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Please advise. Captivate issues galore...

Hi all. I just got a Captivate after using Mattc on my HD2 and I used an Aria for a couple weeks as well. I used Mattc on the HD2 for a couple months and really liked it. I understood it was running from the SD and lived with the other issues like slow wake up and occasional goofiness.
So when I got my Captivate I was thinking, wow, I'll have one of(if not the) fastest Android phone on it's native hardware. Everything should rock. I should be blown away... Not.
HELP!
The brightness settings. WTF! Why did they implement like 10 ways the brightness screws with your day. On my HD2 w/Mattc I set the brightness in settings to where I wanted and it stayed. Forever. Also when it hits 10% it kicks the brightness all the way down. 10%? Com on maybe 5%. But what is worse is when it does kick it down I kick it back up but it dims again at every percent it goes down. ANNOYING. Please let me control my phone... Oh and don't get me started on the Browser brightness. Huh? Even with the browser brightness set at max it's still dimmer than my regular brightness setting. Noticably. I only keep my brightness at like 75-80% too.
Also what the hell is with the lame Calendar notification settings? Are there any?
My question is this. Is there any ROM out there that will strip all that Samsung ideology and give me a stock Android experience. Especially without the brightness issues. Why do I need to slide my notification bar to change brightness? All it does for me is just cause my brightness to vary accidentally when I don't want it to.
Why must I add on programs for my Calendar alerts to function normally? Why?
So again. Is there a ROM out there that will strip all the Samsung goofiness? If I can't get this phone to work like I want I'm going to sell it and look for a Telus HTC Desire to use on ATT. HTC phones are the best man. IMHO
Thanks.

juiceppc said:
The brightness settings. WTF! Why did they implement like 10 ways the brightness screws with your day. On my HD2 w/Mattc I set the brightness in settings to where I wanted and it stayed. Forever. Also when it hits 10% it kicks the brightness all the way down. 10%? Com on maybe 5%. But what is worse is when it does kick it down I kick it back up but it dims again at every percent it goes down. ANNOYING. Please let me control my phone... Oh and don't get me started on the Browser brightness. Huh? Even with the browser brightness set at max it's still dimmer than my regular brightness setting. Noticably. I only keep my brightness at like 75-80% too.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Turn off auto brightness and pick a setting you like. Done.
Also what the hell is with the lame Calendar notification settings? Are there any?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I don't know what lame is, but I use my Google calendar and I can set notifications. I get notified. Is there a specific problem you have?
My question is this. Is there any ROM out there that will strip all that Samsung ideology and give me a stock Android experience. Especially without the brightness issues. Why do I need to slide my notification bar to change brightness? All it does for me is just cause my brightness to vary accidentally when I don't want it to.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
There is no stock Android experience. Android is just the core - Samsung, HTC, etc, they all add specific things in order for their specific hardware to function. If you don't want what comes on your AT&T Captivate, then you can root and uninstall the apps you don't like, flash one of the many, many cooked ROMs available on this forum (just look around - they are everywhere, and all with great pictures and descriptions and huge threads full of information), tweak settings to your heart's content, or anything else you want to do.
Why must I add on programs for my Calendar alerts to function normally? Why?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I don't have any add-ons and I get my alerts. What exactly isn't working for you?

Auto brightness has been off. First thing I do-
I do not get audible alerts when a Calendar reminder goes off-(and there is no where in settings to change/check this)
I had to install "Calendar Snooze" to play an audible alert for a Calendar reminder-
Phone is at 10% now fully dimmed. Nice... Considering how bad the battery life is for this phone(for me) I'll be spending a lot of time with the screen fully dimmed.

