Newbie needs help with Email and Freezing

[ogmaster]

Hey everyone. I've had my A500 for a couple of months now and really love it, but there's still plenty of stuff to get used to.

Recently, I purchased a case with a USB keyboard - GSAstore Leather Case with Built-in USB Keyboard and Kick Stand for Acer Iconia A500 and it's worked pretty well except for the fact that every word processor I've tried out has had freezing problems after a few minutes of typing. I've tried regular USB keyboard and didn't have the freeze, but this one happens quite a bit. I know it's the case but I have no clue on why.

Also, I'm using the pre-loaded Email app for my main email account, and some days, that app doesn't get any emails. Sometimes it's several hours, other times it's a whole day. When I click the refresh button on it, it'll refresh for a few seconds but not get any emails. Is this just a crap app? Any suggestion on others?

Thanks!

 

[Douvie]

Hey everyone. I've had my A500 for a couple of months now and really love it, but there's still plenty of stuff to get used to.

Yeah there is a fairly steep learning curve. It doesn't ease up for sometime to come. I have had mine since May/June and I'm still learning.
But love it nonetheless.

Recently, I purchased a case with a USB keyboard - GSAstore Leather Case with Built-in USB Keyboard and Kick Stand for Acer Iconia A500 and it's worked pretty well except for the fact that every word processor I've tried out has had freezing problems after a few minutes of typing. I've tried regular USB keyboard and didn't have the freeze, but this one happens quite a bit. I know it's the case but I have no clue on why.

It might be the keyboard. I bought a wireless (Bluetooth) keyboard and it can be quite slow. It could be a faulty keyboard. Especially if the other works fine.

Also, I'm using the pre-loaded Email app for my main email account, and some days, that app doesn't get any emails. Sometimes it's several hours, other times it's a whole day. When I click the refresh button on it, it'll refresh for a few seconds but not get any emails. Is this just a crap app? Any suggestion on others?!

I don't use my tablet to access the main email (ISP based email) account. I have several accounts and I just shift mail between them. I have a yahoo account which is my junk email account. My Gmail account is my tablet and smartphone email account. The one from my ISP doesn't get sync'd to my tablet.

One thing don't use POP or POP3 too much hassle use IMAPI for sync'ing. Also if you haven't updated to ICS yet unsync your ISP email (turn it off) because it will wipe out your emails on the isp's server and you'll loose all your kept mail.

 

[Mrhelper]

Have you retried the other USB keyboard since you bought the GSA unit? Have you tried testing the GSA keyboard with a regular PC?

If not and the other USB keyboard now fails also, you could be encountering a problem caused by an app you installed since then. If the ICS upgrade installed after you tried the other keyboard, one of your apps may now be incompatible with that, and triggering the freeze. It may even be caused by some intermittent bug in ICS.

The fact that it works for a while before freezing/hanging makes me suspect that this problem is caused by an app, and not the keyboard. It seems likely that if the keyboard were bad, it would not work at all, unless the USB connector or cable is faulty. I suppose there could be a loose connection inside of the keyboard case also. If you have not tried moving the cable and plug in various ways in attempt to cause temporary connection loss and trigger the problem, that may be worth some time.

In either case, you can install aLogcat to look for errors concurent with the freeze. After installing aLogcat, run it and go into the setting/preferences and set the format to "long." This will cause log messages to have more detail, including a timestamp for use in correlating messages with the time you notice the freeze. At the start of your test, plug in the keyboard and look for the message reporting that action. Pull the plug and look for messages associated with the disconnect. If you then see those messages intermittently while using the keyboard, you will know it is a USB connection issue. You can run aLogcat and try just typing into the keyboard for a while, watching the log to see if there are USB disconnects.

If you find that the other USB keyboard is causing the problem now also, and you are running ICS, read this post for tips on how to mitigate an ICS sensor bug, various app problems, and be sure to read the part about the Dolphin and stock browsers. I like the Dolphin browser, but I have found that heavy use of it can really corrupt the system at times. I have seen it cause all kinds of hangs and strange display behaviour, distortions, etc., even on the home Android screen while Dolphin is parked in the background. Read: Possible Relief for Several A500 ICS Related Symptoms/Problems - Android Forums

Please post what you find out, and how you resolve this. If it is a bad GSA keyboard, I may have to cancel my order. Not really, though I did look at that case late last year because I thought it looked very handy, but instead I occasionally use a $10 USB mini keyboard. I don't encounter any hangs with that unless I am running the Dolphin browser a little too hard.

 

[ogmaster]

Actually, I think I may have found the problem. Of course it's a weird one. So I was typing again today when I noticed that when I press Shift+Backspace, it'll freeze. I had a guess that some sort of key press was going to be a problem. It's weird though, when I use the touch keyboard, holding down the same keys has no problem. There's obviously something faulty with the keyboard, but it appears it'll be something that I'll have to adjust with since I mainly hit those two keys when I'm in a hurry to type something. Also, the convenience of this case outweighs the need for me to press both keys at the same time.

Regarding the email app, are there other apps that have been worthwhile for checking non-web based email accounts?

 

[Frederuco]

I know that on the Transformer devices, SHIFT + BACKSPACE is interpreted as a DELETE function. Not sure if this applies to all external keyboards across all Android devices, but that could be the issue. Some apps do not work well with the SHIFT + BACKSPACE combo, and others are good with it.

I would be curious if that is what is going on with yours.

 

[Douvie]

ogmaster said he was using an ACER KEYBOARD. I have a TOSHIBA blutooth keyboard and it works fine.

 

[Mrhelper]

Actually, I think I may have found the problem. Of course it's a weird one. So I was typing again today when I noticed that when I press Shift+Backspace, it'll freeze. I had a guess that some sort of key press was going to be a problem. It's weird though, when I use the touch keyboard, holding down the same keys has no problem. There's obviously something faulty with the keyboard, but it appears it'll be something that I'll have to adjust with since I mainly hit those two keys when I'm in a hurry to type something. Also, the convenience of this case outweighs the need for me to press both keys at the same time.

Regarding the email app, are there other apps that have been worthwhile for checking non-web based email accounts?

Glad to hear you made progress on the keyboard issue. Frederuco makes a very good point about it possibly being a compatibility issue -- where the key combination could merely be generating a code that affects the text editors you are using. I wonder if everyone using the GSA keyboard has the exact same issue.


On the email client issue, I've been using the stock Android email client for pop3 accounts with my ISP on both Honeycomb and ICS and it appears to be very reliable, at least when the system is not being severely trashed by some rougue app. The stock email client has probably been tested more exhaustively with the a500 and many other devices than any other client available for Android on the market, so the problem you see is much less likely to be in the stock client.


Have you checked your ISP accounts using a PC while this is occurring to see if new email is actually on the server?


Are you accessing the same email account on another computer, and deleting email there, where the client on that other computer is configured to delete emails on the server upon download? That is a standard feature of pop3, and that could cause what you are seeing.


My suspicion is that you may see similar behaviour with any email client you try. This could be an issue with your ISP email service and/or how you are using it, and not a problem with the stock Android email client.


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