this one now waiting for a GPS fix and JI6 worked great for me....for about the first week. Now its just as bad as ever.
I get an initial fix much quicker, but after about five minutes it loses GPS signal completely and indefinitely. In the past week my phone has begun freezing AGAIN, including three times today alone. Two of the times I would go to unlock my phone and nothing would happen. The screen would remain off, softkeys wouldn't light up, and a long press on the power button does nothing. I have to pull the battery out and reboot.
This is incredibly frustrating because this phone takes nearly 5 minutes to boot (never actually timed it but I have to imagine somewhere close to that). So its a long wait before I can do what I intended to do. I did notice that Shopsavvy was sucking on the GPS signal when I rebooted the phone so perhaps that's what was secretly crashing it (Needless to say, ShopSavvy got the boot after the second freeze).
I've tried uninstalling and re-installing the Maps updates w/ no change. I would bring the phone back but T-Mo doesn't have any other phones I want. My Touch 4G is hideous and I don't want another QWERTY like the G2.
So did I just end up with another dud Vibrant or is there a fix? Would rooting fix my problems? This phone has never been rooted or hacked in any way.
Any ideas???
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I did not know what a real smartphone was supposed to be until I rooted and custom rom(ed) it.
For the first 3 months I had the phone... I was reluctant to root. But ofcourse... It was just another phone... laggy and slow...
Until I rooted and installed Bionix. Now its smooth as butter.
Good things in life are always free. I paid for a suffocated phone... xda developers free services released and refreshed my phone.

Well
I would install Fusion 1.1 with the Core kernel from Sombionix and see if that fixes it. Stock is totally unacceptable.
If it stills sucks, its likely a dud.

You must either be getting dud phones, or you're installing some app that's messing them up(?) I'm stock/unrooted, and very happy. Not that I doubt the happy results reported by folx like those above, but I don't have bothersome "lag" or freezing etc. -- no issues that even tempt me to ROM-swap (I wouldn't have kept the phone if I weren't satisfied w/it stock).
My GPS did used to lose signal as you report; haven't given it a good comparison test since JI6 update.

Well I've rooted using OCLF and also applied the lag fix. No change.
I still find the phone dead 2-3 times a day with no warning. I'll go to wake it up and nothing happens.
Some of you think installing a new ROM with help? How can I do that? The one time I tried using ODIN, it was never able to identify my phone.
Ugh, why can't this POS just work.

atvman29 said:
Well I've rooted using OCLF and also applied the lag fix. No change.
I still find the phone dead 2-3 times a day with no warning. I'll go to wake it up and nothing happens.
Some of you think installing a new ROM with help? How can I do that? The one time I tried using ODIN, it was never able to identify my phone.
Ugh, why can't this POS just work.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Did you make sure you had the Samsung USB Driver for the Vibrant? If you don't Odin won't recognize your phone. Also important to have a newer version of Odin. Like I have 1.7. And last as Odin is a little troublesome, you should have Odin up and running before you connect your phone. Read the Bible in the Dev section for links.

1) Could be a dud, it happens
2) When I first got my Vibrant, it boots up so fast. Its because there are hardly any apps installed that as part of the boot up process, go and check on. I think it has to do with the cache, because once you load it up with apps, the time it takes to get to the home screen is noticeably longer.
Also ShopSavvy is a bit wonky with the gps, so I disabled that setting in the app. But my though is you might have a bad app installed or something funky on the internal/sd memory that its fighting with. I'd say as something to just try for kicks, backup everything, copy memory to your pc, wipe the memory and do a factory reset(You could odin to stock, but you'll lose the Sims app). If things work, slowly add your apps back in.
As for gps, yes before the update it just wouldn't lock or would take forever, but still not be very accurate. After the update(but then also after alot of flashing different roms, then finally just going back to stock), gps works like a champ. But I would also point out that gps is vulnerable to several things. Don't place the phone near any large metal or magnetic object, this will throw the compass off. And always try to have a clear view of the sky, without being in a 'canyon' of buildings. The buildings distort the signal(which in the case of gps is just a signal that tells the time) and can throw off the reading(which is where the a in agps is supposed to come in).