juiceppc said:
Auto brightness has been off. First thing I do-
I do not get audible alerts when a Calendar reminder goes off-(and there is no where in settings to change/check this)
I had to install "Calendar Snooze" to play an audible alert for a Calendar reminder-
Phone is at 10% now fully dimmed. Nice... Considering how bad the battery life is for this phone(for me) I'll be spending a lot of time with the screen fully dimmed.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Try reading a little and you will see you can set the brightness at where you want it by un-checking the automatic brightness setting..Then you can swipe along the status bar to raise and lower the brightness..It will stay where you had it set IF the automatic brightness is unchecked..Where you have the slider at will be the brightest it will swipe to..
Set your alerts to something you can hear and turn up the volume..They work fine.
Battery life is not a issue provided you follow some advise..Bump charge it 1 time and then use it till it drains down to single digits before recharging...also make sure you back out of all programs and turn off wi-fi and gps and syncing when you don't need them. Loose any task killer program you have and run it stock..you will find your battery life is excellent..if not you may or may not have a bad battery..Lastly..if you are really dissatisfied with it..take it back..
Good Luck
Mac

In regards to the brightness, turn off auto brightness and the 'power saving option.', that should solve your issue.
As far as removing the AT&T bloatware goes, try Unleash the beast.
If you want to run Froyo try flashing a rom, I used the latest version of Cognition.

Run far away from this phone if you still have the chance.

MikeyMike01 said:
Run far away from this phone if you still have the chance.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Broad-brush damnations do nothing to help anyone.

Mac11700 said:
Try reading a little and you will see you can set the brightness at where you want it by un-checking the automatic brightness setting..Then you can swipe along the status bar to raise and lower the brightness..It will stay where you had it set IF the automatic brightness is unchecked..Where you have the slider at will be the brightest it will swipe to..
Set your alerts to something you can hear and turn up the volume..They work fine.
Battery life is not a issue provided you follow some advise..Bump charge it 1 time and then use it till it drains down to single digits before recharging...also make sure you back out of all programs and turn off wi-fi and gps and syncing when you don't need them. Loose any task killer program you have and run it stock..you will find your battery life is excellent..if not you may or may not have a bad battery..Lastly..if you are really dissatisfied with it..take it back..
Good Luck
Mac
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the advice. Although I have done all of those things. I'm kind of coming to one real main pain point that I can't seem to solve. The screen dimming at 10%. Does anyone know how to disable that? Even if I kick the brightness back up after it dims at 10% it will redim at 9% and so on...

Bitter. But hopeful.
Picsman said:
Broad-brush damnations do nothing to help anyone.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Unfortunately, running away from this phone does seem to be good advise. It doesn't mater how slick it is in theory. Uber display and kickass hardware are useless if the basic functionality suffers due to glitches most of the other options don't seem to exibit.
I decided to play the "mod and wait" game with this thing, and I'm regretting it. Broad-brush damnations would have helped me. At this point, enough issues have came up about this hardware that a "broad-brush" sticky may be warranted. The alert issues found by the OP, may be related to his speaker begining to fail. I had a similar issue. Calander and alarm notifications began failing in some apps, but not others. The phone would still ring. Some apps could still use the speaker. Within a week, nothing could use the speaker, and I had to do the "push-on-it" fix.
It's a forum. Posts are opinions. I've been impressed occasionally by the raw performance of this phone. Yet, I've also spent hours, hours, researching problems, applying fixes, flashing, pushing on the speaker, etc. And I've spent hours "waiting" for the thing to do something simple like send an email when it did fine the day before. With as much time and effort as I've put into researching and working on this phone, I feel like I (and others) have not gotten enough stability out of it.
I propose a broad brush damnation for this phone: "slick but intermittent".

fshalor said:
Unfortunately, running away from this phone does seem to be good advise. It doesn't mater how slick it is in theory. Uber display and kickass hardware are useless if the basic functionality suffers due to glitches most of the other options don't seem to exibit.
I decided to play the "mod and wait" game with this thing, and I'm regretting it. Broad-brush damnations would have helped me. At this point, enough issues have came up about this hardware that a "broad-brush" sticky may be warranted. The alert issues found by the OP, may be related to his speaker begining to fail. I had a similar issue. Calander and alarm notifications began failing in some apps, but not others. The phone would still ring. Some apps could still use the speaker. Within a week, nothing could use the speaker, and I had to do the "push-on-it" fix.
It's a forum. Posts are opinions. I've been impressed occasionally by the raw performance of this phone. Yet, I've also spent hours, hours, researching problems, applying fixes, flashing, pushing on the speaker, etc. And I've spent hours "waiting" for the thing to do something simple like send an email when it did fine the day before. With as much time and effort as I've put into researching and working on this phone, I feel like I (and others) have not gotten enough stability out of it.
I propose a broad brush damnation for this phone: "slick but intermittent".
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
haha. Thanks for the ,.. opinion. I'm starting to feel the same way about this phone. I had super high hopes. But I'm really going to stick with HTC. They just get it. IMHO.

