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Android 4.2 Jelly Bean Bugs Plaguing Nexus Users

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It seems Google’s latest Android update, the new Android 4.2 Jelly Bean update that was released earlier this month, is tormenting some Galaxy Nexus, Nexus 10, Nexus 7 and Nexus 4 owners with an assortment of bugs.

Users of Google’s latest operating system, Android 4.2 Jelly Bean, have been complaining about several bugs, some minor and some major, in the days since Google started rolling out the update. This is a far cry from the near flawless update that is and was the Android 4.1 Jelly Bean update that touched down earlier this year.

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Android 4.2 is causing issues for Nexus users.

And while we had heard about some minor bugs with the Android 4.2 Jelly Bean update, the voices have become so loud that it’s impossible to deny that Google has some software issues that it needs to deal with.

Read: Android 4.2 on Nexus 7 Review: Final Impressions and Performance.

Nexus 4, Nexus 10, Nexus 7, and Galaxy Nexus owners, who are the only users to have received the update thus far, are reporting several highly visible issues that are seemingly tarnishing their experience with what we consider a fantastic update. According to a compilation from Android Police, users are experiencing everything from random reboots, to Bluetooth issues, to abnormal battery drain.

Here are the bugs that appear to be plaguing Android 4.2 Jelly Bean users.

Random Reboots

Owners of the Nexus 10, Nexus , Nexus 4 and Galaxy Nexus are seeing their devices reboot randomly, which means without any user provocation, after installing the Android 4.2 update.

For some users, the reboots happen once or twice a day, for others, more than that. It appears that Nexus 10 owners might be the worst off as some are saying that they are seeing upwards of three reboots per day.

A complete wipe of the device seems to fix the issue though that is obviously not going to be the top choice for those who are experiencing the bug.

Stability Issues

Maybe even worse is the fact that some owners, besides reboot issues, are seeing slow down in the user interface and when opening applications. The sluggishness has apparently taken the buttery feeling aka the smoothness out of Android Jelly Bean for some users.

Google Now is also apparently slower than it was in Android 4.1 Jelly Bean and users are also seeing their clocks off by several minutes from the actual time.

As for the application bit, it seems applications are crashing for Nexus users on a consistent basis. Now, this could definitely be an Android 4.2 Jelly Bean issue but it’s more likely that the developers have been slow at patching up their applications for the latest update.

We’ve heard from plenty of Nexus 7 owners who are saying that they are seeing app stability issues but those will likely be fixed once developers offer updates post-Android 4.2.

Bluetooth Problems

We heard from numerous Nexus 7 owners over the weekend who complained about Bluetooth issues. Connections get lost, the sound is choppy and bad, and some can’t even get it to connect at all. We saw this with the Galaxy Nexus with the release of Android 4.1 Jelly Bean and Android 4.2 has apparently just made things go from bad to worse as far as Bluetooth is concerned.

It should be noted that that most Nexus 4 owners aren’t seeing issues with Bluetooth and the issues seem to be plaguing Galaxy Nexus, Nexus 10 and Nexus 7 owners.

Auto-Brightness Bug

Nexus 7 owners have also been telling us that their Nexus 7 and other Nexus devices are experiencing a bug with auto-brightness wherein the feature just seems to automatically adjust itself without any sort of reason. We’ve heard from people who say that the devices will automatically turn the display down, even it’s not necessary, and then bring it back to normal lighting levels.

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Nexus 7 owners are complaining about an auto-brightness bug.

Android Police also notes that some people are experiencing screen flickering when auto-brightness is still on but that bug has seemingly shown up in many iterations of Android and can’t be blamed on Android 4.2 entirely even though Android 4.2 users are seeing it.

This could certainly be a reason why some people are seeing the next bug.

Abnormal Battery Drain

Nexus users are reporting abnormal battery drain with Android 4.2. Apparently, some of the Google Play Services are gouging stand-by battery life on the Nexus 7 and Galaxy Nexus to the point where users are seeing a upwards of a day of stand by time lost.

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Nexus owners are seeing an assortment of Jelly Bean issues.

It appears that exchange accounts are responsible for massive loss of battery as well. Exchange users will want to try removing an account and then re-entering the account information. That fix may not work for everyone.

Slow Charging

Some users are also saying that charging the Nexus 7 after installing Android 4.2 is now a long and arduous process. We heard from a few owners who stated that it now takes quite awhile to charge the Nexus 7 after the update, much longer than it took with Android 4.1 Jelly Bean.