[Q] Dismally slow application response

For awhile now, my Droid 2 has been slow - slow to launch applications, slow to respond to touch, etc. I cannot attribute it to any newly installed application. Updates, maybe, but I'd have no idea which. I had it rooted with Z4Root, but then Verizon pushed out 2.3 and the phone became so slow that it is totally unreliable. I'll receive phone calls and 25% of the time the call will go to voice mail before I can get the phone to respond. I'll try to make a call and it may be 30 or more seconds between initiating the call to when the dialer appears and dials. Data speeds are slow.
At times the phone seems to operate at almost normal speeds and then it gets slow again. I've removed root access and uninstalled applications that require root access. I've also removed many other applications that I just don't need or use.
On my SD card it says I have 6.11GB free (out of 14.83 total). For "Application Storage" it says I have 5.63 Available Space.
I can't figure out what's wrong. Are there any suggestions short of resetting the phone to factory defaults and staring over?
Thanks,
Andrew

This has happened to my phone before also (droid2 rooted stock rom).
What i did to fix the situation, was the only thing i could think of.
I just did a factory reset to froyo and my phone was fast again.
Just back up all you apps and do a factory reset, its your only real option far as i can tell.
You could try installing something like 3g watchdog to monitor your apps and see if maybe 1 of them is eating up your phones processor.
Good luck.
Far as i can tell these phones are not much different from a home pc, in that they acquire so much extra pointless bull**** during their use that it just clogs the system. Forcing a reinstall just like a home pc.
Once they are reset back to factory, their performance returns to normal along with battery life.
Just be careful not to keep putting useless apps you dont even use onto your phone, just the apps that are absolutely necessary.
Keeping to this formula keeps my phone in tip top shape, short of changing roms or major tweaking.

Sigh I guess I'll need to try the reset.
I do have Watchdog installed and the last reported 'incident' was three days ago. No help there.
Everything is backed up, so here it goes... (I'll post back once I recover.)
Sent from my DROID2 using XDA App

I am having the same issues. I have an R2D2 stock, never rooted. Since the Gingerbread update, it has been flaky and getting worse. It is rebooting several times a day. I miss calls because the screen won't respond. Sometimes the hard keyboard won't respond and I have to manually reboot the phone to get the keyboard back. At least once, the soft keyboard wouldn't work either. I am hating Gingerbread but am at a loss on how to remove it. I'll be watching for your updates.

The gingerbread update has been reported to have several annoying as hell bugs, i never installed it for that reason alone. Besides i don't feel like loosing the ability to tether wireless, just to upgrade to a buggy version of android. Ill wait for ice cream to hit then maybe upgrade if i see something worth upgrading for. Till then its froyo, maybe try cyanogen mod 7.1
Far as going back to froyo from gingerbread, i know its been done and is fairly easy to do. Not sure how much different it is from a factory reset.

How I got my Battery Life Back!!

