Why 1GB Windows Tablet can Multitask while Android cant'?

orangpelupa

Elite Bug Hunter
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This been itching me for a while ever since i upgraded to 1GB RAM Android Phone 2 years ago and now its becoming more confusing with the release of many cheap 1GB RAM Windows Tablets.

Why 1GB Android Phone only can open 1 app while 1GB Windows Tablet can multitask? Even years ago, im sure i can Multitask on 256MB RAM windows PC.

Do android have problem in using pagefile or something?
 
It's all a matter of software. As such, Microsoft does know how to do software properly.
 
My thought on this is that Google alternative for a page file functionality is ultimately better than a page file, especially on older phone with slow storage.
But with newer phone and much faster storage, maybe Google should rethink about using a page file (swap?).
Fyi, I have used swap on 128RAM and 768MB phone. In general, the phone felt slower. On the upside, apps didn't get killed easily.
 
Here's my note 3 multitasking. (Although it seems like it's a Samsung addition (Multi-window) so may not be on all android devices)

This isn't counting the several apps all running in the background.

Years ago you wouldn't have been 'multi-tasking' on a windows PC, you would've been time-sharing, proper multi tasking is fairly new to Windows, maybe introduced with Windows 7 I cannot remember exactly which version.
 

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Multitasking on portable devices just tend to kill the battery quickly, IME... ;)

Being able to switch quickly and easily between apps isn't (necessarily) multitasking, though, heh.
 
Is this about running 2 apps on top or preventing background apps from being killed? The first one is doable but undesirable. Even Windows phone don't do that. The 2nd one is technically doable on Android but Google choose pursue different path.
 
My thought on this is that Google alternative for a page file functionality is ultimately better than a page file, especially on older phone with slow storage.
But with newer phone and much faster storage, maybe Google should rethink about using a page file (swap?).
Fyi, I have used swap on 128RAM and 768MB phone. In general, the phone felt slower. On the upside, apps didn't get killed easily.

years ago i think i also enabled swap and it do allow more app to run. But it was in low-ram device. Now im on 1GB RAM and only can run 1 app lol.

Or it's a trade-off versus battery life.

App on background does not necessary means battery drain. Google Keep did not eat cpu, operamini eat CPU on BG, opera classic did not...



Here's my note 3 multitasking. (Although it seems like it's a Samsung addition (Multi-window) so may not be on all android devices)

This isn't counting the several apps all running in the background.

Years ago you wouldn't have been 'multi-tasking' on a windows PC, you would've been time-sharing, proper multi tasking is fairly new to Windows, maybe introduced with Windows 7 I cannot remember exactly which version.

i mean multitasking with app on background without the important app getting killed haphazardly.

Multitasking on portable devices just tend to kill the battery quickly, IME... ;)

Being able to switch quickly and easily between apps isn't (necessarily) multitasking, though, heh.

From what i understand, Windows Phone support this "fake" multitasking really well while android are dumb. Android behave like windows where all apps are running (not "frozen") but it need enormous RAM to do it. So when working with a web browser and typing on a notes, windows phone will works fine. While android will forget the web browser, need to load the whole page again.

Is this about running 2 apps on top or preventing background apps from being killed? The first one is doable but undesirable. Even Windows phone don't do that. The 2nd one is technically doable on Android but Google choose pursue different path.

the annoying thing is, on my phone, background apps almost never get killed. but foreground app get killed easily. The worse thing is when my phone killed the Keyboard app while im typing. seriously...

basically i cant do something like looking the web for reference then write some stuff. or writing something on web then a phone call comes. bye-bye long sentences, by the time the call ended, the web will need reload. Or when i do GPS with google maps then a phone call come, or when i need to google stuff a bit. Bam, android killed the google maps.

hmm, im not so sure to call my android phone smartphone or dumbphone :/
Symbian phone with 4MB of RAM is much better at multitasking.