Personal Experience

As a Nexus 7 owner myself, I can say that I haven’t seen any of these bugs occur on my device other than the Bluetooth connectivity issues. I’ve tried replicating every single one and the only one I’ve been able to reproduce is the Bluetooth issue where the device can’t keep a stable connection. It also doesn’t sound top notch.

Applications work well on my Nexus 7 and my battery life is as good as it ever was. Charging it doesn’t seem slow whatsoever and it has not randomly rebooted itself.

As with any software update, there bound to be people who have difference experiences based on not only their usage of the phone but their setup – meaning apps, rooting, etc. For the record, my Nexus 7 has not been rooted and is running stock Android 4.2 Jelly Bean.

What’s Next?

Just because I’m not having major issues doesn’t mean that people aren’t. It’s clear that there are enough Nexus users out there experiencing issues that it’s now crucial for Google to update these phones with Android 4.2.1.

When that update will arrive is unknown but we imagine that it could be soon given the outpouring of complaints from owners of not only the older Nexus devices but the newer ones as well.

What Android 4.2 Jelly Bean bugs are you seeing?

43 Comments

43 Comments

  1. Jeremy Plaiss

    11/19/2012 at 3:27 pm

    Kaspersky icon is present in the upper left corner, but it keeps telling me the app is shut down. I’m not sure I have protection.
    How might I get this addressed?

    • Neil P

      11/27/2012 at 8:12 am

      My kaspersky has also stopped working – how can I have this repaired?

    • anon54325423

      03/10/2013 at 12:30 am

      Solve it by uninstalling it. You don’t need it. Use apps from the Play Store and you’ll be fine.

  2. Larry Retzlaff

    11/19/2012 at 4:26 pm

    I updated my 1 month old Nexus 7 to 4.2 on Saturday. It’s a nightmare. It took my favourite device to something I would happily heave through the window to get rid of it.

    Previously rock solid WIFI hotspots now only connect intermittently, and drop off after a couple seconds, the music player has developed a stutter if you’re doing ANYTHING else with the device, it turns itself off randomly, and it’s DEADLY slow and choppy now. NOTHING on the device other than the update has changed.

    I hope they hurry with a fix because this thing is unusable. Can I revert back to the previous version?

  3. Christopher

    11/19/2012 at 4:58 pm

    Bluetooth problems. Lost my ability to connect my bluetooth keyboard, which was working fine on 4.1.

  4. Adam

    11/19/2012 at 7:38 pm

    I’ve had mine charging all day. It started at 38% and 12 hours later, it’s at 80%.

  5. bharathbhai

    11/19/2012 at 8:37 pm

    GPS does not work. No directions on Google maps

  6. Yvette

    11/19/2012 at 9:28 pm

    Google Play Movies app lost my purchase information and no longer lists the latest episode of the season of The Walking Dead I bought. I called Google Play customer support and they said there’s nothing they can do. I will no longer buy TV shows on Google…

  7. Mark K

    11/19/2012 at 10:13 pm

    Thanks for the write Adam. Hopefully they can resolve this quickly. The high from saving a pretty penny compared to Apple will wear away quite quickly for many buyers if this continues.

  8. Nexus 10 user

    11/19/2012 at 10:42 pm

    Clock has stopped issue
    Could not launch app
    Reboots 2 times
    Battery drain – just got 4 hrs after charging it full
    Taking way too long time to charge
    Chrome issues
    Wifi is terrible although it is good on my iPhone

  9. Richard Prior

    11/19/2012 at 11:15 pm

    Great write up. However, I am only here because of Nexus 7 power management issues following system upgrade to Jelly Bean 4.2 last week.

    Battery drained in minutes not hours.

    Charger cannot keep up with Battery drain – when son is using Team Lava Farm Story Game.

    Also have slow charging rate – time is tripled over Jelly Bean 4.1 (using USB charging)

    This Android update has been released too early.

    • Brian

      11/29/2012 at 1:22 pm

      You Should know by Charging with a USB is totally dumb, you need a OEM Charger that came with your Nexus or it will take hours to charge and the battery lasts for 48 hrs for me and everyone else. Use the Charger it came with Only

      • Richard Prior

        11/30/2012 at 11:54 pm

        If the damn USA worked on 220v power rather than their 110v systems all would be well.

        My Nexus 7 had to be purchased in USA at the time, as it was not released elsewhere.

        More importantly, USB charging suits my working habits.

  10. Paul StJohn Mackintosh

    11/19/2012 at 11:29 pm

    Couldn’t connect to Google Play and download/update apps for ages, though this seems to have fixed itself now.