Through this forum and others, I was able to restore my battery life on the epic back to the 20 odd hours. I thought of writing my process here for the benefit of those who might be struggling with similar issues:
ROM: Clean GB
Tools: Better Battery Stats and Battery usage graph (BetterBatteryStats from the market. I think there is another one that is free. I will try and find it. However, the graph referred to is the one that is built it. When you see battery usage, click on the the top part and it shows the graph of battery drain. )
Observation: There is unusual usage of phone when the screen is off. The phone wakes up roughly once every 2-3 minutes even when the screen is off. Battery life between 3 and 5 hours. Emails do not sync or slow to sync.
1. Removing DRM files: The three said files were frozen using Titanium Backup. However, when I looked under battery usage/Android, I would still see DRM listed. So in the end, I UNINSTALLED all three files and the DRM was no longer listed. Not sure how much of a culprit it is but worth mentioning if you are freezing the files assuming they are not coming up. Check under Battery:
2. Calendar: This was the main culprit: Calendar storage was damaged on the phone and so, the phone was constantly polling to sync my calendar, in turn, running the battery down and making the phone slow. Cleared Calendar Storage using Titanium and that fixed the problem of syncing.
Emails:
1. Hotmail : Activesync (now on 1 hour polling)
2. Corporate: IMAP (1 hour)
(Above two running on Enhanced Email client). Not sure if standart client will also work, will test that and post later)
3. Gmail: using gmail app
Worth mentioning, that I used Enhanced Email and turned on logging to really see what was going on, hence coming to the issue of Calendar taking forever to sync.
3. SNS: The symptom was that SNS would be constanting restarting when seen under Applications/ Running services. Freezing the 2 sns files took care of that. Lost facebook status messages etc for contacts but made the phone faster.
4. KERNEL and CWM : Initially, although the phone was rooted, CWM was somehow, not FULLY installed. And for some reason, the phone would go to Sprint Recovery Menu. Also, worth mentioning, kernel usage was high. Installed the Clean_kernel and the latest CWM till I was satisfied the install was good and clean. A good way to test is to watch kernel usage on better battery stats and CWM behaviour when you go to Recovery.
5. Moved all content of SD card to PC and reformatted it. However, my SD card was fine, so did not see a change in performance, however, others might benefit, especially if you have movie files that the system is having a problem parsing.
I will add more if I think I missed something but doing the above took my phone from a paltry 3 hours on standby to more than 20 hours with usage. Totally acceptable and happy.
Hope this helps others.

Thanks, there's some interesting information in your post!

I cannot find either of those battery tools on the market... I also run clean GB...

I took into account what you mentioned, and removed SNS completely, hell I went a step further and just uninstalled the FB app. I will use the mobile site, and that is fine and dandy for me, I don't really need or want the constant notifications anyways.
I recommend the app Juice Defender, get the ultimate version, either pirate or paid, it is well worth it. Manages your 3g and wifi better, turns them off when the aren't needed, turns them on when they are. Really handy, has at least doubled my standby time.
I also recommend getting CPU Master, and having both it and voltage control on boot. CPU master lets you have profiles based on events, like the screen being off, or the battery getting to hot, again setup properly this also has done a number on my standby time.
Since I just flashed this kernel I haven't run a battery test yet, I am using Legendary 2.1 and IAP 2.0.6. Will run a test tonight to see how long the battery lasts for standby, hopefully it will turn on in the morning, it hasn't in the past very often.
---------- Post added at 07:30 AM ---------- Previous post was at 07:26 AM ----------
Milkman00 said:
I cannot find either of those battery tools on the market... I also run clean GB...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I haven't used the graph, in order to find Betterbatterystats it has to be spelled just like that

Yes, BetterBatteryStats from the market. I think there is another one that is free. I will try and find it. However, the graph referred to is the one that is built it. When you see battery usage, click on the the top part and it shows the graph of battery drain.
The important part that I wanted to see was when the screen is off, is there any activity, meaning the phone is not truely speaking. At when the phone was at its worse, there was a activity roughly every 2 minutes. That was the main cause of the battery drain.

saramon said:
I took into account what you mentioned, and removed SNS completely, hell I went a step further and just uninstalled the FB app. I will use the mobile site, and that is fine and dandy for me, I don't really need or want the constant notifications anyways.
I recommend the app Juice Defender, get the ultimate version, either pirate or paid, it is well worth it. Manages your 3g and wifi better, turns them off when the aren't needed, turns them on when they are. Really handy, has at least doubled my standby time.
---------- Post added at 07:30 AM ---------- Previous post was at 07:26 AM ----------
[/COLOR]
I haven't used the graph, in order to find Betterbatterystats it has to be spelled just like that
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I cant say much about those tools cause I havent really used them. However, in my case, the problem was a bad calendar sync and SNS, I can see Juicedefender would maybe improve the battery life as it wont let the phone connect, but wont necessarily correct the issue at hand. Just my two cents.

saramon said:
I took into account what you mentioned, and removed SNS completely, hell I went a step further and just uninstalled the FB app. I will use the mobile site, and that is fine and dandy for me, I don't really need or want the constant notifications anyways.
I haven't used the graph, in order to find Betterbatterystats it has to be spelled just like that
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
FYI: I have the facebook app installed and it works fine. The problem is in the SNS when you put in your facebook info and it lets you sync fb events etc.
Also, by removing, I am hoping you mean you froze or deleted those two SNS files. Just watch Applications/Running to see if you see SNS there. If not, you are golden.

