SystemPanel, the third app I ever purchased for Android, and definitely worth it in my mind. Although the only feature you get for buying it is the history feature in the monitoring part of the app (at least the only part I know of!!) I use this app as a Task Killer, only if something locks up and I do not get a force close window (infinite loops?), or if I have an issue with multiple apps accessing the same hardware (this has occured more than once when I am playing with multiple apps that take pictures, although killing the apps does not always resolve the issue. I recently had to shut my phone down when I had 783 hours of uptime, because the camera got locked “in use” by an app and then I could not use my bar code scanner, or camera app…) Anyway! I often use the history feature of this app to monitor activity while the phone is inactive (while I sleep) to see how certain apps affect battery life. Also a good way to find out if you are charging efficiently (crappy USB ports on laptops or desktop computers, accidentally use your Bluetooth headset charger!!).
Believe it or not I use it more for App backups and restores, it has a great backup system and keeps multiple version of the apps backed up, so you can switch between versions in case a developer does a major overhaul (see ShoppSavvy, or any app where a dev adds advertisements after not having them in a previous version, or for widgets where a developer continues to add support for other devices, which only increases the app size and it obviously already works on your device!). I keep a sync’ed backup folder on my PC and every couple of months I change the name of the sync’ed folder, so I have a history of past apps and their versions. When you go to the installer you can filter by installed, already archived, and not installed apps. Very in depth backup system for a “task killer”!
| Developer’s page | http://android.nextapp.com/site/systempanel |
| AppBrain link – Free | http://www.appbrain.com/app/systempanellite-task-manager/nextapp.systempanel |
| AppBrain link – Paid | http://www.appbrain.com/app/systempanel-app-task-manager/nextapp.systempanel.r1 |
Marketplace direct DL links
| Free Version | Paid Version | |
(this is an old post that apparently was stuck in draft mode, releasing it now. A good bit has changed since then, but I will not edit it now.)
What has happened and what I have learned over the last 10 days.
Well, I have had several issues, fixed a couple of others, and ordered an extended battery.
Right, so for starters, DISABLING the “Enable Always on Mobile” setting in: ‘home –> menu –> settings –> Wireless & Networks –> Mobile Networks –> Enable Always on Mobile’ is the cause of all the “rebooting issues”, which I have determined were not actual reboots, due to the fact that the uptime counter does not get reset when it happens, it is simply a major system function restart, that requires reloading nearly everything. 2 points to androidforums.com for discovering this.
Next, I resolved my randomly starting apps issue by running Startup Auditor, which has 2 settings for each app, (both called disable, but for two different things)
1. “Startup Disabled” really means Disable automatic startup during boot.
2. “Keep Disabled” really means prevent app from ever running, even if you launch it.
Startup Auditor polls something in the system (chron tab?) for all apps that auto load on startup and then allows you to modify these two settings for each one. The help information does not tell you what the options really do, it is what I figured out from both what it says, and the effects of what it does. I had many apps acting weird, or crashing during use, without providing a Force Close “OK button”. ALL of those issues were caused by option #2 in this app. I have learned that disabling the following is a bad idea:
1. anything that says HTC in it is bad if you run Sense UI
2. “Google Partner Setup”
3. “IQRD”
4. “Android System”
5. anything bluetooth if you intend on using any bluetooth devices, causes pairing issues, connectivity issues, prevent some features from working (like A2DP!!)
6. “calendar” x2 – one is google, one is HTC and both interact with your clock, alarms, all social apps, email, messaging…
7. “clock” x2 – one is google, one is HTC unless you don’t want the clock to update properly, calender to work well, emails to sort properly, messages to sort properly, mostly small issues, but annoying if yo ucannot figure out why it is happening…
8. ‘DM’ anything
9. ‘DRM’ anything (affects media mostly, but also web and emails
10. anything that says ‘Download’ – affects all apps that try to download data.
11. anything that says ‘Upload’ – affects all apps that try to upload data.
12. “Messages” – this is not just email!!