  11. Xman

    11/20/2012 at 12:16 am

    This is the price you pay for being an early adopter. That has always been the case. I NEVER run updates as soon as they are released. I always wait at least a couple of weeks in case there are problems because there usually are. Just look at Apple with iOS 6.

  12. George

    11/20/2012 at 1:03 am

    my galaxy nexus is suffering from the occasional reboot problem. also the auto brightness is very annoying. just randomly changes up and down every 30 seconds or so even in a stable light source. have had to set a brightness level manually until they fix this one.

  13. Navallo Rezvie

    11/20/2012 at 1:49 am

    on version 4.1 looks great, when you upgrade 4.2 it getting worse, try to uninstall all your 3rd party android apps then re-install 1 at a time and observe android apps make it trouble, draining your android device problem is 1 of your apps of your android installed uses a lots of thread infinite process, just like when playing games on your android that keep ON will over heat your device because there apps still running and consume battery life, try to un-install that and observe which android apps making a mess

  14. paul

    11/20/2012 at 6:52 am

    bluetooth headset choppy and unusable on netflix. one of my crucial apps will not start, and i dont buy the line that says thats a 3rd party developer problem. without apps the device is worthless – microsoft learned that years ago. google did not give enough time for testing and upgrading the apps after major os changes, then they pretty much force us to use it. i went back to 4.1.2, and all is well except that i constantly need to press that annoying “update later” button.

  15. anon

    11/20/2012 at 8:12 am

    I’m sure they know about these problems by now and are trying to fix them (google’s own employees use it). It’s seems like it was rushed to meet the launch date.

  16. Robert Chase

    11/20/2012 at 9:02 am

    I was on the verge of buying a Nexus 7, but I want to know that the OS is stable and that applications are able to use what connectivity the Nexus provides seamlessly before I buy one. If services supporting Google Play are draining the battery it is particularly troubling, because I don’t want my device using any system resources more to accomplish basic tasks like installing applications than I explicitly direct. Unless Google resolves these problems decisively I will delay purchasing a tablet until a $200 one with just a little more resolution becomes available.

    If suggestions that Google is sucking up system resources in the inappropriate conflation of system utility and online store which is Google Play are borne out, I may delay buying a tablet for longer still. If Google want s to drive all end-users to its store to update applications, the software that does that needs to be efficient, unobtrusive, and flawless.

  17. Ralph Collins

    11/20/2012 at 11:27 am

    Clock on startup is in two different fonts; some kind of screen cut out mars the display on the left side of the device; bluetooth is choppy; auto brightness is having issues. The update took a really smooth device and has made it pretty clunky. I’m hoping for a patch soon.

  18. george

    11/20/2012 at 11:33 am

    I think the clock font is intentional… But I agree it looks crap so I hope they either change it back or at least give US the option to!

  19. Jerry

    11/20/2012 at 1:33 pm

    My Samsung Galaxy Nexus bluetooth doesn’t work on initial bluetooth on and connect to the device; shutting down the phone and restarting then turn on bluetooth and it works fine.
    But… my bluetooth has a heckuva time recognizing my voice dialing now, it seems to think that I want to call my wife every time I try to tell it to dial a number. So if I get it working I don’t have a lot of options!

  20. Dan

    11/22/2012 at 6:34 am

    Cant connect to wifi. Keeps saying authentication problem on 2.4ghz. Can not connec5ghz at all. Was working fine before 4.2 update.
    Galaxy Nexus

  21. r2kay

    11/23/2012 at 11:46 pm

    GN updated to 4.2 bluetooth takes 30-60 sec to connect to the car audio. When making calls it wont connect over to bluetooth

  22. David

    11/24/2012 at 1:28 am

    My wife and I both have Nexus 7’s and she has had problems since the upgrade of loads of apps opening at once, the keyboard constantly typing and unable to stop it. I cannot find a setting which prevents an automatic upgrade. Does anyone know of one?

  23. Ravindra Hegde

    11/25/2012 at 3:42 pm

    I am also facing 3 problems after 4.2 update…
    Quick battery drain
    Longer charging hours
    and
    Poor WiFi connectivity…

    Hope Google resolves this at the earliest….

  24. Chris

    11/26/2012 at 9:19 am

    My screen on my GNex just comes on randomly throughout the day since the 4.2 update.