4hours of battery =) blazerRom is the best out right now. Thought it usually would be at 2% with 3g on and not wifi allday
Sent from my SPH-D710 using xda premium

My phone stays "awake" constantly. How can I figure out why it is staying awake??? I think that is a big part of my battery problems.

Milkman00 said:
My phone stays "awake" constantly. How can I figure out why it is staying awake??? I think that is a big part of my battery problems.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Betterbatterystats has a listing of programs under partial wake lock. See which is using up the most time.

hindibuff said:
Worth mentioning, that I used Enhanced Email and turned on logging to really see what was going on, hence coming to the issue of Calendar taking forever to sync.
.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
How do you turn on logging in enhanced email?
Sent from my SPH-D700 using xda premium

sethlo said:
How do you turn on logging in enhanced email?
Sent from my SPH-D700 using xda premium
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This might help:
http://enhancedemail.net/viewtopic.php?f=36&t=4&sid=25404e9a1c5b7b2471d2e184a1fbb6e2

saramon said:
I recommend the app Juice Defender, get the ultimate version, either pirate or paid, it is well worth it. Manages your 3g and wifi better, turns them off when the aren't needed, turns them on when they are. Really handy, has at least doubled my standby time.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I also highly recommend this app, and have realized enormous power savings from it. My phone takes microscopic sips of electrons when in standby with JD.
However, I most emphatically DO NOT recommend that anyone be a thieving, pond-scum, crook with the ethics of a crack whore and obtain a pirated copy of this app, as saramon has recommended above. The author if this app has spent a lot of their time developing it, and should be compensated fairly. It is one of the best supported, most often update apps around. For the value it provides, there really isn't any legitimate argument justifying stealing it to avoid a few bucks.
Shame, saramon, shame.

I purchased JuiceDefender but ended up uninstalling it. Much easier just to toggle wifi and sync on-off manually, rather than tweaking it constantly. I found that the app causes more connection hassles and permission annoyances which offset any battery saving benefits it offers, and is yet another ram-draining backround process that slows my phone.

Never said that I did, but not everyone can afford it, just sayin'

hindibuff said:
3. SNS: The symptom was that SNS would be constanting restarting when seen under Applications/ Running services. Freezing the 2 sns files took care of that. Lost facebook status messages etc for contacts but made the phone faster.
4. KERNEL and CWM : Initially, although the phone was rooted, CWM was somehow, not FULLY installed. And for some reason, the phone would go to Sprint Recovery Menu. Also, worth mentioning, kernel usage was high. Installed the Clean_kernel and the latest CWM till I was satisfied the install was good and clean. A good way to test is to watch kernel usage on better battery stats and CWM behaviour when you go to Recovery.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I had 2 questions. First, what exactly is SNS? I see it restarting a lot as well, but I've been afraid it was something important so I've always left it alone.
And how would ClockworkMod affect battery life? Doesn't that only come into play when going into recovery mode?
Thanks

TheSkipperCDB said:
I had 2 questions. First, what exactly is SNS? I see it restarting a lot as well, but I've been afraid it was something important so I've always left it alone.
And how would ClockworkMod affect battery life? Doesn't that only come into play when going into recovery mode?
Thanks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you have SNS restarting it's probably because you removed the stock "Feeds & Updates" widget that came with your phone. Either freeze SNS in Titanium Backup (rooted), put the F&U widget back on one of your screens (unrooted) or kill it after every reboot (unrooted and no F&U widget).

