Database Develop

Why 512MB of RAM means no Bionic for me

I've seen a lot of discussion on various Android/Droid forums on the web over the past month or two about the Bionic, and it having 512MB of RAM. A lot of people don't seem to mind, and some people have even said it doesn't matter because it's DDR2, which is faster than regular DDR.
Well, 512MB of RAM is not enough for a dual-core phone you plan to use for 2 years or more. Here's why, in a rather lengthy post that I also put on MyDroidWorld the other night. I've been on the XDA forums for a long time, though I don't post very frequently and I'm curious to see what people will think of my admittedly long post. So, here is why I think people should think long and hard about whether to buy the Bionic when it does come out, assuming it still ships with 512MB of RAM.
Caching.
Ok - let me explain. The single most important factor in performance of a computer is having enough RAM. When a computer runs out of RAM, it starts to use what's called a page file. It's basically a file on your hard drive that acts as additional RAM. Now, DDR3-1600 speed RAM transfers data at 12.8 gigabytes per second. Phenomenally fast. It also has a reaction time of around 5 nanoseconds, also ridiculously fast. When your operating system has to start using the page file because the physical RAM is full, the performance hit is EXTRAORDINARY. Even the best hard disk drives (not counting SSDs) like the latest Raptor from Western Digital cap out at around 155 megabytes per second for reading and writing, and it has a peak latency of 7 milliseconds for reaction time. 1 nanosecond is 1 million milliseconds, which makes the DDR3 RAM over a MILLION times faster reacting than the hard drive, and the transfer rate of the RAM over 80 times faster than the transfer rate of the hard drive.
In real-world terms, it's like you're talking about an ant versus a Porsche 911 Turbo. Most old computers that have long pauses or hang for several seconds doing even basic tasks, it's because they don't have enough RAM and it's caching stuff between the hard drive and the RAM.
Now, whenever Android runs out of RAM, (same with any operating system) it has to start using its page file, which means it starts using this monstrously slow flash memory as RAM. It's like merging onto a freeway that is gridlocked with traffic when you were going hundreds of miles per hour. The flash memory is a lot slower than the Raptor hard drive for data transfer rates, but it has a read time a lot faster; the best-performing ones are generally under 1 microsecond. 1 microsecond is a thousand times slower than 1 nanosecond. The write times are closer to hard drives, though; generally less than 1 millisecond, so like 10x faster than a hard drive but still 100,000 times slower reaction time to writing data than the RAM is.
What this means is, when your permanent storage is flash-based, it has a much faster reaction time than a hard drive but it's still dog-slow compared to RAM; so when Android runs out of RAM, it caches to the page file on the flash memory, and you'll have the same slowdown effect as you do on an old POS computer, but it's not as noticeable because flash memory reacts faster than disk-based hard drives.
The point of all of this is that, 1GB of DDR1 memory on a phone is FAR better than 512MB of DDR2 memory. The 1GB will prevent you from hitting that metaphorical brick wall of caching data to your flash memory when the 512MB won't. We already use 400MB, or more, of our 512MB of RAM on our existing phones just by turning it on and having a couple of widgets/services in the background above & beyond the stock ones. How do you expect to take advantage significantly higher-end applications and games, which also means (for games, primarily) that they take up more RAM, as well?
You can't have higher-quality graphics without needing more RAM, so when that new version of Angry Birds comes out this fall or something that requires two cores and looks amazing, but uses 250MB of RAM to run instead of the 80MB or whatever the regular one uses now, what do you think has to happen? That's right. Android has to cache that much extra data to your flash memory so it can unload it from the RAM, freeing the necessary space to load Angry Birds HD. This causes more of a delay as it's writing data, and will cause extra choppiness, etc. Another thing to keep in mind is that, as resolutions increase, so do the texture sizes for all applications and widgets that you use, assuming they support the new resolution. More size needed, which takes up more space in RAM.
Don't be fooled. When truly good and proper dual-core benchmarks come out, 1GB RAM dual-core phones will spank their 512MB RAM dual-core brethren for real-world performance in games, and other high-memory applications. Also, excessive caching greatly increases the chance of flash memory going bad. Not a common occurrence if it was fine when shipped, but still something to think about.
So, in summary, even though the performance hit from caching to flash memory isn't as bad as caching to hard disk drives, it's still a tremendous slowdown and it will matter for dual-core phones way more than for single-core ones. The average amount of RAM installed on dual-core desktop computers from Dell/HP/etc. was significantly higher than what the average was for the previous single-core generations were, and there are reasons for that. Primarily, the same reasons I just outlined. In simple terms, faster processors can do more things, which necessarily requires more RAM.
Sorry for the wall of text, I tried to be more concise but it kind of got away from me. I'm not buying a Bionic because it has 512MB of RAM. After owning it a year, it'll be having performance issues on top-end dual-core-required games that run just fine on phones like the Atrix.

