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I thought I'd start a thread to see what people's favorite features of the Captivate are. Not looking for things like "it's not an iPhone" but more of something like...
My favorite feature is the Panorama setting in the camera. I think it's awesome how you can sweep right to left, left to right, up and down, down and up and it will stitch together a panoramic photo instantly, just like that. I think that's by far my favorite feature.
Others? What do you love about the Captivate?
It's not an iphone
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lol... I should have expected that.
Ok, so I'm totally sold on WinMo 6.5 and this is my first Android device. My gaming rig at home is 2k8R2, but virtually every other system I own runs Linux (8 at home counting VMs). I absolutely love Linux, but letting go of WinMo has been difficult - especially with the great people in those part of the forum. But more and more are moving to Android. So that's where I'm coming from on this.
0) Speed. It's wayyy faster than my 528 Mhz Touch Pro.
1) The screen. It's about 90% the size of the iPhone itself. Resolution is ok, but could be better.
2) Android. The ability to modify anything that I choose to is awesome.
3) It's not an iPhone. I FREAKING *HATE* Apple with a passion.
4) Proximity and light sensor. I expect this feature, but I also really like it.
5) 16 GB of internal memory. That's sweet, until you brick your phone and then Samsung has all of your personal data from TiBu and SMS backups. Dammit.
Things I hate:
0) It appears the GPS issues are mainly antenna-related. There have been hundreds of smartphones with GPS. How hard is it to learn from others' mistakes? This is what you do.
1) Froyo is taking way too long. It's been out for 5 months. Why do we not ALREADY have it?? (Officially...)
2) Devices are shipping with the 3-button combo broken. QA really dropped the ball on that. FAIL.
3) No flash on the back for the camera. Come on, it's one LED.
4) USB is on the top. This is totally personal, but on every other device I've had (mostly HTC), the connector is on the bottom. This is just weird.
5) This is way out of the ballpark, and a complaint about Android itself. The only thing that I dislike almost as much as Apple is Java. Yeah, we can discuss this all day, but I'll still hate Java. I'm uneasy with everything (dex files/executables) being Java based. I understand why they did it that way, and I'm glad they did something besides straight-up Java (that would make the phone unusable), but I'd prefer actual Linux binaries to run on these devices. I'm not sure why they did not do that, so if someone wants to continue this discussion, PM me and maybe we'll open another thread. I'd really like to understand more about this.
All-in-all, I really like this phone.
I love how the battery runs out of juice after about 10-12 hours and doesnt even make it through one business day. I love that!!
GPS. Because it gives so many people a reason to be unhappy. And, as I've said before, some people aren't happy unless they're unhappy. So now they're happy. And that's good.
The screen and Android.
Everything I hated about iPhone has been tended to and all of what i loved about the iPhone is intact.
Don't have to conserve power any more or carry a charger or buy a "juice case" ......Battery is replaceable on the fly.
Removable storage. No need for Syncing SW
Samsungs battery charger/phone stand is a great accessory to have....http://www.amazon.com/Samsung-Batte...UTF8&s=wireless&qid=1287164024&sr=8-3-catcorr
These are all going to be comparisons to the iPhone so deal with it.. it's what I came from. It's not an "I hate iPhone" just a comparison because I loved the device when I had it.
I love the customizations that can be done with the phone. From custom ROMS, to tweaking the Icons, and I can do with it what I want to. With an iPhone I was VERY limited by what i can do.
Notification bar - I hated the bubble popup while i was in the middle of doing something else with the phone.
Speed - the phone is 100000000 times faster than my old iPhone 3G.
The ability to backup what I want to - contacts, data, applications - I can back it up. I was at the whim of Apple and its proprietary iTunes before.
The screen is gorgeous - Every thing pops and I think it's on par with the "uber iPhone 4 retina screen". It might not be as crisp or sharp as it.. but it is nice nonetheless.
The Ugly:
I hate the fact that it can be easily killed - but not necessarily bricked. One wrong move and *poof* have to restore the device and start all over again.
The battery life due to the screen being a HUGE battery hog. I am able to get 12-16hrs out of one charge. But I feel as if I have to restrain my phone usage to prolong battery life from the device.
GPS is still flaky at best. Although Samsung states this is a "software" issue - too man Captivate owners have had too many issues with it. Thankfully I don't use it all that often being a casual phone dood (i.e. I don't travel alot, and mainly use it for txt, calls, email, xda, etc...)