saramon said:
Never said that I did, but not everyone can afford it, just sayin'
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
He's not suggesting that you did. He is just saying that you shouldn't suggest it to others.
Piracy is for children that want to feel savvy because they know how to steal Photoshop. Thepiratebay.org, kat.ph, isohunt, and the various novas aren't original or cool, everyone knows about them. The difference is that some people have grown up and understand that people that do work deserve to be paid for it.
Besides it is what? $2-3? Anyone with the intention to buy a product could afford that.
I bought After Effects, Sony Vegas, and Photoshop Elements. Elements I got on sale for $50. The others were a couple versions old and I got them for $300 and $150 respectively. I am a poor college kid. However, I know I can get a part time job and pay for the things I need and that's what I did. I only needed to work for about a month to buy all my software and now I have a legal license to use it. So Sony and Adobe won't try to steal the rights to everything I make >.>
In short, stuff only seems expensive if you have no intentions of paying for it in the first place. My family lives well below the poverty line and I still can afford a pretty decent production set up. I'm sure anyone could conjure up $2. It's less than a round trip bus ride.
I know this was long enough, but I figure I should mention this isn't an attack on you or anyone else. I feel very strongly about the subject and I would say this regardless of who brings the subject up. I have a lot of friends that disagree with me and I have pirated software in the past, I just think that people deserve the money they worked for. Perhaps prices could even go down if everyone actually paid for their software.

I got some life back out of my battery with CM7. Then went back to ERA legendary. I did all the following:
Wiped / reformatted the sd card, odined and repartitioned, odined ec05, odined CWM5, flashed ei22, flashed the rom, then kernel I wanted to try, multiple setups.... no avail. (Monitoring every combo with battery status)
What I have done now is repackaged the rom, removed the "stock" launcher (swapped for zeam) and a couple apks I though were pointless to me, and replaced the kernel so there is all only one flash. I am really starting to think mix_n_match flashing was causing an issue for me. Also, CWM 5 odined and not using the app is not giving me all the aformentioned issues or running as a background process...
So far my battery life is much better with one flash, but one thing I notice in all cases is after a reboot, better battery stats shows "system" under process tab, always highest on the list. Once charged it goes away until a phone call, reboot, and even after forced sync.

SNYPE2K9 said:
He's not suggesting that you did. He is just saying that you shouldn't suggest it to others.
Piracy is for children that want to feel savvy because they know how to steal Photoshop. Thepiratebay.org, kat.ph, isohunt, and the various novas aren't original or cool, everyone knows about them. The difference is that some people have grown up and understand that people that do work deserve to be paid for it.
Besides it is what? $2-3? Anyone with the intention to buy a product could afford that.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
my troll post for the day.

Hight CPU and battery usage on idle system; restarts don't help

I've got a problem with my S8 which is running latest, official, non-rooted XEO firmware. Specifically, it uses battery like crazy and heats up whilst doing nothing. This smells like a virus / malware infection or just... well, the last update was in December 2021 so it's also possible some system component is wonky OR... <shivers> some rootkit? I'm generally rather careful when installing apps, most of which will be coming in from official sources (Google Store) or at least fairly trusted sources.
Every so often I'll get a warning that a system component is using too much CPU and I should restart the phone - which obviously doesn't help at all. Also the battery drain is reported primarily by Android System and System Core (29 and 15% respectively). Battery usage stats generally don't add up because the listings don't add up to 100%. :/
I know the S8 is an old phone... and I know there are probably steps I should take prior to asking here - like a factory reset. But I'm really sceptical of doing a factory reset simply because I've got so much stuff on the phone that, while not impossible to backup, is certainly annoying (authenticator or banking apps for example - and I don't think the standard backup tools like those available from Google or Samsung backup such apps).
So I'd rather try some solutions or methods of dealing with the damned thing without resetting the phone first. Is there anything I can do?

