Database Users

[Q] Nexus 7 running incredibly slow

My 1st generation Nexus 7 started running incredibly slowly - to the point of unusability - around the time I set up a second user profile on it for my fiancée. I'm not sure if these two are connected, however we are using the same two-profile setup on our Nexus 10 with no issues.
N7 was running stock, and I finally had enough of not being able to use it so I wiped and installed the latest nightly of CM which I'm running on both my N4's and also the N10. Since flashing CM on the N7, there has been little improvement in the speed of the device.
I'm very hesitant to put it down to a hardware problem, as it seems very unlikely to me. I think it's far more likely that there is a misbehaving app or service that I had before, and re-installed since flashing CM and is continuing to cause problems.
Looking at the battery usage graph, I can't see anything obvious that stands out. Is there any other way I can find out if there is a misbehaving app or service that's causing this problem? Do you have any other suggestions on how I can narrow down what the problem may be?
Many thanks.

How much memory do you have still free on it? It's a known fact, that if you go low of memory (<1-2GiB free) the system is slowing down very much.
Sent from my Nexus 7 using xda app-developers app

AndDiSa said:
How much memory do you have still free on it? It's a known fact, that if you go low of memory (<1-2GiB free) the system is slowing down very much.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Are you talking about storage space?
I have 2.98GB free right now, apparently.

..

Yes, storage space. There was already a thread some time ago where especially people who had bought the 8GB version noticed a massive slow down after they had installed some apps and the free memory went below 3GB(!) (I remembered wrong, it was not 1-2GB, but 3GB). The thread can be found here

use clean master to clean your cache and kill tasks.i do it constantly so my device runs speedy

Try to get more than 3GB of freespace then try lagfix(fstrim) free.
Has ran into this problem once. but after done booth solutions above now my N7 is running as smooth as Brand New again.
P.S. Before I've found Lagfix(FStrim) I'm use Forever Gone and it work just as well as Lagfix did. except Forever Gone is take much longer time than Lagfix to finish its job.

[Q] Note 3 RAM consumption

By default (no additional apps installed yet), Note 3 consume almost 1,4GB of its RAM. Is it normal? Can we disable or uninstall some useless apps/services from it? Any recommendation? I need more free RAM to run other apps.

Device doesn't manage its memory well enough for you?

this beast suck a lots of memory, i ran only few apps memory remain at 400mb free WTF, when i clear memory i saw it clear 40+ apps ,so it look like many samsung junk apps run in background.
-No custom for me at this time, i'm not big fan of Omega Rom. Wait for more custom rom.

Why wouldn't you want the device to cache Apps in RAM?

RAM is there to be used, not to be empty so you can see a big non-utilized number. If new opened applications need more RAM, the OS will automatically clear the old stored data to make room for new ones. It even explains this in the task manager if you bothered to read.

RAM is indeed to be used. But it's not pleasant to see your rebootet phone is slurping up 1GB of ram immediatly.
I've rooted mine and loaded up Omega. I deleted all useless apps. I'm running now on 500 - 700MB after booting up
This means for me less bloatware and more private apps that I downloaded can be cached
Win-Win Situation

After clearing memory I have a gig used somehow and it's pissing me off to be quite honest cause I can't work out what's using it all
Sent from my SM-N9005 using Tapatalk 4

Drizzy xS said:
After clearing memory I have a gig used somehow and it's pissing me off to be quite honest cause I can't work out what's using it all
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm with MohJee here; Android is just using as much memory as it can because it's faster to access the RAM than the storage. The boot processes use RAM, and if there is enough RAM in the system, then the boot processes will just use that RAM in order to avoid swapping, hence helping the device boot faster. The amount of 'free' RAM you see after system boot is just the RAM that was not used by the boot processes; the 'used' RAM is not necessarily being used by active processes. It looks used, but it's in fact free to take.
Whenever an app needs memory, the OS loads it up in RAM until there is no more RAM available, in which case the OS will just clear some unused memory to make room for the new app. This is more efficient than cleaning memory as soon as you leave an app, because then if you reopen an app you closed a while back, you don't need to load all the data in memory, it's already there.
Basically, unless you run a lot of processes or you have very little RAM, the RAM being full is a good thing in the Android world.

