OK, Phil and Jerry, then explain this to me . . .

[Vance14]

I just checked, and mine is around 220, and I am not running anything in the foreground, that is just with background stuff going on. When I crank up Beyondpod to listen to a podcast, then open a game to play while I listen, my guess is that I am using up most of the rest of it. Whenever I do that, I get a complete redraw when I close the game. Other times, it is just stuttering and choppy performance, and I will go in and check and find that I have around 75mb free.

 

[Tedium]

Hey, if you don't pirate apps you probably won't need antivirus software, and you can scratch that off your list.
HTH.

 

[trivor]

RAM is used in many different ways. You see a slowdown when too many things are trying to stay in the foreground. Foreground apps will try to close background processes and sleeping tasks (basically anything that's not a required service) if they need more memory.

If I write an app like Instagram --

I can code the processes and threads in different ways with different priorities. The correct way would be to have the threads and processes needed to run the app in the foreground while the user has it open and looking, and when the user no longer has my app on the screen a main thread goes to sleep, a thread runs as a service to accept push notifications or check for updates, and the rest of the threads are "ghosted" -- marked as dead, not running, and OK to kill when more space is needed. The service (that checks for updates or push messages) would be very small and only used to wake up other processes when updates are received, the main app would be asleep (ok to close if it has to be closed), and the other misc threads are dead, and ready to be killed. There's no need to flush them unless they are needed, because there's a chance the next app that gets opened is my app.

Now if I did it the wrong way, my misc threads and routines would just get backgrounded, and the system will think they should stay alive if at all possible. Or I could bundle everything up in the service that runs always. Or if I really wanted to foul things up, I could code the main app to stay awake even if not displayed to the user. Don't laugh -- apps like that are out there.

TouchWiz 4 is a great real-world example. Prior versions of TW were pretty roughly coded in relation to proper memory management. But when TW 4 came out on the SGSII, people were amazed at how well it worked. Word is HTC has done the same thing with Sense 4. As developers get better at coding for Android (both big guns like Samsung and HTC, and small independent devs) apps will get better and better at managing their memory space.

For now, the only way to fix the issue is to root and edit the minfree settings, or go a step further and edit the kernel minfree settings before building , or just not use apps that cause your phone to crawl. Flushing the RAM is just a temporary fix, because the next time you use an app that behaves poorly it's going to do the same thing again.

One last thing to consider -- next time things get slow, check the CPU speed. Many (as in many, many) times we blame RAM when the CPU is pegged and the system is CPU bound. An that's a whole other mess.

Jerry (oh most awesome pinnacle of Android knowledge )

Question on Apps and RAM.

I know that 3rd party task killers can really mess up your phone BUT is it OK to kill tasks from the OS itself (settings/manage application/running apps)? The reason I ask is it seems like there are a few apps (especially Sports) that don't seem to close themselves when you exit and you can see them running in the background and very often using data to update scores/notifications?

Love all you guys on the shows and the forums (best Android podcast - can't necessarily say best podcast period because I do have other interests)

 

[moosc]

If your rooted try this app. I've been using since od days. https://forums.androidcentral.com/e...s/details?id=com.rs.autokiller&token=VAsbfwFu

Jerry (oh most awesome pinnacle of Android knowledge )

Question on Apps and RAM.

I know that 3rd party task killers can really mess up your phone BUT is it OK to kill tasks from the OS itself (settings/manage application/running apps)? The reason I ask is it seems like there are a few apps (especially Sports) that don't seem to close themselves when you exit and you can see them running in the background and very often using data to update scores/notifications?

Love all you guys on the shows and the forums (best Android podcast - can't necessarily say best podcast period because I do have other interests)

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Xparent Cyan Tapatalk 2

 

[bed269]

I just want to say I'm impressed with the knowledge of this community. I do good to take widgets on and off the screen.

Sent from my DROID RAZR using Tapatalk 2

 

[SOTK]

I've read and been a part of this subject a few times in the past on other phones. Its a subject which always comes up. I can say that I've never used a task killer on any of my Android phones. If you're patient, development on most Android phones address low memory issues. My previous phone, the Droid Charge, had complaints from the community on screen redraws and other low memory issues. Eventually, through development the issue was taken care of (for the most part).

I've never had problems with low memory on the GNex. I don't even worry about it. I don't think I've even bothered to even check my memory once since owning it. Maybe its how I run my phone with a combination of the kernels and Roms I use, but there's no issues.

If you're that worried about your memory management, I would suggest running V6 Supercharger. I ran this all the time on my Droid Charge which had way less Ram than our GNex and never saw screen redraws. I know you can run V6 on the GNex too. I just don't see the need for it personally as i think Android 4.0 does a great job in managing memory. At any rate, that's my two cents and my experience.

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2