Sleep, wake, and reboot issues are the latest problem for Android tablets

July 19, 2011 | by Charles West

When I’m not reading the latest and greatest from Androinica, I’m usually reading not just the articles of certain publications, but the comment section of those same publications. What you’ll find in the comment section is a real world reaction that goes way beyond what you would read in any article.

That said, I’ve been reading about a lot of disgruntled Android tablet users when it comes to this weird sleep/wake/reboot issue – I myself have experienced with the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1. When I first experienced this issue, and had to force a restart to fix it, it was head scratching to say the least. It’s a problem that continues to this very day, and apparently, this is a problem that is becoming prevalent in the latest tablet from Honeycomb (version 3.1).

You can now add the recently released Toshiba Thrive to the list of tablets suffering from the sleep/wake/reboot bug. An alarming amount of bug reports cropping up over at the outfit’s own site. Thrive owners are suggesting that their devices are having a hard time coming out of Sleep mode without a full, hard reboot, and some are even suggesting that it’ll turn on itself on occasion. This doesn’t sound good.

What is causing these annoying bug issues? I won’t pretend to act as if I know why, but this leads me to believe it could be an manufacturing problem. If Sammy and Toshiba are going through these issues and Motorola isn’t, that would make it sort of self explanatory, right?

For it’s part, Toshiba has acknowledged the problem and is working on a fix according to PCMag.com.

“We are aggressively working to implement a fix that resolves this issue and will push an update as soon as possible. Separate from the Resume issue, Toshiba will push an update to enhance the multi-tasking capabilities of the device within the next 48 hours. As a general practice, Toshiba recommends users download the latest system updates.”

Either way, this isn’t good for Google. This is a poor representation of what its Honeycomb OS is all about — and once again spotlights the cancer that is fragmentation. The problem doesn’t exactly help consumer confidence in Toshiba or Samsung for that matter, but in Android tablets in general — as it tries to compete against the behemoth that is Apple’s iPad.

What do you guys think? Is it a manufacturing issue or could it be a Honeycomb issue causing the annoying sleep/wake/reboot bug? As always, please drop us a comment.

android tablet, Galaxy Tab 10.1, honeycomb, motorola, Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1, Toshiba Thrive

11 Comments

Tenkely says:

July 19, 2011 at 3:40 pm

LG is probably the worst offender of this. Somehow they messed up the stock 3.01 build and have offered no fixes, updates or even statements to address them. The G-Slate was the second Honeycomb tab on the market if I remember correctly too. Google should take LG out back and beat them with a hose. My recent post
Charles West says:

July 19, 2011 at 7:26 pm

Lol, I forgot all about the G-Slate. With the G2x and G-Slate, it's safe to say that LG is not handling this whole Android thing very well…
Jerry says:

July 20, 2011 at 4:02 pm

Add Asus EEE Pad to the list. ALL of the above problems!
Bill says:

July 26, 2011 at 3:22 pm

I bought a Toshiba Thrive (16GB) this past Friday (thanks to Office Depot honoring Staples' $100 coupon). I really wanted the full-size ports, esp, the SD slot, which will be great for sharing photos from my DSLR. I noticed the model in the store had a sleep issue. I also experienced w/my new tablet at home. Just once. Before the evening was I had applied 3 system updates for which I had received notifications. Haven't had a sleep/awake problem since. Now if I could just get rid of the some of the annoying apps Toshiba put on this fine device, but won't let you remove.
- joe says:
  
  April 30, 2012 at 11:38 am
  
  what is the version you have?
Mark says:

October 17, 2011 at 1:22 pm

Work for Sony and have the Tablet S, same problem here. my screen goes into sleep mode by itself and can be a bitch to wake.
- josh says:
  
  June 10, 2012 at 10:02 am
  
  Mine too. Did you ever contact Sony or find a fix? My Sony S has gotten so bad that you have to do a full power down almost every time it goes to sleep.
samantha says:

March 15, 2012 at 12:48 am

I have the Asus transformer tablet and it just started this. It could be a glitch in the new honeycomb os.
Rob says:

April 17, 2012 at 11:54 am

In Australia the AT100 isn’t called the Thrive, but it still has the sleep/wake if you’ve used the security coded screen lock. If the unit has been locked for some time, you can only input one number of the lock code.
joe says:

April 30, 2012 at 11:24 am

I resell Android tablet from different manufacturer from China. This is a problem even for 2.3 or 4.0 version. I think it is both OS and sometimes a hardware issue. Most of the time it is the OS. When I flash the FW, most of them gets fix. It is kind of annoying. I also have tablet. I hope Google can fix the OS.
dee says:

March 7, 2013 at 2:18 pm

visual land prestige 10 Just had same problem – shut down on it’s own and now wont load the OS
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