Android-Task-Killers-Explained-What-They-Do-and-Why-You-Shouldn’t-Use-Them.docx

Android Task Killers Explained: What They Do and Why You Shouldnt Use ThemAndroid task killers improve your phones performance while also boosting battery lifeor at least thats the much-debated promise. Heres a look at how task killers actually work, when you should (or shouldnt) use them, and what you can do instead.A task killer is an app from which you can (sometimes automatically) force other apps to quit, the hope being that the fewer apps you have running in the background, the better your Androids performance and battery life will be. Not everyone agrees with this premise, though. The argument about whether task killers are effective rages all over the internet: Android forums are full of threads with constant bickering and conflicting anecdotal experience, making it difficult for most users to make sense of the situation.Below, Im going to dig into the truth about Android task killers: that apart from maybe some older phones, Android manages tasks fairly well on its own, and how task killers present quite a few problems. Ill also take a look at the rare occasions when theyre useful, and offer some alternatives you should try to improve your phones performance and battery-life quirks.Before we dive in, heres a quick overview of how Android handles process management by default.How Android Manages ProcessesFull sizeIn Android, processes and Applications are two different things. An app can stay running in the background without any processes eating up your phones resources. Android keeps the app in its memory so it launches more quickly and returns to its prior state. When your phone runs out of memory, Android will automatically start killing tasks on its own, starting with ones that you havent used in awhile.The problem is that Android uses RAM differently than, say, Windows. On Android, having your RAM nearly full is a good thing. It means that when you relaunch an app youve previously opened, the app launches quickly and returns to its previous state. So while Android actually uses RAM efficiently, most users see that their RAM is full and assume thats whats slowing down their phone. In reality, your CPUwhich is only used by apps that are actually activeis almost always the bottleneck.Why Task Killers Are (Usually) Bad NewsFull sizeApps like Advanced Task Killer, the most popular task killer in the Market, act on the incorrect assumption that freeing up memory on an Android device is a good thing. When launched, it presents you with a list of running apps and the option to kill as many as you want. You can also hit the Menu button to access a more detailed Services view, that lists exactly which parts of each application are running, how much memory they take up, and how much free memory is available on your phone. This set-up implies that the goal of killing these apps is to free up memory. Nowhere on the list does it mention the number of CPU cycles each app is consuming, only the memory youll free by killing it. As weve learned, full memory is not a bad thingwe want to watch out for the CPU, the resource that actually slows down your phone and drains your battery life.Thus, killing all but the essential apps (or telling Android to kill apps more aggressively with the autokill feature) is generally unnecessary. Furthermore, its actually possible that this will worsen your phones performance and battery life. Whether youre manually killing apps all the time or telling the task killer to aggressively remove apps from your memory, youre actually using CPU cycles when you otherwise wouldntkilling apps that arent doing anything in the first place.Full sizeIn fact, some of the processes related to those apps will actually start right back up, further draining your CPU. If they dont, killing those processes can cause other sorts of problemsalarms dont go off, you dont receive text messages, or other related apps may force close without warning. All in all, youre usually better off letting your phone work as intendedespecially if youre more of a casual user. In these instances, a task killer causes more problems than it solves.What You Should Do InsteadThat said, not all apps are created equal. Many of you have used task killers in the past and actually found that after freeing up memory, your phone works a bit better. Its more likely that this is because youve killed a bad appone that was poorly coded, and (for example) keeps trying to connect to the internet even when it shouldnt. Any performance increase you experience is more likely because you killed the right app, not because you freed up loads of memory (or, in many cases, its just placebo). Instead of killing all those apps, find out which ones are actually causing the problems. If you really know what youre doing, you may benefit from using a task killer to stop the one or two inefficient-but-loved apps on your phone.Note, however, that this is still a contested notion. A lot of developers (including ROM builder extraordinaire, Cyanogen) will not even look at your bug reports if youre using a task killer. In this humble bloggers opinion, your best bet is to stay away from regular task killer usage entirely. If you absolutely have to have that one battery-killing app on your phone, though, kill awayjust be aware that when you experience a recurring Android bug later on, the task killer may be at