A brand new G1 (or HTC Dream if you prefer) is a reasonably speedy device but most owners find they tend to get more sluggish over time. This is a lot to do with a serious lack of internal memory. Not much we can do about that but here’s a few tips to keep your phone running as fast as possible.

  • Downloaded an app but never use it? Get rid. It’s taking up valuable resources. Go: Market -> My Downloads -> Long press to uninstall. Alternatively, go: Settings -> Applications -> Manage Applications for a list which includes the size in KB of each installed app. Use the menu button to order the list by size to zap the memory hogs first.
  • Turn off radios (GPS, Bluetooth, wi-fi) when you’re not using them. You’ll also prolong battery life by doing this.
  • Use Airplane mode if you don’t need a connection at all. Long press the on/off key for the option.
  • Android claims to manage in memory apps and close recently used apps to free up resources but you can take control by forcing any application to stop via: Settings -> Applications -> Manage Applications -> app to close -> Force Close
  • Use something like TasKiller (available from the Android Market) to make the above a 1-click operation.
  • Bit of a weird one this but it seems to make a difference. If you have long text conversations delete the thread. Long-click on the thread you want to delete or: Menu -> Delete Threads to remove everything.

If you’ve got other tips, please let us know.

  • Bit of a late addition, this, but the ultimate way of improving performance is to perform a hard reset on your phone. You’ll be amazed at just how much quicker your phone runs afterwards. Bit of a drastic step but not nearly so traumatic as you might think. Full instructions of how to hard reset your G1 here.
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