[Galaxy Note II Android Development] passenger001:
My apps freeze list! (along with my personal app suggestions) + battery saving tips

DN4 OPTIMIZATION AND POWER SAVING GUIDE

Updated for DN4 on 10th December, 2014

It seems people from other ROMs also use this guide, so I have also included apps from older versions.

I have always wanted to make a solid list of apps that can safely be frozen/uninstalled without breaking the ROM. Here is my preliminary list, please provide feedback on each item on the list, additions, deletions to help me make this a complete guide to make your phone leaner and meaner.

First of all, I want to make it clear which functionalities I expect from my phone, and those that I don't care about. I think most people will have similar expectations and they can hence use this list as a guide to optimize their phone, make it faster, get more battery and reclaim disk space.

Most important is access to Phone, SMS, Gmail, Whatsapp all the time, therefore

I will not disable sync or turn off data/wifi

or greenify these apps. You however may choose to.

Since we own a Note, it doesn't make sense to disable Note functionality, so everything SNote and SPen related will be preserved. Disabling these would be a waste of the hardware. Same thing with NFC.

I do not use Samsung account or download anything from the Samsung app store. I also do not sync anything to Samsung because, who knows, my next phone might not be a Samsung!! I sync my SNotes to Evernote. I sync everything else (contacts, email, bookmarks) with Google. I use Chrome for my normal browsing needs, Firefox is great too, especially if you use it on the PC and want to sync your stuff. Dolphin Browser and Hover Browser are awesome too. I like dropbox. I do not have a network printer so I'll get rid of related apps. I don't group play either. I don't like widgets in general, I only use the digital clock and torch (formerly known as 'assistive light'). I also don't like Live Wallpapers, but I do appreciate a nice hi-res background image. Hangouts is a necessary evil for me, because I use it to talk to my mom :)

That said, here's my freeze list for DN4 and DN3 5.2 and earlier, with some comments. I have abbreviated some names, but it will be clear.

I actually went one step further and

uninstalled

these apps permanently. So far so good, no problem.

The apps marked in RED seem to be related to the 'Studio' feature. You can freeze them, but don't uninstall them just yet!

Air Wakeup

Allshare* (Worthless pieces of software. Doesn't seem to do jack. Haven't tried on a Samsung TV though. Includes Allshare cast dongle s/w update, AllShare ControlShare, AllShare FileShare. Uninstall if you don't have a Samsung TV. Uninstall even if you do have a samsung TV. :D)

ANT HAL

ANT Radio

ANT+ Plugins

Baby crying (use your phone as a baby monitor. Only works when paired with Galaxy Gear)

Backup 1.0 (don't need it if you have titanium)

Backup 2.7.9

Basic Daydreams (Daydreams is now working on v5)

beacon manager (i think it provides location based information on nearby stores, etc. Google Now does it also.)

briefing (related to Flipboard. I don't use this.)

Bubbles

ChocoEuKor

Clock (digital easy)

Clock (modern)

com.monotype....chococooky 1.0 (it's a font)

com.monotype....cooljazz 1.0 (it's a font)

com.monotype....rosemary 1.0 (it's a font)

com.sec.pagebuddynotisvc

com.sec.android.sviewcover (i don't have sview cover)

CoolEUKor

Deep Sea

Dictionary (I use GoldenDict Free instead, with Merriam Webster Collegiate and other dictionaries in .bgl format)

DirectConnectManager

DirectShareManager

Dual City Widget

Dual Clock (digital)

Email (i only use gmail accounts)

Enterprise VPN

EpsonPrintService

Exchange Services (don't disable if you use exchange server email)

favorite apps 1.0 (there are 2 of these!)

favorite contacts 1.0 and 1.1

Fingerprints

Flipboard (I don't like it, I use Press and Reddit News. News360 is nice too.)

FWUpgrade

Galaxy Apps (new name for Samsung app store)

Gear Manager (I don't have gear)

geo news (Location based information like weather etc. Nothing that Google Now doesn't provide)

Google Partner Setup

GoTrace (program to use Note4 hardware to track phone movements with great accuracy. I don't see how you would use this on the Note2)

group camcorder

Group Play

Hancom Office Viewer (never got it to work. uninstall this and replace it with a different office suite eg OfficeSuite Pro)

HealthService (needed for S Health, but S5 S Health seems useless on Note 2)

HomescreenFestivalEffect

HP Print Service

IndexService 1.0 (Search indexing for S Finder)

Internet (I'm using Firefox right now because I'm a PC Firefox user. Dolphin Browser with Jetpack and Hover Browser are also viable and interesting alternatives)

Kids * (froze everything that starts with the word 'kids')

Studies show that very young children using smartphones/tablets have impaired language learning and social skills, and there is increased occurence of autism and other mental disorders related to development. If you have a child <5-6 years old, keep them away from your phone, tablet, TV, PC. They're better off playing outside and interacting socially with other children.