I think most people regret buying this phone. Or they will, when FroYo never arrives, the lag gets worse and worse, the phone dies on them, and the GPS never come close to working, the market decides not to intall your app, this, that, or the other thing force closes, etc. etc. etc.

MikeyMike01 said:
I think most people regret buying this phone. Or they will, when FroYo never arrives, the lag gets worse and worse, the phone dies on them, and the GPS never come close to working, the market decides not to intall your app, this, that, or the other thing force closes, etc. etc. etc.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Umm froyo is already leaked and OTA is on its way.
Lag has never been an issue.
And GPS is a software fix... proven on these boards over and over.
SHEESH... I'd say go tell somewhere else.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I897 using XDA App

yeah, 5 million people are completely dissatisfied because one guy managed to not know how to operate his phone.....

MikeyMike01 said:
I think most people regret buying this phone. Or they will, when FroYo never arrives, the lag gets worse and worse, the phone dies on them, and the GPS never come close to working, the market decides not to intall your app, this, that, or the other thing force closes, etc. etc. etc.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think your wrong. I think quite a few people got defective phones and haven't bothered returning them,thinking that if they root it and flash a different rom that would magically fix a broken phone. This is XDA and folks here mostly do this..thus the reason for most of the complaints. Problem is..it won't change much of anything to reflash if the phone is defective..If it is broken to begin with..it will be broken no matter what you do to it.. If yours is defective..quite *****ing about it and get one that isn't..or a different phone entirely. The working ones are great..just like they are supposed to be.
I have 2 of them built in September..both work and neither is defective.This tells me many of those built prior have some issues..perhaps not all of them..but some of them certainly. This certainly doesn't make it right by anyones account..just saying if yours is defective..return it and get one that isn't.
I honestly don't understand people who have the option of doing this,not doing it.The folks at my AT&T store opened 7 different boxes and checked every one of them for any blue tint on the screen and having the 3 button recovery option..for my second one bought at the same time,so I do know there are many out there that ain't working properly..The OP of this thread..is unhappy with it..damn..loose it and be done with it if you are that unhappy..or take that one back and get them to open up the boxes and show you one that works properly...If it was bought mail order..then you should just return it as defective and get your money back..and buy where you can see it first..It's your choice...and your money.
Mac

Third Phone - Not the Charm!

Just got my third G2x from T-Mobile. I'm running LauncherPro. I must have done something wrong because I backed up to SD card but after installing new phone it gave me an error reading SD card. I had to reset everything!
Anyway, I got a 2nd replacement (this is number 3 phone) because the 2nd one continued to have the random reboot issues.
This one is different from the other two. The icons in the top bar are smaller and the GPS signal button is different. Could this be an upgraded software?
It states Android 2.3.3, kernel version 2.6.32.9 and Software version LG-P999-V21e
Trouble is, this phone is way worse than either of the first two! I think only 1 reboot so far (1 day) but 3 times now after the phone sleeps I have to remove battery to turn it back on! And it will not allow me to mount the phone as a USB. Sometimes the message appears to turn on USB but it will not work. Touching the screen does nothing. Then the screens start to rapidly change.
Looking like number 4!

What other programs have you installed? These types of issues are almost always apps and not the OS or the hardware. The fact you are having similar problems with three phones seems to indicate that even more. Stop blaming the device and figure out what you are doing to it to screw it up.

