The OP wrote :"Battery drain: MMA is the worst offender, by far. I'll open it, scroll through the folders for twenty seconds, and exit. A couple hours later MMA has used 40% of my battery and it's nearly dead. Happens every time. The only way to keep it in check is to "force close" the app when I'm done with it. I think it may be due to continuous scanning?"
If you are running Android 4.1.1 you will have issues with battery life with any player if you have a big library especially on a microSD card. The issue is that the native Android program "mediaserver" (which Android uses to catalog files) has a huge bug in it and it chokes when it tries to catalog alot of MP3s. Very often it will also corrupt a microSD card causing mount errors and wiping the card. As mediaserver tries and fails to catalog your MP3 is slows down your phone and drains the battery.
The best solution is to update to Android 4.1.2 or 4.2 where this bug is supposedly fixed but unless your carrier has this update or you root/unlock, you can't do this. This update is being released very late or maybe not at all for many big carriers, probably because they want people to upgrade. I am still waiting for Bell to release it and I don't think they will ..... the Samsung S3 is too good a phone and nobody will need to upgrade for years. Also Samsung is currently making phones for users and not the carriers (at least for now) and the carriers will dump them as soon as possible. The S3 and S4 may be the last great phones and after that the carriers will start taking things away and replacing them with services that use data so they can $$$$ you for it.
The next best solution is to put all your MP3s in a single folder and add a .nomedia file to prevent mediaserver from catalogging it. Then use PowerAMP to catalog and play files as it has its own MP3 scanner separate from mediaserver.
Disabling mediaserver works but then your Gallery app wont
Take home message. MMA is pretty much unusable for anyone on 4.1.1 unless you have hardware unaffected by this very serious bug.
Phones I know are affected: Samsung Galaxy S3 747 = tested on 2 phones from different carriers with multiple microSD cards (probably the most popular phone with a microSD slot but forum post indicate more also have this bug
The program Mediaserver is a dinosaur in terms of catalogging files ..... it is slow and rudimentary meaning that Android is 20 years behind the times when it comes to catalogging files
The OP wrote :"Battery drain: MMA is the worst offender, by far. I'll open it, scroll through the folders for twenty seconds, and exit. A couple hours later MMA has used 40% of my battery and it's nearly dead. Happens every time. The only way to keep it in check is to "force close" the app when I'm done with it. I think it may be due to continuous scanning?"
If you are running Android 4.1.1 you will have issues with battery life with any player if you have a big library especially on a microSD card. The issue is that the native Android program "mediaserver" (which Android uses to catalog files) has a huge bug in it and it chokes when it tries to catalog alot of MP3s. Very often it will also corrupt a microSD card causing mount errors and wiping the card. As mediaserver tries and fails to catalog your MP3 is slows down your phone and drains the battery.
The best solution is to update to Android 4.1.2 or 4.2 where this bug is supposedly fixed but unless your carrier has this update or you root/unlock, you can't do this. This update is being released very late or maybe not at all for many big carriers, probably because they want people to upgrade. I am still waiting for Bell to release it and I don't think they will ..... the Samsung S3 is too good a phone and nobody will need to upgrade for years. Also Samsung is currently making phones for users and not the carriers (at least for now) and the carriers will dump them as soon as possible. The S3 and S4 may be the last great phones and after that the carriers will start taking things away and replacing them with services that use data so they can $$$$ you for it.
The next best solution is to put all your MP3s in a single folder and add a .nomedia file to prevent mediaserver from catalogging it. Then use PowerAMP to catalog and play files as it has its own MP3 scanner separate from mediaserver.
Disabling mediaserver works but then your Gallery app wont ;)
Take home message. MMA is pretty much unusable for anyone on 4.1.1 unless you have hardware unaffected by this very serious bug.
Phones I know are affected: Samsung Galaxy S3 747 = tested on 2 phones from different carriers with multiple microSD cards (probably the most popular phone with a microSD slot but forum post indicate more also have this bug
The program Mediaserver is a dinosaur in terms of catalogging files ..... it is slow and rudimentary meaning that Android is 20 years behind the times when it comes to catalogging files