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Help Running slow, brand new phone

S

sevron

Lurker
I just got my revolution today (this morning) and now it'll sometimes hang up and go to white screens and act slow, etc.

I've been downloading some launchers to try them out and see how I can customize it, but that couldn't be it could it?

And what's the point of rooting the phone? What purposes does it serve? Does it open up more customization or something? And if I do root it, will that void my warranty or what and will I be able to get back to the stock phone if I ever need to?

Sorry for all the noob questions, first day with an android phone and I like it so far just a few issues.

Also one more thing, now that I have this phone, what the hell do I do with it lol. I'm trying to think of things to do and I'm like uh what now lol.
 
If you just got the phone, it likely has received the Gingerbread update already. This was an operating system update (from Froyo) that the phone was originally released with. My phone works great with the Gingerbread update, has longer battery life and the one problem I had (radios not always waking up) is gone. I couldn't be much happier with it.

As for launcher, I recommend Go Launcher EX. It's a great free app and is very customizable. One feature I use all the time is that when opening the app drawer, you can choose apps from tabs marked "All", "Recent", or "Running". If you switch to the Running tab, you'll see all apps that are currently running along with an indication of available RAM. This is actually quite important as the lagging issue you mention is often caused by low RAM. You'll see that there are a lot of apps running that you didn't start. Many of these run automatically and will restart if you close them (which you can do individually from the launcher). I routinely close some of them that I know are not system critical and won't restart, thereby gaining chunks of free RAM. Your question about rooting ties in here as it's the one way you can "freeze" native apps (that you can't uninstall) thereby gaining RAM and improving performance and increasing battery life. Many have rooted their phones just to do this. Others have to use alternate ROMS. I'd planned to root mine after the Gingerbread update, but don't feel I have a reason to now.

One way you can increase available RAM is to minimize the number of constantly running widgets you have open on your home screens. I used to run various news widgets from CNN, CBSNews, SI and others but found they took a lot of RAM to run and update constantly. I therefore deleted them and just put shortcuts to the apps in their place. I just open the app to retrieve the information and once I'm done, I can close it completely by using the feature in the launcher (from the Running tab) if it's still in memory.

I don't obsess over memory management, but a little help does bring rewards. Before Gingerbread, my phone would drain the battery in 6 to 8 hours easily. Now, with just a little management help, it can go 16 hours. I bought the extended battery some time ago, but don't use it anymore. - MarkC
 
Forgot to say, yes, rooting the phone will void the warranty. This isn't a big deal to some and I'd planned to do it, but don't really feel a need to now.
 
Well, the phone came with 2.2.2 at least that's what it said in the about phone area, so I updated it. Does fine so.

And I tried the GO Laucnher EX, but I thought that changed teh lock screen as well, I don't like the slide up one and I'd like to put like time, battery info, missed calls, etc on the lock screen as well.
 
Go Launcher didn't change the lock screen (though I use a pattern lock instead anyway) and all the information you mentioned (time, battery, missed calls, etc) shows up on my lock screen.
 
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