Try installing the GB drivers to your computer via LG. That's what I had to do to get my phone to mount.
Powered by a G2x

jboxer said:
What other programs have you installed? These types of issues are almost always apps and not the OS or the hardware. The fact you are having similar problems with three phones seems to indicate that even more. Stop blaming the device and figure out what you are doing to it to screw it up.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I agree. "I went through 8 G2x's and all of them did the same thing after I restored my backup..."
Also, get off the stock firmware as it is absolutely unstable (Sleep of Death (SOD) and resets). I've been running MIUI since mid-August and haven't had 1 reset or SoD. Most CM7 nightly builds are good but a few will cause issues. Look at the stable version of CM7 or Weapon.

player911 said:
I agree. "I went through 8 G2x's and all of them did the same thing after I restored my backup..."
Also, get off the stock firmware as it is absolutely unstable (Sleep of Death (SOD) and resets). I've been running MIUI since mid-August and haven't had 1 reset or SoD. Most CM7 nightly builds are good but a few will cause issues. Look at the stable version of CM7 or Weapon.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The stock Gingerbread firmware is absolutely rock solid. I have been running it since it was released and have had zero problems. The only change to the system is that I rooted it. If I install an app that gives me the slightest trouble I uninstall it immediately. There is nothing wrong with the GB rom as LG delivered it. The Froyo rom did have problems, but the GB rom is very good. Many of the custom roms are based on it and just have hacks and tweaks. Very few are compiled from source like CM is.

Update to Phone
First, let me say that T-Mobile Customer Service is great! Every time I call or visit the store they are friendly and try their best to help me.
I called T-Mobile and explained the issues on this phone, as one person wrote above the "SOD". She walked me through a bunch of steps, and I'm fine with that, I understand she has to be sure i have done all the typical troubleshooting. She confirmed that the new one had GB.
She is sending phone number 4 out today. Meanwhile she said go by the store to have them check the battery, just in case. I did that, it was kind of funny. Gal says, no need to test it, I'll just grab a new one. She comes back and inserts new battery, "There ya go, brand new battery". Ah, Miss, I say, it won't turn on now. "No, that can't be, its a new battery". She finally went and got me yet another new battery!
Hopefully this 4th phone will do the trick.
As for the apps, maybe I do need to uninstall some, but it seems like what I have are all mainstream apps:
Launcherpro
Beautiful Widgets
Touchdown Pro
Pure Calendar
Juice Defender
Batter Monitor Widget (free edition)
All of the above are paid apps too, not free versions (except Battery Monitor).
Any thoughts, known issues on these?
Thanks!

All those are pretty common apps, none of which I've had trouble with. Juice defender has been a cause of connectivity, etc issues for some people, but works fine on all my devices.
If I were you I would ***** until they replaced it with a Sensation, Amaze, SGS2, etc. I've seen so many people with 3,4,5,6 replacements on this board....why? As much as I like the form factor, the G2x is not worth 4 replacements. NO product is worth 4 replacements. Needing to have a product replaced is one thing, having to replace the replacement, or more, is ridiculous. Fool me once....
At what point do you say, "wow screw this POS." 4 replacements is a company jacking you around. I got lucky with a mostly mint G2x on launch day. Had it had issues I would have replaced it, beyond that..... the G2x is a nice phone, but there is absolutely zilch nada NOTHING special enough about it to deserve 4 replacements.
I don't mean to sound like a douche or harsh or anything. I just don't get why this is a recurring theme on this board. Would you do this with a pair of jeans, or with a TV, or with tires? No. The product sucked the first time, why repeat the experience?

I hear ya Adamhart. On the phone with CS today I asked this very question. She said I was not eligible for a different pone ... yet. She indicated that x number of returns within 90 days usually trips the option. First sign of trouble on number 4 and I will be calling. When the phone is working I like it, but I'd happily trade it for something else.
Thanks for the note on Juice Defender, I noticed on another thread some issues so for the moment I have it turned off.

Fouth Phone Arrived
So number 4 arrived next day. I set it up. Such a pain to have to reinstall everything. So far all is good. The battery life is not improved but one day later with no reboots and it starts up without a problem (no sleep of death!).
So far so good.....

I' ve been using an extended battery for a few months now and its been great. No reboots or SOD issues.
Couple of weeks ago I insert the stock battery. Within the hour I have 1 freeze up and 3 SOD! That stock battery is defective. Its been the cause of 80% of my problems with this device.