You need to find the root cause. It may be a 3rd party using one or more of the Samsung system apps running under Android services, lol Legend for there are many... all lumped together.
A firewall with logging can help. Karma Firewall is what I use, uses almost no battery. Being rooted you have more options... use them.
Malware is always a possibility.
3rd party apps can cause hell. I don't allow any social media apps on the phone, ever.
Try in safe mode... if things calm down it's likely a 3rd party app. If so start going through the installed apps.
Clear system cache.

blackhawk said:
You need to find the root cause. It may be a 3rd party using one or more of the Samsung system apps running under Android services, lol Legend for there are many... all lumped together.
A firewall with logging can help. Karma Firewall is what I use, uses almost no battery.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Will try that, thanks!
blackhawk said:
Being rooted you have more options... use them.
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The phone is NON-rooted.
blackhawk said:
Malware is always a possibility.
3rd party apps can cause hell. I don't allow any social media apps on the phone, ever.
Try in safe mode... if things calm down it's likely a 3rd party app. If so start going through the installed apps.
Clear system cache.
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Oh, safe mode! I'll try that too! Thanks!

Shaamaan said:
Will try that, thanks!
The phone is NON-rooted.
Oh, safe mode! I'll try that too! Thanks!
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Sorry about the root thing, my bad.
If you're running on Android 9 or lower Karma Firewall's logging feature is fully active otherwise not. Samsung store>Galaxy Labs> Battery Tracker can be useful.
I use Accubattery's history page to get a quick idea of charge/discharge rates.
I use Device Care>storage>clean as well.
Make sure no cloud apps are running in the background.

Update: in safe mode the phone doesn't heat up and battery usage seems normal. So it's probably some app.
Alas, the firewall wasn't very helpful - it seemed that apps that attempted accessing the internet were your usual suspects - Play Store, One Drive or other sync apps, Vanced.
Any other suggestions on possibly nailing down the culprit?
PS. I've also decided to send Samsung an error report via the Members app - I don't know what their reply times are and I honestly don't expect much from them but who knows? Perhaps they'll come through.

Shaamaan said:
Update: in safe mode the phone doesn't heat up and battery usage seems normal. So it's probably some app.
Alas, the firewall wasn't very helpful - it seemed that apps that attempted accessing the internet were your usual suspects - Play Store, One Drive or other sync apps, Vanced.
Any other suggestions on possibly nailing down the culprit?
PS. I've also decided to send Samsung an error report via the Members app - I don't know what their reply times are and I honestly don't expect much from them but who knows? Perhaps they'll come through.
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Why other than maybe text messages is anything syncing? Take out the trash and go from there.
The ones that are connecting every minute or more when not open are prime suspects.
Some apps like Brave browser need to be closed out when not in use or they eat battery.
You can also try a hard reboot.

Update!
I left the phone in safe mode overnight. I mean, it seemed like things were better, so at least I'd have a stable phone.
Well, in the morning I was greeted with a severely depleted battery (went from 100 to 40 in the span of 6 hours) and I got the "high CPU usage" warning popup. The phone wasn't as hot to the touch tho.
So... Whatever is going on seems to happen also in safe mode, albeit less often? Or perhaps it's less "severe" where it doesn't heat up the phone but the drain is still there? But since safe mode is affected it's probably NOT an app, right?
At this point I'm completely baffled. Any other ideas?

Shaamaan said:
Update!
I left the phone in safe mode overnight. I mean, it seemed like things were better, so at least I'd have a stable phone.
Well, in the morning I was greeted with a severely depleted battery (went from 100 to 40 in the span of 6 hours) and I got the "high CPU usage" warning popup. The phone wasn't as hot to the touch tho.
So... Whatever is going on seems to happen also in safe mode, albeit less often? Or perhaps it's less "severe" where it doesn't heat up the phone but the drain is still there? But since safe mode is affected it's probably NOT an app, right?
At this point I'm completely baffled. Any other ideas?
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Click to collapse
Hard reset... hold power button until it powers off.
Try temporarily disabling Google play Services at night, see what that does.

OK, I'm baffled. I feel like I didn't really do anything but the phone is now running fine. Battery drain now might be better than ever!
Warms up on usage, obviously, but when idle it's nice and cool and battery drain seems minimal. I'll... leave it for a few days to see how this develops. It's very difficult to tell what the heck's the case here.

