Not so impressed anymore

[bdlmotox]

So I was an iPhone user but was lured by the Moto X last year. At first things were fun, exciting, and I enjoyed finding new apps and the ability to customize things in ways the bad apple wouldn't allow. To be fair, I love the form factor of the phone. I think the size and feel are perfect for me. I don't want it larger, and I don't want it smaller. Of course, now the new Moto X is larger, so I'm out of luck in the upgrade department.

But then strange things would happen fairly consistently. Here's a few of these issues.

1) Programs on my desktop would vanish accidentally.
2) I'd occasionally shake the phone (in anger) and wonder why the heck it was doing things that I didn't expect.
3) Or I'd twist the phone hoping to get the camera working and it wouldn't start.
4) I'd have to shut down apps because it was running so slow.
5) I'd be trying to send a text and no input was being accepted until I killed the sms app and restarted it.
5) Sometimes, the battery would drain very rapidly.

Is my experience unique in the android world?

So now I'm tempted to go back to the iPhone. Specifically, an iPhone 5s, since I paid 400 bucks to have this unlocked phone and I can't see forking over top dollar again just a year later. I don't remember nearly the litany of times with my 4s that I wanted to throw it out the window, outside of the fact that I was on Sprint and Sprint was garbage in my area. I don't need to be aggravated by technology...I need it to work.

It's a slippery slope we are all on with these upgrades and fees, and these phone manufacturers have done a great job of making us believe we somehow need the newest hardware. I'm just not buying it anymore.

 

[natehoy]

1. That one is unique. I don't think I've ever heard of a program icon vanishing on its own. I have been known to try and move them to the top row of icons, overshooting slighly, and ending up trashing the icon. Inconvenient, but I go back into the app drawer and make a new shortcut.

2+3. I'm not aware of any stock Moto X feature that responds to motion other than Active Display and the Camera app.

4. I've had that happen as well. A lot of things like that depend on what apps are running. Android has gotten much better about prioritizing background apps below the foreground stuff, but an app that wants all available system resources can still give you a bad time. This is also related to 5 (both of them). They all strongly indicate an app in the background that's being a resource hog.

 

[someguy01234]

Lots of the issues you mentioned are software based. Look like you have issues with "wakelocks" that drain your battery and too many background apps running at the sametime that slow down the device. Android devices sometimes require a little more management than iPhones. I believe all your issues could be fixed with a little more tech know how, not trying to be offensive. Some of these problems are recurring issues that affect other people.

Maybe iPhone is better for you if you don't want to deal with wakelock or apps using up the ram. I think the iPhone 6 is pretty good phone, I can't blame you if you decide to drop Android.

In my case, if I had your device, these are things I would do:
-determine if the camera shake not working due to damaged hardware or not
-do a factory reset (which would delete everything in the device)
-install a different launcher like Google Now Launcher
-enable ART mode
-install the app "Greenify" and enable it's automation feature which will automatically stop background running apps, this will help prevent wakelocks and keep the phone running smooth
-for text message issue, try a different SMS app, Hangouts maybe

Your carrier and how good your connection is can also be related to the SMS issue and may drain your battery as well.

 

[Mike Spranger]

i switched from an iphone 4 to a droid dna, to an HTC one, to an LG G2, and now a note 4 - if this isn't way better i'll be back to apple for life. The "sometimes my battery is good and sometimes it's non existent" seems to be an android trademark. the dna was a joke, and same with htc. lg was better, but the lag on it is awful. the note 4 is better all around, and no lag (so far), but i'm having problems with s-health login, with message+ (seems to be a verizon thing). also, my s pen doesn't seem to do any of the things it is supposed to, i'm going to take it into the store to get an explanation or a new one today. last night i was watching tv and saw a commercial of all the neat stuff the s-pen does, so i tried them, to no avail. i did figure out a few things, but the button on mine seems to do nothing. if i lose the yellow popup, i have to put the pen back in and pull it back out.
maybe some of these iphone bashers i always see bragging about andoids can help me out. hopefully i'm just a n00b and messing things up

 

[ScottMGS]

1) Programs on my desktop would vanish accidentally.

Do you have auto-update on for apps? I've occasionally had some icons/widgets disappear when an app updates.

 

[bdlmotox]

1) It's not so unique. It's like a pocket dial. It's accidental. But it's a pain when I have lost a folder full of apps, and having to restore it is a bigger pain. Especially when I don't quite remember what apps I lost.
2) My "shaking" was in anger. Edited original post for clarity on that one
3) I think the camera doesn't start if the RAM is being used up by other running apps.
4) I'm aware that the RAM needs more "management." Problem is, you don't so much know you need to kill apps and I was mistakenly under the impression that I wouldn't have to do that sort of thing.

 

[Mike Spranger]

also - do you lose the whole program, or just the icon/shortcut to the program?

 

[bdlmotox]

Do you have auto-update on for apps? I've occasionally had some icons/widgets disappear when an app updates.

I turned off Auto update since apps seem to updating so often, that was contributing to some of my slowness. Now I auto-update manually at night, or when I know I won't be trying to do anything useful.

 

[bdlmotox]

also - do you lose the whole program, or just the icon/shortcut to the program?

Just the shortcuts.

 

[Chase Lilly]

I came to the Moto X from iPhone as well. I have been happy with the change. Honestly I would go to Windows Phone before going back to iTunes and iCloud. My mother and sister still use iPhone and dealing with there photo storage without having a PC drives me crazy.

1) Sometimes when apps update they are removed from the home screen. I don’t know why. The same apps seem to do it all the time so I guess it is an issue with the way that app is updated. In contrast with Apple you have no home screen. You basically look at the app drawer at all times. The disappearing app thing is not a large thing for me.
2) Shaking does nothing to my phone. It is hard to tell without knowing what your phone does when you shake it. Some apps want you to shake the phone for certain actions.
3) It is a specific twist gesture you need to use for the camera. Shaking will not bring up the camera. I have actually never had the twist gesture fail but I also do not go into the camera all that often. When I do though I have always used the twist feature…. I actually am not sure where the camera is in my phone.
4) I have had the slow phone issue with my 4s and had to do a Factory reset. My son has the issue on his iPhones and factory resets more frequent than most. He goes through a lot of apps though with all the games. I have reset my Moto X once just recently because it was buggy and slow. Really speed things up again. Rouge apps killing the battery sucks and I have tended to just delete them and get another one that does the same thing. Apps in general work better with iOS but I can do so much more with Android
5) If this is happening with the stock app you may need to reset the phone. If it is another app reinstall the app or get another one. The reason I reset my Moto X recently was the stock messaging app failed and somehow that killed hangouts which I use for SMS.
6) Battery drain is usually an app that went crazy. If it is a new app get rid of it or maybe give it one more chance. If the app is not new restart your phone. I have found with my Moto X I need to restart my phone more than I did with Apple. These things are just computers and a restart can fix a lot of things.

So yes your problems are not unique. If you have these issues all the time do a reset on your phone. It will help. I have had these same issues but not weekly or all the time which it seems like you have. Just throughout my year of owning this phone. Every time things get weird I just restart the phone and generally all is better.

 

[bdlmotox]

3) I get that it's a twist and not a shake. Maybe I need better rhythm...but I think its more related to the memory/RAM issue.

 

[bdlmotox]

I also *never* have done a factory reset, as I think I had all these issues from the start. I just learned to deal with them. Maybe I'm as frustrated with the endless attempts at making me think I need a new phone to solve them, when I now know that new isn't necessarily better in any tangible way. New is just more money out of my pocket.

 

[bdlmotox]

Here's a problem that I'm sure others have had, with Moto assist. Lets say I'm on a bus. Of course, assist thinks I'm driving, so I have to remember to shut off the volume or else have an announcement that I have a text message. Annoying! So one of those neato features that was exciting at first just means I have to "manage" things more efficiently. Or turn off the feature altogether.

 

[delrey1900]

How many apps do you have installed? The one thing I've learned with phones (not platform dependent) is to keep the amount of apps installed to the minimum. That may sound dumb/counter productive, but hear me out. If you install a ton of apps whether you use them or not, the phone will have a lot more apps to manage. Apps that run in the background, have notifications, etc. This will slow down your phone and hamper battery performance. If I do not use an app, it is not installed on my phone, period. Only apps that I use on a regular basis is installed. Since I've been practicing this method, I've never seen a slow down or performance issues with my phones. I've seen friends and family members phones that have so much crap installed and they don't even use a third of it. It makes no sense to clutter a phone if it's not being used. This, however, may not be your problem. And this may not work for everyone and while everyone's experience is different for many reasons, I never had any problems with my OG X like you are having.

 

[bdlmotox]

How many apps do you have installed? The one thing I've learned with phones (not platform dependent) is to keep the amount of apps installed to the minimum.

that's actually something I've addressed by going through the running app list in the settings and seeing what was using processes. I killed/deleted a bunch that way, but I'm still having fairly laggy response quite often.

 

[Chase Lilly]

Here's a problem that I'm sure others have had, with Moto assist. Lets say I'm on a bus. Of course, assist thinks I'm driving, so I have to remember to shut off the volume or else have an announcement that I have a text message. Annoying! So one of those neato features that was exciting at first just means I have to "manage" things more efficiently. Or turn off the feature altogether.

If you are a passenger and Assist fires up you need to hold and pull down on the notification in the notification shade. Then select “I’m not driving”. Most notifications have options if you do this. Like media controls for media apps.

Sometimes you just have a bad install even on a new phone. Factory reset might fix a lot of your issues.

 

[Photo_Drew]

I've found battery issues to be app related. Twitter updated and kept my GPS active and killed my battery in about 4 hours. I could turn location data off but I like high accuracy for Google Now.

Posted via Android Central App

 

[drew_sf]

As a former iPhone user (with a Mac desktop & MacBook Air) I bought the Moto X this summer. I sort of wanted to play with an Android phone having picked up a refurbed Nexus 7 for cheap and liking the OS. I keep my Moto X stock with no added launcher, ART, or any app that saves battery life or speeds anything else up. Having said that I find the Moto X to be a solid phone, no crashes, no delays, battery lasts for the day, it just works. On the other hand the Nexus 7 will freeze and often reboots on its own.

When the Moto X 2014 was announced I preordered and got one of the first. I liked the more informative active displays, IR sensors but didn't care for the size. Another reason I didn't keep it was the cost of upgrading to the new X while having to sell the old one. I figured it would cost at least $300 if not more to upgrade to 32GB 2014.

I use iTunes for music and podcast management. Trying to make iTunes work on Android is frustrating. I like all my albums to show album art and uploading to Google Play doesn't always guarantee the cover transfer. Basically I'm used to iTunes music management and forcing it into an Android device isn't pretty. I thought about getting another iPod and then it dawned on me why not just get another iPhone?

To keep it budget friendly I was able to pick up a refurbed 16GB iPhone 5C for about $230 on swappa. When I want iTunes music and a phone I use the 5C, otherwise I go with the Moto X since I'm fine with all the Google+/Google Now features. This also turned out cheaper than moving to the 2014 Moto X as I now have two phones with distinctly unique features that I care about. And really even the cheap 5C has a better camera than the 2014 Moto X!

 

[4runnerbrett]

Lately I have Also been having horrible battery life. I have been really stuck on the one plus one phone lately but I bought this moto x phone telling my self I would get 2 years out of it. I'm only like a year in.
I'm hoping android L can save me from this phone window shopping.

Posted via the Android Central App

 

[benhaube]

Here's a problem that I'm sure others have had, with Moto assist. Lets say I'm on a bus. Of course, assist thinks I'm driving, so I have to remember to shut off the volume or else have an announcement that I have a text message. Annoying! So one of those neato features that was exciting at first just means I have to "manage" things more efficiently. Or turn off the feature altogether.

Or you can hit the button on the persistent notification that says "I am not driving".