New owner questions

[travlinsouth]

Hi All,

I've wanted an M8 ever since it came out (don't get me started on the Vzn rep who was so incompetent that I had to get a Moto X) and I'm really pleased to now have one. The Moto X (First Gen) wasn't a bad phone, and I'll probably be making comparisons for a while as I "move in" to my new daily driver.

A first question concerns processing memory. Although it's got more RAM and and a better CPU than my old phone, it seems to be able to hold fewer apps in "ready" without restarting when I switch back and forth between them, sometimes as few as two or three; I don't think I ever had this problem with the Motorola.

I noticed in this post (and a number of other sources that I've seen over time) that task killers are counter productive, but I'm wondering what's going on that only a few apps are available at any one time, and what I can do to gain more efficiency.

On a possibly related note, I'm going through more data than I did with my old phone, by almost double. A contributing factor may be that I like my phone so much that I'm on it more, but I don't think that much. I'll be going through to see which apps are taking bigger bites and trying to limit their usage.

I'm really excited to be starting with my new M8, and I know there's a lot of good info in this forum. I'm looking forward to reading through the posts and benefitting from the collected knowledge.

Best,

- J.R.

 

[B. Diddy]

Welcome to Android Central! How much free RAM is usually available? Where are you looking to see what apps are currently in memory?

To see what's been using data, go to Settings>Data Usage​, and see if anything there stands out.

 

[Golfdriver97]

I had both the M8 and Moto X 2013. I think both devices are very good. The performance difference you are seeing....some can probably be explained by the fact that the Moto X ran a more trimmed down version of Android than the M8.

 

[travlinsouth]

Thanks replies (and sorry about the delayed follow up.) Diddy, I hadn't checked free RAM until just now, but it's showing me that I've averaged 1.4 GB (out of total memory of 1.8, for 80%) over the last 24 hours, with 373 MB currently free. The biggest culprit was Android OS averaging 408 MB, with Facebook and Google Play Services around 100 MB. Android System, SIM Toolkit and EasyAccessService were next, all in the high double digits MB. I went to Settings >App Manager >(menu) Memory to see aggregate, then "Memory used by apps" to get specifics. I haven't looked at anything to see what programs are currently in memory, and a quick google search didn't turn up a way to check. I did notice a few posts saying lamenting that "running programs" was removed in Marshmellow. Is there a work around?

I did check the data usage shortly after activating the phone, and at first it didn't seem to add up (amount for each program added together was considerably less that total data used) - or perhaps I misread it - so I wasn't putting much faith in that. In any event, that seems to have evened out, and data consumption, while still high, seems justified (turns out I'm using Google maps a lot more).

Golfdrive, I kind of suspected it might be something like that. Is there anyway I can manually slice it down? Is 400+ MB (plus other system apps) normal?

I should probably mention that I've been playing a fair amount of Ingress, a game which I suspect is memory intensive, and a helper program for it (IITC), and that's motivating my query (though not in the last 24 hours, which is why it's not showing up). On my Moto X, I could have both programs loaded, and swap between them seemlessly; on the M8, I frequently get the splash screen when I switch. It's not a huge deal, but I notice it, so I thought I would ask.

 

[travlinsouth]

And here's an issue that is a bit more irksome: There seems to be a substantial difference in the spell check between the two devices. I'm a reasonably careful typer, and use a lot of unusual syntaxes, so I don't want to vigorous spell check. Yet the M8 seems to want to correct everything I input, even after I re-"correct" it back to the way I want it. Is there a way to relax the behavior - or better yet, note that a word isn't in the dictionary, but don't correct it unless I ask it to? That'll probably be tonight's topic for internet searching.

 

[travlinsouth]

This very old XDA post talks about the same problem and suggests Swiftkey. Like him, I don't want to stray too far from stock, but might not have any choice.

 

[Golfdriver97]

I can manually slice it down? Is 400+ MB (plus other system apps) normal?

I know stock ROMs can be modified, as some other developers on XDA have done it...here is the catch....it's a lot of work. I haven't had my M8 in a while, and I ma not sure if they can be unlocked to the point where you can flash custom ROMs anymore.

Edit: forgot about the other half of this question....something to keep in mind is Androdi likes having RAM full. It makes switching apps easier on the OS. The amount you specified is on the low side. There are other versions of Android that can get much higher (not really a good thing).

Yet the M8 seems to want to correct everything I input

I had much better luck with Google Keyboard than HTC's. That one is pretty bare itself, so perhaps that might be a better way to go?