The RAM should get used in any Android device, with 3GB of ram, it seems like the phone is caching almost everything it can, it doesn't seem to affect usage as it kills non used apps and loads the ones you open if it reaches the limit.
This is perfectly normal, and how it should work.

Im suffering the same .. my Note II usually consumed 600-900MB but my Note 3 suffers 1.3-2GB smh. I'd be grateful if someone gave me a valid solution ^^
Sent from my Galaxy Note 3 via xda-Premium 4

Riccardo123 said:
Im suffering the same .. my Note II usually consumed 600-900MB but my Note 3 suffers 1.3-2GB smh. I'd be grateful if someone gave me a valid solution ^^
Sent from my Galaxy Note 3 via xda-Premium 4
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'd recommend reading the 2 posts above yours.

I am having launcher redraw issue. Could that be due to high ram usage?
Sent from my SM-N900 using xda app-developers app

1.2GB after doing a lot of things, drops to 700MB if I clean using Taskmanager.

ShadowLea said:
1.2GB after doing a lot of things, drops to 700MB if I clean using Taskmanager.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Wow haha
Sent from my Galaxy Note 3 via xda-Premium 4

Riccardo123 said:
Wow haha
Sent from my Galaxy Note 3 via xda-Premium 4
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yea, upon a reboot it only has 689MB in use. Even running 6 apps at the same time (Tapatalk, Firefox, Gmail, Outlook, Whatsapp, Oh!Edu Towns) it still sticks to about 1.28GB In Use.
All I did was clear out the bloatware as much as non-root allows, replaced Touchwiz(480MB usage) with Apex(68MB usage), turned off all sync and location services, and I don't use Facebook.

ShadowLea said:
Yea, upon a reboot it only has 689MB in use. Even running 6 apps at the same time (Tapatalk, Firefox, Gmail, Outlook, Whatsapp, Oh!Edu Towns) it still sticks to about 1.28GB In Use.
All I did was clear out the bloatware as much as non-root allows, replaced Touchwiz(480MB usage) with Apex(68MB usage), turned off all sync and location services, and I don't use Facebook.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Im not going to root but idk how to clear bloatware .. I think FB eats lot of ram , smart ideas there though lolz
Sent from my Galaxy Note 3 via xda-Premium 4

Sent from my SM-N900 using xda app-developers app

sohebq said:
Sent from my SM-N900 using xda app-developers app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
2.66gb max?
... samsung screwed with us claiming the 3gb bs.
they loaded a bunch of **** that constantly loads. all their dumb software screwing with the consumer.
So they give more, and reserve almost half a gig or more on some devices.. the North American has a max of 2.38gb so reserved a lot more.
the note 2 had max 1.75 but less crap loading in the background

sohebq said:
Sent from my SM-N900 using xda app-developers app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sent from my Galaxy Note 3 via xda-Premium 4

habs101 said:
2.66gb max?
... samsung screwed with us claiming the 3gb bs.
they loaded a bunch of **** that constantly loads. all their dumb software screwing with the consumer.
So they give more, and reserve almost half a gig or more on some devices.. the North American has a max of 2.38gb so reserved a lot more.
the note 2 had max 1.75 but less crap loading in the background
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Even If they put 5gb, 4.77 will be full. Phone doesnt get slow, however I have launcher redraw issues.
Sent from my SM-N900 using xda app-developers app

Nexus 4 uses only 512MB???

Hello
I'm, still shocked.
Today I've upgraded to kitkat from 4.3. Everything stock and OTA.
I've noticed that heavy apps are often killed from RAM, so that when I open them again it takes a startup time as if it were the first time.
Then I have noticed that regardless of the apps I open, my memory usage is always around 500-550MB leaving 1300MB free!!
WTF.
Chrome is the most painful example.
1) Open some tabs in Chrome.
2) Then open some heavy apps, like play music, hangouts, youtube and calendar (maybe you should open some more to fill as RAM as possible).
3) Then open again Chrome
4) Chrome will reload tabs since it has been re-started again
If you have a look to the memory usage you will see aroun 500MBs. What about our 2GB!!!!
Being chrome so heavy, memory management decides to kill it each time, delivering a terrible user experience...
Any idea? Any solution apart from restoring 4.3???
Thanks a lot.

