new Thunderbolt owner (new to Android too)

[KrautBurner]

Hello all,

my name is Russ, and I'm a former :blackberry:BlackBerry:blackberry: user
I just switched from my 2 and a half year old :blackberry:STORM and so far, I'm pretty happy.

there is definitely a learning curve (as with anything)
so far, I've had an ANDROID for all of 12 hours (and I was sleeping 6 of those)

any help and suggestions would be greatly appreciated

so far, I've only downloaded a couple apps:
- Advanced Task Killer
- Pandora
- DroidForums

 

[Jboxen]

Get rid of that task killer! You have froyo and it's bad news!

 

[KrautBurner]

Get rid of that task killer! You have froyo and it's bad news!

why?
how is it bad news?

I'm very new, the sales person put it on the phone.
explained what it does. (shuts down idle apps)
and it makes sense.


Edit: I found this...

http://www.droidforums.net/forum/htc-thunderbolt/132327-tips-help-improve-battery-life-thunderbolt.html

[FONT=&quot]20. [/FONT][FONT=&quot]Task killer – do not use them, uninstall if you currently have one, can harm phone and consume battery, just use back arrow key to exit apps instead of home key, simply monitor rogue apps instead and uninstall/replace[/FONT]

is that it?
how can it "harm phone"?

 

[JonKyu]

Androids memory management is pretty efficient and loads things into memory for faster loading. I think actively killing apps in memory takes a lot more power than to just let them sit there. The reason why it seems like battery life is greater is that your stopping any background syncing. So I think it'd be better just to change the syncing options in the application rather than killing them off with a task killer. I only use task killers to force stop any rogue apps that are poorly coded and don't die correctly. For the most part most Android apps are OK though. I'm no memory expert, but this is what I've understood about task killers.

Sent from my ADR6400L using Tapatalk

 

[Jboxen]

Task killers work against minfree(androids native task killer) to consume more battery life and severly decrease overall performance. The salesman was incorrect in his efforts to try and save your battery life. When android needs more memory, it will shut down the idle apps on it's own. Android is smart when it comes to multi-tasking. The whole point of idle apps is to give you a much smoother experience when moving back and forth between apps. Froyo also deals with this much better than eclair did.(android 2.1 vs 2.2, you have 2.2)

 

[KrautBurner]

cool,
thanks for the info.

any other suggestions?

 

[Jboxen]

As far as the Thunderbolt goes, not really as it's still brand new. I suppose turning off the 4g radio down to 3g when you're not using a lot of data would make sense to conserve battery life. I'd reccomend just taking a couple of hours to explore your settings menus and customize everything to your liking. I know the Thunderbolt has differen't themes for sense which is nice. Also search around the market for some nice free apps. I recommend words with friends personally because you can play it with friends who also have it. Just explore!

 

[KrautBurner]

As far as the Thunderbolt goes, not really as it's still brand new. I suppose turning off the 4g radio down to 3g when you're not using a lot of data would make sense to conserve battery life. I'd reccomend just taking a couple of hours to explore your settings menus and customize everything to your liking. I know the Thunderbolt has differen't themes for sense which is nice. Also search around the market for some nice free apps. I recommend words with friends personally because you can play it with friends who also have it. Just explore!

I had read that you cannot turn off the 4G (it's automatic)

can you play "Words with Friends" with iPhone users?

 

[Jboxen]

Ah, didn't know that. And yes words with friends is for android and iphone users.