Aggressive background process reaping - Eee Pad Transformer Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

I'm considering rooting, even though I'd prefer to keep this device stock, simply to have the ability to tweak the background process killer in Honeycomb. I don't know if it's something Asus cranked up, but I haven't heard of anyone else with a tablet having the same problems that I do. I literally cannot listen to music (through ANY app, default Android Music or whatever, they ALL die) because at some random point, beteeen 5 and 15 minutes after I switch away from the player to do something else with my tablet, ActivityManager will kill it and respawn it. This obviously stops playback, which is annoying.
I have no task killer apps or anything like that running on the tablet. Checking logcat shows nothing leading up to the event, simply a line for ActivityManager whacking the music player PID, then restarting it. If I leave the player in the foreground, it's fine, and plays without stoppage. When I switch away from it to browse, or write this post in the XDA app (expecting music to die shortly ...) or anything, it will get killed, even though it's still playing music.
Anyone else experiencing something like this?
Sent from my Transformer TF101 using xda premium

No, it's certainly not normal, and I suggest doing a factory reset before rooting if you want to keep it stock (even though custom ROMs do offer better overall performance). Does it happen randomly, even if you're sitting at the desktop for the 15 minutes, or does it only happen when you are switching between lots of apps, or using memory heavy apps?

Gary13579 said:
Does it happen randomly, even if you're sitting at the desktop for the 15 minutes, or does it only happen when you are switching between lots of apps, or using memory heavy apps?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The only situation which will keep the app from dying is if it's the active, foreground app. Strangely enough, the screen can sleep, as long as that music app is the one that's up when it shuts off, and it'll keep playing. I can sit at the home screen, and it will die. It will die if I switch apps, to run Talk, or the browser, or Mail, Market, anything other than Music (or any music app, I've tried them all, it's not a specific app problem.)
Checking the log via logcat shows an entry from the ActivityManager class killing the PID of the app, then immediately restarting it. If I'm watching it when it happens, the music stops, and if there's a status bar icon for the player (such as Music, WinAmp, or PowerAmp) it disappears for a moment, then reappears, on the same track, but reset to the beginning. I suspect this is because the current track is cached/saved somewhere but the position is not when the PID is killed. Oddly enough, the app must be considered to be in a "crashed" state because of the instant restart a second later.
As I said, the tablet is 100% stock. When I got it (early August, I think?) there was a single update that immediately applied. Then I got the latest 8.6.5.9 US update what, a few weeks ago? That's all that's been done as far as the code that's running on it. No root, ever, no custom ROMs, nothing.
I suppose I should do a factory reset and see if that helps. I just hate having to set everything up again without a backup (which I obviously don't have, not rooted.)
[Edit: I should add that the music player isn't the only app that ActivityManager logs kills/restarts on. logcat is full of them.]

Factory reset last night (VolDown while powering on, select "reset," so this was a full wipe) and it's STILL DOING IT.
Sent from my Transformer TF101 using xda premium

hm strange, maybe there is an issue with your music library that crashes the music player? file corruption during transfer, maybe?
or some app your recently installed is not 100% Honeycomb compatible and makes the Activity Manager go nuts.

d3l1 said:
hm strange, maybe there is an issue with your music library that crashes the music player? file corruption during transfer, maybe?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've wiped and re-copied the music files several times. Also, as I said, if I keep the music app active (foreground) it plays forever, no problem.
or some app your recently installed is not 100% Honeycomb compatible and makes the Activity Manager go nuts.
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Click to collapse
I wiped back to stock with no apps and it still does it.
No, I actually did some more research yesterday, involving BTEP and staring at the output of "top" for an hour or two.
Warning: Linux babble ahead --
It seems that ALL the background apps will respawn at the same time. So, when Music drops and restarts, the com.google.android.music process is not the only one dying, pretty much anything running forked from zygote, except for the following exceptions: system_manager, com.android.systemui, com.nuance.xt9.input (part of the Asus keyboard,) com.android.phone (with wifi only, why is this running?) and com.google.process.apps.
You can tell when all the application PIDs are grouped tightly together, in the range of a few hundred, that some event is forcing a mass kill and refresh of the apps, except, curiously, if the app is running in the foreground. So there's at least some logic involved in whatever's doing it, and not simply a kill -HUP `pidof zygote` or something like that. (I don't even know what that would do, heh.)
While monitoring top I didn't notice any processes with extreme CPU or RAM usage. Everything looked fairly well behaved. The system had plenty of memory available at all times. I checked dmesg for any kernel errors, nothing at all to indicate a failed read/write or any other type of hardware error.
Since what I'm looking at is basically a Linux system (and I troubleshoot this sort of stuff for a living) I'm trying to dig into it from that angle first. If I can find out WHAT is causing the mass process kill, then I can hopefully have a better idea of WHY.
Sometimes I hate computers.

Related

[Q] Android Market & Music Player Slow?

The android market on my captivate is slow, it'll take anywhere from 15-25 seconds to load a page sometimes. Also my music player is sluggish, I only have about 300 songs on there right now and the player lags a little bit. Anyone else having these problems?
I also face the same problem with android market.
Any application takes a while to start installing, sometimes even upto 10-15 mins for the installation to start.
I reset my phone to factory settings a couple of times before and still this problem exists.
I know this may sound a bit crazy, i think the GPS malfunction on this device has got to be somehow connected with all the lag.. (Most of the applications required your current location, and maybe the GPS gets activated or something like that).
I know it may sound lame, am not a software guy, but i am just thinking that it may be the case!
Same for me with the Android Market lag... of course my GPS too but that's a given :-(
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I897 using XDA App
hmm, i dont use the music player (pandora ftw) but i do use the market quite a bit. I havn't noticed any page loading lag (this could be due to you reception) but now that i've hit 50 apps, when i install new ones, the phone has a brain fart while its installing and becomes generally slower untill the install completes. However downloads and installs dont take any longer than normal...
yeah my installing is fine, it's just when i try to load pages. Sometimes it'll take 15-20 seconds to load the page and it's quite annoying. I tried clearing the cache from manage applications settings but that didn't do much.
wheres FROYO!!!!!!!!!
Simple solution that helped for me on several phones.
Exit all applications.
Go to Settings => Accounts & Sync => Uncheck Background Data and confirm
Quit all screens with back button
Start Market => You will receive a message that Market can't run without Background Data => click Activate => Enable Background Data and click the back button
Now test Market again
Enjoy!
If you are rooted the OCLF helps this issue immensely. I had it installed and just uninstalled the OCLF to see if there was any difference in load times and I'm ready to reinstall, it helps out a lot!

CM 7 and the Droid 1

Alright guys, I have a simple question for ya.
I've recently flashed CyanogenMod 7 onto my Droid 1, and have been experiencing problems. They are as follows:
1) After a phone call, I either need to wait about 5 minutes to get my data(3G) signal back, or reboot because it never gets a data connection back
2) I can no longer multitask as efficiently, and example is if I'm listening to music (Pandora, Rhapsody, or the default music app) and I go home to do another activity (Facebook, Browser, Pulse, etc.) my music app stops playing and the ongoing notification disapears.
3) My Facebook contacts are no longer kept in sync. It still is the same version as the one I used on CM6.1.2. However, when I do select to sync, it adds the contacts, without pictures, and within an hour, they are removed.
4) My messaging app, although it is locked in my memory, still is being killed by my system.
I've tried restoring, fixing permissions, formatting data and system.
So: has anyone else that hs CM7 expierenced these problems and if you did, did you have a solution?
Thanks in advance
Sent from my Droid 1 running CM 7 OC'd to 1.2GHtz using XDA app
I have the problem with Pandora/slacker and mutlitasking... though I haven't had any of the other problems. I'm on nightly #25. No solutions yet.
Protocol 7 said:
Alright guys, I have a simple question for ya.
I've recently flashed CyanogenMod 7 onto my Droid 1, and have been experiencing problems. They are as follows:
1) After a phone call, I either need to wait about 5 minutes to get my data(3G) signal back, or reboot because it never gets a data connection back
2) I can no longer multitask as efficiently, and example is if I'm listening to music (Pandora, Rhapsody, or the default music app) and I go home to do another activity (Facebook, Browser, Pulse, etc.) my music app stops playing and the ongoing notification disapears.
3) My Facebook contacts are no longer kept in sync. It still is the same version as the one I used on CM6.1.2. However, when I do select to sync, it adds the contacts, without pictures, and within an hour, they are removed.
4) My messaging app, although it is locked in my memory, still is being killed by my system.
I've tried restoring, fixing permissions, formatting data and system.
So: has anyone else that hs CM7 expierenced these problems and if you did, did you have a solution?
Thanks in advance
Sent from my Droid 1 running CM 7 OC'd to 1.2GHtz using XDA app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
1) Known issue with all GB based ROM's for the D1. Enable airplane mode a few times to force it to come back.
2) This is due to GB's aggressive memory management and the D1's lack of RAM. To help this you can do 1 of 3 things.
A. Use Swappa 2 to make a swap space on your SDcard.
B. Enable Compcache at about 18% or so.
C. Change ROM's and use Project Elite 5.0.2. They have a function that allows you to lock up to three apps into memory so they don't get auto-closed.
3) I don't use Facebook so I'm no help there.
4) Refer to number 2.
Good Luck!
Hello I'm having the same problem. My Droid seems to not be able to multitask very well anymore. My music player will often get killed by the system randomly, and it has made this phone pretty much useless for music.
I have tried enabling compcache and everything and it doesn't seem to help. I assume this is a problem of the Droid not having enough memory?
Sent from my Droid using XDA App
I'm running CM7 RC4 on my droid and the only "issue" I've noticed is that I get a low memory warning from time to time.
What kernel are you running?
Perhaps CM7 is too much for droid at stock speeds.
The 1.1Ghz low volt Chevy kernel does a very good job for me.
Do you have any issues with music playback? Maybe my kernel is the problem. The 1.2 ghz slayher kernel bootloops with my CM7 but it worked fine on CM6.
Sent from my Droid using XDA App
Sorry to post again, but I just wanted to update you guys. Flashed the Chevy 1.1 LV kernel and am still having the music player shut itself off when I try to open other apps. If I leave the music player up in the foreground, it will run all day with no issues. The minute it gets sent to the background, android seems to kill it within seconds.
The taskbar notification for the player will also disappear, but may reappear randomly as I continue to use my phone. It will appear briefly, then vanish. The music will never resume playback, however, until you physically hit the pause button and then the play button.
The sad part is that this behavior was exactly what my Motorola Q used to do. The thing had so little memory that the minute apps were released from the foreground view, they'd almost instantly close. I hate to say this but I think the only solution is a new phone... I guess android has finally outpaced the hardware on the OG Droid.
I've tried everything setting the music & media processes to 'always keep alive' using the little blue fish memory manager, but that doesn't seem to work. Like I said before, *something* is closing the music process very aggressively when it leaves the foreground and I'm not sure why it's doing this.
Sent from my Droid using XDA App
Yeah I'm using cm7 on my Droid incredible. Everything works fine except, sometimes applications such as messaging app and the default web browser restart randomly. I'm also using the kernel that came with it.
Sent from my ADR6300 using XDA App
I've found that particular memory-hungry apps tend to cause the music player to close itself. The browser for one, almost guarantees that the music playback will stop. Last night I was able to keep the music playback going while switching between my SMS inbox and Tweetdeck. However certain other app combinations don't seem to work so well.
I've heard some talk of "bulletproofing" ... is this something that could help in my case? What does it do and how do I go about locking the music player in memory?
Sent from my Droid using XDA App

[Q] LG MyTouch Q CM9 freezing problems

First of all, thanks to chui101 and all the other people here who put in the effort to get CyanogenMod to run on this phone. However, I'm having a bit of a problem with my phone slowing down severely and becoming unresponsive, usually at the lock screen. The specific issue is that the lock screen will be on screen, but not respond to button presses, or respond very slowly, and then it will do the "old CRT television turning off" effect much much slower than it's supposed to (think close to a minute), go blank for a while, the lock screen comes back up, another very slow screen turn off effect, and the whole process keeps repeating until I get tired of it and pull the battery to reboot the phone. This issue happens to me with both the 2012-11-21 and 2012-11-25 nightlies. To me, the behavior sort of seems like an out of memory issue, maybe some program is leaking memory or something.
Things that cause the freezing issue:
Power button presses too close together
2 cases of a call coming in while the phone is locked and playing music in Apollo
Things I've tried thus far:
Switch launcher from Trebuchet to NovaLauncher
Set Background Process Limit from "Standard Limit" to "At most 3 processes"
Set "Force GPU rendering"
Remove SD card
Out of those, pulling the SD card is the only one that seemed to help. The SD card I had installed was a 16GB SanDisk Class 2 card with ~3.7 GB of music along with less than 10MB of small text files, ring tones in .wav format, pictures, etc.
I put the 2GB card that originally came in the phone back in, this card currently has nothing but the text files and ringtones and a few pictures.
Is anyone else getting hit with this problem? What can I do to help? I don't know much about android ROM development, but I can handle collecting a LogCat from a case where the problem I'm describing is happening and know a reasonable amount about general Linux stuff, just not Android internals.
Thanks!
I used to own an LG Mytouch Q, the only reason I'm even remotely interested in this thread.
However, you should definitely post in that specific thread, as it's basically the only group of Mytouch owners and they should give you lots more help
Sent from my DROID2 using xda premium
I would, but I just joined here so I can't post in the dev forums. I'm hoping someone there will see this post.
Update
With the smaller SD card without all the music files installed, I'm getting less of the freezing problem, although I am not certain whether this is due to the music files not being there, or me not using the phone to play music. I guess the next part of this experiment is to go back to the card with the music files on it but not play any of them. I did grab a LogCat from one of the cases where the phone is 'freezing' and see a bunch of "Application Not Responding" messages, and the CPU usage stats that follow these messages indicate that most of the CPU time is being used by 'iowait,' for instance "100% TOTAL: 0.3% user + 6.9% kernel + 92% iowait". I've read some threads relating to other phones indicating that this could be some process poking around somewhere in storage. I'm thinking that running top from adb shell next time the phone ends up in this state might give some clue as to what's eating the CPU.
Also, I've hit the issue with email message bodies showing up blank that others on this phone, and on CM9 on the non-keyboard LG Mytouch (E739) have experienced.
Hope I'm not spamming with yet another status update, but I tried disabling live wallpapers (going instead to no wallpaper/black screen) last night, and I haven't had any of the freezing problems today. I'll try adding the music files back and see if the problems return then.
* Update 11/29/2012
I put the 16GB card with ~4GB of music back in the phone, used it all day at work for listening to music/checking email/some web browsing without any crashes. (Still with live wallpaper disabled) So, I'm starting to think live wallpapers are causing my problem.

[Q] [HELP]Microphone and speakers stop working

I had been doing a great deal of tinkering trying to get my phone's battery life back in the last few days, and I made good progress, but I severely jacked up something related to the microphone/speaker/video recording.
PROBLEM:
The problem, as far as I can tell, is that every app that tries to access the microphone can't do it--this shows up when I try to use Google voice input in various text fields with a little "Can't reach Google at the moment." Same with trying to do a search by voice in Google Now--brief brief flash of the microphone red, then back to gray, with "Can't reach Google at the moment". Additionally, my Touchless Input cannot be enabled--the box has automatically unchecked itself, and pressing it makes the button get a little gray, registering the action, but no checkmark will appear.
Additionally, other apps which would use the mic don't seem to have that functionality--Evernote, for example, would crash if I attempted to record an audio clip. This was before I performed a factory data reset last night--and the problem has persisted regardless.
There are two other, seemingly related, issues. First is the inability of the phone to capture videos. The camera opens fine, and I can take fine stills with it, but pushing the video recording button makes the red "record" flash for a moment before a "Not able to record media" message pops up, and the camera returns to the still photo mode.
Second is the inability to play videos. I have tried playing videos in as many formats as I could try, from within several players, including the stock "Photos", "Gallery", and "YouTube" apps. "Sorry, cannot play video" pops up, or the app simply crashes. Similar story for attempting to play music through the stock "Google Play Music" app. And it gets worse. I can't make or receive calls. Actually, let me revise that. I can't hear anything being said on the calls, over the speaker, or through headphones (though I've yet to try BlueTooth). The call appears to connect, but I can't hear anything from them, and they can't hear anything from me.
So--that's the basic summary of the problem--threefold.
1. No audio input through mic
2. No audio output through speakers--my phone doesn't ring when I get a call, although it will vibrate and the options to take the call appear as they normally would.
3. No audio/video playback whatsoever for other media.
I'm running Android 4.4 on a Droid Mini, unrooted, and I just completed a factory reset last night.
ANALYSIS:
Here's the wrinkle. I know this isn't a hardware problem, because I have found a surefire fix that makes all of this work properly if I absolutely need it, it just sucks. Rebooting into safe mode is what does it. Playback resumes as it did before I had the problem. I can play videos, pump music, and Touchless Input works flawlessly--although interestingly, it has me re-enter the catchphrase three times every time I get into safemode, like setting up from scratch.
My consternation comes from the fact that, to my very limited knowledge, all that safe mode is doing keeping any user-added apps from running. Which is all well and good, but I just did a factory reset. Literally when I boot the phone no user installed apps are running, and yet there's a definite difference when I boot into safe mode, cuz everything works there.
So, safe mode must do something more than just disable user-installed apps--and I need to know what that is if I'm going to fix this thing. I have added 4 apps since then-- App Ops, GSAM Battery Monitor, BetterBatteryStats, and Button Savior (Non-root), all of which I know from experience to be very "well-behaved" apps.
Anyone know what safe mode is doing besides disabling user apps? Along those lines, does it revert updated stock apps to their factory state? I ask because very, very briefly, while my phone was slowly trying to upgrade the 40-odd pieces of Bloatware from the Play Store, the microphone was working. Which makes me think that the culprit is one of the system apps in it's updated form. If safe mode runs these apps as they originally appeared on the phone, that might explain it. It would also hopefully let me painstakingly disable these apps, one by one, to find the culprit and disable it.
I say culprit because of something I stumbled across trying to research this--weirdly enough, in a message from the devs of Shazam. devs of Shazam They say that the issue has shown up on 4.4 and the cause appears to be one app somehow monopolizing access to the microphone. I could see this breaking the video as well, and potentially the audio playback if, as I assume, Google uses the mic to help tweak the sound of the speakers.
Anyone know any more about any of the aspects of this? I will be posting back myself as I learn more.
What happens if you factory reset without restoring any apps? In other words, factory reset, choose not to restore your apps (or don't attach to a Google account on initial setup, and do it post-setup). In other words, do you have an app that is blocking this access?
doogald said:
What happens if you factory reset without restoring any apps? In other words, factory reset, choose not to restore your apps (or don't attach to a Google account on initial setup, and do it post-setup). In other words, do you have an app that is blocking this access?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Trying this now. Thanks for the suggestion!
Update: Tried this. Did another FDR, signed in to one of my Google accounts afterwards, but haven't updated a thing. The audio/voice/video/bugs seem gone; however, the ****ty battery drain I had before is back. I'm playing around with some settings to find out what can be done. I'm also going down the list and updating the system apps one by one.
Does anyone know a good testing process (ie, should I run the app? do I need to restart after install? run the app and close? etc) that will keep me from getting false negatives (ie thinking an app isn't causing the problem when it is)?
Update again: I'm working down in alphabetical order through the factory apps. However, after the most recent factory reset, it appears that my battery drain is back, and as long as the battery drain is there, the phone works normally. So, not looking good in terms of battery+functionality for me. Went through the 40ish apps that were on the phone stock--after the fresh reset, the phone is working, but the battery life is shot to **** all over again. Not sure what to make of all this, and now back to being frustrated with a 4 hour battery life from the phone that never sleeps. UGH
Update yet once more:
For kicks and giggles, tried unchecking the "Touchless Control" in settings, to see what effect that would have on my battery. But, reasoning that whatever wakelock was keeping my phone up all the time had to be persisting after it was needed, I guessed I needed to reboot to get rid of them. Booting up again, I'm back to battery life without audio/video/etc. Very confused here. Apparently it has nothing to do with the apps installed, period.
Facing the Same problem please someone tell me What should i do
Same problem! No audio call
Inviato dal mio Redmi Note 3 utilizzando Tapatalk
Please help me I have this same problem. No audio, cant play video, nd mic isn't working.

