HTC Mogul memory decrease over the course of a day [Archive]

Dishe

26th July 2007, 08:45 PM

I posted this on another forum discussing this problem, so I'll just quote myself here:
The memory "leak" thing is nothing more than a cache "optimization" in place to make the device respond snappier.
Whether it succeeds or not is another story altogether...

Basically, like any cache, it stores recent calculations for faster response later. For example, if you open and close IE alot, you might notice that the first time you open it on a fresh restart takes a little bit longer than the next times- that's because the second time you start it up, parts of it are still in memory from the first time!

You might be wondering why this happens even after forcing it closed with Xbutton or the memory settings. That's because the info stored in the performance cache aren't directly related to any one program! Many apps can use the same routines and calculations, and therefore this process exists on a processor/file system layer as opposed to a software layer, and therefore also exists even when all programs are closed!

Meaning, if I have mapopolis that uses a certain routine to access my BT GPS receiver, even after I close it, some of that routine stays in memory because perhaps Google Maps will use the same routine, and therefore respond faster!

Now, ideally, this should speed up performance, and it SHOULD disappear on its own if the memory is needed and the information goes "stale" (hasn't been processed in a while = not really needed for optimized perfomance). However, one look at the way Microsoft handles "automatically closing apps" (native X button, anyone?) is enough to know that WM can't manage its own memory very well.
I can, however, vouch for the fact that the longer you leave all programs closed, the more of your memory starts to creep back into available. I've sat and watched this happen. So, it sort of works, but perhaps not well enough if people are having low memory system crash problems.

Now, before you all start blaming MS for this... Its not Microsoft's problem. They developed CE-5 (which WM6 is based on) on machines limited to 32MB to make sure the programmers didn't get lazy with OS bloat.
Its the manufacturers who add all this file system optimization and stuff to their final device. In this case, its the way HTC thinks the system should run, which is why this anomaly is NOT as apparent on, say, a WM Treo device.

The good news is that if we complain enough, HTC might realize this optimization does more bad than good, and leave it out on the next ROM update for us.
However, truth be told, I think it works. The Mogul is one of the snappiest PPC's I've used of late, although I can't say for sure if its because of the cache or not.
This is just my personal opinion, so don't flog me! I just don't look at the memory useage anymore unless I'm having a problem, which mind you, I hardly do.
My most recent observations were this:
Soft reset gives me ~21MB (got some htc plugins), and after a day of use, making sure to close everything after I'm done, I get 18-19MB. At lowest, I hit 10MB after closing alot of apps. This memory usually comes back to 18-19mb in a matter of time for me. If for some strange reason it doesn't (can't say how often this happens), I soft reset.
All in all, I'm happy with the Mogul.

hansolos

26th July 2007, 10:00 PM

I wasn't blaming the Titan directly, although I wish they would allow you to adjust the memory like they have in the past. But as I've read that may having something to do with chipset of battery consumption.

I was just wondering if others had the same issue and might know of the reason.

Is there a list of known apps that cause memory 'drain' or don't clear their cache. I can understand apps caching data into memory to run faster, but they are not cleaning themselves out upon exit. The strange thing is how they continue to grow over the course of the day with no interaction.

I'm doing a hard reset to see if it get better. Add apps one at a time until I find an issue.

hansolos

26th July 2007, 10:54 PM

Ok did a hard reset. Setup Outlook to get my mail from Exchange and Gmail. Let it get synced and then did a soft reset. Started with 24mb after reset, down to 21mb without doing anything after an hour and it's still falling. The only thing running is ActiveSync. I've also removed htc_cm_guardain and ssdaemon from the startup. The only thing in startup is poutlook.

The thing I noticed when I had handyswitcher installed (before hard reset) was that filesys, device, gwes, services, shell and cprog all continously increased there memory consumption over the course of a few hours and never stopped or released it.

Dishe

26th July 2007, 11:01 PM

I wasn't blaming the Titan directly, although I wish they would allow you to adjust the memory like they have in the past. But as I've read that may having something to do with chipset of battery consumption.

No no no... the reason you used to be able to select storage vs RAM was because it was SHARED memory! It was actually all RAM. If you had a 64MB device, that 64mb was split between ram and storage, and just like the rest of your RAM, it would wipe out when the battery died!

Ever since WM5 came along, they stopped sharing the memory, and now have dedicated RAM and Storage (using the leftover space on the EPROM chips used for the ROM image), much like a computer. This is a much better solution since you don't sacrifice your RAM for storing some large files, and you don't have to worry about battery failure cleaning you out!

Also, its not the apps that have cache, its the file system. The file system WILL actually free up some of that memory as the device is left with all apps closed for a while (maybe not all of it, but I've watched my device go from 11mb free after closing stuff to 18-19mb).

bam099

27th July 2007, 12:26 AM

hansolos

27th July 2007, 04:57 AM

bam, thanks for the info... that little app rocks.

samspoon

27th July 2007, 02:09 PM

use a file explorer and go to \Windows\Startup. There is a shortcut there for a program along the lines of HTC_Guardian_cmsomething. This app is a htc app used to enforce sprint settings and runs in the background. So long as you don't destroy your phone internet settings you can just remove the shortcut. I found all my memory leak issues have gone away. I don't have any leaks when using the kaiser tab plugin.

hansolos

27th July 2007, 04:41 PM

Yes I've removed the links for HTC_Guardian and SSDaemon from startup and added them to my settings folder (if I ever need them). I soft reset to around 25mb and the Oxios Hibernate app keeps me around 24.5mb.

Dishe

27th July 2007, 05:04 PM

what does SDdaemon do?

hansolos

27th July 2007, 11:06 PM

sddaemon is suppose to be the speed dial or voice command app you get when you hit the button on the left side with the talk bubble. It loads the app if you hit the button, so I'm not sure why they have it in startup.

jaslo1

28th July 2007, 01:57 AM

On my old Treo 700W, which REALLY had a memory problem, I used Oxios hibernate all the time. It works quite well.

xxza

30th July 2007, 02:38 AM

yes, it works.

