[Q] droidx2 need help with memory management - Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

In "running services" my x2 drops down to 60mb of memory free and this seems to be the avg bottom.
the phone runs terrible when it hits this bottom. when its above this memory it runs like it should.
i imagine this is android doing its thing but its not good enough. is there a way to change this bottom number or some program that just works better? i stay away from task killers with the exception of the one that came with the phone.
im not rooted but have rooted my old dx.
thank you

Android is built to keep as many apps in memory as possible to make them load faster. Using a task killer will only use up more battery because Android will start loading apps back in memory when you kill them, so its good that you stay away from them.
Androids memory management is really good, so its odd that your performance is bad.
I haven't followed x2 development, but if available, I would suggest rooting and loading a custom Rom to see if that helps.
Sent from my HTC ThunderBolt powered by SkyRaider Zeus Preview 2

Try v6 Supercharger!! Its a complete memory management and fix....
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=991276

i blame moto blur for more of the unsightly lag, but i noticed that when im lagging free memory is around 60. If I check it when its running smooth, its usually well above 60.
supercharger looks like exactly what I need. Guess I gotta root this thing

Related

1GB RAM ???

hello all,
sorry if this has been asked before (it prolly has been, i didnt find it though):
the atrix got 1gb ram right? after a reboot there is only around 570mb free ram...
after a few days without rebooting iam stuck around 440-480mb ram...
1st: where is my 1gb?
2nd: why do i even loose more ram?
sorry iam really new to android.
thanks for the help.
There is a reserve amount for android and motoblur then whatever apps u got running in background
Sent from my greyblur 1.57 atrix
grncivic2001 said:
There is a reserve amount for android and motoblur then whatever apps u got running in background
Sent from my greyblur 1.57 atrix
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
yea i know android needs some itself but is it 50% ??? i mean the LG optimus only got 512mb... in my case id have 0 left... something strange here?
i got the launcherPro running. should be motoblur disabled now?.
thanks for the fast answer !
Yes it has 1gb 200mb is reserved for the webtop and 800mb is for android
you might want to read up on how linux and android USE ram also. free ram is wasted ram
is it bloatware
So its normal i only have roughly 600 mb left. Ok thx a lot.
Can you help me with another problem.?
I read somewhere that you don't need a task killer. I have always used one to get back to like 500mb. Now you tell me unused ram is wasted ram. I installed autokiller after some advice and opened some games and stuff. Later i was at 154 unused ram. After 2 hours standby i was at 237mb unused ram. Would i ever get back to 400+ ? And is it really better or at least soesnt matter for battery life?
Thx for help
Smintz said:
So its normal i only have roughly 600 mb left. Ok thx a lot.
Can you help me with another problem.?
I read somewhere that you don't need a task killer. I have always used one to get back to like 500mb. Now you tell me unused ram is wasted ram. I installed autokiller after some advice and opened some games and stuff. Later i was at 154 unused ram. After 2 hours standby i was at 237mb unused ram. Would i ever get back to 400+ ? And is it really better or at least soesnt matter for battery life?
Thx for help
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I found that to be true (not needing a task killer) but only under Gingerbread (I've noticed that since I upgraded my Nexus One to Gingerbread), but on FroYo that's not really the case, or so I've noitced.
However I found that the task killer included on the Atrix works really well (much better than any other on the Market). It's just a matter of selecting the apps that you don't want to auto close and that's it. The battery last a bit longer and the device does not heat up at all.
Cheers!
RayanMX
Heres how I see it.
On your computer, you're always scrambling for more ram right? Because you are running multiple applications at once. You have a music player, a game, chat, windows itself, antivirus etc.
On your phone, it depends more on your processor speed. You arent multitasking like crazy (and if you are your phone would start to heat up really rapidly) Android allocates ram accordingly to what you are running in the foreground and apps that arent open but were opened recently. That way, if you reopen a recently closed app, it is still in memory and will open quicker. If you don't access the closed app after a while, it will clear itself from memory. You definitely don't need a task killer for android, only more processing speed.
I only have 325 of ram
Sent from my MB860 using XDA App
Pirateghost said:
you might want to read up on how linux and android USE ram also. free ram is wasted ram
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Bingo. So many people freak out that they don't have enough RAM... it's getting annoying seeing as how the Android OS has been out for a long enough time to understand this now.
Even of you cant find it it doesnt matter. Your phone will tell you.
Sent from my MB860 using XDA App
I have like 600 when running chongoblur it quickly goes down to 400 something but still this thing is a devastator of worlds
Sent from my Googletron

[Q] Where is my RAM?