No kidding I'm still surprised. In the beginning I was using 800mb but now it sits at 475~mb ram usage. This is ridiculous and I'm using the heck out of it. On the downside its kicking my hangouts out of memory. When I launch hangouts, it takes a while to start up.
Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk

It looks like the system is trying to limit itself to use only 500mb. Maybe that's what Google meant with Kitkat being more optimized? so much for 2gb ram...
Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk

Now you mention it I am noticing a lot of apps restarting now. And hangouts is a prime example.
Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk

So does this mean there is now no benefit in having 2GB ram? Kind of like having a laptop with 8GB ram running a 32 bit operating system that can only see 2.

CalabiYau said:
Hello
I'm, still shocked.
Today I've upgraded to kitkat from 4.3. Everything stock and OTA.
I've noticed that heavy apps are often killed from RAM, so that when I open them again it takes a startup time as if it were the first time.
Then I have noticed that regardless of the apps I open, my memory usage is always around 500-550MB leaving 1300MB free!!
WTF.
Chrome is the most painful example.
1) Open some tabs in Chrome.
2) Then open some heavy apps, like play music, hangouts, youtube and calendar (maybe you should open some more to fill as RAM as possible).
3) Then open again Chrome
4) Chrome will reload tabs since it has been re-started again
If you have a look to the memory usage you will see aroun 500MBs. What about our 2GB!!!!
Being chrome so heavy, memory management decides to kill it each time, delivering a terrible user experience...
Any idea? Any solution apart from restoring 4.3???
Thanks a lot.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Per Google, KitKat is designed to run in older phone too, even at 512MB RAM can still run KitKat. For example, Nexus One which has only 512MB RAM and still able to run KitKat, not stock ROM per se.

are you sure??? I tried it on purpose. I opened asphalt 8, Dragon Realms, turned the music on on the Play music, Hangouts,Facebook, Google Currents, Chrome, and music tuner in capture mode, and I am able to switch between them seemlessly. I opened settings and it jumps to 719 MB RAM.
On the other hand I faced some weird lag on my N4 these past days with KitKat. I must say I already forgot how laggy Android was long long ago, and now I am forced to remember it.....
Stock 4.4, not rooted yet (for observation purposes)

Even my tapatalk app seems to get killed off all the time.
Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk

This is a huge problem, can someone confirm if this is only on nexus 4 or even on the nexus 5 ?

Federico_96 said:
This is a huge problem, can someone confirm if this is only on nexus 4 or even on the nexus 5 ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hmm maybe it's not only using 512mb... but mine reaches 1gb and kills stuff off relentlessly.

I just loaded around 11 apps. After switching to the first app; it refreshes. My ram never reaches 1GB.

Could it be something kernel side? I'm on faux kernel.

Now that u mentioned i checked on my phone .. i am on stock rooted.. my ram doesnt go above 600mb howmanyever apps i open it reaches 600 mb and then starts killing them .. this isnt cool ..!! now i understand why my apps restart on me sometimes .. this is a screwup .. whats the point in having 2gb ram and not getting the benefits out of it .. kitkat is supposed to support 512mb ram .. not make the max limit of the phone 512 mb .. hope this gets solved!

Can someone on stock do a backup then test faux kernel or some other kernel see if it's the same? As i sai mine reaches about 900-1000 before it starts killing off i still think this is a bit low. 2gb of ram so why not use it it's being wasted.

In stock is confirmed. Sometimes you can get up to 680-700 but then in some seconds they get reduced up to the 500 again...
A friend of mine has a Nexus 5. He did the same test and he get stable usage of 1Gb and no tab refresh/hangout re-start..
It is clearly a Nexus 4 issue. Final proof:
https://code.google.com/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=322336
They say that it is logic management problem of android... Chrome has nothing to do except being so heavy... But it happens with lots of others...