You guys need to hit the easy button on this one! It may not be a permanent fix, but there's a small freeware called Oxios Hibernate that releases RAM. I just put it on my start menu and 2 clicks....I have free RAM. Try it out, you won't be disappointed.

ji1386

30th July 2007, 08:30 AM

you know what might help...if windows mobile had some sorta sorta disk caching feature...

Dishe

30th July 2007, 07:58 PM

that's what is causing the memory leak.

xxza

30th July 2007, 08:47 PM

great tips. thanks.

Yes I've removed the links for HTC_Guardian and SSDaemon from startup and added them to my settings folder (if I ever need them). I soft reset to around 25mb and the Oxios Hibernate app keeps me around 24.5mb.

kmartburrito

30th July 2007, 09:35 PM

Removing the links combined with Oxios is working great. I have used MemMaid and Pocket Mechanic which have similar RAM-reclaiming apps, and none compare to Oxios, plus it's free.

Great combo, and great find!!

We are one step closer to mastering the Titan :D

dsotm82

31st July 2007, 06:13 AM

Removing those 2 files keeps me at 21MB all day

diomark

11th August 2007, 07:30 PM

You guys need to hit the easy button on this one! It may not be a permanent fix, but there's a small freeware called Oxios Hibernate that releases RAM. I just put it on my start menu and 2 clicks....I have free RAM. Try it out, you won't be disappointed.

Oxios hibernate is nice.. But it doesn't always help.

I ran it on my ppc after I was down to 9mb free with NOTHING running.. it freed up 700k...

-mark

Dishe

12th August 2007, 05:35 PM

Oxios hibernate is nice.. But it doesn't always help.

I ran it on my ppc after I was down to 9mb free with NOTHING running.. it freed up 700k...

-mark

jeez man, what are you doing on your device that keeps the memory down like that? do you have a lot of plug ins installed or something?
How much memory do you have on a soft reset?

uberGoober

15th August 2007, 09:09 PM

someone mentioned that these were the culprits: HTC_Guardian and SSDaemon

What do each of them do? (before I remove the links to them in the startup folder)

diomark

15th August 2007, 09:51 PM

You guys need to hit the easy button on this one! It may not be a permanent fix, but there's a small freeware called Oxios Hibernate that releases RAM. I just put it on my start menu and 2 clicks....I have free RAM. Try it out, you won't be disappointed.

I'm still going down from ~16-17mb free to ~10mb free overnight.. with nothing loaded (and I've tried using oxios...)
-mark

Dishe

16th August 2007, 12:40 AM

I'm still going down from ~16-17mb free to ~10mb free overnight.. with nothing loaded (and I've tried using oxios...)
-mark

As I said before, you've got to be doing something unholy to it.

Why on earth are you only starting with 16-17mb free? With several apps open, I average around 15-16mb! When all apps are closed, I get ~20mb. Sometimes I need to run Oxios to get it over 20, but most of the time I don't see the point in bothering with it. So what if the file system cache is eating a couple of MBs? As long as things are running smoothly, I'll let it do its thing (its purpose IS to make things run smoother after all, and in general I find that it works).

What plugins, etc. have you installed? I asked you this a few posts ago, but since you didn't respond, perhaps you are afraid to tell us since that might be your problem... lot easier to complain about something and wish it away than to do something about it...

AJerman

16th August 2007, 12:55 AM

As I said before, you've got to be doing something unholy to it.

Why on earth are you only starting with 16-17mb free? With several apps open, I average around 15-16mb! When all apps are closed, I get ~20mb. Sometimes I need to run Oxios to get it over 20, but most of the time I don't see the point in bothering with it. So what if the file system cache is eating a couple of MBs? As long as things are running smoothly, I'll let it do its thing (its purpose IS to make things run smoother after all, and in general I find that it works).

What plugins, etc. have you installed? I asked you this a few posts ago, but since you didn't respond, perhaps you are afraid to tell us since that might be your problem... lot easier to complain about something and wish it away than to do something about it...

Out of curiosity, what plugins of note to you use. I know I use two big memory hogs, the Touch Home plugin, and Slide 2 Unlock. Perhaps the Resco home plugin uses a bit as well. Either way, when I just grabbed my phone from charging, I had email, active sync, IE, and PocketCM running, and I had about 9 mb free. After closing everything and running Oxios, I went up to a grand total of 15,824 KB free.

On a fresh boot I get... *waits* 21.8 MB free and dropping... I'll wait for it to stabilize. Looks like it was checking email as a notification just came up. 21.44 MB free looks like my final number.

Honestly, I could care less how much memory I have free as long as I have enough to run everything smooth (which I don't always, but maybe Oxios will help that). However, there must be a way to list all applications that are running, even the ones not shown in the Memory module of Settings. It would be interested to see exactly what is running and how much memory EVERYTHING is using.

gobmonster

16th August 2007, 02:17 AM

I usually get around 22 mbs free after a restart, and it always seems to decrease constantly

right now im at 17, keep in mind that i can run a few programs in the first hour and have no problem, but as time goes on, ram goes down

i noticed that pie seems to have the most fluctuate release of memory when closing. sometimes it lets it all goe, sometimes it lets only a little bit

levelbest

16th August 2007, 04:06 AM

Hey All:

Ok, don't hammer me for using windows media player. I know, I know. Whatever ;)

Anyway, I installed Oxios and noticed after I ran it that windows media player would play about 30 seconds of a cut and then roll on to the next cut. And it would keep doing that till I soft reset. (edit - it's definately "close apps" that does this - not the "hibernate" - tested it and confirmed)

Of note, I am running the newer rom that came out last month, but there seemed to be a correlation between the two. When I don't run it, I don't have the issue.

On the memory hog side of things...