Samsung/ATT support by not having the phone truly ready for the public. They have finally released their official 2.2 Froyo to Europe - which means we might see it by December.
Having to had to install a tweaked custom ROM on a device that should have been working from the start.
Java - I personally cannot stand Java. I think it is slow, bloated, bulky, easily exploited, and is not a great programming language. I liken it to Visual Basic in the Linux world. But then again.. the phone could have been programmed in all C, Perl, or C++ only. *eek*. Sure it would have been screaming fast, but who would be programming for it?
Overall I have a feature rich, fast phone that is about 90% functional. As a consumer it is disappointing that my first foray into the Android world had to be so difficult. But thanks to XDA and the people taking the time to make this device work - its been completely worth it.!
I've used everything so far as mobile OSes go. WinMo 6.5, iOS, and now Android. I have to say, Android is by far the best I've used to date.
The things I love about this phone:
The screen is absolutely amazing. I go back and forth between my phone and my iTouch for apps and there's just no comparison. The SAMOLED screen blows Apple's technology out of the water for clarity and color.
We actually have real multi-tasking, not that lame app-switching-loading-an-app-from-memory that Apple calls multi-tasking in iOS4.
It's speed. I never thought I'd get a smartphone with a 1Ghz CPU in it, let alone a standalone GPU capable of 70+ fps in OpenGL. That's just insane. I can still remember using my Blackjack1 with its 200Mhz OMap CPU that we could overclock to a blistering 312Mhz!
The notification bar and the toast notifications. It's nice to be able to continue using an app without getting a popup notification that deletes everything you were working on or pushes your app to the background.
The seemingly limit possibilities of Android. It seems like you can edit just about anything on this phone. While theming the phone could probably be easier, (I wish there was something more like Winterboard for Android) the ability has always been there and there wasn't a need for something like a jailbreak to get there.
And I'm just going to group these last ones into on big category. The camera, the accelerometer, the 16GB of built in storage, the style (especially the nice carbon fiber patterned battery door), and it's lightweight and comfortable design.
I like USB on top. I can charge my phone right side up in my cup holder.
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wildting said:
I like USB on top. I can charge my phone right side up in my cup holder.
You make a very good point.
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wildting said:
I like USB on top. I can charge my phone right side up in my cup holder.
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Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ahh, that's the one thing I don't like. I drive an '08 Ford Focus with a manual trans. The cup holders are literally right behind the gear lever and when I put the phone in the cup holder, I'm constantly hitting it the cable whenever I go to shift. I really need to make some sort of dock for the car...
Sent from my Captivate
I love the design and feel. Metal back, corners that make it look different than an iPhone, and the perfect size. 4" is the perfect screen size, perfect.
I was contract free and could get any phone on any carrier and I thought the look, feel, size, etc of the Captivate was the best. 3.5" really too small. 3.7" close...but still not really as nice as 4" for web and games. 4.3" I was holding a damn frozen waffle to my ear...just too big.
The only real negative I have after the Cog 2.2 update (no more lag, faster, better gps, etc) is the battery sucking power of the screen. It is quite manageable with things like dark backgrounds and reduced brightness. However, there is a definite tradeoff on the screen. Personally I like the contrast ratio, colors, etc, better than the iphone4 screen's slightly higher rez. However on bright apps, the battery does take a hit. Battery in all other areas (3G talk, etc) as good as the best out there.
The thing I like the most is the look of the phone, its not squarr, it has really nice curves to it. To me it seems the cappy is the best looking phone around, all my friends are jelous that I got this phone even my friend,that has the iphone 4 lol! Second things is the screen its very clear in,sunlight. When I had the iphone I couldnt see a thing with this phone I can still see everything even in direct sun light. The snappiness of the phone is awesomee to, unlike some other phones like desire it doesnt lag at all!
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I like the battery cover, and the phone's design in general :3
WoW..what is my favorite thing...more than just 1 thing for me too...Everything so far. The looks..the feel..the size of the screen..The clarity and detail I get when watching a HD movie on it that I loaded.Just being able to watch a HD movie I loaded on it. The ease of typing a message or making a phone call. The responsiveness of the screen. BTW..I have no lag and am running it stock with the Jf6 rom (is that right ?) Having a great camera helps too...All in all I am well pleased with mine and have but 2 complaints... the gps issue..and the weak usb socket...I prefer the GPS to work properly of course,and the usb socket is what it is and I'll just have to be careful on inserting the plug..but neither were my primary reason for buying this phone..I bought it for all the other reasons I already listed. My wife loves her too..I have to say I've changed my mind about the new Iphone 4's though..they are pretty nice too since bought my sons got them when my wife and myself got our Captivates a couple days ago..They are good solid phones from what I can see..some what limited to what is on them..but otherwise good solid phones..Even my boys watched in awe when I fired up the Transformer movie to show them this morning on mine..but not enough so to exchange them for what we have...They are firmly entrenched in the apple orchard..and have been since the i-pods came out..