I'm sorry because I know this is probably going to come across the wrong way, but WOW, you spent a lot of time writing that up, and too much time for me to read it alll, especially considering Motorola has pulled back on the Bionic and it's receiving "enhancements". I guess what I'm saying is why all the speculation/conjecture until we know the revised specs? Maybe it'll land with 8GB of DDR 6 RAM.

I'm hoping Motorola gives Verizon a phone that is higher end than the Atrix. Afterall Verizon has done much more than ATT in the way of supporting Moto..when they needed it. Anxious to see what Big Red winds up with.
Sent from my ERIS using XDA Premium App

I disagree that ram is the single most important factor of performance of a computer.
hard drives are the biggest bottleneck in a computer. this is why I use a vertex 3 ssd.
Sent from my PC36100 using XDA Premium App

gemro311 said:
I'm hoping Motorola gives Verizon a phone that is higher end than the Atrix. Afterall Verizon has done much more than ATT in the way of supporting Moto..when they needed it. Anxious to see what Big Red winds up with.
Sent from my ERIS using XDA Premium App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I concur, really hope VZW pushes for a premier device

I disagree. Android isn't expanding as an OS at some breakneck pace and 512MB is definitely suitable for the near future. 1GB is absolutely not necessary for great performance in a phone. RAM is a bottleneck, but it is not something that magically allows for better performance if the device isn't hitting the pagefile anyway.
The way that Android manages applications will allow 512MB phones to be relevant for some time. The Bionic will be a solid phone for the next year, but there will always be something bigger and better next year. Phones aren't future-proof.

I was just checking out this thread and wanted to say maybe the reason that the atrix comes with 1gb of ram is because of the extra contraption that you can buy along with. It looks like a netbook but is not very well performing and who would even care to rely on it for anything I don't know.

gemro311 said:
I'm hoping Motorola gives Verizon a phone that is higher end than the Atrix. Afterall Verizon has done much more than ATT in the way of supporting Moto..when they needed it. Anxious to see what Big Red winds up with.
Sent from my ERIS using XDA Premium App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I certainly hope Motorola makes the required improvements, but you also need to keep in mind Verizon approves and in many if not all cases specs the phones they want. They chose the specs, they had to live with the specs. I think once they saw what was coming they figured it was no longer premiere and wanted changes made.
Regardless of why its been pulled back the fact that it was is good, but if its going to take 4-5 months to get it out the door they should have just scrapped it altogether.

E30kid said:
I disagree. Android isn't expanding as an OS at some breakneck pace and 512MB is definitely suitable for the near future. 1GB is absolutely not necessary for great performance in a phone. RAM is a bottleneck, but it is not something that magically allows for better performance if the device isn't hitting the pagefile anyway.
The way that Android manages applications will allow 512MB phones to be relevant for some time. The Bionic will be a solid phone for the next year, but there will always be something bigger and better next year. Phones aren't future-proof.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well, wait for Ice Cream and we'll see. Since the future Android version will also run in tablets, it is likely that it will have huge memory requirements.
By the way, my Acer Liquid A1 can't be officially upgraded to Froyo because it only has 256Mb. Later Liquid models with 512Mb are upgradeable. At the time I bought it, 512Mb seemed unnecessary because the Nexus One operating system only supported 256Mb, having the other 256Mb wasted. This was only 12 months ago...

galaxyjeff said:
I was just checking out this thread and wanted to say maybe the reason that the atrix comes with 1gb of ram is because of the extra contraption that you can buy along with. It looks like a netbook but is not very well performing and who would even care to rely on it for anything I don't know.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think you are on to something here. I think I read somewhere that the atrix only uses 512 mb when not connected to the dock. I have the inspire which has 768 mb, and I came from the captivate which was 512 mb, and I done know if is the ram or what but this phone performs way better than the captivate. Even when I bought the inspire, right out the box stock, preformed much better than a captivate overclocked with an ext4 filesystem kernel. Not that this is empirical evidence, but hey.
Sent from my HTC Desire HD using XDA Premium App

cryptiq said:
I'm sorry because I know this is probably going to come across the wrong way, but WOW, you spent a lot of time writing that up, and too much time for me to read it alll, especially considering Motorola has pulled back on the Bionic and it's receiving "enhancements". I guess what I'm saying is why all the speculation/conjecture until we know the revised specs? Maybe it'll land with 8GB of DDR 6 RAM.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I lol'd. But seriously 512 MB of RAM is more than enough... It's a PHONE not a high end desktop system. I play tons of games on my x2 and with alot of crap in the backround open, and I notice zero performance hits. If you are spending all day monitoring your RAM on your phone and trying to measure FPS loss, load time differences, etc. I suggest that you try to pick up a new hobby ASAP, OCDing will be the end of you. Best of luck!
Edit: I wouldn't worry about it either! Bionic probably won't come out anyways, and if it does, another phone with 1GB to satisfy your OCD probably will be out by then.