I can also confirm this
I can also confirm this on Stock Nexus 4 Kitkat (Root).
I did not notice this before, since apps were loaded so seamlessly and quickly from cache (Is it because I'm using ART?), but Chrome gave it away since the tabs are refreshed.
It starts caching apps at ~800+ MB usage till it reaches ~500 MB.
It doesn't bother me performance wise, but is there a way to change the memory limit other than 800 MB on a rooted device?

Do you Know any custom kernel that allows this better usage?
The less intrusive possible since stock is fine for me except for this...
Faux? Semaphore? Another?

Im using semaphore but mine is same. Hangouts gonna restart, chrome refresh and launcher redraw. Maybe Google will fix it.
Sent from my Nexus 4 using xda app-developers app

i think your problem maybe related to OTA update .
i'm okay with Stock rom with factory image .
but i use franco kernel .

No wonder the kitkat makes my phone lag a lot.. Even apps like Facebook and whatsapp take time to load and lots of time to scroll.. And chrome gets stuck every time I scroll..
Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk

CM11 High RAM Usage

I've noticed lately that CM11 is using abnormal amounts of memory. It doesn't slow my phone down all that much, but it's just bothering me because I know its not supposed to. Before I got this G2, my S3 ran CM10.2 and it used a ton less memory (between 4 and 600mb).
And from what I know, KitKat is supposed to use less resources.
I also have a normal amount of processes running. Just basic apps like Snapchat, Kik, Voice and Voice+, and all the normal Google services that always run. I even uninstalled FB cause I barely use it and at any given time it would be using up 70mb, and it made no difference,
I cant just keep killing my apps cause they reopen automatically. Even when I do, it doesn't even make a temporary difference. Even when I kill the cached apps.
Its just really bothering me. Any suggestions?
I have a couple screenshots.

free ram = wasted ram

sawyerbenjamin said:
I've noticed lately that CM11 is using abnormal amounts of memory. It doesn't slow my phone down all that much, but it's just bothering me because I know its not supposed to. Before I got this G2, my S3 ran CM10.2 and it used a ton less memory (between 4 and 600mb).
And from what I know, KitKat is supposed to use less resources.
I also have a normal amount of processes running. Just basic apps like Snapchat, Kik, Voice and Voice+, and all the normal Google services that always run. I even uninstalled FB cause I barely use it and at any given time it would be using up 70mb, and it made no difference,
I cant just keep killing my apps cause they reopen automatically. Even when I do, it doesn't even make a temporary difference. Even when I kill the cached apps.
Its just really bothering me. Any suggestions?
I have a couple screenshots.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The amount of free ram looks fine. That's what I get on my end with stock LG G2
Sent from my LG-D801 using Tapatalk

It bothers me so much that people still don't know how Android runs and manages resources.
It's not Windows, it's not MacOS, it's Android, it allocates everything on the RAM so that it can be accessed faster, and this improves load times, multitasking, etc.
Free RAM is pretty much wasted RAM and please, do not install task killers nor kill tasks manually. Android does it alone and does it better. Whenever it needs free RAM it will shut down something that's not being used and haven't been used in a long time to free that RAM up.

As two others have stated, free RAM is wasted RAM. I only have about 600mb of RAM free on the Optimus G3 ROM.

prowsterz said:
As two others have stated, free RAM is wasted RAM. I only have about 600mb of RAM free on the Optimus G3 ROM.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I hope I don't sound stupid. It's just more of an OCD thing. Just a couple days ago and prior to that, my phone stuck around 750-850mb. Now its using a over a gig 100% of the time and its just bothering me. I figured there was an actual reason for this. Maybe its from Xposed modules? I never noticed it until I started using Xposed a couple days ago.
But its not a big deal I guess.

