Another casualty of non-flipping/working live tiles - what really is the cause and the solution?

[mikewarner]

I have an unlocked Lumia 920 with the GDR2 update + Amber. It's all been working so well for the last year but over the last week or two (unsure exactly when because the lack of activity sort of crept up on me) I've noticed that the tiles stop flipping and/or updating, excepting the email, messaging and phone tiles. When I pick up my phone to check everything has stopped (to me it looks like an iPhone screen with rows of apps blankly sitting there or an Android phone with widgets all over the place but not really doing anything). However, by moving up or down the screen the tiles come back to life for what seems 30-60 seconds (i.e. flipping, showing pictures (in People), showing current info in Chronos Calendar, etc..) and then it all stops again. It's infuriating and makes me now appreciate the significant difference WP8 has over the opposition - when it works!

I've scoured the web and WPCentral to find similar stories which tell of rogue apps or soft and hard resets or an arcane process of resolving the issue but still I have a busted WP8 phone. I have reviewed every single app on my phone (and I am one of those that loads a lot to check out what there and either deletes them or leaves them for another day) and deleted, probably, twenty of them. For all of the others I have been through their settings function and switched off notifications, background processing but left location services on. Through WP8 settings and Applications/Background Tasks I've blocked every app/task then allowed only those I want (and now have only five listed as I am conscious of the mythical 15 tasks limit). I've soft reset the phone. I've also switched it off and on countless times and performed all of the above in a different order. And yes, I've also cleared the browser history on my phone as well as checked/deleted all but one weather app (I use WeatherPro)!

The end result? A phone that just sits there with non-working live tiles.

I have to believe this issue is unknown to MS (it has to be a conflict within WP8) as there is no feedback from them to acknowledge or reassure users (such as me and you) that they are doing something. In the meantime I keep looking and fiddling (because that really is what we're all doing as we con't get too deeply into WP8) and coming up short. Which leaves me considering whether the Lumia 920 with WP8 is for me. I love the phone but hate the lack of action from MS to what appears a lot of people with this issue. I don't really want to go to Android like I don't want to do a hard reset (as surely MS and Nokia will advise me after 1-2 hours of 'consultation') of my phone only to get the problem re-occurring a few weeks later.

Microsoft: WAKE UP and acknowledge the issue and let us know what action you are taking to resolve it. I don't care if it is a rogue app or a conflict in the o/s, but I do care it is damaging my pleasure of using my WP8 phone (costing me ?550) and I don't see any discernible action to provide a solution. I can't spend 4-5 hours every evening trying to sort this problem out. But I can spend a few hours looking for another phone and it won't be a WP8 phone if MS don't pull their finger out!

Lastly: If anyone has a truly proven solution to this issue please let me know.

 

[ttsoldier]

I know you said you don't want to do a hard reset. But I think that is your best option.

Or you can try updating to GDR3 preview.

 

[jmerrey]

What has always worked for me is going to the settings->applications->background tasks->advanced, looking thru that list to determine which apps I'm really not using, then going to the main app list and deleting them. I don't know what the number is, but it seems to be tied not only to how many you have running, but how many are in this "advanced" list of apps that can possibly run in the background. Every time I get too many, I delete a few and within an hour the tiles are back to working again.

 

[Chris_Kez]

Yeah, I'm afraid you are left with few options, and they likely amount to superstition. It sounds like you've done the kinds of things everyone here has recommended. I do wonder why you didn't just block all background tasks while you were at it, and delete Weather Pro. I went through largely the same stuff a few months ago. Cleared IE history, cache; unpinned everything; blocked all background tasks; checked Advanced background tasks and deleted just about every 3rd party app except games, things that had no background processes, and one or two that had lots of saved that couldn't be replicated; reset a few times for good measure. I then added back one live tile app at a time, starting with a Battery app that had a live tile. Once I saw that was working for a day, I added back a Weather app, then a few more. Since then I've kept an eye on background tasks.

I agree, it is ridiculous that we should have to go through this.

 

[E Lizzle]

What has always worked for me is going to the settings->applications->background tasks->advanced, looking thru that list to determine which apps I'm really not using, then going to the main app list and deleting them. I don't know what the number is, but it seems to be tied not only to how many you have running, but how many are in this "advanced" list of apps that can possibly run in the background. Every time I get too many, I delete a few and within an hour the tiles are back to working again.