Mac
see post #2 and#7
love the super amoled screen!!
What's not to love? Such sheer beauty and potential that I just see quirks where many see problems.
It's inanimate, though, right?
I used to be a iPhone fanboy and somewhere along the way I thought I'd give Android a try and I got myself a Samsung SGS2. There must be a lot of people out there in the fruit cult wanting to be brought to the green robot cult or vice versa. Here's my complete NON-BIASED story that might help you out with consideration of both the user experience and the technical side of things.
WARNING: This is a looooooong story. So if you're not into a good long thread, please skip.
NOTE: The iPhone being discussed is a jailbroken, fully utilized iPhone. A non-jailbroken iPhone cannot come even close to the SGS2.
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APPS:
Surprisingly, the Android Market and the Apple AppStore are not created to be equal. Although most of the popular apps like Facebook, eBay, Google apps are available on both stores, the Apple equivalent apps are usually several versions ahead (i.e. Navigon, Tunein Radio, etc.) except for the Google-centric apps and/or other apps that I don't typically use. The apps simply look / feel better on an iPhone. But for sure they run faster on the SGS2 hands down. There's IXX0XX on the iPhone for the *free* apps. The Android-equivalent AXX, BXX, 4XX, etc simply cannot compete against it. Although it's much easier to find *free* Android apps from all over the place, IXX0XX, as a centralized place to go, has all of the popular high-quality paid apps/games, up-to-date version.
RESOLUTION / SCREEN SIZE
I don't know why people always want a 4.3", 4.5" or even bigger screen on a phone. For me, as long as the same amount of information can be displayed on a screen, that's what counts. The SGS2 screen is huge compared to the iPhone, and certainly things do appear bigger and easier to read. However, the iPhone resolution is just much higher. If you look very closely on an iPhone 4 screen, you simply cannot see the pixels, whereas for the SGS2 (non-HD version), it's just like every other smartphone, you can see the pixels (but not so bad). Why does this matter? Say, you open a webpage in overview on an iPhone, it's almost like the letters that are too small to see is because my sight is not good enough to read it. But with the SGS2, the letters that are too small to see is because the screen doesn't have a good-enough resolution to display it. This is the best way I can put it. The text does appear much sharper on the iPhone.
PHONE QUALITY / FEEL
This is really a personal preference. The SGS2 has a huge screen, so it is bigger. Both look very slick. I like the weight of the SGS2 because it feels much lighter so if I ever drop it, it *should not* be destroyed. The iPhone is a little too heavy. Heavier = Better Quality? I don't think so. Some people complain that the back cover of the SGS2 is just soft plastic. It feels quite good though. The textured surface prevents fingerprints. The iPhone is only good in terms of its size. I can do one-handed operation where my thumb can pretty much reach both sides of the screen. The SGS2 is slightly too big where it's not too comfortable to use it single-handedly over a long period of time.
ROOTING V.S. JAILBREAKING
Android ROOTING = iPhone JAILBREAKING. It is so much easier for the Android to be freed. You simply flash a rooted kernel, then you're "jailbroken" no matter what firmware version you have. Everytime an iOS version comes out, we have to wait for the Dev team to find a new security loophole in the firmware in order to get a jailbreak. Note that Apple appears to be hiring these bright guys one by one. Even if you can get a tethered jailbreak, it is still not acceptable. If your iOS ever crashes, you need to plug in your computer to properly boot the phone. What I really like about Android is that you can do everything without a computer (once rooted). You can flash new kernels, new ROMs, complete restore (nandroid), all without a computer. With an iPhone, if you want to reflash your firmware to newer/lower version, you need to be beside a computer, even for restoring apps / app settings.