sawyerbenjamin said:
I hope I don't sound stupid. It's just more of an OCD thing. Just a couple days ago and prior to that, my phone stuck around 750-850mb. Now its using a over a gig 100% of the time and its just bothering me. I figured there was an actual reason for this. Maybe its from Xposed modules? I never noticed it until I started using Xposed a couple days ago.
But its not a big deal I guess.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you're not having actual performance issues as a result, then don't worry about it. If you always have X amount of free RAM, then you don't need that RAM. As has already been stated, free/unused RAM is wasted RAM. Something most people don't understand about how computers work is that storage and RAM and two completely separate things. Storage is just that - STORAGE. Nothing runs directly from storage. RAM is where things run. When you - or the system - goes to run an application, it gets read from the slow storage and loaded into the much faster RAM and runs from there. This is why more RAM is better (notice I didn't say more free RAM). It allows more applications to be cached in RAM ready to run fast - or to keep more services loaded to allow for more cool features.
More RAM is better, but if you're always clearing it out to keep X amount free and then reloading the same apps again, you are doing yourself no favors from a performance perspective. I am sure you have plenty available at all times for the system to load new apps. It will kill them on its own either when it needs to, or when it sees that haven't accessed that app after a certain amount of time.

rebar71 said:
If you're not having actual performance issues as a result, then don't worry about it. If you always have X amount of free RAM, then you don't need that RAM. As has already been stated, free/unused RAM is wasted RAM. Something most people don't understand about how computers work is that storage and RAM and two completely separate things. Storage is just that - STORAGE. Nothing runs directly from storage. RAM is where things run. When you - or the system - goes to run an application, it gets read from the slow storage and loaded into the much faster RAM and runs from there. This is why more RAM is better (notice I didn't say more free RAM). It allows more applications to be cached in RAM ready to run fast - or to keep more services loaded to allow for more cool features.
More RAM is better, but if you're always clearing it out to keep X amount free and then reloading the same apps again, you are doing yourself no favors from a performance perspective. I am sure you have plenty available at all times for the system to load new apps. It will kill them on its own either when it needs to, or when it sees that haven't accessed that app after a certain amount of time.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am 100% fully aware of what Random Access Memory is and what purpose it serves, and I can distinguish it from storage. I know far more than the very basics of a computer. I was just wondering what was using all the extra RAM up. It was bothering me because prior, my phone was using a lot less. Idk why you assumed I didn't understand what RAM and storage was.

sawyerbenjamin said:
I am 100% fully aware of what Random Access Memory is and what purpose it serves, and I can distinguish it from storage. I know far more than the very basics of a computer. I was just wondering what was using all the extra RAM up. It was bothering me because prior, my phone was using a lot less. Idk why you assumed I didn't understand what RAM and storage was.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Read your own post again and see if you can figure out why i thought it needed explaining.
Sent from my LG-D801 using XDA Free mobile app

rebar71 said:
Read your own post again and see if you can figure out why i thought it needed explaining.
Sent from my LG-D801 using XDA Free mobile app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah I didn't mention storage once.

sawyerbenjamin said:
Yeah I didn't mention storage once.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
EDIT: No, you didn't mention storage. But just by asking the question, people generally are demonstrating a clear lack of understanding about how computers work. I usually just keep quiet, but every now and then, I feel compelled to fully explain it in the hope that the topic won't return. Alas, it always does.
I apologize that you were the unlucky one that I singled out on this occasion. I did not mean to offend. I thought I was being helpful. Maybe I helped someone else.
Sent from my LG-D801 using XDA Free mobile app

[Q] Opening task switcher takes very long (2-4 seconds) on 5.0 Lollipop SM-G900F

I flashed the polish Android 5.0 lollipop on my SM-G900F Galaxy S5. I have the latest xxxBNL9 update. When i hit the task switcher (left) button it takes very long to minimize the screen and open the task switcher. Typically it takes 2-3 seconds. When i do it repetitively it goes quicker. I've already set the "transition animation scale" to off (or 0.5x) in "developer options". Frequently closing all apps also doesn't help.
Please help me. I multitask a lot and this delay is very annoying.