1) Slide2Unlock - yep, I run it and yep, it hogs.
2) WisBar Advance. love how you can skin your phone but it eats memory and I'm not convinced that the current beta doesn't have a memory leak. I have pulled it for now and the phone is running MUCH better without it.
3) Phone Alarm - dunno about this but guessing it sucks resources. Still running it.
4) iLauncher - Love it, can't give it up. Don't know what it does memory wise.

Other than that - I have started using Opera Mobile instead of IE and that seems to help. Oh, and I have removed the two files from the startup folder.

It's still a bummer though. I start out with 17-18mb free and by the end of the day (right now) I have 6.12 mb free. Simply put, I have been soft resetting first thing in the morning. Wish I didn't have to do that though.

Update: Just did a reset - and I officially start at 23.05mb - and am down to 6.12 at the end of the day with nothing apparent running.

diomark

16th August 2007, 11:10 PM

I'm running three memory hogs that I can't really live without -

SPB mobile shell
Microsoft voice command
SBSH Pocket breeze

(and a bunch of smaller ones that use a few kb here, few kb there..) - I'm fine with this though - the only program that I seem to have problems loading is minimo - which is a complete memory hog...

(Still - would be nice to shrink the memory usage down a bit..)

To be honest - not really sure where it's going -

activesync - 584kb
aebplus - 204kb
connmgr - 236kb
cprog - 936kb
device.exe - 4092kb
filesys.exe - 3980kb
gwes.exe - 3432kb
mobileshell.exe - 2028kb
nk.exe - 216kb
pdanetwm.exe - 100kb
poutlook.exe - 16kb
services.exe 456kb
shell32.exe - 1536kb
tmail.exe - 436kb
voicecmd.exe - 2304kb

...that's on a fresh boot. that adds up to 20mb's... yet I'm starting with 16-17mb's free...

Where's the other 25mb's??? Is HTC using that much??

-mark

As I said before, you've got to be doing something unholy to it.

Why on earth are you only starting with 16-17mb free? With several apps open, I average around 15-16mb! When all apps are closed, I get ~20mb. Sometimes I need to run Oxios to get it over 20, but most of the time I don't see the point in bothering with it. So what if the file system cache is eating a couple of MBs? As long as things are running smoothly, I'll let it do its thing (its purpose IS to make things run smoother after all, and in general I find that it works).

What plugins, etc. have you installed? I asked you this a few posts ago, but since you didn't respond, perhaps you are afraid to tell us since that might be your problem... lot easier to complain about something and wish it away than to do something about it...

Dishe

16th August 2007, 11:22 PM

I'm running three memory hogs that I can't really live without -

SPB mobile shell
Microsoft voice command
SBSH Pocket breeze

(and a bunch of smaller ones that use a few kb here, few kb there..) - I'm fine with this though - the only program that I seem to have problems loading is minimo - which is a complete memory hog...

(Still - would be nice to shrink the memory usage down a bit..)

To be honest - not really sure where it's going -

activesync - 584kb
aebplus - 204kb
connmgr - 236kb
cprog - 936kb
device.exe - 4092kb
filesys.exe - 3980kb
gwes.exe - 3432kb
mobileshell.exe - 2028kb
nk.exe - 216kb
pdanetwm.exe - 100kb
poutlook.exe - 16kb
services.exe 456kb
shell32.exe - 1536kb
tmail.exe - 436kb
voicecmd.exe - 2304kb

...that's on a fresh boot. that adds up to 20mb's... yet I'm starting with 16-17mb's free...

Where's the other 25mb's??? Is HTC using that much??

-mark

MiniMO!
Oh don't bother with that... did it ever leave beta?
I played with it for 5 minutes before swearing never to touch it again!
Use Opera Mini if you want full rendered pages (mini 4 beta is really slick with a touchscreen... scroll around the page and zoom like the iphone browser), and if you want flash/java support, go with Netfront or something... anything is better than minimo!

Anyway, as far as your memory... I have voice command so I know its not that one, but maybe Breeze and Mobile shell are causing the leaks?
If I were you I'd systematically try using the device without one of them for a day or two just to see if that's the cause of the problem.

diomark

17th August 2007, 10:21 PM

MiniMO!
Oh don't bother with that... did it ever leave beta?
I played with it for 5 minutes before swearing never to touch it again!
Use Opera Mini if you want full rendered pages (mini 4 beta is really slick with a touchscreen... scroll around the page and zoom like the iphone browser), and if you want flash/java support, go with Netfront or something... anything is better than minimo!

Anyway, as far as your memory... I have voice command so I know its not that one, but maybe Breeze and Mobile shell are causing the leaks?
If I were you I'd systematically try using the device without one of them for a day or two just to see if that's the cause of the problem.

still in beta - 0.2 - it doesn't load unless you have ~17-18mb memory free..

But it's FAST when it does run...
-mark

diomark

18th August 2007, 06:11 PM

I can't believe in mid-2007 HTC would release a WM phone with only 64mb of memory - out of which only 47mb's is usable!

Is there a way to setup a pagepool on our devices?
-mark

Wescorp7

30th August 2007, 04:08 PM

I had a similar problem on my appache. I found that when I used internet explorer it stored information from web sites. I had to go into the IE options and memory tab to clear the memory and make it available again.