13. “Media Storage” – unless not using an SD card! may also affect the internal storage
14. “Open Sense Plugin Manager” – another HTC system service
15. “Rosie Utility” – this is an HTC function and SENSE UI does not like not being able to use it! *edit – Rosie is part of some widgets, not necessarily HTC.
16. “Updater” – does not refer to sending files to another computer!! But is a service called by anything that needs to periodically make minute changes to it’s display (like the clock, or battery widgets)
Most of these are things I have tested and found out the hard way, others I am assuming, as they have related names (all the HTC services and apps are for Sense…)
Onwards!!
My Nuvelli Stereo Bluetooth headset does not seem to have full 33′ range even though it has the ERD designation, oh it will stay connected at 33′, but you will hear lots of static and the other person (if you are on a call) will not hear you so well either. the forward and backward controls do not work with the default music player (DL’s 2 more, haven’t tested them yet, Meridian and Zimly)
My Jabra Cruiser may also suffer from range, but since I am using it while I am driving, I have not tested that either. but it plays sound fairly well, a touch hard to understand from the built in speaker, I would not want to take a 2hr conference call on it without a radio to broadcast the output to. That said, the output via FM is pretty good, although the FM transmitter is strong, but has an excessively short range, moving it from one side of the car to the other makes a difference in the amount of static received (front end antenna).
On Monday this week, I performed a Hard Reset of my Evo (shut down, then turn it on while holding in the “volume down button” then follow the on screen instructions (in size 3 or 4 font!!) and navigate through the menus to find the reset option.
Immediately afterwards the phone was 100x more responsive and everything just “worked” I immediately installed 184 apps and it stopped being quite so responsive!! I know, but I’m working on it, I’ve installed 2 apps, but removed 6 since. Still widdling down the list, and I have purchased 7 or 8 apps at this point (staying under $6 per week), all ones I have been using on my wife’s Samsung Moment since February, or that I have tested the free version of on my Evo.
I have also, as mentioned above, ordered the Seidio 3500mAh battery for the HTC Evo from MobileCity Online, you can read about my experiences with this purchase by going to my post about it, on androidforums.com
I have stopped using Advanced Task Killer and Advanced Task Manager, in replace I have SystemPanel, which in combination with Startup Audit and Startup Cleaner 2.0 handle everything I could with ATK nad ATM, but also gives me more options. I am testing to see if I truely need SA AND SC2.0, but I think they compliment each other more than fight against each other.
I have also stopped charging my phone at night, it has been discovered that the Evo does trickle charge until full, but then instead of maintaining the trickle while plugged in, it stops charging completely unti lothe battery charge level drops down to approx 90% (the Android OS does not determine battery charge by percentage, it just reports it to us in that manner), then it starts to trickle charge back up to full and repeats. This appears to be an 8 minute cycle. (please read section 5 and section 7 for information on these batteries) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium-ion_battery#Advantages_and_disadvantages
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium-ion_battery#Charging_procedure
This “float charge” can dramatically reduce the batteries maximum life span. Using the BatteryTime Lite app and setting it to give notification allows me to pull down the notification bar and see the current voltage and temp of the battery, so I can pay more attention to it so as to maintain performance and prevent accelerated deterioration. Even though I am getting an extended battery (not sure if the BatteryTime lite app will compensate for it), I still want to keep my stock Li-Ion in good shape, and have good battery habits for my new monster!
I have also been having a new issue (started before the Hard Reset, but continued on after it) where my home button only refreshes whatever screen I am looking at, and does not return me to my home screens, causing me to have to hit the back button 8-40 times to return to the home screen, which in turn ruins any chance of leaving an app running in the background at a particular position. Happens about 90%-95% of the time. This has not changed since it started. I would also like to kill the touch based hardware search button, I have never used it intentionally, but hit it accidentally at least 10 times per day now. Very extremely annoying, almost enough for me to want to get a different phone!!
The biggest issue facing me now is keeping up with all the app updates!
