[Q & Discussion]Is SWAP really useless? - Galaxy Ace S5830 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

Lets face the facts guys. Our Galaxy Ace has very little RAM as compared to other devices currently on the market. Switching between apps is a pain in the ****. So I would like to ask is SWAP really useless as concluded by some members or its good for the phone. You can also list out experience with using SWAP & what kind of brand and class of microSD card you use here. I now personally do not use SWAP but I did b4, I have a class 4 32GB transcend microSD card that comes with life time warranty (I purposely put the warranty so I can also ward off those whom say it may wear out the card etc, what I want to find out is PERFORMANCE)
I search all over xda and all I got was some bits and pieces of answers here and there so was hoping to conclude everything right here in one place.

it makes the phone reaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaally slow. Happened to me.

it depends on ur swappiness setting (0~100)
set to 0 will disable swapping
set to 100 will make the system keep making cache and store them into your swap partition
*well, i'm still a noob, so just take my answer as a reference and if u want to know them more clearly, then ask uncle google
***
btw, too large linux swap partition is not needed, 32mb /64 mb will be enough for galaxy ace

If you use a lot of multitasking, swap will allow you to keep the apps data in memory for longer (no more reloading old web pages when browsing through lots of Windows)
It WILL SLOW DOWN YOUR PHONE, always (even with class 10 SD cards). The swap's new ram is much slower to read/write to SD card than the ram in your internal memory.
Swap will eat through your SD card and wear it out much faster. This isn't so bad with a life warranty and considering the low prices of SD cards. It's a pain in the nuts though, if you don't keep a regular backup of your SD card when the day it dies arrives.

I tried Swap with a class 4 SD Card, not really useful, so, I removed. You will try it if you have a class 10 SD

thanks for the reply guys

I would recommend swap only if you are a gamer. It will smooth out some games like nova or bia 2 or dead space or mass effect 3. Not saying that it will make the game lag free but it helps
Sent from my GT-S5830 using xda premium

here for some informations:
http://zerocredibility.wordpress.com/2009/08/24/why-android-swap-doesnt-make-sense/
ps. read the comments too

Related

Apps2SD - Class 2 SD Card ?

Hello Friends,
Wanted to ask you all if Class2 Sd Card is suggested for app2sd.
The whole reason of buying a 8GB SD Card was to use apps2sd.
But after buying i realized its a class 2 and when I flashed Dwang-v1.11 ROM my G1 is running very smooth.
The latest v of Dwang has apps2sd.
This post is to confirm my understanding and create awareness about the Class 2,class 4 and class 6 SD Card.
Thanks in advanced as I have always got amazing response from all u guys.
Class 6 is recommended.
Yep Class 6 all the way.
The class of an sdcard is a measure of the *minimum* performance.
Not the maximum.
A real good class 2 card can be faster than a bad class 6.
Or, it could be relative to chip yields. Basically, not all chips produced will be exactly identical, some may just happen to work faster than others.
In other words, a lucky class 2 card is fine. The recommended minimum of class 6 increases the CHANCES of having a good experience with it.
I also have a class 2 card, 16gb. All normal Android roms run great with it, but don't even think about running Hero. Your phone is so slow, it's unusable. No problem with any of Cyanogen's roms.
I used an 8GB class 2 w/ apps on ext2 for ages, didn't have any issues. The performance wasn't noticably different when upgrading to an 8GB class 6 w/ ext3. You'll be fine.
Any way to turn off the apps 2 sd on Cyanogen's mod
Hello,
I just flashed my phone with the latest Cyanogen's mod 4.2.14.1 and experiencing a lot of lag while opening any application.
Even the dialer gets stuck, messaging is getting stuck.
It would be great if the apps run on the rom rather then through the sd card till I get a class 6.
Any help is highly appreciated, as I have started avoiding making calls from my G1 due to the lag.
Else suggest a better ROM if there is no easy solution to turning off apps2sd
Worst Class 2
AdrianK said:
I used an 8GB class 2 w/ apps on ext2 for ages, didn't have any issues. The performance wasn't noticably different when upgrading to an 8GB class 6 w/ ext3. You'll be fine.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hi AdrianK,
Thanks for sharing your experience but may be i got the worst quality of class-2 mmc as mentioned by lbcode, which might be causing this problem.
The class of an sdcard is a measure of the *minimum* performance.
Not the maximum.
A real good class 2 card can be faster than a bad class 6.
Or, it could be relative to chip yields. Basically, not all chips produced will be exactly identical, some may just happen to work faster than others.
In other words, a lucky class 2 card is fine. The recommended minimum of class 6 increases the CHANCES of having a good experience with it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
-Chinmay
The system applications are stored on the ROM, not on the SD card.
chinmayfun said:
Hello,
I just flashed my phone with the latest Cyanogen's mod 4.2.14.1 and experiencing a lot of lag while opening any application.
Even the dialer gets stuck, messaging is getting stuck.
It would be great if the apps run on the rom rather then through the sd card till I get a class 6.
Any help is highly appreciated, as I have started avoiding making calls from my G1 due to the lag.
Else suggest a better ROM if there is no easy solution to turning off apps2sd
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Most roms now, if you don't have an EXT partition, will skip apps2sd.
thanks
Hey thanks will try removing my ext partitions...
Thanks a lot for the help friends