Anubiset

30th August 2007, 08:09 PM

I'm running SPB Mobile Shell, SPB Backup, SPB Diary, SPB Phone Suite, HTC Home, HTC Dialer, HTC X-Button 1.5, and Weather Panel. I have SPB Diary, Phone Suite, and Weather Panel as tabs in Mobile Shell and I have the Mobile Shell Tabs above HTC Home. In HTC Home I'm running the Home Tab, Program Launcher Tab, Contacts Tab, and the Music Tab. I leave my phone running all day and night and never see any memory issues. My phone has been running for two days now without soft reset and I have 18 MB of RAM free after heavy use of telephone, text messaging, and internet browsing. There must be something going on that your phone is using so much memory. Make sure your programs are closing when you exit them and make sure nothing is running in the background that you don't know about. You may want to try a program like memaid to help you find the source of the problem. If my RAM ever starts to get low, I just use oxios to free it up. I never see my RAM get below 16MB and using Oxios brings it right back up to 18-20MB free. Hope this helps :-)

oakwestplayer

4th September 2007, 01:21 AM

hi guys, isnt there a registry hack to lower the system cache size? im not familiar with wm6 but im interested in jumping ship from a ip830 to the mogul but on reading this idk if that would taking a step foward and two steps back. on a soft reset i have about 45 mb of ram, but i have my systems cache set real low. can this be done on wm6?

lanwarrior

5th September 2007, 08:52 AM

I use SKTools and it has a tool called "FreeUp RAM". I set this with the softkey applet so when my memory going below 12 Mb, I run this tool to bring back the memory to 18-20 Mb.

Windows Mobile leak has been there since WM2003 and M$ never bother to fix it...

oakwestplayer

5th September 2007, 10:02 AM

you can also use sktools to set the system cache to 2mb. give that a try and maybe that'll help.

Dishe

5th September 2007, 05:58 PM

I can't beleive people are still discussing this, and even calling it a leak, bug, oversight by M$, etc... and yet others are still asking if they can adjust the size!

I don't know how many more times you people need to hear this, but the "leak" is a file system cache that helps keep WM6 running smoothly without hiccups.
We are no longer using shared RAM between storage and memory (as 2003 did), and starting with WM5, we now thankfully have real dedicated storage that won't get wiped out when the battery dies or need to be compromised for the working memory.
The catch with storage memory (and this is true of ANY storage medium, whether it is flash based or disc / hard drive / tape medium) is that it is not as fast to read/write from as RAM is, and needs to be accessed in blocks of memory at a time (as opposed to RAM which can read/write from individual bits if needed). Imagine if every time a single bit was written to storage there was a pause for a second or two. Something as simple as loading a web page would be grueling!
Hence the system cache... instead of writing directly to the storage memory, everything is written to a temporary location in RAM, which then writes to the storage card a whole block of data at a time when ready, or when the system is idle. The same is true of reading data... if a certain portion of data is accessed often, the system cache will keep that data in RAM instead of loading it from storage every single time.
The more programs that access the storage, the more memory will be eaten up by this process. However, if left to its own devices after a certain amount of time, the cache WILL free itself up. I've seen my device go from 12mb to 18mb free in a matter of minutes, not touching anything.

Programs like SKtools and Oxious Hibernate free up ram by forcing the system to clear the cache immediately instead of waiting for it. This circumvents the purpose of the cache, but it might help in the shortrun if something is memory hungry.

The bottom line is that this shouldn't be considered a problem... if you're missing memory after using a lot of apps, than its is working properly. It will free itself up over time, or if needed you can always clear it earlier.
Oh, and before you start blaming Microsoft for this annoying way of doing things, you should just know that HTC wrote the file system for their hardware. So if you have a problem with their way of doing it, complain to HTC not Microsoft (who has NOT been overlooking some "bug" since 2003.... seriously people, come on already!).

defaultdotxbe

5th September 2007, 07:46 PM

IThe more programs that access the storage, the more memory will be eaten up by this process. However, if left to its own devices after a certain amount of time, the cache WILL free itself up. I've seen my device go from 12mb to 18mb free in a matter of minutes, not touching anything.

The bottom line is that this shouldn't be considered a problem... if you're missing memory after using a lot of apps, than its is working properly. It will free itself up over time, or if needed you can always clear it earlier.

the problem for me (and probably others here) is that it doesnt ever free up, on mine memory will drop from 18mb to 15 to 10 to 5 to 0 without ever running any apps at all, and it never comes back not matter how long i let it sit, maybe i have an app with an actual memory leak but my mogul has been doing it since day 1, i just make it a point to soft reset once a day, but its certainly not working the way it should (the way you describe)

Dishe

5th September 2007, 11:50 PM

the problem for me (and probably others here) is that it doesnt ever free up, on mine memory will drop from 18mb to 15 to 10 to 5 to 0 without ever running any apps at all, and it never comes back not matter how long i let it sit, maybe i have an app with an actual memory leak but my mogul has been doing it since day 1, i just make it a point to soft reset once a day, but its certainly not working the way it should (the way you describe)

I'd take a hard look at what you have installed on your device.
That's clearly not right.

f00dl3

7th September 2007, 04:21 PM

raysfx

7th September 2007, 06:45 PM

how do you delete the shortcuts from startup?? it gives me access denied error..

Dishe

8th September 2007, 12:22 AM

unlock your device first. Search for it.

lanwarrior

8th September 2007, 06:55 AM

That sddaemon is a real memory hog. Disabled that app from startup and freed up about 5-6 MBs of program memory. Phone is notably smoother without it, especially since I don't even use Voice Speed Dial.

(Got the flashlight app assigned to the button VSD used).

What is the purpose of sddaemon? Sounds quite important.. the "daemon" part.

unlock your device first. Search for it.

Unlock the device?? How can you unlock a PCS device and to what purpose, since Verizon won't take the phone. GSM (like 8525) I know, but PCS device? Maybe I am missing something here...

rijc99

9th September 2007, 10:27 AM

Unlock the device?? How can you unlock a PCS device and to what purpose, since Verizon won't take the phone. GSM (like 8525) I know, but PCS device? Maybe I am missing something here...

Unlocking as in being able to install any program... don't think of it as in unlocking a GSM phone to be able to accept any SIM. There are various methods listed... registry tweaks, prepackaged cabs, etc.

I believe several people found the SDDAEMON file to be a startup file for the voice command program. Most believe it to be unnecessary.

Also, I was able to delete the startup files without having to unlock first.

lanwarrior

10th September 2007, 09:05 AM

Unlocking as in being able to install any program... don't think of it as in unlocking a GSM phone to be able to accept any SIM. There are various methods listed... registry tweaks, prepackaged cabs, etc.

