Filed under: iPod Family, Bad Apple, iPhone, App Store
iPhone users reporting reboots due to high App count
Recently, TUAW has received numerous tips about near random iPhone boot loops that force users to restore their units. This forum thread suggests that these reboots may be due to the iPhone's onboard watchdog system.
The iPhone has to create a new Application Map whenever you load or unload apps to the system. Should the time to create that map exceed two minutes, the phone enters an endless boot cycle.
The solution proposed on the thread isn't of much general use -- it requires jailbroken shell access. You may want to limit the number and scope of Apps you load to your phone (i.e. cut down on those tip calculators and sudoku apps that we know you're secretly addicted to) to achieve the same, stable results.
Fewer apps mean a shorter time to generate that map and a better likelihood that your phone will work with greater reliability.
Thanks, Goran
![TUAW [Cafepress]](http://www.blogsmithmedia.com/www.tuaw.com/media/tuaw-cafepress-promo.png)
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)
Stephen Heaps said 4:09PM on 9-05-2008
iPod Touch Fans owns.
Reply
bryon brock said 6:21PM on 9-05-2008
Try increasing your /root partition: http://www.iphone-hacks.com/2008/09/03/how-to-use-winpwn-25/#comments
Jim Danner said 6:06AM on 9-06-2008
Well, actually, iPod Touch Fans copied this from http://hackint0sh.org/forum/showthread.php?t=49782
stevetim said 4:10PM on 9-05-2008
I was restoring every other day until I dumped all non-apple apps. I hate that I have paid apps that I am not using, but apple will probably fix this next month ... right?
Reply
totoro said 4:17PM on 9-05-2008
Uh, any idea what is considered a "high" app count? More than 5 screens?
Reply
LuminousNerd said 4:19PM on 9-05-2008
And they insisted to me that a high app count should have nothing to do with the stability of my iPhone. This is my exact issue!
Great to hear that there's a fix: don't use your iPhone for its primary purpose. Thanks a lot TUAW. :P
Reply
Vince said 6:01PM on 9-05-2008
Apps are the primary purpose of the iPhone?
That's news to me.
starkruzr said 8:32PM on 9-05-2008
That would not be an excuse either way, Vince.
Joel said 4:20PM on 9-05-2008
If only Chrome worked on the iPhone as well as it works on the Mac :)
http://digg.com/apple/Google_Chrome_on_a_Mac
Reply
Apple Rep. said 5:14PM on 9-05-2008
lol... chrome failed, where u been ?
get firefox
Vince said 6:06PM on 9-05-2008
Stop spamming. We know that they are your pictures, you have the same username on Flickr and Digg. And you're obviously running on virtualization software, the icon is in the corner and Chrome has a Windows interface. People aren't stupid, they can read usernames and know what virtualization is, you thought you were clever and were going to pull of a hoax BUT YOU FAILED!
EPIC FAIL!
gerrynjr said 4:28PM on 9-05-2008
Heh...
good luck, been troubleshooting this with apple for over a month, engineers say they are not able to reproduce the issue... resulting in apple refunding me over $120 in apps... about 6 pages worth.
If someone at TUAW wants more details, email me, I'll be glad to share my story...
Reply
SpinThis! said 5:40PM on 9-05-2008
Just because you bought $120 worth of applications doesn't mean you have to store and sync all of them.
I only use a handful of applications day-to-day on my Mac... and even less than that on my iPhone. I have maybe 5 pages of applications... no problems here.
While I think is definitely fixable by Apple, it's also up to the user to take out the trash. What are you guys doing, downloading/purchasing everything in sight?
eric said 4:29PM on 9-05-2008
Every time i restart my phone or it gets restarted by an app...i have to restore it
Reply
Jesse David Hollington said 4:30PM on 9-05-2008
I suspect v2.0.2 has in fact fixed this problem.... Issues that caused the iPhone to land in this state in the past no longer seem to cause this to happen.
I normally run 4-5 screens worth of apps (including the built-in ones), and have had this problem occur on iPhone v2.0.1 when I've loaded or offloaded a couple of dozen apps at once (although that is certainly far from the ONLY cause.... I've also had certain dodgy applications do the same on me).
Another sure-fire way to trigger this behaviour on v2.0.1 was to rip your iPhone out of the cradle in the middle of an app install or update (rather than cancelling sync). Depending on the app and where it was in the installation process, it was likely that a DFU restore would be required to return your iPhone to normal operation.
With v2.0.2 I have yet to land in a situation where the iPhone has not come back after a reboot, even doing the same things that previously were almost guaranteed to cause this problem. So this issue may actually be fixed.
On the other hand, I have had corruption which causes a failure to launch on any third-party apps several times after running updates from the on-device app store. Installing or updating apps from iTunes itself doesn't seem to be a problem, but if I run enough updates through the on-device app store, the iPhone will end up in a state where no third-party apps will launch at all. Reboots and reinstalls do not solve this -- I have had to do restores in this case to return my third-party apps to normal operation. This appears like it may also be a DRM-related issue, since at least twice when this happened, my purchased content would not play in the iPod app either.
Reply
Josh said 4:45PM on 9-05-2008
2.0.2 has not, in fact, fixed this problem... at least for a good majority of iPhone owners. I run an app review website and consistently had a high number of apps on my iPhone. You can read all of my rants on the website if you want. The most helpful bit of information I can offer you comes in two suggestions: keep the app count down (under 30 non-apple apps) and keep memory hogs off of your phone (Apple's Texas Hold 'em is one of the bigger apps out there). If you want to read more about my experience and other reviews, hit the link below:
http://www.cocoatouchapps.com/
Scotty said 5:33PM on 9-05-2008
With 2.0.2 I had to turn off syncing of apps during the restore in order to get a working phone. With 2.0 and 2.0.1 restoring/syncing the phone would produce a working phone.
I've been gradually turning apps back on since my triple restore failure event.
One good thing about fewer apps: backup is faster. :-)
R031E5 said 4:37PM on 9-05-2008
I did a quick shell script to fix you broken iPhone, hope it helps someone.
http://mihd.net/yktjf2s
Reply
Vinod Ponmanadiyil said 4:09PM on 9-06-2008
Thank you!
Jeff Scott said 4:42PM on 9-05-2008
I have 148 apps installed -- just because you can. That's the maximum that 2.0.2 allows. I have had very few reboots. But, that's on an iPod Touch. My iPhone has 20-30 apps installed and has had to be rebuilt (because the backup didn't work) 5 times in the past 2 months.
Stay away from the mobile App Store. That seems to contribute to the problem.
More on the crashes I've had here: http://www.148apps.com/news/careful-apps-eugene/
Reply