[Q] Class 6 or Class 10?

Heya Guys,
I'm completely new to SGS and Android in general
Bought my SGS a Week ago and im quite satisfied with it so far. ( Got almost stock froyo -- TouchWizGTG launcher and a voodo lagfix )
I wonder now, if there is a major speed improvement with a class 10 microSD Card with the the SGS over the class 6 card. Is the device even capable to handle a class 10 card and is it worth the buy, will it reduce lags? oO
Well, thank you in advance \o/
The speed of the microsd won't affect your system speed, because no critical files are placed on it.. (long time ago there was a lag fix that moved stuff to sd, but the newer ones don't do that).
The only difference would be reading/writing to the SD, and unless you're going to be doing stuff like high res video recording to the sd or something, I really don't think it matters.
The internal SD card is class 6 or so btw, and it works fine. You probably won't notice a difference.
i have my external SD card at class 4, 16 gb, no problems seen in terms of read / write speed.
Oh! Thanks for the fast answers!
Think I will buy a class 6 then. Thank you very much! U saved me alot of money

New to the Nook

So I've seen only 3 roms available for SD boot? CM7, Honeycomb, and Nookie. I imagine Honeycomb/CM tablet tweaks doesnt have a SD bootable? How hard is it to convert my nook to emmc instead of SD?
got it on my nook, my SD has clockworks. it takes 8GB as the boot partition, would I be able to shrink this? Or should I just leave it?
Are you trying to install it on the internal memory or run it off the sd card.
I would recommend the internal memory
One point to make:
If you use the stock B&N app for any of the extra features it adds to the Nook For Android app you should probably stick to sd card for custom roms.
IF that is the case, or if for any other reason you want to continue to run from sd card- the Tablet Tweaks will hopefully be merged before too much longer and then will be a part of CM7 anyway.
As for converting to emmc instead of sd- been so long since I wiped the stock os I don't remember...
But there are good instructions all of the place- NookDevs portal, Cyanogenmod site and quite a few threads in here.
got it. gotta say, holy **** it runs much "smoother" on internal memory. it seemed to chop on my class 10 card. not bad, but just once in a while, noticeable compared to now. so nice. i just tried playing nes roms, and n64! some worked, but choppy of course. still, amazing device. I love it more and more everyday!
dude2k5 said:
got it. gotta say, holy **** it runs much "smoother" on internal memory. it seemed to chop on my class 10 card. not bad, but just once in a while, noticeable compared to now. so nice. i just tried playing nes roms, and n64! some worked, but choppy of course. still, amazing device. I love it more and more everyday!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well, sd card classes seem to be un-realistic for actual performance as depicted in lots of threads here. Most of the recent class 6+ products peak at larger block read/writes but underperform in smaller ones - which happens to impact the smoothness a lot. I can't post links but just go back a few pages or search for sd card. There are reports of SanDisk class 2's beatin' class 10's real bad
Enjoy your NC!