I believe several people found the SDDAEMON file to be a startup file for the voice command program. Most believe it to be unnecessary.

Also, I was able to delete the startup files without having to unlock first.

Oh ok. I though unlocking refer to unlocking the phone. LOL! I used GSM phones before so that terms still stuck in my mind for unlocking phones.

Anyho, I think my Mogul is already "unlocked" since I can install any programs the moment I received my phone. I made changes to the registry to without issue. I am going to try removing the SDDAEMON file from the startup folder.

freegood

12th September 2007, 08:06 AM

I too had this problem of losing memory while sliding my Mogul. For me, I fixed the problem by installing Esmertec Jbed and using it to run Opera Mini. I would lose memory while sliding it ( down to 10), but after I closed the program, my memory went back to 19 MB.

Before installing Emsertec Jbed, my leakage would happen even after I closed Opera/Java as long as I initially ran the program.

I hope this helped some of you in your problems.

lanwarrior

12th September 2007, 09:49 AM

I know that Windows Mobile (2003/5) is known to have memory leaks. I had it with my T-Mobile MDA (Wizard), Cingular 8525 (Hermes) and now the Mogul.

However, it seems that the memory leak in the Mogul is much more apparent. I installed the same applications between the 3 devices, such as Spb Pocket Plus, Pocket Informant, PhoneAlarm, etc. and the Mogul memory will decrease to 10 Mb throughout the day. Running "Freeup Ram" application from SKTools only frees up about 3Mb, compared to 5-6Mb with the Cingular 8525.

I really wish M$ will fix this and Sprint comes up with newer ROM update or something.

diomark

12th September 2007, 06:04 PM

But it is a problem.
The point of cache memory is that it should go out of the way (and free up ram) automatically if there's a program that needs it..

Yet why is it that tomtom (for me) which needs ~10mb of memory free sometimes doesn't load with out of memory errors, when *nothing else* is running on my phone? (but when the phone's been up for a day or two..)

MS's cache doesn't behave correctly.
-mark

I can't beleive people are still discussing this, and even calling it a leak, bug, oversight by M$, etc... and yet others are still asking if they can adjust the size!

I don't know how many more times you people need to hear this, but the "leak" is a file system cache that helps keep WM6 running smoothly without hiccups.
We are no longer using shared RAM between storage and memory (as 2003 did), and starting with WM5, we now thankfully have real dedicated storage that won't get wiped out when the battery dies or need to be compromised for the working memory.
The catch with storage memory (and this is true of ANY storage medium, whether it is flash based or disc / hard drive / tape medium) is that it is not as fast to read/write from as RAM is, and needs to be accessed in blocks of memory at a time (as opposed to RAM which can read/write from individual bits if needed). Imagine if every time a single bit was written to storage there was a pause for a second or two. Something as simple as loading a web page would be grueling!
Hence the system cache... instead of writing directly to the storage memory, everything is written to a temporary location in RAM, which then writes to the storage card a whole block of data at a time when ready, or when the system is idle. The same is true of reading data... if a certain portion of data is accessed often, the system cache will keep that data in RAM instead of loading it from storage every single time.
The more programs that access the storage, the more memory will be eaten up by this process. However, if left to its own devices after a certain amount of time, the cache WILL free itself up. I've seen my device go from 12mb to 18mb free in a matter of minutes, not touching anything.

Programs like SKtools and Oxious Hibernate free up ram by forcing the system to clear the cache immediately instead of waiting for it. This circumvents the purpose of the cache, but it might help in the shortrun if something is memory hungry.

The bottom line is that this shouldn't be considered a problem... if you're missing memory after using a lot of apps, than its is working properly. It will free itself up over time, or if needed you can always clear it earlier.
Oh, and before you start blaming Microsoft for this annoying way of doing things, you should just know that HTC wrote the file system for their hardware. So if you have a problem with their way of doing it, complain to HTC not Microsoft (who has NOT been overlooking some "bug" since 2003.... seriously people, come on already!).

scottdw

12th September 2007, 06:08 PM

For the people who have success with the "oxios hibernate" program (I am one of them), I wonder if a MortScript could be written to run this every once in a while automatically.

Just a thought :)

DopeWeasel

14th September 2007, 03:37 AM

For the people who have success with the "oxios hibernate" program (I am one of them), I wonder if a MortScript could be written to run this every once in a while automatically.

Just a thought :)

Typically adding more processes would defeat the purpose this thread is attempting to achieve, but nice thought.

... anyone know what IMstartup.exe is for? Google couldn't find any English description for me. "IMstartup.exe" is a GoogleWhack. Only thing I can think of is Pocket MSN.

rijc99

15th September 2007, 09:28 AM

For those of you that have removed HTC_Guardian and SDDaemon, can you test to see if the OEM SD Card encryption still runs... Thanks.

dragon_76

15th September 2007, 10:24 PM

MS's cache doesn't behave correctly.
-mark

The memory manager for Windows Mobile doesn't behave correctly. There is a big argument on MSDN where one of the devs for WM6 explains why the user shouldn't have to manage their own memory. BUT I get OOM errors when I use an app that needs a lot of memory and I am asked to close application. Why do I have to manage my own memory then! Makes no sense. If an app does not close when you press the X button, it should be an OK button, IMHO.

lanwarrior

16th September 2007, 12:17 AM

For those of you that have removed HTC_Guardian and SDDaemon, can you test to see if the OEM SD Card encryption still runs... Thanks.

What's the purpose of HTC_Guardian.exe? I removed SDDaemon and my device seems to response much slower than before, especially when I open and reopen the same application (Outlook) and at the Today's Screen (PhoneAlarm and SpB Plus). So I am hesitant to remove another executable from HTC.

Dishe

16th September 2007, 05:43 AM

What's the purpose of HTC_Guardian.exe? I removed SDDaemon and my device seems to response much slower than before, especially when I open and reopen the same application (Outlook) and at the Today's Screen (PhoneAlarm and SpB Plus). So I am hesitant to remove another executable from HTC.