  25. Jerry

    11/27/2012 at 3:40 pm

    My GNex with 4.2 has very poor volume on the music player. Half that of 4.1. Too much for me to root it etc. Hope google resolves this issue

  26. Jack

    11/27/2012 at 8:32 pm

    I had experienced battery drain and slow charge on my Nexus 7 but found out that the battery drain was because of G+. I signed out and signed back in and bam, battery drain problem fixed. You may need to sign out and sign back in if you are a G+ user.

    As for the slow recharge, I only see this doing that while being charged and Daydream being running. I set it to charge at like 8 p.m. and then I knew in like 2 and half hour it would be fully charged but it went from 24% to 56% in just 2 hours and half so I knew something was up. It was because I had Daydream running and displaying the clock because I thought it was neat. So after noticing the slow charge, I stopped Daydream and immediately put the N7 to sleep. 1 hour and half later, battery charged to full.

    This is the only time I saw the slow charge. I haven’t tried Daydream again but if you guys were seeing this while Daydream was running then you might know why?

  27. Colin Tedford

    11/28/2012 at 2:18 am

    “I had bad lag, spontaneous reboots, and the Amazon App Store kept making me log in over and over again. Clearing the system cache seems to have solved all of these issues. Go to settings, click Storage, click Cached Data, click OK to clear the cache. I haven’t had any more problems since I did this.” – So says Brian Bull in comments (with some positive responses) at https://www.product-reviews.net/2012/11/18/nexus-7-jelly-bean-4-2-update-creates-problems/

    Can’t verify myself but hope it helps.

  28. Geoff Bott

    12/07/2012 at 11:31 pm

    When my Nexus 7 wakes from sleep, the lock screen shows a rectangle on the top left part of the screen – it is about 3″ x 1″ and looks like it may be part of another screen, It disappears after a couple of seconds and has only appeared since I updated to Android 4.2.1

  29. Geoff Bott

    12/07/2012 at 11:44 pm

    re my comment above about the lock screen – the annoying rectangle first appeared with Android update 4.2, and was not corrected with the update to Android 4.2.1

    • Todd subculture

      12/09/2012 at 8:20 am

      The weird rectangle is a lock screen area in which you can put a lock screen widget.

      • Geoff Bott

        12/09/2012 at 10:15 am

        Thanks a lot for that. Cheers Geoff

  30. jim

    12/08/2012 at 7:14 am

    On Asus nexus 7 after jelly bean 4.2.1 had bad Wi-Fi issue it kept disconnecting all the time had to go into advanced Wi-Fi options and turn off Wi-Fi optimisation seems better now

  31. jim

    12/10/2012 at 4:48 am

    Wi-Fi still keeps switching off when when Asus nexus 7 is on sleep have to keep going to settings to switching it back on never had any problems with jelly bean 4.2 update problem started after 4.2.1 jelly bean update

  32. Oldtimer (Tony)

    12/15/2012 at 5:53 am

    New Nexus 7 today. Updated to 4.2 then 5 mins later 4.2.1 update arrived so updated. Camera will not do 360 shots crashes every time ok on other options.

    Battery charging very slow so turned off and still only charged 8% in 1 hour when I 1st set up out of box it gave me about 10% additional charge in short time so it does seem like the update/’s cause the issue. I have WiFi on its now showing 50% charged after 1hr 10 mins from a power boot at 35% charged. It was showing Play store using lots of power now Play is not showing but I have it running. Shows screen as using 81% but it is turned down low as its night time.

    One clue the official charger is ran warm when I first started to charge before updates and also the back of the tablet got warm now charger and tablet runs cool looking at battery in settings it says Charging(USB) I have a USB phone charger so I tried that and it comes up with Charging (AC) using the phone charger USB cable if i now swap the cable to the Nexus USB cable it says (USB) so the Nexus charger cable (not the charger) is a special cable with a diode in the power wires. So if you use a standard USB-miniUSB it will say Charging (AC) with the Nexus charger or (USB) with the Nexus Cable.
    The charger is rated at 2 amps output at 5v AC. I have now connected my phone charger 1.5a AC charger with standard USB cable and battery charge has gone up from 52% to 56% in 5minutes!! This indicates to me that the Nexus charger may be an issue.

    However I have now reconnected the Nexus Charger with a standard USB cable so it is showing Charging(AC) than my mobile phone charger which is only 1.5amps charger against the 2.0 amps for the nexus.The time to go from 63% to 64% was 4 mins with the Nexus Charger with a standard USB cable and from 64% to 65% 9 MINS with the Nexus USB cable.

