The all new Android update with problems of its own
Where do I start with Lollipop 5.1?
Well I could start by saying how remarkably surprised I was to get the signal to download this software via the old OTA route.
Nvidia had been reglecting us Tegra Note 7 users for quite some time since KitKat with no update to Lollipop 5.0 when that came out ages ago. Some might say that this was a smart move by Nvidia seeing as though lots of people had reported major bugs with 5.0 after its release.
So along comes 5.1 a little over a week ago and so for me this was a totally new operating system and for others a huge bug fix. I was excited to get Lollipop for the first time regardless of the consequences!
Well I could start by saying how remarkably surprised I was to get the signal to download this software via the old OTA route.
Nvidia had been reglecting us Tegra Note 7 users for quite some time since KitKat with no update to Lollipop 5.0 when that came out ages ago. Some might say that this was a smart move by Nvidia seeing as though lots of people had reported major bugs with 5.0 after its release.
So along comes 5.1 a little over a week ago and so for me this was a totally new operating system and for others a huge bug fix. I was excited to get Lollipop for the first time regardless of the consequences!
The main new features of 5.1 apart from squishing loads of bugs is new animations, icons and behind the scenes stuff!? They always say that!. A new power saving mode has been added to cut down on background activity when in standby. This seems to work quite well. A noticeable extra 30 mins of Battery life can be acheived if you switch this on straight after you unplug your Charger.
Another new feature worth a mention was the Encryption or forced Encryption as I like to call it. Having no choice in the matter, the whole system was Encrypted upon first install of Lollipop.
Whilst this is a sound security decision and could be useful if my device is lost or stolen, I would have liked the choice, especially when it now takes an extra 40 seconds to boot up!!
My Lollipop was sour?
Unfortunately for me and many, many other TN7 users we had just unwittingly updated to the tenth layer of Hell!
After pressing install and the tablet resetting and going through the motions, the damn thing started to try and optimise all my apps to the new system (ART runtime) this was taking an absolute eternity and what was worse, it would only optimise two apps or something, gave up with the rest and tried booting into Android.. It only got worse from there let me tell you!
The performance of the device was something akin to that cheap nasty Argos tablet doing the rounds a while back? Single core at best with a stutter and a limp.
The screen of my tablet became as hot as a Lava pool, the tablet itself was not correctly charging. And power was draining at an epic rate. This looked BAD!
Not content with almost setting my tablet alight, Nvidia choose to remove the CPU Tegra 4 performance menu from settings meaning the tab was now either balanced or power save....gone was MAX POWER! What the Hell was the point of that? My tablet is a super fast gaming device! What would be the point of throttling it? Would they take the sixth gear out of a high performance Car? No!
There was an answer thankfully!
It got desperate let me tell you. It's impossible to reverse the update without unlocking the device and generally faffing about, I could be arsed with any of that so I turned to the Web.
Seems a Factory reset was next on the menu. Another pain in the arse process, but less of a faff than rooting the device. I reluctantly decided to flatten the tablet.
Yay! It worked and now everything was running OK!
Lollipop is actually Fantastic! honestly!
Despite the early fiasco the reset solved the problem, that is worrying though. Obviously it was going into melt down and the App optimising seems to be the culprit.
Following the reset and general faffing I can now say that battery life is better, memory usage is better, apps now open quicker etc..
I'm more than happy with the change.... For now anywayanyway
And to end on an even better note, the missing performance menu has been found It was hiding in the sytem, a shortcut had to be made and now it's back for good!
Another new feature worth a mention was the Encryption or forced Encryption as I like to call it. Having no choice in the matter, the whole system was Encrypted upon first install of Lollipop.
Whilst this is a sound security decision and could be useful if my device is lost or stolen, I would have liked the choice, especially when it now takes an extra 40 seconds to boot up!!
My Lollipop was sour?
Unfortunately for me and many, many other TN7 users we had just unwittingly updated to the tenth layer of Hell!
After pressing install and the tablet resetting and going through the motions, the damn thing started to try and optimise all my apps to the new system (ART runtime) this was taking an absolute eternity and what was worse, it would only optimise two apps or something, gave up with the rest and tried booting into Android.. It only got worse from there let me tell you!
The performance of the device was something akin to that cheap nasty Argos tablet doing the rounds a while back? Single core at best with a stutter and a limp.
The screen of my tablet became as hot as a Lava pool, the tablet itself was not correctly charging. And power was draining at an epic rate. This looked BAD!
Not content with almost setting my tablet alight, Nvidia choose to remove the CPU Tegra 4 performance menu from settings meaning the tab was now either balanced or power save....gone was MAX POWER! What the Hell was the point of that? My tablet is a super fast gaming device! What would be the point of throttling it? Would they take the sixth gear out of a high performance Car? No!
There was an answer thankfully!
It got desperate let me tell you. It's impossible to reverse the update without unlocking the device and generally faffing about, I could be arsed with any of that so I turned to the Web.
Seems a Factory reset was next on the menu. Another pain in the arse process, but less of a faff than rooting the device. I reluctantly decided to flatten the tablet.
Yay! It worked and now everything was running OK!
Lollipop is actually Fantastic! honestly!
Despite the early fiasco the reset solved the problem, that is worrying though. Obviously it was going into melt down and the App optimising seems to be the culprit.
Following the reset and general faffing I can now say that battery life is better, memory usage is better, apps now open quicker etc..
I'm more than happy with the change.... For now anywayanyway
And to end on an even better note, the missing performance menu has been found It was hiding in the sytem, a shortcut had to be made and now it's back for good!
Update:
Since writing this article I have bought another device (Hudl 2) and was offered a Lollipop update. Hesitantly I bit the Bullet and installed it.
Much to my amazement, the same issues appeared from the start as they had with my Nvidia Tablet! The slow/laggy operation and the dreaded overheating were back. Having a better understanding this time round did help. All of these symptoms were directly attributed to the evil ART compiling process. At least I know its definitely not confined to one manufacturer and its Hardware.
As before I ended up Factory resetting the device. Sensing a lengthy optimising phase I opted to wipe it first before installing Lollipop. As every App has to be recompiled into Android Runtime its better to leave as little as possible to be done. (just the preinstalled guff was left to optimised). This past painlessly and everything went fine from there.
Since writing this article I have bought another device (Hudl 2) and was offered a Lollipop update. Hesitantly I bit the Bullet and installed it.
Much to my amazement, the same issues appeared from the start as they had with my Nvidia Tablet! The slow/laggy operation and the dreaded overheating were back. Having a better understanding this time round did help. All of these symptoms were directly attributed to the evil ART compiling process. At least I know its definitely not confined to one manufacturer and its Hardware.
As before I ended up Factory resetting the device. Sensing a lengthy optimising phase I opted to wipe it first before installing Lollipop. As every App has to be recompiled into Android Runtime its better to leave as little as possible to be done. (just the preinstalled guff was left to optimised). This past painlessly and everything went fine from there.