[Q] Stock android problem with music

HI guys, I've got a real head scratcher and for the first time in every aspect of my life a Google search hasn't come through for me.
Background: Completely stock Nexus 4 - 4.4.3
Completely stock Nexus 7 - 4.4.2
No task or app killers
Problem: Out of no where when swiping away any music player (Google Play Music, Shuttle+, Wiizm etc) the music is killed!? The phone seems to be preventing the app from running in the background. I can hit the menu hot key and open other apps and music will play fine, it just won't continue playback if app is swiped.
I've also noticed I no longer get any form of mini player in the notification pull down or notification (headphones, play symbol etc) in the status bar if I have music playing unless I swipe the app but by which time the music has been killed!
What I've tried: Numerous searches, factory reset, uninstalling and reinstalling apps, cache and data clearing and even a different user account.
I could completely understand that something could corrupt or I could possibly hit a setting I've never seen before causing this to happen but surely a factory reset would resolve it? To add insult to injury my Nexus 7 has gone exactly the same way with the same symptoms. I don't even have the same music players on the individual device so I can't blame it on one particular app.
It driving me insane! Does anyone have any suggestions?
I experienced the second part of your problem, GPM no longer was in my notification bar+shade. Searched everywhere and your post was the only one I could find related to my problem. Curiously I checked the app under >Settings>Applications>Google Play Music and noticed that the notifications check box was not checked so I checked it and now everything is back to normal. Really can't remember if I turned it off myself or if upgrading to 4.4.3 had something to do with it.
adamrouse123 said:
I've also noticed I no longer get any form of mini player in the notification pull down or notification (headphones, play symbol etc) in the status bar if I have music playing unless I swipe the app but by which time the music has been killed!
What I've tried: Numerous searches, factory reset, uninstalling and reinstalling apps, cache and data clearing and even a different user account.
I could completely understand that something could corrupt or I could possibly hit a setting I've never seen before causing this to happen but surely a factory reset would resolve it? To add insult to injury my Nexus 7 has gone exactly the same way with the same symptoms. I don't even have the same music players on the individual device so I can't blame it on one particular app.
It driving me insane! Does anyone have any suggestions?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
have you tried using 3rd party music players?

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