Live wallpaper picker (I don't use live wallpapers, so I don't need the picker)

Live Weather (i get my weather updates from Google Now)

Luminous Dots

Market Feedback Agent

Memo (I feel Google Keep is better, or even Evernote does a fine job.)

Messages (You most probably use this. I use HoverChat instead. Note that this is your only messaging option in Ultra Power Saving Mode.)

Mobile print

MobilePrintSvc CUPS

MobilePrintSvc CUPS backend

Multimedia UI Service Layer (don't disable this if you use the Stock Music player. See below.)

Music (PowerAmp is a much better music player. Everything works, good equalizer and sound mods, and it supports almost every file format out there such as FLAC, M4A, etc)

musicfx (Viper is better)

My interests (new note4 feature. it's kinda nice if you're using some note4 specific widgets, but I find it non-essential)

My places (new note4 feature, not particularly interesting to me)

My Magazine (I don't like it)

Nearby Devices

Nearby Service

Pagebuddynotisvc (don't disable if you use Page Buddy. I don't think anyone does...)

PEN.UP (portal to share your SPen art and view others' art as well. some of these drawings are pretty cool. App has very little utility otherwise.)

Parental Control

Personal page Service (Knox based, won't work)

Phase Beam

Photo Screensavers

Photo Wall

Picasa Uploader (don't disable this if you automatically upload your camera photos to Picasa)

Play Games

Polaris Viewer (It can only view Office and pdf files. If you want to edit as well, get something else like OfficeSuite Pro 7)

Print Spooler

Private mode service (knox based, not happening on Note2)

Quick Connect

Quick Connect Interaction Service

Ripple Wall

RoseEUKor

S Baro ( it just retreives info from weather websites, kinda useless to me)

S Finder

S Health (nothing works on Note2. No pedometer, no heart rate readings, seems kinda pointless for this device) Might I suggest 'Movn' from the play store?

S Namecard

S Planner (It's really not that bad, but there are just so many alternatives. Try Google Calendar, Business Calendar, Cal. Note that this is integrated with some other features like Action Memo, but disabling this has never bothered me.)

S Planner widget (some people use this, I don't.)

S Suggest

S Voice

Samsung account

Samsung apps

Samsung apps widget

Samsung backup provider

Samsung billing

Samsung calendar syncadapter

Samsung cloud data relay

Samsung cloud quota

Samsung contact syncadapter

Samsung content agent

Samsung Galaxy 1.3.3

Samsung Galaxy Apps widget

Samsung link

Samsung Link Platform

Samsung Link Platform Connectivity

Samsung Memo SyncAdapter

Samsung print service plugin

Samsung Push Service

Samsung sbrowser syncadapter

Samsung setup wizard (i dont think you need this after initial phone setup.)

Samsung snote3 syncadapter (disabling this doesn't affect syncing with evernote, in case anyone's wondering)

Samsung syncadapters

Samsung text-to-speech (You don't need this if you have Google TTS)

Samsung wallet

SapaMonitor 1.0 (Something related to monitoring when you plug your headphones in. You can disable this safely.)

Screen Mirroring (strangely, you don't need this for actual screen mirroring :/)

Share Music

Share Video

ShareShotService

Shot & More

SmartcardManager

SmartcardService

SNS (Social Network Service. It's useful if you regularly use apps that require sign-in to services like facebook, twitter, etc.)

Sound Detectors 1.0

Soundalive 1.0 (doesn't work on S5 music player anyway, and Viper is better.)

Story Album

T store Downloader

Tags 1.1

Talkback (i think it's something accessibility related, I don't need it)

thanhfhuongf xperia (ugly theme imo)

Tinker 1.0 (font)

TouchWiz easy home

Video A.01.011802V (stock video player doesn't support all file formats, and has been known to cause problems. It also doesn't have convenient controls. MX Player Pro is a much better alternative. Supports almost every format under the sun and it has great swipe controls for volume, brightness and seek.)

Video A

Video clips 1.060

Video Player 1.2 (you might want to keep this if you use screen mirroring. This one only plays video on the TV screen while MX player plays the video on the phone screen as well as TV screen, which seems like a waste of battery to me.)

VIP Mode 1.0 & 3.0 (knox based, won't work.)