BACKUP / RESTORE
On an iPhone, you cannot do a true "complete backup" because everytime you want to install a firmware to the phone, the firmware needs to be signed by Apple (or Tinyumbrella with your SHSH). And naturally, your saved data cannot be integrated to this "firmware". With the SGS2, there's a system partition and a user partition. And you can do a "nandroid" backup, which is a complete image of your system (think Norton Ghost or Acronis Home Image), saved on your sdcard partition or EMMC (external sdcard). On the iPhone, you need PkgBackup to backup your Cydia apps (as a list, now with settings as well), and Chronus to backup your AppStore apps. After the backup, you must copy the backup files (at least for Chronus) to the computer because you only have a single partition on the iPhone. A wipe will take your backup with it. On the SGS2, we can use CWM to do a complete system image as mentioned above, or use TitaniumBackup for individual apps (this includes both the app itself and the settings). If you use CWM, once restored, your phone is EXACTLY the way you left it. With TitaniumBackup, it's even a greater concept because you can constantly backup updated apps individually whereas with CWM you have to do a system image everytime. So this means the apps become like "modules" that you can put on different ROMs for instance.
LATEST PHONE??
The good thing about Apple is that once you get the iPhone of the year, you know you have the latest and greatest of that year because of the steady annual release. As for Android, once you buy one, another manufacturer might come up with a better (if not better, a slightly different hardware offering) phone that makes you wonder if you should've waited. This brings us to fragmentation. There are so many Android phones with all kinds of hardware combination and you just don't know which one is the best. As of this writing, the SGS2 is the best available phone IMHO, the SGS2HD is the even better one yet to come. But if you want a balance of specs and price, there are too many to choose from.
FRAGMENTATION / NOKIA
Why the heck would I mention Nokia here? In my opinion, I think one of the reasons why Nokia failed is that it tries come create so many differnt phones to suit the different needs of everybody whereas Apple created a phone that is good for all. Even worse, Nokia will create two phones with similar specs, and one phone will have a need-to-have feature while lacking one need-to-have feature, which appears on the other phone, which is itself not perfect. This is crap. They have the power to give you everything you want but they don't. With Apple, the user experience is the same for everybody. With an Android, I am hoping it doesn't get to the level of how Nokia played the game. Think of iPhone as a PS3 while the Android is a PC. A PC is all powerful, you can have different amount of RAM, different video cards, etc. Every PC user will tell you how they tweak their machine to achieve a certain benchmark score and you wonder why you can't or if the score posted is a fake. But with PS3, everybody playing the same game experience the same thing. That being said, there are too many firmwares (ROMs) to choose from for Android, each offering something different, suited for phones with different hardware. I think this model will be improved once Ice Cream Sandwich comes along where phones with different hardware can share just one firmware.
BACKGROUNDING / MULTITASKING
Android users keep saying that iPhone doesn't do true multitasking, which is somewhat true. But now that Android does full multitasking, everybody complains about battery life and everybody is looking for the "best task killer", which is not supposed to be required for a UNIX kernel. True, iPhone does not do true multiasking. But the iPhone "semi-multitasking" is very well implemented. Whenever you quit an app, the OS stores the last state of the app. So technically it has stopped running. But when you go back, you are at where you left it. This is great for most of the apps like games, readers, etc., where they don't really need to be running in the background. But for Nav apps like Navigon, Tomtom, or even Install0us while downloading an app, these apps do run in the background. With Backgrounder, you can set the behavior of how each app implement multitasking. With Android, every app can run in the background and there is no quick kill button. Although the kernel will kill the app automatically when the memory is low, some apps can misbehave. Try to have Dolphin HD Browser open a page with Flash content and go back to the home screen. The app simply keeps playing the flash content in the background all day long, draining your battery. Thankfully, there's Watchdog Task Manager, which does not blindly kill apps but use CPU threshold to determine what apps are misbehaving. To summarize, with Android, get Watchdog and Wave Launcher, then Multitasking works great. With iPhone, get Backgrounder and use Activate to set up a good gesture to bring up the multitasking bar.
BATTERY / PUSH
All smartphones drain battery fairly quickly, including the iPhone. But Android (SGS2, specifically), drains battery even quicker. On the SGS2, there's this Android OS Bug (Google AOS Bug), which can take off out of nowhere, and drain your battery within half a day without you even touch the phone. But it has been fixed now with Siyahkernal 1.8. But even then, the SGS2 does eat much more battery than an iPhone. One big reason I believe is due to how each phone (or app, actually) manages data. With Android, you have Background Data and Sync to transmit data in the background. But the problem is app developers don't need to follow this API. They can write any app the way they want. Some may keep transmitting data in the background with you knowing unless you use Droidfirewall to block it. With iPhone, we have PUSH notification, which every app follows for transmitting data in the background. I have only now come to really appreciate it. Although for some reason, PUSH email chews a lot more battery out of the iPhone (for Android too) compared to the regular PUSH notification. But the way PUSH is implemented on the iPhone, it IS superior. Android users, due to the battery drainage, have become paranoid about their data toggles. Everything must be toggled off (data/wifi/etc.) when the screen goes off (using Juice Defender or the like). So you are missing out being able to get real-time messages while out and about. With the iPhone, even with PUSH notification on 3G you hardly notice any battery drain when idle and screen off. This is a big plus for Apple. The iPhone has VERY LOW consumption when idle even with PUSH/3G/WIFI all turned on. The SGS2 has a constent ~1.5%/hr drain even when everything is turned off. But of course, if you are on a naked ROM with absolutely no other apps installed, the standby is somewhat better. That's why I think the fact that app developers can program any way they want is not always a good idea. Once you install some apps that do things in the background, your idle battery drain increases.