The Atrix has 1GB of RAM, so I'd expect a good portion of that to be free at all times. But that's not the case. With normal usage I usually only have about 180 MB free. Even after killing everything with Advanced Task Killer, I only have about 230 MB free. This doesn't seem much better than most other Android phones. What's eating up my RAM? I am running a live wallpaper, but I'd still expect 1GB to go a very long way.
MdX MaxX said:
The Atrix has 1GB of RAM, so I'd expect a good portion of that to be free at all times. But that's not the case. With normal usage I usually only have about 180 MB free. Even after killing everything with Advanced Task Killer, I only have about 230 MB free. This doesn't seem much better than most other Android phones. What's eating up my RAM? I am running a live wallpaper, but I'd still expect 1GB to go a very long way.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Many threads explained this already.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/search.php?searchid=75092117
Also, ditch ATK.
Search is your best friend. I should know this by now. Thanks.
And why ditch ATK? I feel like my phone runs cooler with it. Plus, GingerBlur doesn't have the Task Manager that comes stock with the Atrix. Or is a Task Manager really not necessary?
WiredPirate said:
Also, ditch ATK.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
+1
Atrix already handles task killing as needed very well. With task killer, they will just start up again anyway. Let the Atrix handle this function.
Auto mem killer... people who quote the age old "android handles memory fine" argument are simply rehashing an age old argument without an explanation.
#1 "kill all" is silly.. (it kills functions that start back up regardless thus chewing up battery)
#2 you can tweak the android memory management system with root and automemkiller
#3 it is good to have a task killer for rogue apps.
Sent from my Googletron
ChongoDroid said:
Auto mem killer... people who quote the age old "android handles memory fine" argument are simply rehashing an age old argument without an explanation.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
-1
I was quoting the Atrix as handling memory, not Android as a whole in your age old argument!
The ATRIX does handle tasks fine on its own, no need to kill them. OP, I should have said ditch ATK for Watchdog.
lol your RAM is in your phone dude! xD
kidding
you must be using to many apps, try a task manager, i use advanced task manager(paid version), and got always 500mb+ of free memory, it just goes to 200mb free when im playing some game(mc2, gangstar or riptide gp) with the music player opened plus firefox 4
look well which apps are eating your memory, and put in auto end list from the original task manager =)
but 230 free still a lot of memory in a phone =p
Most current devices have 20-30mb free at any given time, be happy for your 200+
this is normal behaviour for alot of linux based os'es - linux tends to steal alot of the free ram for file caches etc and releases it s requested by apps.
Usually ATK results in 400-500MB free on my Atrix so that 230MB does sound strange.
Also, I don't notice any difference in performance or battery life between using ATK and letting the OS handle everything. Under the four occasions that I've seen a process eat up CPU (pegging it at 1GHz and making the phone warm), ATK was powerless to stop it... So ATK is pretty useless IMO.

Eclipse 5 vs. 6 speed?