It enforces the data settings.
It is not necessary unless you mess with the data settings yourself and find it not working, or if you travel alot into roaming areas and find the data suddenly doesn't work.
I removed mine and have zero problems unless roaming exclusively in upstate NY.

winmobilelawyer

10th October 2007, 11:45 PM

Personally, I think the WM6 caching works just fine. VERY TRUE, we should not have to manage our phone memory by using oxios and what not. However, if you think about it, we are kind of experiencing an "in between" right now. And what I mean is that just a couple years ago, the PDA's that were out (Palms, etc.) were pretty much amazing, hardly any problems. Then out pops the ppc6700s and others similar with windows mobile 2003 and such, and now gues what, software developers big and small are starting to catch on to the popularity of these mini computers and are building very powerful apps for these phones (Live Search, Google Maps, OperaMini, Games that put even Nintendo64 to shame) and they require a LOT of memory. So once again we are in between and waiting for the phones now to catch up to the software. If youve noticed, a lot of these bigger memory using programs have started to include a true "Exit" option in their menus (Live Search, Opera Mobile, and some others).

So the caching WORKS. But if youve got 2 or 3 memory hog apps that you run in the background (Mobile Shell, Wisbar, etc) and then you pop open Java or Opera or Live Search and you dont actually close them. Of course you have no memory available. Closing apps after you are done using them is not "managing your own memory" its just common sense. And I don't mean text messaging and PocketIE type programs, these are dinky little programs that your phone could run all day without the slightest problem.

So yes, memory is sometimes a problem, but thats because we are impatient and cannot wait for the hardware to meet up to the software. I suppose if you want Microsoft to do anything about it, they should start building their own phones to match their software.

klmsu19

11th October 2007, 01:54 AM

thats a totally different topic.

here were talking about you start with say 24mb free ram. you open some programs and TOTALLY close them out with x button. do this over the day and with nothing open your free ram will be down to <18mb free. theres multiple mb of RAM escaping and not being reclaimed by closing out the programs. Thats NOT proper operation for any PPC it shouldnt LOSE memory over the day

lanwarrior

11th October 2007, 05:18 AM

ji1386

11th October 2007, 09:56 AM

Agreed. That's what I experienced with the Mogul. Even with no 3rd party apps (I hard reset my device to test it), it still happening but a slower rate.

Same problem here. I'm a Telus P4000 owner and have the exact same problem... Hopefully we get some sort of software update that'll fix it...

Check out these screenshots. The first is after a day of use, as in i soft reset when i woke up and took this screen shot by the end of the day. The second is after a soft reset. Both with "no programs" running...

lanwarrior

11th October 2007, 10:15 AM

Same problem here. I'm a Telus P4000 owner and have the exact same problem... Hopefully we get some sort of software update that'll fix it...

Check out these screenshots. The first is after a day of use, as in i soft reset when i woke up and took this screen shot by the end of the day. The second is after a soft reset. Both with "no programs" running...

That's insane! Mine will go down about 17 Mb and I thought I had it bad.

Guys, I found a tool called SkTools that have a feature called "FreeUp RAM". Basically, just run this tools when the memory is dipping and it'll simulate a low memory situation (like 2 Mb) and force WM6 to free up those memory.

I tried it like this:
1) Start of the day with 23 Mb FREE
2) Throughout the day of opening/closing program, memory stands at 17 MB even after I close ALL programs
3) Run FreeUp RAM and memory back to around 21 Mb FREE.

Until M$ comes up with the fix (or Sprint does), this is a good temporary solution.

thehelios

11th October 2007, 06:12 PM

Just download oxios memory. It's free and will free up memory really well on the mogul. Plus there are no menus, just click the app and thats it.

http://www.oxios.com/memory/

Shaska

15th October 2007, 06:49 PM

Granted, That IS a great program, But people are angry that they need to use such a program in the first place...

Imagine if you had a windows computer with 2GB's of RAM, and over the course of a day your memory disappears down to 1.2GB for no appearent reason... Would you be happy constantly running a program to clear out the system ram because of a horrible idea causing the system to not immediately free the memory?

Hopefully in future ROM updates this will get tweaked to work a lot better, And also heres hoping to WM6 Kitchens so we can take windows into our own hands and tweak it as we see fit to maximize the memory use...

nino63004

18th October 2007, 08:53 AM

lanwarrior

18th October 2007, 08:57 AM

i did these reg hacks and when i went back and restored them to the original settings i no longer go below 19mb.

Using a registry editor such as PHM RegEdit lookup and change the following three values:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\StorageManager\FATFS\Cac heSize=0x1000(4096)
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\StorageManager\FATFS\Ena bleCache=0x1(1)
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\StorageManager\Filters\f sreplxfilt\ReplStoreCacheSize=0x1000(4096)

when i changed those i would go down to 15 mb but now since i put it back to stock its hasnt been below 19mb after i close all apps :)

If I am not wrong, the above are the reghack for FAT File System to speed up the operation of the Windows Mobile, but at the expenses of memory.

However, even without applying the above, I still experiences memory decrease. One key point I noted is that it seems to happen more often when I:
- Open the keyboard
- Have pull email configured

Note that I am, at this point, is NOT running any 3rd party apps.

freegood

19th October 2007, 09:36 AM

Just download oxios memory. It's free and will free up memory really well on the mogul. Plus there are no menus, just click the app and thats it.

http://www.oxios.com/memory/

This program works great. I've gotten back 16 mb after a good day's use, but after running it, my Mogul starts acting weird.

The mp3 player such as Pocket Player will only play for 30 seconds after the screen shuts down.

If I run another program such as Opera Mini, the Pocket player automatically closes, and visa versa. The amount of RAM when I do this is around 6mb, which then makes me run Oxios again.

So it seems to work well with only one program running.