[Q] SD Card Upgrade

I'm looking forward into upgrading my SD Card, right now it's the default CLASS 2 with 2gb. I pretend to buy a 16gb class 10 one, from Adata.
But I need to know some things first. The only reasons that I want to upgrade is to get more space to install apps, place musics and maybe expand my RAM a little.
So, is it possible to expand my ram? I don't want performance upgrade, it's just that I tend to multitask a lot of programs and my memory runs out really fast.
If so, how much more memory I can allocate on my SD?
Same for apps.
How much big can my apps partition be?
I saw that the recommended limit is something around 1.2/1.3gb, but is there a safe way to expand a little bit further? Or would it make the phone too much unstable?
And also, is it really worth it to upgrade my SD to a CLASS 10 one with 16gb? Or is it just a waste of money?
Thanks for the support and excuse me if I'm asking on the wrong section/way. I found somethings about it but there was nothing too much concrete. :/
EDIT
I just flashed my X8 with the latest firmware and baseband, as pc companion didn't want to install the baseband ..15 nor the newest drivers. Also installed the CM7, dualtouch and all that crap. It already installs apps to the SD and I've noticed a small slowdown on app startup. Would a class 10 sd soft it out?
Up to 200MB on SWAP partition, up to 2GB on apps EXT3/4 (any1 have so many of them???) rest for music/videos etc.
I have made a guide for partitioning the SD with ext+swap (you need AlfsKernel+GDX)
Look my signature
Thanks. But just another question. Is it really necessary to have a Class 10 SD card, or would Class 2 (the default one) slow things down while using swap?
Edit:
Also, a class 10 sd card is way too much expensive for me. I found a 16gb one, class 4 but it's SDHC. Will my X8 read a SDHC?
Everything above (and including) 4GB is sdhc, so yes, it reads them fine. About speed, yes it's important, apps will load faster.. but never amazingly fast. The X8 is slow nowadays, don't expect awesome results. If you are used to class 2 speeds and you buy a class 10 card then yes, you will notice improvement.. Not that much with a class 4. Do you really need a 16GB card? Maybe a 8GB class 8 or 10 would be better if you don't need that much space.
About adding more ram, just forget it
Sent from my E15i using XDA App
I got almost 20gb of just music on my computer, full discography of bands and all. Basically, 90% of the sd will be dedicated to music then But maybe i buy a 8gb one, i just need to stop being lazy and copy only the musics that i want instead of CTRL+A, CTRL+C, CTRL+V it all. Thanks for the help by the way.
So class 6 sdcard is enough for x8?