4th phone has same problems. Already posted a rant! I'm going to try rooting!

You know I never had a problem with my g2x and I see all these people going thru 3-6 phones THANK GOD I'm not on that statics.
Sent from my LG-P999 using xda premium

And I see mostly the ones who have problems don't usually nvflash cwm and install a custom rom.
Sent from my LG-P999 using xda premium

I broke my last one (slammed it on concrete) so got a replacement through Asurion, they sent me a refurb (as they tend to do).
thing worked well for the first day, albeit a bit weak on battery, then started having charge issues and general mis-reporting on the battery (it'd say 100% when it meant 20%, around 5 hours after being unplugged it would drop very steeply (~75%) to catch up)
I noticed on the 1809#*999# menu that the Factory Version was registering as Unknown. After a few more days of it being a pain in the ass I went ahead and did a Factory Reset. After which the Factory Version reported the correct numbers.
Works almost flawlessly now, I'm getting a good 30 hours of battery life out of the thing (mostly texting + standby). I'm currently using the default launcher with Go Contacts and Go SMS (It sucks Go Contacts can't clear missed calls properly on 2.3.3 but it's a minor complaint), Facebook, Battery Monitor Widget (3c), and a few other small apps.
Also, I noticed on my first phone that JuiceDefender seemed to cause Sleep of Death issues. At least thats what the process of elimination had me believe (and this was back on Froyo). IMO - just leave everything alone with regards to task killers and battery enhancers, GB actually does a very good job of battery management on its own.

I continued to have trouble with number 4. Called T-Mo. Long story short they said "nothing we can do until LG comes out with new software update".
Phone is just not useable the way it is (mine that is) so I finally followed the advice of so many on this board and I rooted the phone and installed CM7.
I was a little freaked out a first because CM7 looks so different. Now I am comfortable with it. I have loaded up all the apps and configurations again. So far it is good. A couple of times the phone shut down but that may be more to all the changes I have been doing. One the whole it is far more stable than stock. Battery life is a tad improved too, but still not great.

My mom is about to embark on her third try. She doesn't download apps at all. Phone won't hold call for more than a minute.

[Q] Alarms

A few years ago I had a Samsung Focus. I remember a feature that I really loved about it that I haven't found anywhere else but on stock AT&T software.
I remember you could turn your phone off and the alarm would still go off at the right time. I currently have a Moto Atrix and have been looking for an app with that feature, but with no success. Does anyone know of a feature with any app? Not a huge deal I know, but I like to charge my phone overnight with phone off. It's just a habit I can't break.

try this app Alarm Clock Xtreme from the play store

That's the one I actually use, but thanks for the suggestion.

[Q] Weather Widget Constantly Wrong

I have searched through the this forum trying to find a similar thread but I haven't, so please accept my apologies if this has been answered.
I have an AT&T One X. My second one. The first one I had had all sorts of problems. Wifi issue, SMS alerts not working all the time, this weather widget issue, and it just wasn't right. I had rooted that device and removed bloatware so I thought maybe I removed something I shouldn't have.
Enter device 2. This is one received after the hold on customs. It came preloaded with 1.85 and all of the issues went bye bye, except one. This stupid weather widget issue. Basically, the widget shows the right location, right time and date, but if often says that it is 73 and in the midst of a thunderstorm when it is actually sunny and a different temperature. And it is not like it may be raining on the other side of town or something, there is not a cloud for miles and miles. I refresh the weather and it updates properly but I will check back in an hour or when ever and there it is again. 73 and thunderstorms.
What is really odd is we are in the midst of a heatwave and yesterday the temp was 97 and instead of it showing 73 and thunderstorms it was 80 and thunderstorms. Even though, again, no clouds, hasn't rained in weeks, and it was actually 97 out. This happens multiple times a day regardless of the hour or weather.
I know this is rather minuscule issue but I do wonder if there is anyone else that has this issue and if they have been able to resolve it. This is the second phone that I have had this problem with and it has happened on rooted and not rooted phones.