    Conclusions the Nexus USB charger cable is limiting the charge either because it has developed a fault or not being able to supply enough current when the tablet is powered up. I may be wrong but I suspect that the cable may have a diode bridge (4 diodes) that is it will rectify the AC to DC on both the + & – half cycle but if one diode blows then the charging current will be halved and the charging time will double plus a bit more because the tablet is taking power as well.

    When the OS is updated I am guessing that the power requirements to flash the memory are higher and if the charger is charging the battery which in my case was not fully charged and is called upon to supply extra power for the flash update then it may or has blow the cable.

    Not every one is reporting the slow battery charge times after update this may be because they were running on battery only during update. I would suggest for now that you charge the battery to 100% before doing an update and disconnect the charger.

    When you buy a new tablet and power up and set up the update will be highlighted so its only natural to apply the update using the charger rather than waiting a few hours for the battery to be fully charged hence the risk of damaging the special Nexus Charger cable.

    It is normal for manufacturers to say use the charger when updating so the battery does not run out half way, in this case it may be the real cause of the issue.

    With out hacking the cable connectors to find the diode/s and test I can not back up my theory

    Oldtimer

  33. Oldtimer

    12/22/2012 at 6:33 pm

    Follow on…
    To cut the story short I now have a new Nexus 7 the last one decided it would discharge the battery to 0% overnight (6hrs) and then refuse to charge, more on this in a moment.

    The USB cable supplied was faulty 1) could not connect to PC or charge at any usable rate. I still think it may have been damaged when I flashed the update and left the Nexus on charge at same time.

    I took my apparently dead Nexus back to the store and they tried to get it to charge but could not. I had bought it at another branch so I took it home. I remembered with another Android tablet about holding both the Power button & both volume buttons then plugging in the charger. Luck the Boot Screen came up and I pressed ‘Start’ up came the tablet login screen and I could use. The battery showed 0% charging (AC) using a standard USB cable.

    I should say here that it was night time and before I did the above recovery that with the lights off in my room I could see a faint glow from around the sides of the screen. This suggests that the screen LEDs were on although the unit had been powered down. i was not going to risk any more issues so I took it back under warranty and the store swapped it out. They also said they had a customer in before me with the same issues.

    My new Nexus 7 32 GB so far is ok and also seems faster. The first thing I did was to charge using the Nexus charge USB cable and it charges OK it went from 52% to 98% in 1hr 40mins. Once it was fully charged I unplugged the USB cable and then did the update from Ver 4.1.2 to 4.2.1 this went ok on battery power and still showed 100% charge.

    In my last post I reported that the update occurred twice I had thought that there were 2 updates but now I realise that the same update had been applied twice, so something must have gone wrong. I am concluding that the charger & USB cable could not supply enough current when the battery was less than full i.e. 50%. This may have zapped the USB cable.
    So to do an update fully charge the battery 1st then disconnect the charger. Most tablet suppliers say you should run the update with the charger connected!

    I have a laptop that when you power up (with a less than 100% battery) then it will always flag a HD check. If I boot from Battery only or wait for 10 mins to allow the battery to have a bit of a charge then it will come up ok. Issue is that the charging battery and Laptop power overloads the charger until the charge rate drops.

    I am now adding applications to my Nexus 7 in a more controlled manner to see it one of the app’s is an issue. I have found one so far, the Facebook turns on the GPS so I have disabled that feature. I checked today with the tablet powered down overnight and all was fine until about 2hrs before I powered it back on (going by the battery meter discharge display) the last 2 hrs was showing a discharge whereas the rest of the overnight the level was flat at 60% where I had turned it off. No idea what is running when powered off but could be the clock. I have checked the alarm function and this is disabled.

    Maybe a bug exists in 4.2.1 anyway the replacement does seem to be working better and the USB cable works ok charging and as a USB cable to the PC!

    I do not like the issue that if the battery drains to 0% that you can not charge (reported on other blogs and sites). However to fix;-

    Removed charger, Hold Power Button and both +- volume buttons down (maybe one would do) and then plug in the charger. This should bring up the low level boot screen displaying a large word ‘START’ can’t remember if I swiped to right or just tapped. The tablet will then start up and start to charge :)

    Oldtimer

  34. koshum

    12/23/2012 at 12:21 pm

    Kaspersky no longer works since upgraded to 4.2.1, I cant uninstall it either, its annoying

    • Neil P

      12/24/2012 at 12:02 am

      I have the same problem – three emails to Kaspersky, no reply! Email from my bank telling me to contact Kaspersky. Dead end. Such bad customer service!

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