As of now, I feel ALL future top tier smart phones need to come equipped with at least 1GB of DDR2. The G2x, for example, will most likely have issues running a custom ice cream rom. And people will be upset.. especially after putting up with all of the other various problems that particular phone has.

OP, I don't agree entirely with your explanation of the use of caching by the OS - for all 3 major computer OSes, no matter how much excess RAM you have, they will start caching data to the hard drive, whether you like it or not. Obviously if you run out of RAM, it has to do so, but it'll even do it long before you've hit that cap - just because it determines an application has gone "inactive". Now I haven't read up on Android enough to know whether this is 100% true for it, too, but considering it's running a linux kernel, I would imagine so. So just like the 8GB of RAM in my desktop doesn't necessarily help for everyday computing needs, 1GB vs 512mb on the Bionic may not make a huge difference.

raptordrew said:
OP, I don't agree entirely with your explanation of the use of caching by the OS - for all 3 major computer OSes, no matter how much excess RAM you have, they will start caching data to the hard drive, whether you like it or not. Obviously if you run out of RAM, it has to do so, but it'll even do it long before you've hit that cap - just because it determines an application has gone "inactive". Now I haven't read up on Android enough to know whether this is 100% true for it, too, but considering it's running a linux kernel, I would imagine so. So just like the 8GB of RAM in my desktop doesn't necessarily help for everyday computing needs, 1GB vs 512mb on the Bionic may not make a huge difference.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i beg to differ
my captivate; even though its a single core...is still quite capable at most everyday tasks...only thing lacking is the RAM
my phone will slow to a crawl after entering twitter, switching to pulse and then going back to my homescreen....
not to mention my launcher keeps getting killed by android as it keeps running out of RAM

droid_does said:
i beg to differ
my captivate; even though its a single core...is still quite capable at most everyday tasks...only thing lacking is the RAM
my phone will slow to a crawl after entering twitter, switching to pulse and then going back to my homescreen....
not to mention my launcher keeps getting killed by android as it keeps running out of RAM
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have to lol at this one. Absolutely none of those issues have to do with amount of RAM. In fact the launcher problem has nothing to do with RAM at all.
Sent from my ADR6400L using XDA App

While I appreciate other people who have the same amount of passion for phones as I do, I just have two words to say about anyone saying phones with 512 mb ram will not get Ice Cream Sandwich. Nexus S.
Sent from my ADR6400L using XDA App

mb02 said:
I have to lol at this one. Absolutely none of those issues have to do with amount of RAM. In fact the launcher problem has nothing to do with RAM at all.
Sent from my ADR6400L using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
it does as android keeps killing it to free up more RAM to use......

droid_does said:
it does as android keeps killing it to free up more RAM to use......
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yea the task manager is killing the apps to keep ram freed up, as in stopping unused processes etc. That's just the aggressive working of the management software that would run just the same if you even had 8GB of ram.
Sent from my ADR6400L using XDA App

timothymilla said:
While I appreciate other people who have the same amount of passion for phones as I do, I just have two words to say about anyone saying phones with 512 mb ram will not get Ice Cream Sandwich. Nexus S.
Sent from my ADR6400L using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Remember when everyone thought Gingerbread would require a 1GHz processor as a system requirement, which was later debunked?
http://www.talkandroid.com/23041-so...ngerbread-update-due-to-1ghz-cpu-requirement/
Nobody can say what will and will not get updated for sure, although I will venture to say that it's HIGHLY likely the Nexus S will be getting 2.4, you're right.

zetsumeikuro said:
I lol'd. But seriously 512 MB of RAM is more than enough... It's a PHONE not a high end desktop system. I play tons of games on my x2 and with alot of crap in the backround open, and I notice zero performance hits. If you are spending all day monitoring your RAM on your phone and trying to measure FPS loss, load time differences, etc. I suggest that you try to pick up a new hobby ASAP, OCDing will be the end of you. Best of luck!
Edit: I wouldn't worry about it either! Bionic probably won't come out anyways, and if it does, another phone with 1GB to satisfy your OCD probably will be out by then.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
512 mb is not enough for a dual core 4G phone it just isnt. the thunderbolt has 768 mb and its only single core and 4G and let me tell you it would be way faster with the 1024 mb of ram i cant imagine how laggy the bionic would be if you start doing anything with it! the 512 ram will be ate up in no time! i sure hope verizon reconsiders and adds more ram or i probably wont use this device as my daily phone either keep the thunderbolt with more ram which is sad cause it has been out for awhile now and the droid x also has 512 ram and it has been out for a year and they cant make improvements?? and they are going to want $299+++ for this phone ON CONTRACT! it better have more than 512 ram or it aint worth a lick! rip this phone open and put my own ram in it!