VpnDialogs (disable if you don't use VPN)

Weather (i get my updates from Google Now)

WFDS Print Service

Wifi-Direct (Wifi direct works fine even after uninstalling this)

Wifi-Direct Share (SuperBeam is waay better)

Windy Weather

Yellow Pages (idk what this is, but I'm pretty sure I don't need it)

phew, that was some work! hope it helps someone... note that this is a preliminary list feel free to edit this with your comments, additions, deletions, and any dependencies that I'm not aware of (for example, disabling Paper Artist causes Gallery FC when sharing).

Let's make this list thorough and complete!

Note: If by any chance you decide to get adventurous and delete something you shouldn't have,

do a dirty flash

, that should restore functionality.

OTHER BATTERY SAVING TIPS:

Use Xposed Module Greenify to hibernate all apps

except the ones that you need running continuously

. My exceptions are Gmail, Hangouts, Whatsapp, Google Search and Android Device Manager. I wish I didn't have to greenify Facebook, but it sucks a lot of battery. Remember,

every time you install a new app, add it to your greenify list!

(idea adopted from power saving guide by @silentvisitor) Greenify also has a widget called 'hibernate now' which you can use often to save battery.

new! The free version of Greenify can only hibernate User apps, but not System apps. You can convert System apps to User apps by moving them from the /system/app directory to /data/app directory. This can also be done using Titanium Backup and some other utilities too. Note that converting some critical apps (such as 'phone') from System to User can result in instabilities, so exercise caution when doing this. By now you should know you won't get notifications from Greenified apps unless you start them up manually so don't greenify apps in which you need constant sync. Some apps that can safely be moved:

---

Chrome

G+

Gmail (I won't disable this because I need constant sync. You however may choose to)

Google drive

Hangouts (I won't disable this, I need it running)

Maps

Sketchbook

Youtube

---

Use Xposed Module Boot Manager to disable startup of apps at boot. I have everything disabled except Greenify, Hangouts and Whatsapp. Every time you install a new app, remember to check if it starts at boot and disable unless you need it.

Use Xposed Module Wanam Xposed to enable 'long press back key to kill foreground app' and USE this feature. I find this especially useful to kill game apps when I'm done with them. Please be advised that this will override 'long press back key to toggle Multi Window'.

Download and flash Mother of All Ad Blocking from here: http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=1916098 You'll get rid of almost every single pesky ad out there, saving a bunch of CPU, battery and mobile data in the process. Don't forget to check that thread every 15-20 days for the updated definitions.

This section is obsolete for DN4 since it now uses Agni Kernel. Other ROM users read on... For more aggressive and invasive power saving, Use SetCPU for Root Users or ROM Toolbox Pro to define CPU Governor and clock speed restrictions in a way that's suitable for you. I also really like this free app called No-frills CPU Control that does the same.

Other simple stuff: Dim your display and use the 'Auto' brightness feature. Use dark wallpapers. Restrict Widget use, avoid Live Wallpapers.

That's about it, I guess you could try apps like JuiceDefender, DeepSleepBatterySaver

but I don't find them to be useful at all

provided the above tweaks are applied. They turn off wifi/data and I don't like that. I also don't like FastReboot because it kills everything, and more CPU and battery get used up in restarting all essential background processes.

Last but not least, utilize the new Ultra Power Saving Mode feature :)

I personally don't like to 'restrict CPU performance' in the normal 'power saving' mode because I feel it actually results in more battery drain. Sounds crazy, right? but it makes sense if you consider that running your CPU at a faster frequency will allow a

faster race-to-idle

. To quote another post on XDA, "Race-to-idle is the process by which a phone completes a given task, such as syncing email, and returns the CPU to the extremely efficient low-power state". This process is slower when Power Saving Mode restricts CPU speed, thus resulting in longer times for processes to finish and hence inefficient battery use. Think about it.

new! Tweaking Power Saving Mode

I like to use the normal Power Saving Mode with the following settings (long press power saving mode button to enter settings):

-Uncheck 'Restrict Background Data'

-Grayscale Mode ON

-Under 'Restrict Performance', uncheck 'CPU Performance' and 'Turn off GPS'. Leave all other options checked (screen output, turn off touch key light)

new! Freeze or Defrost+Launch apps on demand using Titanium Backup Widgets

Titanium Backup has a very useful type of widget to

one-click toggle freeze/defrost of an app using an icon-size widget

. I find this very useful to temporarily disable apps that I need, but don't want running constantly (eg. Tango, Snapchat, Evernote, Youtube, Facebook, Viber, Hangouts, Superbeam, Chrome). Try it!

:good: