Factory Reset Diary?

[jfslater98]

I have similar issues with a bogged-down Razr Maxx, running 4.1.2. I've tried the factory reset a couple times, but it always automatically want to download all my apps from Google Play. How do I tell Google Play to not auto-download my installed apps after a factory reset? I want to reset, then install my apps one by one, to monitor how they impact my phone's performance.

Hey Nascar,

I used these instructions with success

https://forums.androidcentral.com/e...ces/knowledge_base.html/49625/&token=eS1yLFGp

The key is step 3. Make sure to clear the "Automatic.." option, that's what's bringing the junk back. Good luck, let us know how it goes.

 

[this_is_nascar]

Hey Nascar,

I used these instructions with success

Perform a Factory Data Reset (Device Powered On) - DROID RAZR / RAZR MAXX by MOTOROLA

The key is step 3. Make sure to clear the "Automatic.." option, that's what's bringing the junk back. Good luck, let us know how it goes.

That link sends me to the Verizon phone page. Can you repost with the correct link? I'd really appreciate it. Thanks.


Update... nevermind, I found the link. Thanks. I'll report back on how the reset goes.

 

[jfslater98]

Sorry about that. When I mouseover the link, it's correct, but copying or clicking has cruft added on to it by the forum. I've re-edited my original post, and it appears to be correct now.

 

[jfslater98]

At 40% at 1 day, 14 hours. Hard to believe the banking app would do that, but don't have any other explanation at this point. Two different things happened this time: I had to turn off the phone and turn it back on again, started up the apps I listed above again. Also watch <3 min. of video on Youtube. Hard to believe that would make such a big difference. Note that I log in to the banking app, then immediately sign off.

Will likely do another charging cycle with that app removed and see what happens. After that, will start adding other apps I want, that so far I've held back on.

EDIT: 15% at 2d 4h, similar profile to last time I left banking app on. Have to put on charger. Will uninstall app and reboot. Also noticed over past few days the "compass" icon will appear in the top status bar, as if I'm using maps. But maps isn't on, not sure what that's about, we'll see if it comes back after the banking app is gone.

 

[jfslater98]

3 days 2 hours and at 10%. Will start next with a couple apps and see if I get similar performance.

 

[this_is_nascar]

Well, I completed my factory reset and only installed a small percentage of my apps. After a week or so, I'm back to having the same issues, with a dog-a** slow response time for doing anything and everything. Even turning pages/screens has delays. I'm lost............

 

[jfslater98]

Well, I completed my factory reset and only installed a small percentage of my apps. After a week or so, I'm back to having the same issues, with a dog-a** slow response time for doing anything and everything. Even turning pages/screens has delays. I'm lost............

Sorry to hear about the continued troubles, Nascar. You may need to peel back even the small percentage of apps and try each one at a time. I used battery time between charges to gauge the "greediness" of an app, and did at least one charge cycle with nothing. It's tedious, but right now, I'm leaving my banking app off of the next set of apps I'm planning on installing. The banking app really seemed to suck down the battery.

At 2 days and 13 hours, I'm at 15%. This was with adding My Fitness Pal, adding back my facebook account but leaving sync at Never. Apps were used somewhat lightly, although I had a couple longer than normal phone conversations. Planning on leaving it over night to see if it will die on its own or if the "suspend background data" feature really works. EDIT: at 2 days 22 hours, down to 10%, plugged in to charge.

Meanwhile, I'm moving on to install critical (for me) apps, one at a time. I'm just listing them out now, but will edit this post later to put them in importance order and to list the battery time for each one.

Tapatalk (2d 4h 10% on 7/19, reboot)
Weather Channel (2d 13h 20% on 7/22, reboot before charge)
Drive (already installed, but went to edit a spreadsheet, was prompted to install Google Sheets, used it once. On 7/23 left phone in between wifi and 4g for an hour, was hot.: 2d 2hrs, 10% 7/25. Rebooted, won't use sheets this time)
Paypal (2d 5h 10% on 7/27, reboot)
United Airlines (2d 6h 42m 10%, just hit that level, 7/30, reboot)
Amazon (1d 17h 10%, didn't use Amazon much, during visit to gym last night, phone was bouncing between wi-fi, 4g and 3g, noticed very sluggish behavior then)
Photobucket (1d 7h 15%, on 8/2, had to charge "early" as busy day next day)

Break - this next charging cycle, I won't use many apps, just rebooted the phone during recharge. Previously I would start all the apps above, use the latest one a little, and at least start all the other built in apps I use. This time I want to see if I don't start any apps if it has any effect on battery life, in other words, how much battery do these apps use just being installed.

UPDATE: 3d 0h 56m, 8/6 got the 10% "burp-burp" noise. Haven't rebooted yet, here were the apps that were on during this charge cycle:
Text
Camera, Email, Calendar, Gmail, Keep, Browser, The Weather Channel, Phone, Tapatalk

Don't use apps, battery life goes up, film at 11! However, if I don't want to use apps, I'll go back to a flip phone. All that said, I noticed some sluggishness with the phone last night using text and the screen unlock got hinky as well. Just the one time though, bears watching. Will now reboot phone and continue with the app installs and battery watching.

Ebay (quick note 1d 2hr, 20%?!?! lost previous note, I think 10% burp happened 3 hours later)
Astro File Manager (1d 13 hr, 20%, need to charge early, also added Google Authenticate and some barcode scanner utility Google recommended, due to iPad arriving)
K-9 Email app - added three email accounts, forgot to restart all apps. At 2d 10hr, got 10% burp-burp on 8/12. Apps that were started: Text, gmail, email, K-9 mail, Browser, Camera, Weather Channel, Phone, Google, Keep, Authenticator, Contacts. Had a 45minute conversation on bluetooth.
banking app - 2d, 1hr, 30 min 10% burp. Started all apps on this last cycle, didn't use much, though did score some sweet MC gear using Tapatalk and Paypal. 1-2 hours of talk, no bluetooth.

 

[this_is_nascar]

Wanted to check-in for your latest status. How are you making out?

 

[jfslater98]

I've been updating the post above, as I didn't want to clutter up the forum with bumps. Amazon doesn't appear to be very friendly but my visit to the gym last night saw a lot of network "bouncing" which really seems to chew up battery. I'm putting Photobucket back on now, which didn't appear to be much of a hog (also don't use it much). And I won't be in the gym the next few days, so this might be a good test of Amazon's "hungriness".

I'll keep updating the list above as I go through each app one at a time.

How are you fairing with your Maxx?

 

[this_is_nascar]

I think I'm going to have to take your route. Do another full reset and only put one app back on at a time, with quite a bit of time between each app. Even though I have only 75% of the apps I used to have installed, the phone still gets so slow, even trying to navigate between screens. I have a few different apps that show you the status, but none of them ever point out an issue or anything like that.

 

[SoccerRef12]

Don't know whether they will help in your particular case, but I use Clean Master, Greenify and GSam Battery Monitor and they keep my Maxx running smoothly. Hope this helps.

 

[this_is_nascar]

Thanks. Not sure those apps are going to tell me what's wrong either. All GSam does is tell you about battery usage. Knock on wood, battery usage isn't my issue. As far as I know, those other apps just clean cache and maybe stop apps. That's really shouldn't be an issue anyway. From what I've read the Android OS works by managing cache and what's in there, so stopping cached entries defeats the purpose of the OS. It's gotta be something else. Something is either keeps the disk active, causing my I/O's to be tied up servicing that nonsense or something else is going on. Like I said, this get to the point where even swiping between homescreens/pages takes 3 or 5 or 10 seconds. Many times just simply tapping an icon takes 3-5 seconds before you see it accept the tap and execute.

 

[jfslater98]

So 1.5 months later I'm finished with this part of the experiment: add one app at a time and see what happens. What did I learn? Not as much as I would have hoped. Other than maybe don't just start all the apps for the heck of it. Banking app didn't seem to cause much trouble this time. Paypal still works in the background, whether I'm logged in and using it or not. I'm sure they all are. Clearly, the more apps I added, the worse the battery performance got. Seems to have leveled with light usage at about 2 days, which is fine for me.

A coworker just gave up on his Razr Maxx. He was getting issues like Nascar did: random 3-5 second lock ups. He had done a factory reset and didn't have all his apps put back in. I think he is more of a "power user" than I am. When I last saw him, he was shopping for a case for the new HTC he ordered. To be honest, I did notice increasingly sluggish performance as I went through the installs listed above. Worse when I was betwixt networks.

So after this last install of the banking app, I did a cache reset... just because. Didn't notice any change before I did the "lobotomy".

Next part will be for me to just sort of use it "naturally" and see what happens. So no more starting apps just to see. I'll try and record what was used at the end of a charging cycle to see if any patterns emerge. Likely all on a spreadsheet, because I am a nerd.

 

[this_is_nascar]

Thanks for your report. I helps me with my decision to just use this Maxx for the best I can, for as long as I can, before I decide to throw it against a wall . I'm eligible for an upgrade, but really didn't want to extend my contract for another 2-years with Verizon. In addition, I really have no idea which Android phone I'd go to. I'm going to assume the newest Droid/Maxx is going to be no better than this Razr MAXX in the long run.

 

[jfslater98]

Glad this is helping, even if a little bit. This post will be updated with my battery life and list of apps that were on when it "burped" at 10% battery. Then I reboot and recharge. If I add any new apps to the phone, I'll list that. Maybe I'll do like a month of this before I start tweaking the app mix to see if anything improves.

8/22/2014 1:32pm EST - 2d 2hr. Text, Tapatalk, email, gmail, camera, google, phone, weather channel, K-9 mail, brower, wi-fi, people, maps, banking app

8/25/2013 2d 20hr! Added a GS-911 app. Text, Google, Authenticator, email, phone, gmail, keep, settings, weather channel, browser, calendar, banking app, maps, tapatalk Forgot to reboot after this recharge. Interestingly it looks like the GS-911 app shut itself off. This session also included a few minutes of GPS routing.

