How do I identify apps or settings that cause performance problems?

Question

If I am having performance problems, what tools can I use to identify where my performance lags are coming from? I have used a System Panel Task Manager, Android System Info, System Manager Free and some others but none of them have really identified the problem children. System Panel Task Manager came the closest with it's historical look at CPU and memory usage but it didn't let me look at which apps were using how much resources over time.

Answer 1

Watchdog will monitor your phone's performance and alert you of issues. Here's a quote from the Lifehacker article on Watchdog.

Watchdog runs in the background, watching for apps to start using more than a certain percentage of CPU power that you specify (with a default of 80 percent). When it notices an app going out of bounds, it notifies you and offers options to kill the app, ignore it, or add it to your "Whitelist" of pay-no-mind programs. By default, Watchdog doesn't use much power itself, only checking in every two minutes or so, but you can make it run more real-time if you'd like to really pin down a problem you know is happening.

Answer 2

SeePU is another app that will monitor your phone's CPU, memory and network usage. From Lifehacker's artcile on SeePU:

SeePU puts monitoring meters in your Android phone's notification area. You can monitor the CPU usage, RAM usage, and network activity. You can adjust the frequency the monitor is updated, how the data is displayed—just CPU or CPU and RAM combined, upload and download or combine network activity, etc.