This happens to me as well. I have a first-batch phone updated to 1.85, completely stock. I noticed that when I have wi-fi at home, it doesn't update at all. When I turn off wi-fi, it updates, but not all of the time. I have to manually update it. It is kind of annoying because I love the weather/clock.

I simply ditched the htc widget and use beautiful widgets instead.

gunnyman said:
I simply ditched the htc widget and use beautiful widgets instead.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have beautiful widgets I just don't think they look as crisp as the sense 4.0 weather widget. Maybe with the update that may or may not be coming out soon this issue will be fixed. I didn't have this issue with my Inspire.
At least I know now that I am not crazy.

yeah, I have this issue too, and Ive never paid attention to the temperature but mine is constantly thinking its thunderstorms as well. Thing is since I got my phone we have been having thunderstorms more frequently so I assumed it wasn't updating correctly.
Ill admit with the weather live wallpaper the thunderstorm every time I open my phone is kind of nice though

mckooter said:
Thing is since I got my phone we have been having thunderstorms more frequently so I assumed it wasn't updating correctly.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The odd thing here is, we are in the middle of a drought. It has rained about once in the last 2 months.

Mine did the same thing so I stopped using it. I always felt it was a big battery drainer anyway but I could be wrong. I just use a simple ics clock widget now. I don't need to see the weather every time I use my phone and having the time in such big letters is pointless when it's always in the top right corner anyway.
Sent from my HTC One X using xda app-developers app

Be Weather is another good option as is HD Widgets. The current sense clock looks better than any sense clock ever did, but I've always found it buggy and less than current.

A few issues with S6

There are a few silly issues I'm having with the phone and I just want to find out if anything can be done, for my sanitys sake.
I hate the way the screen lights up when I plug my headphones in.
I hate the fact that the countdown timer will vibrate only in vibrate mode (unlike my M7 which made a noise) but when not in vibrate mode it was only make a noise. I guess it makes sense if you think about it, but to me, its nonsense. I want it to vibrate AND make a sound in either mode, hell I'd even take sound+vibrate in ringer on mode at this point. So I can be listening to music and the timer goes off (in vibrate mode) and if I don't feel the vibration in my pocket, tough. Hard to explain, but I have to call back to the HTC M7, it didn't do this, it worked.
I hate the way that the alarm clock has increasing volume only once. If you snooze the phone, the next time the alarm goes off, it goes off full blast, no increasing volume.
I've been using XtreStoLite Deo-Mod Edition 2.4 rom with a week or so now and it's great. But I have noticed some issues which really worry me. I got this phone because it's fast. But when I press the power button there is a definate delay until the screen lights up and Facebook messenger for reasons unknown makes the phone unusable, it lags so bad and even the soft keys don't work. Never did this on other phones and my partners non-rooted S6 is fine.
It does make me wonder, is all this rooting and custom ROM worth it. So far, I've got odd lag and an app which nearly breaks the phone. If I could adblock and restore apps without rooting, I think I would unroot.

Then sell it and be happy
What is your question exactly then?

jody2k said:
Then sell it and be happy
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Can we automate it so your response is posted for every thread talking about issues with this phone?
My Question is, are any of my issues "fixable". I know xposed could do a lot of things for the M7. Is there something I've missed which can help me with my issues?

X82X said:
Can we automate it so your response is posted for every thread talking about issues with this phone?
My Question is, are any of my issues "fixable". I know xposed could do a lot of things for the M7. Is there something I've missed which can help me with my issues?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Chill i was making a joke
Have you tried full wipe? Or completely unroot to stock? Then back?

I have.
My Mrs has a unrooted stock S6 which I use for comparison.
The lag issues and issue with Messenger are only my phone, the isues I have with the screen lighting up with headphones plugged in and the alarm clock, we both share those.
I know the lag and messenger issue could be fixed by going back to stock, but this is the problem with custom roms and rooting. You get given nice features and you risk losing them all when going back to stock. I can live without messenger and the wake up lag I can just put up with, but it isn't right. I guess in truth I expected too much from this phone, I wanted it to be blazing fast and it just doesn't feel it.
There isn't a great range of roms either, my M7 had literally dozens of roms to try but I find with the S6, there are like only a handful.