[Q] Low available Ram !!!

Hey Guys ... Did you look to the Ram status in the Galaxy Note ???
I have 600+/800 usage in normal situations !!! and when I clear ram it reached to 400+ which goes back to more than 600 Mb after moderate usage !!! what about in your Notes guys ??? Any solution for this ?? plz comments ....

What is it you are planning on doing with the free ram? Has the use of ram caused any problems? Don't worry about it and use the device. There is no point in trying to worry about something which is being used or not being used which is not affecting you in any way. Until it does have fun with the phone.

Do you think Android is running on air? The Note has 1GB RAM which the OS takes 200MB at boot. The rest is used by apps and other things. If you're not going to use the RAM, then why do you need it?
"My computer uses 50MB of RAM, And i have 32GB of it!" WHAT'S THE POINT?!

Try RAM Manager by Juwe. Be aware that the more memory you free up the worse multitasking will be.

Are you kidding me? Use RAM Manager when your device has 1GB of it? Please slap me as hard as you can.

This thread needs to be deleted.
RAM is there to be used.
I would use 100% of my RAM 100% of the time if I could. If it's not being used, it's being wasted.

Unused RAM is totally wasted. When 2GB devices come out OMG my device is using 1GB out of my 2GB!!!

To each his own, who are you to tell others what to do with their RAM? I'm not your typical "as much free memory as possible freak" but how comes that when I kill some apps before running something more intensive it's usually smoother and performs better?

pjm77 said:
To each his own, who are you to tell others what to do with their RAM? I'm not your typical "as much free memory as possible freak" but how comes that when I kill some apps before running something more intensive it's usually smoother and performs better?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've never had to manually kill apps with my G-Note, so I dont know what your doing wrong, Could be a faulty device as far as I can tell.

Thanks for your advice, I'm running to get it replaced.

pjm77 said:
Thanks for your advice, I'm running to get it replaced.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
600mb usage is totally normal on moderate use. Obviously you don't know how RAM Management work on Android. Go and replace your phone but nothing will change.
Sent from my GT-N7000 using XDA App

Would you replace your computer because it's using to much RAM?
Chances are you would find the RAM hog and keep it from starting up when not neccesary.
600mb is normal usage.... if you are not happy with that high of usage delete the apps that have services running or are always in the background. Android does this for you as you approach full RAM usage anyways though...

garytube said:
600mb usage is totally normal on moderate use. Obviously you don't know how RAM Management work on Android. Go and replace your phone but nothing will change.
Ever heard of irony?
Of course I'm not gonna get it replaced I'm happy with the way it is.
Yes, I've read about Android memory management quite a while ago. Very smart and very convincing. Now on the other hand - every now and then after some intense moments - let's say I'm driving and I'm using offline satnav then online satnav then there is a phonecall, then I make a voice note, I get out, send a text, use my GTD app and whatever else - after hours of such use when I get home, stretch my legs and I fancy to play let's say Galaxy on Fire 2, I find it smoother and less likely to crash if I just press "kill all apps" button in Task Manager. And since I installed RAM Manager I don't have to do it. And I haven't noticed any side effects that would interfere with my style of using my phone.
So guess what - I really don't give a **** about Android memory management and all expert opinions because I know what works for me and I'm happy with that state of things.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

pjm77 said:
garytube said:
600mb usage is totally normal on moderate use. Obviously you don't know how RAM Management work on Android. Go and replace your phone but nothing will change.
Ever heard of irony?
Of course I'm not gonna get it replaced I'm happy with the way it is.
Yes, I've read about Android memory management quite a while ago. Very smart and very convincing. Now on the other hand - every now and then after some intense moments - let's say I'm driving and I'm using offline satnav then online satnav then there is a phonecall, then I make a voice note, I get out, send a text, use my GTD app and whatever else - after hours of such use when I get home, stretch my legs and I fancy to play let's say Galaxy on Fire 2, I find it smoother and less likely to crash if I just press "kill all apps" button in Task Manager. And since I installed RAM Manager I don't have to do it. And I haven't noticed any side effects that would interfere with my style of using my phone.
So guess what - I really don't give a **** about Android memory management and all expert opinions because I know what works for me and I'm happy with that state of things.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I liked your response, but it's not irony, it's sarcasm
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