Shaamaan said:
OK, I'm baffled. I feel like I didn't really do anything but the phone is now running fine. Battery drain now might be better than ever!
Warms up on usage, obviously, but when idle it's nice and cool and battery drain seems minimal. I'll... leave it for a few days to see how this develops. It's very difficult to tell what the heck's the case here.
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Retrace what you did. Reason being you may need to do it again. Really most times all you need to do is just "play" with it a bit (a lot). Almost impossible to crash a stock load, so explore and learn by playing with it. You are what you load and download; be careful with 3rd party apps they are the biggest potential hazards.
Once you have a fast, stable OS that's fulfilling its mission, let it be. Don't update or upgrade it.
Updates can and do break Sammy's. This N10+ is still running on Pie, current load is over 2yo. Rock solid stable and it runs like a bat out of hell with minimal maintenance. Security isn't an issue.

blackhawk said:
Retrace what you did. Reason being you may need to do it again. Really most times all you need to do is just "play" with it a bit (a lot). Almost impossible to crash a stock load, so explore and learn by playing with it. You are what you load and download; be careful with 3rd party apps they are the biggest potential hazards.
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Click to collapse
I have a suspicion this might have been some Samsung app (my bet's on Bixby) since those are likely still able to run in Safe Mode that got updated and then fixed...? Does that make sense?
blackhawk said:
Once you have a fast, stable OS that's fulfilling its mission, let it be. Don't update or upgrade it.
Updates can and do break Sammy's. This N10+ is still running on Pie, current load is over 2yo. Rock solid stable and it runs like a bat out of hell with minimal maintenance. Security isn't an issue.
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I'm concerned about the last bit. I mean, upgrading to a new Android version is one thing but security updates are common, no?

Shaamaan said:
I have a suspicion this might have been some Samsung app (my bet's on Bixby) since those are likely still able to run in Safe Mode that got updated and then fixed...? Does that make sense?
I'm concerned about the last bit. I mean, upgrading to a new Android version is one thing but security updates are common, no?
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Kill wittle bixby... you read it EULA?☠
It's more than one apk though. Takes a while to optimize a Sammy the first time
Well... if it's set up and used right Android 9 will run securely in the real world. No saving dumb bunnies anyway; they'll still get tagged even with the latest version
The proof is in my hand. Loaded over 2+ years ago and this N10+ UI version 1.5 is running clean like a bat out of hell. If I do get malware I can't erraticate in an hour or so, factory reset and change passwords.
My data is redundantly backed* up 4+ times, plus the onboard SD card used as a data drive. I'm ready to reload right now if I have to...
A malware forced reload is still less trouble than constantly updating and having the updates screw things up. That means more troubleshooting, finding new work arounds and still maybe needing a factory reset on top of all that. No.
Not vaxed either... not buying the hype.
*critical data must be redundantly backed up or sooner or latter it will likely be lost. Never encrypt data drives as you are the most likely to be locked out!

blackhawk said:
Kill wittle bixby... you read it EULA?☠
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Oh I'd love that - but it's a system app and removing those without root is kind of... impossible? I can look into disabling it completely however - I never use it anyway. Since it's not a single app - any chance you got a link to the list of apps that need manual disabling?
Anyway, I'm still getting those damned warnings. The phone isn't constantly hot however, which is some improvement.

Shaamaan said:
Oh I'd love that - but it's a system app and removing those without root is kind of... impossible? I can look into disabling it completely however - I never use it anyway. Since it's not a single app - any chance you got a link to the list of apps that need manual disabling?
Anyway, I'm still getting those damned warnings. The phone isn't constantly hot however, which is some improvement.
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Package Disabler kills bixby proper.
You can also disable it with an adb edit. That's one of the first things I do.
Bixby is a hot mess best dump along the interstate... like Google Assistant it needs external servers for many of its functions. I may change my mind but it's eula is like eating dry hardtack for breakfast.