Is there a speed increase on v.6 over v.5?
Yes I think there was a definite speed increase, buts that's me and from what I have read from others it seems to be the same comments from all !!!
Well im newest remix. And with oom fixing from supercharger and the edit I made to minfree script came wit rom. I have no skips and productivity index on smartbench is hovering average 3000.
I also use poweramp buffer set huge and moved to sdcard(( don't think its really on my ext sd card tho ) but all my music stored on class 6 8gb lexar card. I get ONE skip when I open bloat freeze
. Which I only use once in a while lol.
Overall speed is very nice and snappy. I put golauncher ex into system app and removed blur home and(after some other freeze/removal..not much) that jumped my ram up to 240mb free in startup. Which makes all my apps able to stay in memory making my phone very quick.
Still the only thing that always takes a couple seconds to respond after I touch is the damn stock browser. I think I may just ditch it for dolphin hd. I just really like the simplicity usefulness in stock browser. I might get my search on for a better one unless someone has a tip for speedier stock browser response.
Sorry I rambled lol
Try the both and judge for yourself. v6 (blurless) is his best for what I need a phone to do - clean and responsive as hell. Battery was much better in v6, for me.
Sent from my DROID X2 using XDA App
ashclepdia said:
Well im newest remix. And with oom fixing from supercharger and the edit I made to minfree script came wit rom. I have no skips and productivity index on smartbench is hovering average 3000.
I also use poweramp buffer set huge and moved to sdcard(( don't think its really on my ext sd card tho ) but all my music stored on class 6 8gb lexar card. I get ONE skip when I open bloat freeze
. Which I only use once in a while lol.
Overall speed is very nice and snappy. I put golauncher ex into system app and removed blur home and(after some other freeze/removal..not much) that jumped my ram up to 240mb free in startup. Which makes all my apps able to stay in memory making my phone very quick.
Still the only thing that always takes a couple seconds to respond after I touch is the damn stock browser. I think I may just ditch it for dolphin hd. I just really like the simplicity usefulness in stock browser. I might get my search on for a better one unless someone has a tip for speedier stock browser response.
Sorry I rambled lol
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
FYI on the browser, Dolphin HD is nice but if you like something simpler that still has the functionality of Dolphin HD try Dolphin Mini. I love it, all I use. though I do have HD as a 2nd just in case.
Running Road Runner on v6 is blazing.. 15 sec bootup til your doing w/e you want. ONly bad thing bout v6 is you cant data roam
Yeah, I already updated to V 0.6, In my opinion its fastest. I use Zeam launcher because I don't really need a bunch of options and its super fast, I haven't put it in system apps though. I think I'll try that. I also get better battery life. For browsers I use firefox beta (7), its totally redone with performance in mind. I like to use fruit ninja thd as a reference for real world performance, on stock it lags big time if you cut 2 or more fruit at once, with eclipse its butter smooth, most of the time. lol

ram used up

I find that every time I check I am using 470+ ram even after I clear it in task. wtf?
stop clearing task then. its not needed as soon as you do this the required parts will just start back up. you havnt needed to use anything like advanced task killer since android 2.0 we are now on 2.3 time to stop making ur phone use more battery life.
So your telling me that next to stock I should be using up 3/4ths of my ram with no windows or programs opened. Sounds strange to me
yup.. Its how android works.. its not like say the way windows mobile used to be.. having to kill off programs left an right. android keeps those apps in the ram for a reason.
I comprehend the keep running in background, my point is some, I haven't had to bad, people complain of lag or lack of smoothness. Well if I am using all my ram for things running in background am I not restricting the amount I can now pull up. Like I said I am close to stock, couple apps installed, and stock is loading 4-500 megs out of my 750. Hmmm just saying ya know. If you sell me on gig of ram and cut it down to 750 and load it up with 500 in all honesty you are giving me 250. might as well call it an iPhone....hides head and runs.
ghettopops said:
I comprehend the keep running in background, my point is some, I haven't had to bad, people complain of lag or lack of smoothness. Well if I am using all my ram for things running in background am I not restricting the amount I can now pull up. Like I said I am close to stock, couple apps installed, and stock is loading 4-500 megs out of my 750. Hmmm just saying ya know. If you sell me on gig of ram and cut it down to 750 and load it up with 500 in all honesty you are giving me 250. might as well call it an iPhone....hides head and runs.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
U are WAY off. The phone is allocated a certain amount of ram for its internal workings. Leaving you the 700+ ram for apps and other things. Ur phone works better if u let it manage Ur ram for u. It will naturally kill off apps as u need more ram for other processes that are being called on. Free ram is wasted ram using the ram will actually make Ur phone smoother. And if Ur not using the super charger script i would take a look at it. It helps as well. Or get Rom tool box and do it manually.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I717 using xda premium

Might the X2 have a memory leak?