EDIT:

lol its even more faster than my android
 
Weirdly, after switching to Lollipop (less RAM usage + zram), my 512MB Android phone can multitask. As in, it does not kill the browser with open tabs when I switch through more than one other application.
 
yeah it seems every OS update, Android become more "slim". When i was using Cyanogenmod KitKat, i can multitask up to 3 apps. But i came back to sony rom :(
 
Here's my note 3 multitasking. (Although it seems like it's a Samsung addition (Multi-window) so may not be on all android devices)

This isn't counting the several apps all running in the background.

Years ago you wouldn't have been 'multi-tasking' on a windows PC, you would've been time-sharing, proper multi tasking is fairly new to Windows, maybe introduced with Windows 7 I cannot remember exactly which version.
you can only run certain apps together on android and noe of them are demanding . really bums me out how limited it is on my note 3
 
Years ago you wouldn't have been 'multi-tasking' on a windows PC, you would've been time-sharing, proper multi tasking is fairly new to Windows, maybe introduced with Windows 7 I cannot remember exactly which version.
I know this is an ancient post, but I've only now seen it and felt necessary to correct.

Multitasking comes in lots of flavors, time-sharing is a valid form of the function. Rather than being pedantic, I have to assume that DJ12 was trying to suggest that preemptive multitasking is the only "true" multitasking. If that's the yardstick, every version of Windows NT supported preemptive multitasking, this dates back to 1993 when Windows NT was first released. On the consumer side, Windows 95 supported preemptive multitasking for 32-bit applications, but 16 bit apps were scheduled within a singular shared environment and were (inside that shared 16-bit container) scheduled using timeslices. NT5 (Windows 2000 and later Windows XP) is where 16-bit apps actually got their own threads and could be preempted individually.

Conversely, and perhaps more surprisingly, MacOS didn't support preemptive multitasking until OSX in 2001. Windows beat MacOS to that punch by three quarters of a decade.
 
OSX is actually built on NeXT (or how you write it) which was available back in 1988, but the color version was 1990 I think.
 
It might be based on NeXT, but NeXT wasn't MacOS during the time when Windows was doing preemptive multitasking.
 
Back to the original topic; time slicing is still considered the most "accurate" way to multitask. Every bare-metal hypervisor schedules virtual machines based on a time sharing system, typically measured in GHz allotted to a guest vs GHz available at the host, but actually executed at MHz resolution. This rapid context-switching plays hell on caching structures; you're not just swapping tasks in a single OS, you're swapping entire OS stacks with their own "sub process stacks." Hardware virtualization features are hard-core driven to reducing that cycle count, because every cycle burned on context switching between entire operating systems is another cycle you can't give TO that operating system to do Real Work(TM).
 
You are right.
Come to think of it, if they didn't fire Jobs in the 80's.. we would have probably had the iPhone before 2000 :(

An iPhone in 2000 or before might have been a failure. Even if you managed to put a high res touchscreen (as in 320x320 or higher) and mp3/video decoding hardware and somehow supporting full web browsing you would be left with no pinch zoom, tiny flash storage, carriers that would fill what little is available with crapware and no way for software upgrade, and then big news of Apple's final bankruptcy and demise.
 
I have to assume that DJ12 was trying to suggest that preemptive multitasking is the only "true" multitasking.
I read it as only concurrent multitasking was the "true" multitasking, not cooperative multitasking or pre-emptive multitasking
ie: you need a multi core or hyper threaded cpu
 
I read it as only concurrent multitasking was the "true" multitasking, not cooperative multitasking or pre-emptive multitasking
ie: you need a multi core or hyper threaded cpu

Which wouldn't be a very good form of multi-tasking as most programs don't require an entire CPU or core. And if you are going to run multiple programs on a CPU/core then you need a way to share processing time. Time slices is the most "fair" method of doing it as it guarantees each program its share of CPU processing time. Pre-emption is useful if you have a mission critical task that absolutely needs CPU priority as well as performance above and beyond that which is allotted to it.

Regards,
SB
 
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