fault. Of course, you can just stop using it to determine whether that is or isnt the case.With task killers firmly in the better-off-without box, there are still a number of other things you can do to fill the void, improving your performance and battery life:Full sizeWatch for Runaway Processes: Previously mentioned Watchdog is a slightly different kind of task killer, in the sense that instead of telling you your phones out of memory and its time to go on a task killing spree, it alerts you when the occasional app starts eating up CPU for no reason. You can then kill the app with Watchdog and get on with your day (though honestly, at that point, I usually just reboot my phone). If it happens often with the same app, however, you may want to move on to the next step.Full sizeUninstall Bad Apps: Worse than the occasional, one-time runaway app is the poorly coded, always-eating-CPU app. If you find (with Watchdog or through some other method) that a particular app seems to drain CPU and battery life whenever its running, confirm your suspicions by uninstalling it and seeing what happens. If an app is causing problems on your phone, youre probably better off without it.Full sizeRoot Your Phone: We advocate rooting Android devices a lot at Lifehacker, but thats because it really is as useful as everyone says it is. You can over- and underclock your phone with SetCPU, install custom ROMs that noticeably improve performance and battery life, and use the ever-useful, crapware-thwarting Autostarts utility to stop apps from starting up on your phone in the first place. Honestly, with one-click rooting apps like previously mentioned Universal Androot available for most phones, rooting only takes a few minutes to do, and youll be much happier for it.Update: Many of you also mentioned the root-only app Titanium Backup, which will help you get rid of the pre-installed crapware that comes on most phones, which are one of the worst offenders of phone lag. Thanks to all of you that sent this in!Full sizeSeriously, Use the Power Control Widget: This may sound ridiculously obvious, but if you arent already using some form of the Power Control widget, you should. The things that drain the most battery on any smartphone are Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, GPS, and your screen. Turn them off when you dont need them and youll find that you can eke out considerably more battery life.Full sizeCharge Your Phone: Even more obvious yet rarely heeded advice: Charge your phone often. This isnt as hard as it sounds for most people. While youre sometimes stuck going out for 14 hours with no place to charge your phone, the majority of us spend our days in our homes, our offices, and other places rife with electrical outlets. Buy a few extra chargers and place them strategically around your home, car, and office. Whenever youre sitting around at home or working away at your desk, you can use that time to dock your phone and give it some extra juice without worrying about battery or performance drains. Before I upgraded to Android 2.2, my battery life was pretty awful, but just having a charger in my car and next to my computer made a huge difference in how often I got the dreaded low battery message.Task managers are a controversial subject in Android-land. Weve done our research and this is what we came up with, but were always keen to hear how similar or different your experience is, so share with us in the comments.RELATED STORIES The Best Camera App for Android Long Press the Back Button to Access Androids Browser History SwiftKey X Updates, Sheds Beta Tag and Includes Tablet Support Move comment Admin page Edit comment Demote comment Move thread User actionThread actionSubmitCancel DISCUSSION THREADS FEATURED ALL START A NEW THREADja2038 29 Sep 2010 9:26 AM Android may not need a task killer, but it definitely needs a better way for the user to monitor system status. I do use watchdog, and I do use a task killer once a week or so, not to free up memory, but on those occasions that the phone h a s t u r n e d i n t o a s l o t h. At which point killing everything and letting god sort it out does wonders for making the phone nice and snappy again. (Edit comment) promoted by Whitson Gordon Whitson Gordon ja2038 ja2038: When that happens, I just restart my phone. Its a much better idea than messing with a task killer. (Edit comment) brianary Whitson Gordon Whitson Gordon: How so, specifically? (Edit comment) promoted by Whitson Gordon Whitson Gordon brianary brianary: Because when you restart your phone, you dont risk ending any unnecessary processes, or ending the wrong processes. You just return your phone to a clean slate. (Edit comment) brianary Whitson Gordon Whitson Gordon: You are probably right, but my phone takes a full four minutes to reboot, and Ive never had any problem killing the wrong process (would I even know?). (Edit comment) promoted by Whitson Gordon Whitson Gordon brianary brianary: Probably not, though you might. Four minutes seems like a long time.Perhaps Autostarts will help it boot up faster? (Edit comment) InfidelAl Whitson Gordon Whitson Gordon: You seem to be a big fan of Autostarts. It requires root, does it not? And if youre rooted, why not just uninstall those apps instead? Thinking Im missing something here. (Edit comment) promoted by Whitson Gordon Whitson Gordon InfidelAl InfidelAl: I dont actually use Autostar