I've had my suspicions about this since I first got the Droid X2. I think it may be possible for much of the lag many (most/all?) people experience at some time or another.
As a test, I can check free RAM in Advanced Task Killer when I first boot up the phone, and it will hover somewhere 150 megs with all user processes killed.
Then, when I check after 24 hours of constant use (with intermittent charging periods) I will struggle to get 100 megs with all user processes killed.
Finally, if I reboot the phone, I will be able to obtain a decent amount of freed-up RAM again.
Anyone experiencing anything similar?
Now, I must mention, I'm operating under the assumption that the X2 does not cache apps or files in the RAM. I suspect there is too little RAM at such a minimal speed to be able to clear RAM fast enough in the event that something non-cached is called on. I mean, even Microsoft was slow to use this cache method, as they first introduced it in Windows 7. A good example of this in Windows 7 is if you check the Task Manager, you will see that roughly only a quarter of your RAM is ever actually labeled as "free", even if you currently have no programs open or are using minimal amounts of RAM.
And it certainly doesn't feel as if the cache is working as intended if Motorola did infact implement it on our phones.
I have contimplated over this for quite some time and have also came to the same conclusion. But the real question is: What can we do about it?
Most likely nothing.
Not sure of this is actually the case but when V6 is ran for instance it does talk about cached apps and gives an "actual" free ram reading. I would guess that zepplinrox would not have worded it that way if it was not the case but I have no real evidence either way.
Sent from my DROID X2 using xda premium
This did happen to me when I ran Advanced Task Killer on cm7. I'd start with a very good 190 free ram (insane I know) and after a few hours I'd struggle to brake 110
Sent from my DROID X2 using Tapatalk 2
This is the nature of Android and Linux in general. When you start an app (or a process), it will remain in memory until it is cleared by the OS. The problem with task killers and Android 2.3.x and above is this: Android 2.3.x and above RESPAWN the killed task since the OS did not kill it. Plus, there is no way to FORCE to OS to kill an app that is in the background. What Android does is renice the process until it is a positive number, greater than 1, then it kills the process. Android 2.3.x was designed to "auto manage" those tasks. If you run htop from an ADB session and launch apps and use the back button to back out of them, you will notice that the amount of free memory diminishes. Then, after sitting for a time, the amount of free memory slowly begins to increase. When an app that requires a bunch of memory is launched, the Android will kill those background apps to free up more memory. In theory, it is a great way to manage the memory. In this respect, apps that have been launched in that past will start up faster. Personally, I like having control over things. You could possibly write a script that will renice a process to something like +20 and then Android will kill it automatically, but that would be a very risky prospect as it might kill RUNNING foreground apps as well.
Hope this little explanation helps!
Ciao!
DX2 Version History lesion / Android Process Cache
theredvendetta said:
I've had my suspicions about this since I first got the Droid X2. I think it may be possible for much of the lag many (most/all?) people experience at some time or another.
As a test, I can check free RAM in Advanced Task Killer when I first boot up the phone, and it will hover somewhere 150 megs with all user processes killed.
Then, when I check after 24 hours of constant use (with intermittent charging periods) I will struggle to get 100 megs with all user processes killed.
Finally, if I reboot the phone, I will be able to obtain a decent amount of freed-up RAM again.
Anyone experiencing anything similar?
Now, I must mention, I'm operating under the assumption that the X2 does not cache apps or files in the RAM. I suspect there is too little RAM at such a minimal speed to be able to clear RAM fast enough in the event that something non-cached is called on. I mean, even Microsoft was slow to use this cache method, as they first introduced it in Windows 7. A good example of this in Windows 7 is if you check the Task Manager, you will see that roughly only a quarter of your RAM is ever actually labeled as "free", even if you currently have no programs open or are using minimal amounts of RAM.
And it certainly doesn't feel as if the cache is working as intended if Motorola did infact implement it on our phones.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Your question is a bit complex. See back when Droid X2 first was released it had 2.2.3 for most users, and didn't have very good application memory management. This was the start of many applications such as "Advanced Task Killer" that you mentioned. These apps were supposed to help in closing apps that were running all the time.
Things changed a bit with the Gingerbread (2.3.3) release. This initial release made the Droid X2 useable. In my opinion the DX2 prior to Gingerbread was nearly a brick! I had many reboot issues, FC, connection issues, GPS issues, etc. With 2.3.3 many issues were eliminated, while others were reduced enough that they didn't bother me TO bad.
2.3.4 came out to fix battery issues largely...
Now I realize you weren't asking for a history lesion, but it is useful to know these things to know where things were and where things are today. I am currently running 2.3.5/412 and have been for months. I can say from experience, Android DOES cache background processes. I thought it did back in 2.3.4, but i can't remember... I don't think it did back in 2.2.x or at least the OS didnt' inform the users via GUI.
Your question about performance though? Yeah the DX2 is crap! I love the physical layout, but it has MANY issues with performance... some have been reduced by doing build.prop edits, yet I have realized that many who post these edits have posted wrong.... for example, they are increasing the buffer sizes thinking this will help internet speeds. This is super complex, but Google "Buffer Bloat" and you'll see how larger buffers often mean greater throughput, but MUCH greater latency....
simply put... big buffer == faster download of individual files.... smaller buffer == slightly slower download but MUCH more responsive
I'm not sure if that answered your question or not... let me know how I did or if I just rambled perhaps =P

Categories

Resources