Ok, I went to the Radio Shack I purchased my phone from, they have had one return, for a very idiotic reason, the user reported that zero incoming calls ever rang through to the phone… I told the manager that I’d put $500 down that he accidentally setup Google Voice on his Evo, but never logged into the web and configured it, nor did he have a gmail account, nor did they set one up with the phone when he bought it. So, he has all of his incoming calls “blocked” by Google Voice and is not getting the voicemail notifications, because he did not setup his phone to receive gmail messages. HA! too funny… Also, none of the employees in the store have even heard of ANY of the issues that has been going on around the web with the HTC Evo (see links at the end of this post). I spent about 30 minutes at the store “educating” the employees about the problems plaguing the HTC Evo.
Afterwards I went to a nearby Sprint repair center, they have not had a single Evo returned, nor have they even heard of ANY of the issues that are being reported on the web. The sales person I talked to was fairly knowledgeable, although he admitted to only having seen 3 HTC Evo’s prior to mine, I was able to cover all of the issues within 15 minutes (they closed while I was doing this) and show him the light leak and the “moving glass” issue from my phone.
I’ve been using my Jabra Cruiser Car Speaker phone (BlueTooth and FM transmitter) with my Evo for 2.5 days now, and I must say it has been working very well. I love it, I had 1 issue where the Jabra connected, but only connected for phone audio, not music playback, but I just had to turn off the Jabra and turn it back on. Now, when I was driving home from Radio Shack and Sprint, I was listening to Pandora through my Evo and the Jabra, played out through my car Stereo Speakers. It sounded, well… good although I have a 200 Ford Mustang with the 6 speaker CD player audio package, and the passenger front speaker has a major tear in it and I believe at least one of the rear speakers has a small rip in the speaker fiber (not the original owner and I received the vehicle in that condition…) So I do not know if that is a good review of the sound quality.
Then I got home and had a lovely reboot issue, I turned off my BlueTooth Speakerphone, and the Evo locked up on my desktop/home screen with a message “BlueTooth Device Disconnected” in a pretty little grey bubble. it sat on that screen for 3 minutes, then the phone rebooted. But wait!!! it gets better… the phone got stuck on the 4G logo (after the video ended) and sat there for 10 more minutes, without dimming the screen, or shutting it off, then it rebooted again!!! I popped out the kickstand and sat the phone on the kitchen table and started to eat my dinner… You won’t believe me, but it rebooted while I was eating AND stuck on the 4G logo screen again! then after 2-4 minutes it rebooted itself (off the 4G logo screen) and made it back to my desktop/home screens. has not rebooted since and I did use my new headset to both listen to Pandora and to take 2 phone calls (about 80 minutes total).
Today I also received my Nuvelli stereo BlueTooth headset/headphones, they are a lot smaller than I originally thought ( a little smaller than a half dollar coin), sound pretty good for music and fairly good for voice, but not perfect; however my one severely audiophilic friend (one of the two people I have talked to so far, while using the headset) said it sound like I am underwater and have severe echo. I then talked to my wife, who is very picky, and she said that I “sound like shit” and should return the headset. I tried to sync it with my PC (Ubuntu 10.04) and the BlueTooth device manager said that my BlueTooth device does not support “input” (note, it also said this about my HTC Evo).
Since I was completely unable to find any real information on this device online, I have happily created an absolutely horrible unboxing which you will find below, including a pdf file of the English section of the manual (If you are reading this and would really like the Spanish version, you might be able to bribe me to scan the pages written in Spanish too… maybe), that I made myself. You also will not find ANY of this information on the manufacturer’s website or even on Amazon.com.
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- The back of the Nuvelli box
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- The front of the Nuvelli box
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- The left side of the Nuvelli box
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- The right side of the Nuvelli box
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- The top of the Nuvelli box
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- The inside of the Nuvelli headset
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- The Nuvelli headset sitting on a Compact Disc with a Quarter
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- Nuvelli headset on CD, again… with Quarter
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- internal packaging
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- The USB charging adapter
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- A closeup of the USB charging adapter
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