Unfortunately... this is android's fault, it is also experienced by some Nexus Roms.

trettet said:
Unfortunately... this is android's fault, it is also experienced by some Nexus Roms.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well that surprises me. I thought it was the bulky touchwiz for sure. I guess there's nothinh to be done but wait for Google to fix it. Thank you for the information, could you provide a link for anyone else who has the same question?

pizzaman79 said:
Well that surprises me. I thought it was the bulky touchwiz for sure. I guess there's nothinh to be done but wait for Google to fix it. Thank you for the information, could you provide a link for anyone else who has the same question?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I couldn't particularly find one on xda, but I've found lots of complaints on reddit..on Nexus and Android subs...just look it up..
Sent from my SM-G900F using XDA Free mobile app

Agreed.
It was faster on 4.4.

There is a memory leak in 5.0 and even 5.0.1-2 that if you keep the phone on more than 2 days running the system eats up the RAM.
Was noted and linked to in the S5 firmware thread.

lynxblaine said:
There is a memory leak in 5.0 and even 5.0.1-2 that if you keep the phone on more than 2 days running the system eats up the RAM.
Was noted and linked to in the S5 firmware thread.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Touchwiz is a bit of a memory leak on itself, but i think the memory leak doesn't just affect nexus phones, but also the Galaxy S5. When i look in my memory manager, with only a few small open apps (totalling less than 200mb) my memory is almost full, 1.4 /1.67gb used.
I don't know if that's the actual cause of the delay on opening the memory manager. It might well be, because with more memory it can keep the task switcher open/active longer. The times when there is a delay are probably when the task switcher app was closed because of low memory. When you open it several times, it goes much faster.
Note: I cleared my cache partition after a failed root attempt and reflashed the stock rom (without doing a factory reset). That helped a bit. It went from 2-4 seconds to 1-3 seconds to open the task switcher. It helped, but it's not a permanent fix.

The only temporary workaround as of yet is to reboot the phone regularly, like every 2 days.

2gb is really not enough for this phone... that's why we are seing a lag free note 3 touchwiz rom because it has 3 gb of ram.
Sent from my SM-G900F using XDA Free mobile app

What you talking is nonsense. If 2 are gigabytes of RAM too little why are then 200 to 300 megabytes always free? If you have more than that it is useless. Why would anyone want to have a lot of RAM just sitting there and does nothing. Eats more battery, literally taking space in phone but does nothing.
Sent from my SM-G900F

AlwaysAndroid said:
What you talking is nonsense. If 2 are gigabytes of RAM too little why are then 200 to 300 megabytes always free? If you have more than that it is useless. Why would anyone want to have a lot of RAM just sitting there and does nothing. Eats more battery, literally taking space in phone but does nothing.
Sent from my SM-G900F
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Having 200-300 MB of ram means yoh have too much crap running, i have 600ish free right now, and as far as i know having more ram would not affect battery life, nlt sure where you got that from.
Sent from my SM-G900A using Tapatalk

Rakuu said:
Having 200-300 MB of ram means yoh have too much crap running, i have 600ish free right now, and as far as i know having more ram would not affect battery life, nlt sure where you got that from.
Sent from my SM-G900A using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Of course it affects battery life because phone could have less RAM in total (physically less) which needs less juice. Less RAM needs less physical space and battery can be bigger. So again, if you have a lot free RAM just sitting there, it does nothing and I don`t know which smart ass even started comparing ROM optimization and free RAM.

AlwaysAndroid said:
Of course it affects battery life because phone could have less RAM in total (physically less) which needs less juice. Less RAM needs less physical space and battery can be bigger. So again, if you have a lot free RAM just sitting there, it does nothing and I don`t know which smart ass even started comparing ROM optimization and free RAM.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Other than having less size for the battery(which is is untrue, you could just have one larger sized ram stick) having more ram does not lead to less battery life. Like i said before where did you hear that? Googling that only brings up the contrary so im confused where you got that information.
Sent from my SM-G900A using Tapatalk

Sending 15 photos via fb messenger causes crash because it needs more ram.
Free ram isn't FREE RAM, it's cached memory, it is still being used but if an needs more it will free it and the cached process will be moved to swap or forced close...and yeah have fun sending a support or bug report to facebook, because they're not fixing it.
Sent from my SM-G900F using XDA Free mobile app