HARDWARE BUTTONS
Why, Apple, why only one button?? I really like the SGS2 with back and especially the menu buttons. All settings can be accessed in the app instead of going through "settings". Maybe because I'm used to PC's. I still don't like having only one mouse button on a MAC. Having BACK button makes multitasking that much easier. Although the iPhone home button can be assigned different tasks (double click / single click, using Activator), the way SGS2 implements buttons is much better. That being said, I don't like the other variants of Android phones with 4 to 5 buttons. If the function can be consolidated, I'd like that better (i.e. Menu + long pressed = Search).
TV OUT + BLUETOOTH MOUTH/KEYBOARD
If you have a SGS2, you have a fully functional computer in your living room. With the HML cable and bluetooth keyboard/mouse, you can surf the web, watch movies, and do just about everything else on your HDTV. With a BT mouse you can actually have a cursor on your screen (only a BT keyboard works on the iPhone). Although the control is not perfect, but it is certainly usable. Note, the videos (or Youtube videos) are in HD when you watch it on the big screen via SGS2. I am very very impressed. The only downside is that "sometimes" the phone drains the battery instead of getting charged. This goes the same with using SatNav apps while on car charger. The kernel has a 650mA limit on charging while using GPS and a bright screen, the usage might go over 650mA, this might explain why. With Siyahkernel and an inid.d script, you can change the charging limit to 1000mA, but it makes no difference for me. But my theory is that the battery charges slower when the phone temperature is higher in order to protect the battery. Becuase when it's nice and cool, the phone does get charged even when using GPS.
PHONE / MSG APPS
Android comes with a pretty good set of apps by default. The phone app, for instance, I cannot live without being able to search a contact by T9. (i.e. find Richard by typing 7424). With the iPhone, you need to go to Contacts and search by scrolling, which is very inconvenient. But with the jailbroken app iSmartDialer, it solves the issue. The Message app is about the same for both phones. But with the jailbroken app Tlert, or iRealSMS or etc, the experience is even better. You can set up a gesture to bring up the non-intrusive messaging box to type and send. But in general, the Android has a much better notification delivery system through the drop down menu (which has the toggles too). iPhone has SBSettings for the toggles but it doesn't looks as nice. Notification-wise, the iPhone is very intrusive. Without the special SMS jailbroken apps above, when an SMS comes in, you either HAVE TO reply to it, or you have to dismiss it (and possibly forget about it). The Android notification drop down stores all the notifications very nicely.
LOCKSCREEN
iPhone + LockInfo = great. But with Android + JKAY V11, although we don't get notifications right in the lock screen, we can have different ways of launching apps quickly. With Android you can kinda get lockscreen notifications through widgets and WidgetLocker.
BROWSER
Coming from a Nokia N85/N86, the iPhone stock browser is a big upgrade. Although there's no flash support, most sites are formatted quite well on the iPhone. But going from iOS to Android, it is at least 10 times better. Even the stock browser loads pages really fast. When you scroll up and down through a very long page you no longer see the "squares" (where page is not loaded properly). I use both the Dolphin HD for full webpages and Opera Mobile for everyday use. The Opera Mobile is REALLY FAST. And Flash support is just great. You finally get the real desktop browsing experience that you cannot find on an iPhone. I don't like the idea of Apple restricting the way developers write their browsers. Every browser on the AppStore simply runs the default iOS browser as its base and add visual tweaks to it. This is true even for the iPhone version of Skyfire. Back in the Symbian days, the Skyfire is truely revolutionary (for the Nokia phones) where contents are compressed on the server side and streamed to the phone. However, Skyfire is a little too slow waiting either for the webpage or the video. The Android browser is so much so much faster. And tabbed browsing interface is good on both phones.