This has been my experience also, except I don't think it's necessarily always an issue of how many background tasks you have, but perhaps sometimes an issue that if one background task behaves badly, some of the others will not run.

-E

 

[mikewarner]

Thanks to everyone for comments and suggestions.

Looking into this issue with more diligence I note that my apps are indeed being updated and the real issue appears to be that the live tiles or tiles that flip are halting after about 60 seconds. I have a strong suspicion that it is the People tile that is the culprit (though can't prove yet) as this runs through the various contacts sources I have set up and display the montage of mini-pictures on the tile (medium size for me) and after c. 60 seconds stops and there will be between 1-3 blank 'pictures'. When this happens all my other live tiles/tiles that flip stop flipping.

Searching the web and various forums it does appear that there are issues regarding the People hub/tile updating or perhaps being able to update/access the likes of FB and other sources used by this hub/tile. So, is this the source of the problem?

Anyone with a way of determining this that can help prove this and then lead to a solution?

 

[rockstarzzz]

Thanks to everyone for comments and suggestions.

Looking into this issue with more diligence I note that my apps are indeed being updated and the real issue appears to be that the live tiles or tiles that flip are halting after about 60 seconds. I have a strong suspicion that it is the People tile that is the culprit (though can't prove yet) as this runs through the various contacts sources I have set up and display the montage of mini-pictures on the tile (medium size for me) and after c. 60 seconds stops and there will be between 1-3 blank 'pictures'. When this happens all my other live tiles/tiles that flip stop flipping.

Searching the web and various forums it does appear that there are issues regarding the People hub/tile updating or perhaps being able to update/access the likes of FB and other sources used by this hub/tile. So, is this the source of the problem?

Anyone with a way of determining this that can help prove this and then lead to a solution?

What you just described isn't a "problem" - this is how live tiles are designed. They won't keep flipping if you stare at the screen. When you scroll away and back they start flipping again and when you unlock phone they flipping.

Flipping is a way to get your attention. It behaves the same way in Windows 8.1 too.

 

[JPDVM2014]

If you are talking about the tiles not updating. I have this issue fairly commonly, and the way I have found to deal with it, is to uninstall any apps that have live tiles that I don't use. Even if you don't have the live tile pinned, it still can cause issues. I don't think there is a set number, because sometimes I need to uninstall an app, but then the next time I install an additional Live Tile app or two, everything works fine. But they always start working again once I uninstall one or two apps. Now, if you are just talking about the live tiles not being animated, I think rockstarzzz is correct.

 

[mikewarner]

Thanks for all the responses. From the feedback and my research I can make the following comments:

- Tiles now update as they should do; have not had reason to doubt this and even Counter app/tile now updates (i.e. counts down) on a daily basis & BBC News app/tile is updating very frequently
- Tile flipping was puzzling me as they stopped and I couldn't find anything that absolutely stated they are programmed to flip 'x' times or for 'x' seconds/minutes; that said, I take onboard that they are programmed and the o/s does halt them after a certain period to stop battery drainage; in respect of the People live tile it just seems strange to see this halt with several blank profile mini-tiles where peoples profile picture should be
- Perhaps a confusion for me was previously removing a lock screen app, the Glance app and the screen time-out which managed the expectation of not staring at a WP8 screen; as such I possibly didn't get to see the tiles stopping as one of the above app/functions cut in and blanked/glanced the screen
- The exercise in reviewing apps that are no longer used and uninstalling them certainly seems to have allowed the phone to get back to normal updating; how it has done this I am still unsure except that there are less apps on the phone, most are not allowed in background and the ones that do not register in background tasks (and therefore I don't know about) are not impacting the phone and tile performance; it does make me believe there needs to be a far better, more sophisticated app to manage this aspect of the phone - how can you not know what is running in background and impacting performance? Ditto, how can the activity of one app really bugger up the whole phone? MS needs to looks into this and make it far more transparent in operation and in management
- It's good to have my 920 back to normal but I'm damned if I know why it went wrong in the first place and that's the most frustrating aspect of this!

Many thanks to all contributors!