Task manager vs. Open advanced task killer

[kashmir728]

I use the open advanced task killer off the market, but is the task manager that comes preloaded with the phone more reliable or better?

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[tcrews]

I use the open advanced task killer off the market, but is the task manager that comes preloaded with the phone more reliable or better?

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You shouldn't be using ANY task killer....bad bad bad idea.

Sent from my Xoom

 

[Fr33dom]

Or to put it a bit differently, There probably isn't any such thing as a better task killer, they all tend to be useless weight on the system. Just about any of them kill tasks as well as the next one--and thats the main problem. This isn't Windows. It manages memory differently. Killing tasks is rarely needed and mostly leads people to make things worse without realizing it.

Task killers don't make your phone any faster because more memory doesn't make it faster. I know that sounds counter intuitive, but it is a fact. Because of the way the OS works, it is better to have things preloaded, but not running unless they're needed. Task killers can actually make your phone slower by killing tasks that then need to be reloaded.

There are some instances where a task killer can be useful, but you need to understand a bit about what you are killing.

 

[docweston]

I did an experiment one day while at work. I stopped killing any tasks and followed the well-meaning but misguided advice received on these forums. You know what happened? My battery died faster and my phone was sluggish and skipping all night long. To be fair, I decided to leave it that way for 3 days. It was the worst performance I have ever gotten from my phone (Droid Incredible). I then fired up the task killer and went to work. Once I had the phone cleaned up, I ran the same apps that were previously skipping and sluggish. They ran glass smooth again. Task killers are the way to go. I've done the experiment.

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[Droid-Xer]

Task killers are only needed for 2.1 and lower period. You need to use your device like normal for awhile to build up cache and run at optimal.

 

[SupperDroid]

I have never believed in tasks managers, having said that, I started using the preloaded task manager in my Droid 3. I use it to close certain apps after the screed has been off for 2 min, for example: the browser, weather app, Amazon appstore, dictionary, maps and some other apps I use that do not have an exit command and stay open after I put the phone to sleep. This has resulted in about 20% better battery life, I can see it in the battery usage is settings and in the actual battery life in a day to day usage. I have tested this many times. However there are some apps and services that should always stay running since other apps may rely on them. So be very careful which apps you have close after screen is off. I also have my WiFi set to sleep after screen is off.

 

[spunker88]

I use the built in Task Manager. Its a waste to have VZW bloatware that I don't use like IM running all the time, instead I add them to the auto end list and they stay closed.

 

[SecretAgentMan]

I did an experiment one day while at work . . . . It was the worst performance I have ever gotten from my phone (Droid Incredible).
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That's great, but this is a D3 forum. You have a different phone and likely a different OS. I don't think you'd see the same thing on a D3.

 

[BayouFlyFisher]

[h=3]How Android Manages Processes[/h]In Android, processes and Applications are two different things. An app can stay "running" in the background without any processes eating up your phone's 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 haven't 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 you've 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 that's what's slowing down their phone. In reality, your CPU—which is only used by apps that are actually active—is almost always the bottleneck.
[h=3]Why Task Killers Are (Usually) Bad News[/h]Apps 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 you'll free by killing it. As we've learned, full memory is not a bad thing—we 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, it's actually possible that this will worsen your phone's performance and battery life. Whether you're manually killing apps all the time or telling the task killer to aggressively remove apps from your memory, you're actually using CPU cycles when you otherwise wouldn't—killing apps that aren't doing anything in the first place.
In fact, some of the processes related to those apps will actually start right back up, further draining your CPU. If they don't, killing those processes can cause other sorts of problems—alarms don't go off, you don't receive text messages, or other related apps may force close without warning. All in all, you're usually better off letting your phone work as intended—especially if you're more of a casual user. In these instances, a task killer causes more problems than it solves.

 

[NoBloatware]

Go with whatever works for you, but if you're auto-killing stuff that just starts up again then you're wasting resources with an infinite loop. Many tasks (especially stock apps) sit idly in memory and use no resources. Watch out for apps that you download that run on boot. If there's no reason why an app should be running on boot, uninstall it and find an alternative. Killing tasks should not be necessary.

 

[Fr33dom]

The problem here is that we are faced on one hand with statements about how Android works and on the other, subjective opinions about how their systems felt when they used task killers. There is no way to deal with these opinions, especially when they happened sometime in the past. They are real to the people who express them. I have my own story about use of a task killer on my D1 and the work I did when I first saw people saying not to use them. But again, the result is my opinion and not measurable outside my perspective so I 'll keep it out of the discussion. There's also some difference between 2.1 and now, and other phones with differing amounts of memory and differing amounts of applications.

So yes, like NoBloatWare says, do what you think is best, just keep the discussion about how Android works in mind.

http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/fundamentals/processes-and-threads.html