pjm77 said:
garytube said:
600mb usage is totally normal on moderate use. Obviously you don't know how RAM Management work on Android. Go and replace your phone but nothing will change.
Ever heard of irony?
Of course I'm not gonna get it replaced I'm happy with the way it is.
Yes, I've read about Android memory management quite a while ago. Very smart and very convincing. Now on the other hand - every now and then after some intense moments - let's say I'm driving and I'm using offline satnav then online satnav then there is a phonecall, then I make a voice note, I get out, send a text, use my GTD app and whatever else - after hours of such use when I get home, stretch my legs and I fancy to play let's say Galaxy on Fire 2, I find it smoother and less likely to crash if I just press "kill all apps" button in Task Manager. And since I installed RAM Manager I don't have to do it. And I haven't noticed any side effects that would interfere with my style of using my phone.
So guess what - I really don't give a **** about Android memory management and all expert opinions because I know what works for me and I'm happy with that state of things.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
it looks like to me that you posted in this thread just to promote RAM Manager
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

TeeeJaay said:
pjm77 said:
it looks like to me that you posted in this thread just to promote RAM Manager
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I posted in this thread beacuse another user complained about the problem that I came across and found solution to. It's certainly not the best one, but it's the one that works for me.
In the meantime I got ridiculed by more social-oriented users who need to accept and be accepted. To which I got upset and posted some crap. As a result I hijacked the thread. I apologize and shut up.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

LordManhattan said:
Are you kidding me? Use RAM Manager when your device has 1GB of it? Please slap me as hard as you can.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Samsung makes us fool it has only 800MB RAM. Even i thought it was 1GB.

It has 1GB. 200MB is reserved for the system.
Sent from my GT-N7000 using xda premium

Memory usage
My daughter started a game where a photo is used in the programme, and I got the message "Free RAM low, resolution of photo reduced". Had to kill running services to be able to run it without the reduced resolution. Checked the overall Galaxy Note ram usage and just out of the box I have around 230mb free of RAM, I have an HTC Desire HD (768 ram) that has the same free and it is filled with running apps. When you get that kind of messages from a new phone, from some ****ty simple kid programme before I have even filled it up with stuff I get really annoyed. When I kill all I can i can get max up to 400mb.

Yup, TouchWiz is a greedy RAM eating whore. Wait for CM9 and then you'll see why custom UIs like TouchWiz and Sense is bull****.
Sent from my iPad GT-N7000 using xda premium

Is it normal only 1,5 gb ram free?

When I reboot the tablet and look the free ram memory only have 1,5 ram free, is it the normal when this tab has 3 gb ram? I have thunderrom and skyhigh kernel installed.

Yep. It's for most of the android processes and important things that need to run. I also get that much too.
Sent from SMT800 using Tapatalk.
-Helper around Tab S forums√
Active Everyday√

yeiyei0891 said:
When I reboot the tablet and look the free ram memory only have 1,5 ram free, is it the normal when this tab has 3 gb ram? I have thunderrom and skyhigh kernel installed.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yup that's totally normal I'm running cm12 and it's using 1.5GB.

I'm on stock, non rooted and using ES Explorers task killer i can still have about 1.4GB free.

Ok, then 3gb RAM but really you can use less that half of it.

Yep. But hey at least we got 3 GB of ram instead of 2 GB!
Sent from SMT800 using Tapatalk.
-Helper around Tab S forums√
Active Everyday√

DUHAsianSKILLZ said:
Yep. But hey at least we got 3 GB of ram instead of 2 GB!
Sent from SMT800 using Tapatalk.
-Helper around Tab S forums√
Active Everyday√
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah i get 2GB to use because my system uses 1GB

yeiyei0891 said:
Ok, then 3gb RAM but really you can use less that half of it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I do wish people would actually learn about RAM and why free RAM is actually wasted RAM.
A good summary can be found here: http://m.androidcentral.com/ram-what-it-how-its-used-and-why-you-shouldnt-care

foxmeister said:
I do wish people would actually learn about RAM and why free RAM is actually wasted RAM.
A good summary can be found here: http://m.androidcentral.com/ram-what-it-how-its-used-and-why-you-shouldnt-care
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah but otoh caching boat load of stuff into ram that won't be used is a waste of battery.
I look at the list of running processes with a system monitor and I have to say WTF does it just load every thing or what. It's running apps I don't even use any more but haven't uninstalled just in case. So if I don't want them running I have to freeze them. And that does not include all the system processes whose purpose I can't even tell. It's kind of nuts.

foxmeister said:
I do wish people would actually learn about RAM and why free RAM is actually wasted RAM.
A good summary can be found here: http://m.androidcentral.com/ram-what-it-how-its-used-and-why-you-shouldnt-care
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sorry but you should start to learn yourself. The RAM displayed as free is actually used as a file cache. Besides, Android killing apps in the background means that it takes longer to start a new app in a low RAM situation (because the new app needs to wait until the LMK cleared enough space) and of course you lose the context of the closed app (it needs to reload data from the internal storage or even worse from the web when you restart it).

