What is MDNSD and how do I get rid of it?
markt36264
Newbie

What is MDNSD and why is it killing my battery?

Samsung S5

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Re: MDNSD
KBTron
Enthusiast - Level 3

Suggest full charge of the phone, followed by a power cycle. The mdnsd is some kind of zombie process; once started, it runs fowever until Linux is restarted. So, uninstall Firefox, power the phone off, charge it all the way (which clears the list of apps eating power), then turn the phone back on again. Worked for me and others.By the by: if you really want to run FF, it's possible to get an old version (41.0.2) or a rediculously new version (the nightly) and run one or the other of those until the main branch is fixed. The developers are painfully aware of the issue and are working towards a fix posthaste.

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Re: MDNSD
Snn5
Legend

Best I can tell is it is a media scanner.  I have heard all manner of solutions from factory resetting without restoring apps, to an issue with an app named Freeflight, and even removing the SD card and formatting it in a PC.  I have seen similar battery drains from media scanners on other phones which use SD cards and constantly search the card for new files.  Usually related to 3rd party music players.

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Re: MDNSD
KBTron
Enthusiast - Level 3

Been up, down, and sideways on this one. It's some kind of networking discovery software; so far, I've discovered it's used by some drone aircraft control software, by some Ebay app, and (drum roll, please) the most recent version of Firefox and Firefox Beta from the Google Store.

Install this new version, run it once, and the mdnsd process starts busily running your battery life down. It took my S5 from 17 or 20 hours before the battery would run out to 4 hours. This is true whether or not Firefox is running in the background.

All the complaints on the web about this start around November 2014 time frame with complaints about the two other random apps, but only a couple, and a comment on the Mozilla Bugzilla platform that there was a report of extreme battery usage sometime in July of 2015. That MR was closed. Now they've got a new one open; it's active; and there appear to be people trying to fix it. And there's a >lot< more complaints on the web. I take that last to mean that there's a lot of people running Firefox on Android.

There's indications that the MDNS library (?) is something relatively new, originally written for Apple and IOS, that's being gradually ported to Android since last year. It's not clear whether usage of this software is busted from the get-go, or whether just using it improperly is what sucks the battery down.
I was able to get rid of mdnsd by uninstalling Firefox, charging the phone all the way up, and resetting the phone. YMMV; but I haven't seen any sign of mdnsd since doing that. Reinstall Firefox and it pops right back up again. There are others who have noted the same thing. The Firefox Beta on the Google Store shows the same behavior, so it's not clear whether the next version of Firefox, purportedly due in mid December, is going to fix this either.

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Re: MDNSD
Snn5
Legend

KBTron wrote:

.....so far, I've discovered it's used by some drone aircraft control software, .....

That's news to me.

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Re: MDNSD
KBTron
Enthusiast - Level 3

Here you go:

"Freeflight 3, or (if you need it), just make sure you kill the process every time you finish flying your drone AND when you restart or first turn on your phone."

Link: http://www.matthewgatland.com/journal/2015-01-16-mdnsd/

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Re: MDNSD
kawaikini
Newbie

Uninstalled Firefox but mdnsd process returned. Also uninstalled Runtastic on a hunch, but no change. Number one on battery usage list. So, any new ideas?

Thank you very much.

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Re: MDNSD
KBTron
Enthusiast - Level 3

Suggest full charge of the phone, followed by a power cycle. The mdnsd is some kind of zombie process; once started, it runs fowever until Linux is restarted. So, uninstall Firefox, power the phone off, charge it all the way (which clears the list of apps eating power), then turn the phone back on again. Worked for me and others.By the by: if you really want to run FF, it's possible to get an old version (41.0.2) or a rediculously new version (the nightly) and run one or the other of those until the main branch is fixed. The developers are painfully aware of the issue and are working towards a fix posthaste.

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Re: MDNSD
kawaikini
Newbie

Thank you very much, KBTron. Followed your suggestions to the letter and mdnsd has not recurred for two days now. This apparently is a Firefox problem; hope Mozilla is working on a solution. Now just need to learn how to get Android OS and Android System to not be such battery gluttons.

Thanks again.

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Re: MDNSD
KBTron
Enthusiast - Level 3

Just putting the word out: The people over at Mozilla have fixed Firefox for Android: The mdnsd problem is gone with the latest version of Firefox, 42.0.2; no more massive battery drain.

Ken