[Q] how can i increase ram of my samsung galaxy ace

how to make virtual ram in galaxy ace rooted s5830.....running ics'ed by snowpluralism....
n do it helps in smooth runnings...
and any disadvantages:highfive:
Ashish924 said:
how to make virtual ram in galaxy ace rooted s5830.....running ics'ed by snowpluralism....
n do it helps in smooth runnings...
and any disadvantages:highfive:
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well, you can use a swap partition. CM7+ also has ram compression.
Sent from my GT-S5830 using Tapatalk 2
NathanBookham said:
Well, you can use a swap partition. CM7+ also has ram compression.
Sent from my GT-S5830 using Tapatalk 2
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
can u help me in that...i dont know how to do it...n also is it safe and effective....thanks
Ashish924 said:
can u help me in that...i dont know how to do it...n also is it safe and effective....thanks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Google for it. XDA is against spoon-feeding..!!
___________XDA Premium__________
Don't be a noob. Be a newbie..!!
Details here.
____________________________________
I've tried swapper 2, it's good. But have to understand each term they use in the app. Currently I'm now on RamExpander. Very good.
Sent from my GT-S5830 using xda app-developers app
DuckyDawn said:
I've tried swapper 2, it's good. But have to understand each term they use in the app. Currently I'm now on RamExpander. Very good.
Sent from my GT-S5830 using xda app-developers app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
For me Ramexpander say is not compatible with Ace.
I heard swapping partition from sd card to increase the ram, sd card might get damaged!!, is it true?
Reduces SD Life so yes.
Sent from my iPhone
but i guess you will change your sd card before it gets damaged so much, that you will notice.
i only had this once on a USB pendrive. it loses data since some weeks ago. but its about 8 years old.
lets say that todays SD cards have better lifetime than years old USB sticks. lets also say that you use your sd card more often than i used this stick (backups later car-radio). so we can say your SD card might have a bit less lifetime. lets say 6 years. in 6 years you will (most likely) have a new phone, sd cards are "oldies" and if not, 1TB cards are state-of-the-art.
so....yes you loose lifetime but i dont think you will use it till it "dies"
CJCord said:
but i guess you will change your sd card before it gets damaged so much, that you will notice.
i only had this once on a USB pendrive. it loses data since some weeks ago. but its about 8 years old.
lets say that todays SD cards have better lifetime than years old USB sticks. lets also say that you use your sd card more often than i used this stick (backups later car-radio). so we can say your SD card might have a bit less lifetime. lets say 6 years. in 6 years you will (most likely) have a new phone, sd cards are "oldies" and if not, 1TB cards are state-of-the-art.
so....yes you loose lifetime but i dont think you will use it till it "dies"
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It really depends on use. When I swapped i ate through my sdcard in less than 6 months.. so there you go. Keeping low swappinness will increase sd card life, but it does depend on use.
increasing ram by swapping sd card is effective to what extent...can any body tell me....does it bridge the gap of our low ram...
AND ANY OTHER DISADVANTAGE THAN REDUCING SD CARD LIFE
Blackstard said:
For me Ramexpander say is not compatible with Ace.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Huh? I Don get u cozy mine is working fine. Downloaded from blackmarket
Sent from my GT-S5830 using xda app-developers app
Ashish924 said:
increasing ram by swapping sd card is effective to what extent...can any body tell me....does it bridge the gap of our low ram...
AND ANY OTHER DISADVANTAGE THAN REDUCING SD CARD LIFE
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That why the requirement need class 10 SDcard
You can use CM7 that uses less RAM!.. I just went from CM10 to CM7 and it really is an improvement for ACE as it uses a bit less RAM and that is noticeable.
thanx but no cm7
Jimmyslam said:
You can use CM7 that uses less RAM!.. I just went from CM10 to CM7 and it really is an improvement for ACE as it uses a bit less RAM and that is noticeable.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
thanks...but i dont want cm7 as i dont like it....i want it in a stock rom...btw thanx
Ashish924 said:
how to make virtual ram in galaxy ace rooted s5830.....running ics'ed by snowpluralism....
n do it helps in smooth runnings...
and any disadvantages:highfive:
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
there are quite a few apps for increasing the ram like ramexpander and swapper...
but before using these apps remember that the read and write speed of sd card(which is secondary storage) is vey less as compared to that of the internal ram.. and probably thats why ram is very expensive as compared to sd card...
so if you use these apps may take a bit longer to start and even the best of sd cards i.e. the class 10 one won't last longer than 6 months...
Increasing ram
Hi i install ram manager pro apk on gts5830i then i create a swap file 128mb using this apk, then on sd card i see swap file img does it mean my phone ram increased.... i didn't install any kernel for it... plz does tell me if it increase ram or not...
I tried something on a other phone from my neighbor. is a huawei with same specs than the galaxy ace..
I moved apps to SD card with link2SD and created a Swap file in the internal storage.
The internal storage is much faster than the SD card and much better for swap file.
sahil chandel said:
Hi i install ram manager pro apk on gts5830i then i create a swap file 128mb using this apk, then on sd card i see swap file img does it mean my phone ram increased.... i didn't install any kernel for it... plz does tell me if it increase ram or not...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What is RAM
Random Access Memory (RAM) is temporary data storage that the CPU uses during calculations. The more RAM a device has, the more calculated results the CPU can store - which means less time the CPU has to do the same thing over and over again. In other words, the CPU can check RAM to see if it has already made a particular calculation in the recent past. If it has, it can use the pre-computed results instead of wasting processing time recomputing the same calculation. In short, more RAM means a more efficient (and faster) device.
SWAP
What is SWAP
Swap is, in short, virtual RAM. With swap, a small portion of the hard drive is set aside and used like RAM. The computer will attempt to keep as much information as possible in RAM until the RAM is full. At that point, the computer will begin moving inactive blocks of memory (called pages) to the hard disk, freeing up RAM for active processes. If one of the pages on the hard disk needs to be accessed again, it will be moved back into RAM, and a different inactive page in RAM will be moved onto the hard disk ('swapped'). The trade off is disks and SD cards are considerably slower than physical RAM, so when something needs to be swapped, there is a noticeable performance hit.
Unlike traditional swap, Android's Memory Manager kills inactive processes to free up memory. Android signals to the process, then the process will usually write out a small bit of specific information about its state (for example, Google Maps may write out the map view coordinates; Browser might write the URL of the page being viewed) and then the process exits. When you next access that application, it is restarted: the application is loaded from storage, and retrieves the state information that it saved when it last closed. In some applications, this makes it seem as if the application never closed at all. This is not much different from traditional swap, except that Android apps are specially programed to write out very specific information, making Android's Memory Manager more efficient that swap.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Credits go to CarlDeanCatabay

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