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At the latest after two years of use, most smartphones show the first signs of aging. At least in direct comparison to the young competition, which is full of juice, you want to meet your old Schindmare in the sanctuary instead of being by your side. Manufacturers are doing their part, with increasing promise for new models and step-by-step care for their older siblings.
But there is still hope for these models: With the right settings and reduced apps, you can get some smartphones back up and running.
Address performance issues
In the case of entry-level Android smartphones, normal operation sometimes poses challenges for weak-chested hardware. Sometimes a video shakes, sometimes the device takes several seconds to commemorate the start of the applications or the little memory grips. Fortunately, some delays can be minimized.
First of all, there are performance issues on the collar. Step One: Avoid complex design effects by organizing apps on the screen and for the home or lock screen. Live backgrounds are also hard work for smartphones. Strictly speaking, a monochrome background is sufficient.
You can limit the transition effects and animations through the developer options or disable them entirely: search for “Developer options” in the “Settings” menu. (If the developer options have not yet been activated for you, first tap “Phone Info”, then seven times at the “Build Number” entry and then the Back button. Find the new Developer Options menu.) There you will find the entries “Animator time” and “Transition animation”. Set a smaller value there. Possible, but not visually appealing: You can also disable animation entirely.
In the developer options there is also the “Background process limit” point, which should be used with caution. If there is very little memory, you can limit the number of processes that, for example, are used to send messages even when the application in question is not in use. This may give some apps a bit more RAM, but you shouldn’t forget to reset this screw back to the default so that the smartphone continues to function properly.
Take out first
In general, it is always a good idea, even with new devices, to remove it first and thus get rid of the ballast. It’s really easy with the Google application “Files” or the thinner version “Files Go”. You can use it to search for unnecessary files and installation remains and to clean excessive media folders for WhatsApp or other messengers.
A useful tip for older versions of Android (prior to 9) was to occasionally clear the app cache. You should refrain from doing this on smartphones with a newer operating system, because Android can now do better on its own than with your help.
If memory on a meager device causes space issues or gives you an idea, you can counter this by moving large files, like photos and videos, to a cloud of your choice and storing only the essentials on the device. Alternatively, with at least some devices, relocating data to a MicroSD card could alleviate the problems.
Uninstalling unnecessary apps is obvious – this can be done through the Files app or through normal app management. You can only disable some pre-installed apps; This prevents the application from generating a system load, which in this case is sufficient. Hopefully you could uninstall the app using adb-trick, but that doesn’t take up usable storage space, it just frees up space on an unusable system partition. The trick is only worth it if the app can’t be disabled.
Often listen to advice for installing a CustomROM, for example LineageOS. But this only has an advantage with a few devices. Most CustomROMs use the same memory allocation, so there is hardly more memory for applications and data after installation than before, as long as you uninstall or disable all unnecessary applications.
Only a few CustomROMs resize partitions, and even less frequently it achieves a relevant advantage. Some CustomROMs run more smoothly than the original, but here, too, it usually achieves the same result if you pull down or disable the superfluous and do the above settings.
Lean applications
The Facebook application is known as a notorious memory eater. The Facebook Lite application, which only occupies 1.6 MB, offers more agile access. Google in turn has a series of applications that have the suffix “Go”. Google Maps, for example, requires 34.4 MB as an application and only 123 KB as a Go variant. However, the latter runs entirely as a so-called web application, that is, it runs in the smartphone’s Chrome browser. Other variants of Go would be Gallery Go (8 MB) and Google Go (7.2 MB). However, Gmail Go is not available in Germany.
Similar to how Google executes your maps in the browser, you can do it in many ways with other applications that are basically just images of web offers: the easiest way is to open the relevant website and select the option “Add to the screen of Start “in the options menu.” Of course, web applications saved in this way only work with an Internet connection. Applications that limit themselves to their main task and don’t waste their computing talent in secretly sending user data External servers can be found in the F-Droid app store, among others.
Some apps update their data in the background and are supposed to do exactly that: WhatsApp and other messengers, for example. But does every email, every Facebook update, every Twitter twitter, every impending rain cloud, every news have to appear? Turning off so-called background activities is useful in several ways: This not only saves traffic, battery, and performance, but also your valuable time and attention.
You can specifically deprive applications of the right to remain active in the background (“Settings”, then “Applications”). This especially helps if you can’t turn off notifications in the apps themselves.
However, it makes sense to call the apps individually and check their settings for background activities that can be disabled. In this way, you can also achieve individual niceties, for example to constantly receive commercial emails, but only privately every few hours, or vice versa.
conclusion
No illusions allowed – you won’t love your entry-level smartphone into a sprint star in the old days. But after implementing the measures described, it ends a few kilometers on the long haul.
