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A better Android emulator

manymo.com

51–58 of 58 posts

Re: A better Android emulator

#51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've found the official Intel-based emulator images (2.3+ only) plenty fast. Details here[0] but the tl;dr is: * Open SDK manager, install Intel image for your preferred SDK version and the "Intel Hardware Accelerated Execution Manager" from the Extras section * Find the HAXM installer in SDK/extras and run * Create Intel-based AVD [0] https://developer.android.com/tools/devices/emulator.html

Just an FYI -- this killed my Virtual Box install the last time i tried it. Uninstalling HAXM fixed it all, but having Virtual Box was more important than the Intel images, so I left it uninstalled.

This issue specifically, and others like it (snapshot management, bugs in the interface to create emulators, such as setting the hw keyboard) really made managing local android emulators a pain for us. We thought we could make the experience better, so we made Manymo.

Re: A better Android emulator

#52

If you want a fast way to run Android, you can also use a VirtualBox image, it is significantly faster than the emulator in the SDK: http://www.buildroid.org/blog/

I've found the official Intel-based emulator images (2.3+ only) plenty fast. Details here[0] but the tl;dr is: * Open SDK manager, install Intel image for your preferred SDK version and the "Intel Hardware Accelerated Execution Manager" from the Extras section * Find the HAXM installer in SDK/extras and run * Create Intel-based AVD [0] https://developer.android.com/tools/devices/emulator.html

Testing inapp billing without a physical device is still my biggest reason staying with the VirtualBox-based approach.

Installing Play Store app on emulator still requires some hacky workarounds.

Re: A better Android emulator

#53
post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Get a low-end (HTC Legend), a mid-end (HTC Desire / Moto Droid), and a high-end (Samsung Galaxy Nexus or S-II/III) device, and you are good to go. Also get a cheap tablet if you need to support that. Always develop on the lowest end device as a rule, and the optimizations you apply to make it usable on it will make the app super snappy on higher end devices. Choose Android 2.2 as your target platform and you include…

by moto droid do you mean the original moto droid? if so, i'd think by now the 2+ year old handset would be considered low end

Yes, the original one. No, HTC Legends are still around, those are the real low ends, also in terms of display resolution.

Re: A better Android emulator

#54
Really irks me there isn't a tool I can download to setup emulators that mimick actual released devices - trying to find the settings and set it up manually is a real PITA.

Re: A better Android emulator

#55

What I really need is a way to emulate specific devices. My Android app crashes on a Droid Razr Maxx right now, when it rotates, and I don't have one to test on, so I have to get crash logs from users.

Device Anywhere might be what you want. They connect real phones to their system for you to use, and have a large variety of models (or at least had - I haven't used them in a couple of years). They're expensive, but worth it for the convenience.

Re: A better Android emulator

#56
post #5

This looks extremely useful assuming it works. Although I never use the emulator while building Android because it basically does not work on most machines and does not give you any real indication how your code will run on an actual device. Very curious how they pulled this off.

> Although I never use the emulator while building Android because it basically does not work on most machines and does not give you any real indication how your code will run on an actual device. This has not been my experience in the least...

you find you get a consistent experience between running code on the emulator and on a device?

Have you tried running your code on any of the OEM releases like HTC sense, Samsung TouchWiz or Moto Blur?

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