TheGoD said:
Sorry but you should start to learn yourself. The RAM displayed as free is actually used as a file cache. Besides, Android killing apps in the background means that it takes longer to start a new app in a low RAM situation (because the new app needs to wait until the LMK cleared enough space) and of course you lose the context of the closed app (it needs to reload data from the internal storage or even worse from the web when you restart it).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Are you in a low RAM situation when you have 1GB free out of 3GB? NO! 0.5GB out of 3GB? NO!
Does it take a significant amount if time to reclaim resources when android does require additional RAM, because it genuinely is in a low RAM situation? No, because it unceremoniously terminates unused processes, releasing resources to the kernel almost immediately. This is very different from garbage collection to release unused memory from active processes.
Don't just believe me though - take it from the people who actually wrote the OS - http://android-developers.blogspot.de/2010/04/multitasking-android-way.html?m=1
It's also worth saying that you've also validated my statement "Free RAM is wasted RAM" by saying that the OS "uses" free RAM as a file cache.
All that being said, the context of this entire thread is why the OS is "using" 1.5GB out of 3GB pretty much at boot. All I've said is why this is perfectly normal, and in the general usage case, actually not undesirable.
Of couse there will be specific usage cases, where this is not going to be the optimum approach, but this is only going to affect a very small minority of users, with extremely memory demanding applications.

barth2 said:
Yeah but otoh caching boat load of stuff into ram that won't be used is a waste of battery.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No. RAM impact on battery life is, for all practical purposes, insensitive to the amount of RAM being used. When sections of RAM are clear, the locations are not zeroed out or anything. Instead the space is just added to a free space table. Stuff in RAM not being used does not waste battery. The exception to this is if that RAM is being occupied by a misbehaving program that is driving CPU usage.
foxmeister said:
Are you in a low RAM situation when you have 1GB free out of 3GB? NO! 0.5GB out of 3GB? NO!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Foxmeister is exactly right. In nearly all real world cases, higher RAM usage leads to faster performance and better battery life.

GeorgeP said:
No. RAM impact on battery life is, for all practical purposes, insensitive to the amount of RAM being used. When sections of RAM are clear, the locations are not zeroed out or anything. Instead the space is just added to a free space table. Stuff in RAM not being used does not waste battery. The exception to this is if that RAM is being occupied by a misbehaving program that is driving CPU usage.
Foxmeister is exactly right. In nearly all real world cases, higher RAM usage leads to faster performance and better battery life.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No, but you still have to get the data into RAM. That takes power, which it is wasted if the data is never used.

barth2 said:
No, but you still have to get the data into RAM. That takes power, which it is wasted if the data is never used.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It's a trade off - preload the processes and data so that they can be accessed far more quickly (less lag) if and when required. Once in memory, if they are not being used the battery drain is negligible.
The reduction in perceived lag is *far* greater than any battery drain.
Regards,
Dave

barth2 said:
No, but you still have to get the data into RAM. That takes power, which it is wasted if the data is never used.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
LOL! Now are in angels dancing on a the head of a pin territory:laugh:

GeorgeP said:
LOL! Now are in angels dancing on a the head of a pin territory:laugh:
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Lag is mostly a function of user expectation.
When you open a new app that is not running, you expect a delay. So as long as it's not excessively long, you don't feel lag. unnecessary preloading then just increases bootup time and long boot up time DOES bother people.
Now it makes sense to preload frequently used apps and some system apps that have high probability of being needed. But what I was talking about is seeing apps I used once once weeks ago still get loaded, while some apps I use every session, like my browser, not loaded on start up. The algorithm needs tweaking.
(Large apps like games have long load time, but you are not going to cache those so they are not in the conversation.)
Most lags people experience is in app lag. It's mostly due to loading graphics onto the screen, screen painting, and garbage collection.
What baffles me is I have an iPad 3 (there have been 4 generations of iPads since then) , which on paper is like a Toyota Camry compared to the Tab S BMW 300. And yet on many same apps the iPad feels smoother, scrolling around is less jerky. The only place where the Tab S is superior is 3d games like asphalt with high details and because it has 3x memory, apps need reloading less.

barth2 said:
Lag is mostly a function of user expectation.
When you open a new app that is not running, you expect a delay. So as long as it's not excessively long, you don't feel lag. unnecessary preloading then just increases bootup time and long boot up time DOES bother people.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The vast majority of users (i.e. the sort of user who doesn't frequent sites like XDA) probably don't reboot their tablets/phones very often at all, so most people probably aren't that bothered.
I rather suspect that the engineers at Google have experimented with an awful lot of different strategies, before settling on what we have now.
Is it perfect? No. Like everything software related, it could do with improvement but this is always a continuous, on going process
Regards,
Dave

How much average free RAM do you have left on your Note 4 during Usage?