Based off of other members' previous comments, I think it's a cache issue that oxios messes with.

lanwarrior

19th October 2007, 10:19 AM

This program works great. I've gotten back 16 mb after a good day's use, but after running it, my Mogul starts acting weird.

The mp3 player such as Pocket Player will only play for 30 seconds after the screen shuts down.

If I run another program such as Opera Mini, the Pocket player automatically closes, and visa versa. The amount of RAM when I do this is around 6mb, which then makes me run Oxios again.

So it seems to work well with only one program running.

Based off of other members' previous comments, I think it's a cache issue that oxios messes with.

I use SKTools FreeupRAM and never had the issue above.

ilordvader

5th January 2008, 05:37 AM

I use SKTools FreeupRAM and never had the issue above.

with SKTools FreeupRAM (any links for this freeware )
or
http://www.oxios.com/memory
how much memory do we make ?

I mean is it worth it ?

Nunim

5th January 2008, 05:59 AM

stevenewjersey

5th January 2008, 01:56 PM

What is up with the memory drain on this device. I'll start the day with 24mb of memory (soft reset) and only have 10mb or less at the end of the day with no apps but activesync running. Has anyone less notice this?

Remove every HTC program from the device. I did and my phone runs for days at a time.

donas2000

16th January 2008, 11:17 AM

How much memory is available on a new 6800/mogul before any extra stuff is installed?

ronin

16th January 2008, 05:38 PM

donas2000

16th January 2008, 06:50 PM

I've got a program installed that helps me out, but I don't know how much memory was already consumed when I started out fresh???

ca3sar

16th January 2008, 09:04 PM

It that something that has to be selected each morning or something>? or does it autorun?

jraggio

6th April 2008, 01:08 AM

I don't seem to be having any of these memory issues, I'm running that latest rom with Wisbar lite so I can actually close programs and they won't sit around eating up memory. I have PDANet home plugin and wisbar running and I'm at 24.79 free ram. I recently did a soft reset and before that it was about 22 megs of ram with some junk open. You guys are trying to run too much in the background.

What is PDANet home plugin? Is that the same as the HTC Home plugin?

I can't figure out what I'm running really, but after a soft reset I'm down to 15.

I have HTC Home plugin and spb pocket diary running. I have active sync syncing with my work exchange server. I have like 1200 messages in my inbox along with 200 contacts and 500 tasks. Does Outlook data use a lot of memory? Does acticesync over the air have a leak of some sort?

I'm also running wisbar advance. I forgot to mention that before.

Thanks,
John

JoeSchmoe22

12th April 2008, 11:30 PM

I suffer from the same memory issues just like most everyone in this thread. To make matters worse, I use about 5 "MUST HAVE" programs that load every time I boot my Mogul. They are:

PhoneAlarm
PocketBreeze [for tabs and calendar]
WeatherPanel
S2U2 [only way to keep from accidentally answer calls while in my pocket]
cLaunch

In the morning on my way out the door I do a reboot to start my day with maximum memory. At that moment I have about 17.5MB with everything above running and a few small apps like batti .

Within 20 minutes I'm down to around [B]14MB.

In an hour I'm down to somewhere between 10MB and 12MB.

2 to 3 hours later, after 3 or 4 phone calls, ActiveSyncing with PUSH emails connecting to an Exchange server, about 5 text messages and checking a contact phone number, I'm down below 10MB for sure. Most likely right at 9.5MB.

If I want to launch PIE at this time, it's about a 50% chance it will launch. If it doesn't I can run SKTool's FreeRAM and I may pick up anywhere from 1MB to 3MB of RAM. Now PIE will launch and it usually works okay until I bump into a site with a lot of photos or content. Then many times my Mogul locks up and I have to reboot because it won't run with less than 1MB free.

OKAY, this is my day and it SUCKS! :mad: I usually reboot once to twice a day. If I avoid surfing the web I can make it through the day. I usually walk in the door at night with about 3.5MB of free RAM.

I decided to try to fix things and started reading a lot of blogs on XDA, SprintMogul.net, PPCGeeks, PDAPhonehome, etc. and I think I have got it dialed in finally.

YEAH!! :D

So here's what I did.
1.] Kept all my same program. No changes there.
2.] Replaced SKTools' FreeRAM with Oxios. It has no menu, so no extra step to run, and it seems to free up more RAM than SK's. I did a few unofficial tests and Oxios seems to release more RAM every time.
3.] This is the "Biggie". Used SKTools' "Optimize" feature and set it to "Memory" [not Maximum Memory] and let it handle all the changes and then reset the device. This cut back the amount of memory that my Mogul could allocate to system cache and other caches. The phone / CPU is already snappy enough so you'll hardly notice any change in performance, but you'll get a whole lot more RAM back.
4.] Follow the advice in this thread to overwrite the HTC_CM_Guardian and SDDaemon files with text files. You see a small pick up in RAM and in addition your RAM will not continue to drop all day. [FYI, I'm using the new 3.35 ROM, so I couldn't disable in my startup folder. Also, I don't use the Voice Dial, so I didn't need SDDaemon.]

My phone works great and I have plenty of memory! I reboot fresh with about 18MB and go all day and end with about 15MB. If I run OThe next thing I'm going to try is Opera Mini to avoid the memory hogging of PIE.

Good luck to all the Mogul users, I know your pain.

JaxDreamFunding

13th April 2008, 04:08 AM

So here's what I did.
1.] Kept all my same program. No changes there.
2.] Replaced SKTools' FreeRAM with Oxios. It has no menu, so no extra step to run, and it seems to free up more RAM than SK's. I did a few unofficial tests and Oxios seems to release more RAM every time.
3.] This is the "Biggie". Used SKTools' "Optimize" feature and set it to "Memory" [not Maximum Memory] and let it handle all the changes and then reset the device. This cut back the amount of memory that my Mogul could allocate to system cache and other caches. The phone / CPU is already snappy enough so you'll hardly notice any change in performance, but you'll get a whole lot more RAM back.
4.] Follow the advice in this thread to overwrite the HTC_CM_Guardian and SDDaemon files with text files. You see a small pick up in RAM and in addition your RAM will not continue to drop all day. [FYI, I'm using the new 3.35 ROM, so I couldn't disable in my startup folder. Also, I don't use the Voice Dial, so I didn't need SDDaemon.]

