Phone is running out of memory

[janehm]

I think I have a memory problem.  The Internet is extremely slow.  If I try to play a short video from a text message link, it often won't play.  Frequently when I try to search for a name in my contact list, the contact list crashes.  If I turn off my phone and then turn it back on, the video will run and the contact list search will work.  I have to turn off my phone several times a day.  I have plenty of space on my SD card.  How can I fix this?

[Ann154 · Accepted solution]

To check how much internal memory you go to Settings > sd card & phone storage.

How many text message do you have stored on your phone?  Try deleting some or use a sms backup from the market to save them elsewhere and then clear out your text messages.

Have you ever cleared out the cache in the phone?  Setting > Applications > Manage Applications > All tab > Menu sort by size.  You have to go through them one by one.  However after doing it a few times, you start to learn which apps are the worst offenders.

Also check the App "Dialer Storage". It seems to holds your text messages and call history in its memory.  If you can clear the data, it will erase that information, but it will also clear up some memory.

[#3]

You can also move many apps from your phone to your SD card.

[reallyniceguy]

If all else fails. Factory data reset. If you use facebook, make sure that its not taking over your phone contacts. It eats up memory like crazy.

[janehm]

Thank you everyone for your suggestions.  All of them helped; it is much better.  However, there are still specific areas of slowness.  When I press the Home button, I get a blank screen and it takes several seconds before any of the icons appear. Going to a web page is also very slow.  Is there something specific that slows these down?

[Ann154]

Can you describe a little more when you are getting this issue when you press the home button? Been web surfing? Something else? When you are loading the web page, is it a graphics heavy one or all of them? How much internal storage are you working with?

I do see the blank screen after hitting the home button to get out my prolonged browsing session. Android had shut down my launcher to free up memory to run the browser session. I have learned to expect it at those times. My processor and RAM isn't very big either.

[janehm]

I get a blank screen for a few seconds to 30 seconds when I click Home after viewing something on the browser, if I open the keyboard and turn the phone landscape, or even after sending text messages.  It does not always happen but it does happen often.  Thank you.

[Mickeym88]

Known problem with 2.2 os. I have this as my sole complaint from my droid. Installed launcherpro about two weeks ago and it has sloved almost all the delay concerns. Very rare freeze ups now. Its in the market and its free even though they should advertise it as a fix and charge for it. Your welcome. I wish someone told me about it 3 months ago