8/27/2014 20% @ 1d 15hr had to charge early due to schedule. Settings, People, email, Gmail, Weather channel, text, calendar, Google, authenticator, phone, keep, banking app, maps. Rebooting this time.

8/29 10% 2d,10 hr. Pretty much same as above, no banking app

Gap - travelling a lot, had to use airplane mode a bunch until I got to a charger.

9/4 2d, 19hr. Can't remember if I rebooted. Settings, email, text, gmail, calendar, keep, gallery, weather channel, tapatalk, google, browser, phone, K-9 mail

9/7 lost notes, 2d 3hr(?). Not long after the battery completely died so don't even know what apps were on it. Currently got a note saying there's 27(!) updates waiting. Not sure if I should run them or not, if so will do while charging. Also considering running a set with Wifi shut off.

9/9 2d 4hr. Settings, people, phone, text, gmail, browser, email, keep, calendar, google, camera

9/12 2d 3hr. 30% had to end early, traveling. settings, email, text, Gmail, people, browser, phone, k-9 mail

9/18 1d 23 hr. 10% weather channel, settings, email, browser, gmail, people, keep, text, phone, calendar, google, camera

Gap here, obviously. Phone starting to lose connections to SD card, had to restart a couple times for that.

9/20 1d 17hr. 5% settings, camera, email, text, gmail, browser. Something bad happened here, this cycle seemed really short, almost no apps

9/23 1d 15hr. 10% settings, browser, text, email, k-9, gmail, camera, wifi, phone. Thinking about shutting off location services next, seeing the little GPS symbol when it's not needed.

9/24 at 60% had to reboot after SD card "undocked" at the gym. Was 70% battery before gym.

9/25 1d 21h, 10% SIM card disconnected at least twice more since yesterday. settings, text, camera, email, keep, gmail, k-9 mail.

 

[jfslater98]

So this might the last post for me on this phone. It is now exhibiting the same behavior as my coworker's before he ditched his: SIM card disconnecting, forcing a reboot. If this behavior continues, I can't really gauge which app(s) might be the battery hog(s). I reset the SIM card today, may take the excruciating trip to a VZ store to have them look at it.

As I think about replacements, I was drawn to the Droid Mini, I like the size (as I have a tablet or two). But a different co-worker lambasted it, seems he's gone through 3 of them in a period of days. Anyway, hope this was helpful to some, good luck to all.

 

[this_is_nascar]

Thx. I'm about ready to dump my Droid RAZR Max as well, due to my issues.


Sent from my DROID RAZR using Tapatalk

 

[jfslater98]

Over the few months while I was tracking my battery usage, I kept getting pestered to update all the apps had updated, the number got as high as... 32(?). For some reason, I decided to finally update everything since my last post. I did it while it was recharging, it took *hours*.

When it was done, I was left with a much less useful phone. It's definitely slower now, stuttering as I try to simply type in the passcode to use it. Gmail now sometimes takes... a minute to show emails. Gmail?!?!?! Isn't this a google operating system, wouldn't they think to at least make this built in app work right? Well, I guess they've decided to optimize it for the next hardware set, not mine. Along with all the other app suppliers. But for some reason, even though I can get a new phone, I'm hanging on.

Why?

I'm guessing it's because I feel like I did in 1998, when my first PC a Dell XPS 90 was showing it's age. Or a some years later, when it was time to buy a digital camera to record my new daughter growing up. Or not too long ago, when the CRT TV was not keeping up with the HD content that was filling the cable... There's something better just around the corner, it's all getting faster and cheaper, when will the new thing I have now become a worthless paperweight?

I might look into rooting the phone, or "cyanogenmod" whatever the hell that is, if it even works on this RAZR maxx.

Or I might even go rogue. I wandered into the Verizon store and fondled the lowest end flip phone covetously. No more email, F.U. boss I can't get email on this phone. No facebook. No apps. Email is now irrelevant anyway, everyone texts each other now. God forbid I actually use a map to figure out where I'm going before I get there. It all seems so appealing, moving backwards.

But my company pays for this electronic leash, so "smart" phone it is. One of my coworkers likes his HTC one. Maybe I'll do that.

 

[mooch91]

How many of your bloat and system apps do you have disabled? I'm theorizing that disabling some system apps ha slowed me down. On my wife's bionic I just turned all the google play apps and the wallpaper apps back on, among some others I had disabled long ago. Seems to be blazing along now... Need more time to confirm.


Sent from my mobile device.

 

[jfslater98]

I made a comment earlier thinking about shutting off location services, but I never did it. Other than that, I have not touched any of the apps settings even after updating them all. the random SIM card disconnects have stopped(?), maybe I'm being more gentle with it subconsciously. Performance seems to have worsened, both with battery life and responsiveness. Still holding in to it for now...