My phone works great and I have plenty of memory! I reboot fresh with about 18MB and go all day and end with about 15MB. If I run OThe next thing I'm going to try is Opera Mini to avoid the memory hogging of PIE.

Good luck to all the Mogul users, I know your pain.

WOW....Incredible. I just did what you outlined and replaced the HTC Guardian and SDDaemon with txt files. When I reboot, I have 19.3 to 19.7 free....if I run Oxios Hibernate as soon as I finish the boot process, it takes it up to 20.7meg free....I will wait and see what kind of leaks I have.

clamknuckle

13th April 2008, 05:22 AM

Ok, so what do you do if you don't have HTC_CM or SDDaemon at all and you are still coming with a memory leak?

devinf

13th April 2008, 09:53 AM

Ok, so what do you do if you don't have HTC_CM or SDDaemon at all and you are still coming with a memory leak?

I have got to seconed that! I got this phone just recently shipped with the new rom and radio.
I dont have those two files in startup... are they somewhere else or did htc just eliminate them already?

JaxDreamFunding

13th April 2008, 11:24 PM

I did not have those files in startup either...I just copied a txt file renames as exe over them and did a soft boot. Now those files are not in memory any more.

JoeSchmoe22

14th April 2008, 08:31 PM

Ok, so what do you do if you don't have HTC_CM or SDDaemon at all and you are still coming with a memory leak?

Did you check the processes or just the startup folder? You may find that the processes are running. Use a task manager to check the processes.

JoeSchmoe22

14th April 2008, 08:42 PM

I have got to seconed that! I got this phone just recently shipped with the new rom and radio.
I dont have those two files in startup... are they somewhere else or did htc just eliminate them already?

They're still there, but in ROM 3.35 they moved them out of the startup folder. They are now started by another process. I haven't tried to figure out which process does launch them. If you verify that they are starting by using a Task Manager to view your processes, then the easiest way to avoid them starting in the future is to copy a "null" file over each one of the files in the Windows directory and reboot. You will need to use a file manager like Total Commander to copy over the files. It works great! Memory consumption will drop.

nonegiven

15th April 2008, 05:42 AM

They're still there, but in ROM 3.35 they moved them out of the startup folder. They are now started by another process. I haven't tried to figure out which process does launch them. If you verify that they are starting by using a Task Manager to view your processes, then the easiest way to avoid them starting in the future is to copy a "null" file over each one of the files in the Windows directory and reboot. You will need to use a file manager like Total Commander to copy over the files. It works great! Memory consumption will drop.
I'm running 3.35 WM6.1 and don't have the HTC_CM Guardian on my phone. Resco Explorer doesn't find anything close to that name (hidden, ROM, etc.) and no process is running with that name.

clamknuckle

15th April 2008, 04:44 PM

I'm running 3.35 WM6.1 and don't have the HTC_CM Guardian on my phone. Resco Explorer doesn't find anything close to that name (hidden, ROM, etc.) and no process is running with that name.

Same here. I guess I should have mentioned I'm on nuerom 5060.

jraggio

17th April 2008, 06:02 AM

I got so aggravated the other day and I did a hard reset. I haven't installed much yet. After the hard reset I was at 26 MB! Seemed to stay there all day long. I then setup push via wireless activesync and I went down to 20 MB. I have a lot of calendar entries, 300 contacts and about 300 items in my inbox now. I wonder if the amount of Outlook data affects memory usage. Before the hard reset I had 1,500 items in my inbox, but I wouldn't think that would matter, but you never know.

This is killing me. Verizon shows no signs of getting the new ROM with GPS and 6.1. I'm thinking of going to a cooked ROM. Anyone out there using a 6.1, GPS enabled ROM with the Verizon XV6800? Will I see any better memory performance? How hard is it to install?

John

JoeSchmoe22

17th April 2008, 06:52 AM

I got so aggravated the other day and I did a hard reset. I haven't installed much yet. After the hard reset I was at 26 MB! Seemed to stay there all day long. I then setup push via wireless activesync and I went down to 20 MB. I have a lot of calendar entries, 300 contacts and about 300 items in my inbox now. I wonder if the amount of Outlook data affects memory usage. Before the hard reset I had 1,500 items in my inbox, but I wouldn't think that would matter, but you never know.
John

I'm not sure if the email count matters, but the ActiveSync with calendar, tasks and contacts will eat up a lot of memory. HTC should have thought about this for a business PDA / phone and installed more memory!!:mad:

akboy82

8th May 2008, 07:18 PM

i did these reg hacks and when i went back and restored them to the original settings i no longer go below 19mb.

Using a registry editor such as PHM RegEdit lookup and change the following three values:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\StorageManager\FATFS\Cac heSize=0x1000(4096)
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\StorageManager\FATFS\Ena bleCache=0x1(1)
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\StorageManager\Filters\f sreplxfilt\ReplStoreCacheSize=0x1000(4096)

when i changed those i would go down to 15 mb but now since i put it back to stock its hasnt been below 19mb after i close all apps :)

Nino

Does anyone know what the optimal settings for the above are for 6.1?

I have been playing with different setting for the last week because I'm tired of running out of memory!!! When I'm really low on memory I find that WM will auto turn off programs I'm running when the screen turns off, this doesn't go well when I'm using the phone for navigation because I have restart the program and find sat's all over.

Someone also said to remove HTC_CM_Guardian and SDDaemon, but I don't have anything like that on my mogule. I do have a file calle VCDaemon.exe that is in the start up folder, does anyone know what that does?

Another way to save ram is turn off extra services http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=385054