Task killer

[stuarta]

I know there has been many a thread lurking around here with lots of people with various opinions.

For myself, I have used the Rechild one and didn't have any issues. It was setup to clear apps as soon unlocked the screen and worked well. Mainly because I use World War, iMobsters and Racing Live all by Storm8 and felt that they weren't closing properly. I've since found out that they close better if you just press back which I'm doing now and so while testing battery performance, have disabled ATK.

For the last couple of days though, I've noticed my phone really slowing up and lagging, most noticeable while typing either in a text or web search. I've restarted the handset and it still comes back quickly. I've tried manually launching ATK and noticed that the memory drops to about 120mb but when I kill apps, it jumps back up to 350mb.

So for me, I'm thinking that ATK is worthwhile and I might reimplement it but know I'll probably get flamed for suggesting such a dastardly act

 

[El Presidente]

No comment.

 

[stuarta]

No comment.

you think I'm crazy? Not sure how else to resolve the slow down and lag. Can be terrible, 1 character at a time while typing

 

[Xyro]

Heresy!

In all seriousness, by your description it only sounds like the task killer is fixing another problem. The phone shouldn't be slowing down so badly in the first place.

 

[stuarta]

Heresy!

In all seriousness, by your description it only sounds like the task killer is fixing another problem. The phone shouldn't be slowing down so badly in the first place.

ok just started doing the same now. Done nothing but send half a dozen texts all from Handscent and started slowing. Any ideas?

 

[Xyro]

Well, I would try killing your apps one by one whilst it was happening to pin down any problem apps.

It might also be worth checking out an app called Watchdog from the market. It tracks the CPU usage of every app to see if something is slowing you down.

 

[stuarta]

yep do have that installed. Click on Real CPU and loads in there that I don't use or not used since last restart such as Sipdroid and WhatsApp. They are using 0% CPU so guess just services in the background

 

[El Presidente]

My comment was made in jest.

I agree with Xyro though, your phone shouldn't be doing that in the first place. I installed Handcent for about 4 minutes, then took it off. I did use GoSMS for about a day and noticed in the settings that there were options to install "lite" or "standard" versions/modes as it did have the potential to cause slow down. Maybe Handcent is the same.

Stock Messaging App > 3rd Party one anyway.

 

[stuarta]

yep, liked Go as it shows Folder view but noticed issue when replying on popups, which you don't get with Handscent

 

[SB13X]

FAIL!

Its like banging your head against a brick wall of ignorance....

Now from the Dev of the Last.FM app:


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Task Killers are for those who cannot be arsed with managing their device properly. You wouldn't keep anything installed on your PC that hogged all the resources and ground it to a halt so why leave it on your phone and put up with its errant behaviour just because you can temporarily solve the issue by using a TK that screws with the OS.

Even Task Killer Devs tend to agree that they are only worthwhile on legacy 2.0 below OS devices:

TASK MANAGER DEVELOPERS RESPOND

However, developers of task killing apps are of a different opinion. Arron La, developer of Advance Task Manager, suggests that task killers are more important for legacy devices like the G1 and phones running older versions of Android.
“Task Managers were absolutely needed in the past before the new services UI came out in Android 2.0 or 2.1,” La said in an e-mail. “Task Managers had a niche of allowing users to quickly kill services associated with apps – including all the other stuff as well, such as alarms – but that was the only way to do it before the introduction of the new services UI.”

Even the developer of TaskOS concurs, though he makes it a point to say that TaskOS is more about task switching and ending apps only when absolutely necessary.
“It’s very bad to kill services on Android because those services are loaded with a lot of information and are ‘sleeping’ without using battery usage,” says Christophe. “That’s why TaskOS doesn’t show services…Killing one application when you know what to do is [beneficial]. Killing mass applications is bad.”

 

[stuarta]

FAIL!

Its like banging your head against a brick wall of ignorance....

Task Killers are for those who cannot be arsed with managing their device properly. You wouldn't keep anything installed on your PC that hogged all the resources and ground it to a halt so why leave it on your phone and put up with its errant behaviour just because you can temporarily solve the issue by using a TK that screws with the OS.

There we go, that's the abuse I was looking for

 

[SB13X]

There we go, that's the abuse I was looking for

Thats not abuse, if I was gonna hurl abuse it would have had asterix galore...thats education and pointing out simple straightforward facts.

There is far more info to tell you what I am telling you out there on the interweb that outweighs your outlook. Therefore not to take heed of advice would by definition make you ignorant.

I also state that abuse would be directly aimed at you but I am encompassing the entire TK using community.

 

[stuarta]

yep, have read all the pros and cons and arguments in the past and just stating an instance I noticed. Probably not going to use it anyway, keen to eliminate as much rubbish apps as possible since the frantic install of a new handset