Though I continue be impressed by the Battery Life and ability to move Apps to SD on the T-Mobile Note 4, I've noticed the free RAM availability is pretty slim when using the device on a day-to-day basis. The T-Mobile Note 4 is probably one of those carrier devices that I've experience containing little or not bloat. Not sure if the 3GB RAM specification lives up to its value. Makes room for Samsung to add more to the background process. In reality, a stock Vanilla Android device uses about 1/3 of its RAM whereas anything overlaying it like Touchwiz or HTC Sense uses more.

arjun90 said:
Though I continue be impressed by the Battery Life and ability to move Apps to SD on the T-Mobile Note 4, I've noticed the free RAM availability is pretty slim when using the device on a day-to-day basis. The T-Mobile Note 4 is probably one of those carrier devices that I've experience containing little or not bloat. Not sure if the 3GB RAM specification lives up to its value. Makes room for Samsung to add more to the background process. In reality, a stock Vanilla Android device uses about 1/3 of its RAM whereas anything overlaying it like Touchwiz or HTC Sense uses more.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
After an heavy debloat and greenify a lot, I have about 1.2 gig free after reboot and then drop and stay around 400-500mb after some use. I use next launcher, though, which is heavy on ram and I currently(temporarily) use Pimp my Screen which is ridiculiously heavy. I use a Wave live wallpaper, which I never used a live wallpaper on my S2, 3, or 4, but I had ram to spare and I like it. So, thats rpobably 200mb used up in looking pretty. After fresh Rom, I was losing 2% overnight. So I'm pleased but I agree that more RAM in phone is more RAM used by phone and you kinda end up with the same numbers in the end.

This has been long discussed and resolved years ago. Android is designed to utilize as much RAM as possible to function smoothly. If you're phone is running poorly or not quickly enough, chances are it's a rogue app that was made poorly causing your issue.
RAM usage should not be likened to an OS like Windows.

Not being an Apple fanboy, it seems Apple was able to optimize their apps just right to go hand-in-hand with the available RAM.
mzrdisi said:
This has been long discussed and resolved years ago. Android is designed to utilize as much RAM as possible to function smoothly. If you're phone is running poorly or not quickly enough, chances are it's a rogue app that was made poorly causing your issue.
RAM usage should not be likened to an OS like Windows.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

Exactly my thought, "So I'm pleased but I agree that more RAM in phone is more RAM used by phone and you kinda end up with the same numbers in the end."
I'll need to monitor which apps causes my device to occupy over 90% of the RAM at all times. Ironically, my device has not once froze up or restarted. I'm stunned if the device can keep up in this environment.
Bubba Fett said:
After an heavy debloat and greenify a lot, I have about 1.2 gig free after reboot and then drop and stay around 400-500mb after some use. I use next launcher, though, which is heavy on ram and I currently(temporarily) use Pimp my Screen which is ridiculiously heavy. I use a Wave live wallpaper, which I never used a live wallpaper on my S2, 3, or 4, but I had ram to spare and I like it. So, thats rpobably 200mb used up in looking pretty. After fresh Rom, I was losing 2% overnight. So I'm pleased but I agree that more RAM in phone is more RAM used by phone and you kinda end up with the same numbers in the end.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

I'm not sure why but I like to see free ram. Iknow what people say about killing apps and then they restart…… but I'm a bit of a battery dork and spend decent time on tweaks for power. I feel like I get as good or better than I've seen posted and I try to have as much ram as possible free. It has always worked for me, but my phone habits may be different from others. I don't even have a facebook account.
Oh yea, Apple has to pre-optimized because their user can't do it for themselves!)

I'm just saying, I'm sure the Software engineers know quite a bit more about the subject than hobbyists like many of us on here.
People obsess about battery life all the time and all of these tweaks and apps people use I find don't do any real good. I'm not saying they don't help at all, because it would seem based on some people's claims it does. But I feel there are so many other factors that really are the problem. Primarily how you just simply use your phone. And 2nd, which is the issue I find most often on Android is someone downloading a terrible app that is running in the BG allll day without them really knowing it. (GPS being used frequently or the kernel is kept awake for long periods of time)
But my point above was that you will and really shouldn't see your device with 50% or more RAM on an Android device. It's just not designed to be that way. If the apps you are using are basically "made" properly. You don't need to worry about having to close apps or block them from running.

One of the culprits using a lot of RAM is Lookout Mobile Security. I have T-Mobile Jump. Never knew Lookout was one of the culprits.

Multitasking/RAM

You're busy and don't have time to wait, which is why you need to stop reading this thread and get back to organizing your Pogs. Rate this thread to express how the LG Nexus 5X performs when multitasking. A higher rating indicates that the LG Nexus 5X keeps many apps in memory so that they don't need to reload, and that when moving between apps, transitions are smooth and performance is excellent.
Then, drop a comment if you have anything to add!

Does a pretty good job keeping apps in RAM considering it only has 2GB RAM. Can hold about 6 apps.

Holds up just fine with "only" 2GB of RAM. Would I want more? Sure. I don't think there is such a thing as too much RAM. However, the Nexus 5X does hold up just fine with 2GB RAM.

I think amount of RAM is fine, but...
Nexus 5X is very capable phone and multitasking is mostly fine, but I feel that it could be better if LG would use faster flash storage(throughput), when compared to lets say Samsung flash memory that is included in Galaxy S6 and such.

For the most part it seems ok, but i do frequently experience phone locks and lag. Snapchat seems to absolutely hammer the RAM and makes the phone practically unusable, known issue from what i've seen on the Play Store reviews.

Not sure if it's my configuration...
Maybe it's the apps and features I have configured, but I see the memory becoming a problem. I'm sitting at 80% or memory used most of the time, while my N5 (with the same amount of ram) is at 46%. My N5X leaves about 350MB free, which may not cut it for intense use. I'll need to look into tweaks to reduce the OS use of memory, but I'm surprised that the N5, with the same amount of memory but a slower processor, is running more smoothly.

Never had a dropped application. 2GB is enough. I only use 200MB and have 1.7GB available which is enough to run intensive games (which required around 800MB to run).
EDIT: I am using PureNexus as my ROM so it's probably due to optimizations.

2GB is good enough for now, but given that this is a 64-bit device that means installed apps are going to take up more space both in the storage and memory. 2GB may not suffice down the road, even though it's more than enough for now.

Yap, 2 GB is good enough for now.

I really don't think the 2GB is going to be a big problem for me personally.
The 5x seems to do nice job managing the memory. Granted i only use it for browsing and reading mostly. Also the occasional video. No lagging yet.

ProjectJourneyman said:
Maybe it's the apps and features I have configured, but I see the memory becoming a problem. I'm sitting at 80% or memory used most of the time, while my N5 (with the same amount of ram) is at 46%. My N5X leaves about 350MB free, which may not cut it for intense use. I'll need to look into tweaks to reduce the OS use of memory, but I'm surprised that the N5, with the same amount of memory but a slower processor, is running more smoothly.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm looking into this also, the nexus5 was just right with my usage, but the 5x is just short with the same apps
Opera mobile which uses a lot but the system is also at 650-700mb ram

Less RAM Available!!

This is my main concern along with battery
I use tasker, twilight, autovoice, Google now, join, and many other apps that need to be kept in ram
That would let me a few MB for keeping other apps like chrome or tapatalk. I predict redraws for that apps... Right?
(I'm still deciding between 5x and moto x style)
Sent from my Redmi Note 2 using Tapatalk

Multitasking sucks on this phone!
Almost all of the apps refresh everytime, and the available ram is always around 400mb even when there's no apps running in the background.
Any way to.improve this?

Coming from Nexus 6 I have to agree the available memory is too low. Apps almost always close in the background and have to constantly refresh and lose progress. And its not like I've got tons of app running all at once, just simple apps like Firefox, inbox and WhatsApp. I'm running latest version of PureNexus Rom and available memory is always below 500MB. Wouldn't recommend this phone to anyone.
Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk

After 10 months I still have no issues with RAM management on this device. My apps rarely reload and I've never seen a launcher redraw. I'm able to do GPS navigation in the hot sun while streaming Spotify and still able to answering a SMS with Google voice without any of them closing.
Those who load up on lots of background services might have issues, however starting with Android N that will no longer be a problem. See XDA article below on Android N limiting 3rd party background services.
http://www.xda-developers.com/how-android-n-will-improve-battery-and-memory-management/

on hindsight whether 2gb of ram is enough will depend on how app developers are able to optimize their apps so that it does not hog unnecessary memory. however in the wake of the latest android n os with increase system ram consumption. i believe much modifications will have to be done to keep the 5x optimise and smooth for daily usage

Since Android N, i noticed something strange in games.
For exemple in Deus Ex Go or The Room 3.
The games runs well, but after some minutes, it starts to lag.
Don't know what's happen, it's like game is loading its content, level after level but never clean it after levels are done.

fruity101079 said:
Since Android N, i noticed something strange in games.
For exemple in Deus Ex Go or The Room 3.
The games runs well, but after some minutes, it starts to lag.
Don't know what's happen, it's like game is loading its content, level after level but never clean it after levels are done.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It's probably more related to CPU throttling.

Android is doing the best it can with what is has on this device, but 2 GB of ram just isn't enough to handle heavy multitasking without some rather large hiccups where the device just slows down and chugs for a bit.