CAMERA
SGS2 camera beats the crap out of an iPhone 4 camera. It is true that the iPhone 4 can take a pretty decent photo when you are "absolutely still". SGS2 camera is simply better with more options. The night mode actually takes very good pictures even without flash. The iPhone 4, if you move at all during the picture taking, the photo becomes blurred. The iPhone camera is only good under very well lit condition and that you're absolutely still.
SYNCING
With SGS2, you can forget about iTunes. If you have a picture, drag it in because your phone shows up as a USB drive. If you have music, pictures, or whatever, create your own folder, drag them into anywhere you want. The iPhone depends on iTunes too much. Although with PWNTunes you can make the iPhone into a USB drive and drag music in there. But everytime you drag something new in there, the scanning for the new content takes a while. Also, SGS2 is truely integrated with Google services. I keep a copy of my Contacts on the Gmail server and that's all I need. The iPhone with Gmail exchange server set up, it can do the same, but the battery drain does apply for the iPhone (i.e. battery drain with exchange email described previously).
MULTIMEDIA
SGS2 can play all kinds of file formats, which pretty much eliminates the need for a computer. The iPhone requires VLC player or alike. It does work, but for one, you cannot organize your files by folders.
VOIP
SGS2 has a fairly sufficient VOIP client built in. And you can get a modded phone app to do call recording. This is not as easy on the iPhone. I use Acrobits as my VOIP client on the iPhone and I can only do call recording on VOIP calls but not regular GSM calls. The VOIP incoming calls rely on PUSH notification, which is a bit inconvenient because once you get the notification, you have to consider the delay of opening the respective VOIP app to properly receive the call. By the time everything is opened, the caller might've given up. On Android, the client itself is constantly listening for incoming calls at the cost of battery. But it does responds like the regular calls.
GPS
The actual GPS performance when a signal is locked is pretty much identical for both phones practically. However, when you depend on AGPS for a triangulation, the iPhone works much faster and accurately. For instance, the Camera geotagging works more reliably with the iPhone because it will record your location nearest to the cell tower you are connected to. But with Android, many apps apparently do not use this information and try to wait for a full GPS signal. The result is, if you take a picture, the location recorded can be way off.
ACCESSORIES
When I went to Best Buy / Future Shop to find a car holder for my beloved SGS2, I was totally pissed by the fact that every (+95%) accessories in the store are for the iPhone!!?? Ebay is probably the only other good place to look for accessories. The good thing is that the iPhone headphone with mic and control does work on the SGS2. Note the microphone jack pins changed from the Galaxy S to the S2. S2 follows the iPhone (i.e. headphone works, mic works, call button works, but not the volume buttons). For the Galaxy S, two of the pins are reversed like the Nokia phones. So I'm glad that SGS2 is more "future-proof" in this regard. At least it accepts iPhone headphones (which is the trend??)
WARRANTY
I haven't had to deal with this yet for my SGS2. But when my iPhone broke the last time (home button stopped working), I just unjailbreak it (new flash) and took it to the nearest Apple Store (not the one I bought the phone from), and a brand new iPhone was given to me no questions asked (they only checked for any sign of water damage by looking at the special stickers in the headphone jack and charger port). But I am pretty sure the Samsund warranty cannot be as good as the Apple warranty. For one, I got the international version from Expansys.ca. So if it breaks, I guess I would need to buy a new one.
SELLING THE PHONE
The iPhone retains its value very very well. My iPhone 4, I bought at about $6xx, I sold for $540 after one year. My iPhone 3GS, which I bought locked, I sold it much higher than my buying price. I think the SGS2 is more like a car, once you drive it, the price is at least halved.
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I'm so tired of typing, I'll type some more some other time. Feel free to ask me questions though.
I also just switched from the iPhone to the S2. I have had a iPhone since THE iPhone so this was a big decision for me.
For the most part, there is no comparison. The S2 is so much better.
But...and there always is one isn't there?
I am now thinking about switching back. The one big hold up I have right now is sending videos via MMS. With the iPhone, ANY video I shot could be sent. No matter the size, the duration or the settings. I always shot video at the highest quality and could send them any time later.
Can't do that with the S2. 1000k limit. That sucks.
Bloody hell thats one long long story...Some parts i agree with you some i dont.
Apps yes hands down appstore is the best..If i was you i would not be posting about Installous and about the same for android cause its against the rules here my friend.
Display i have to say the S2 beats the retina anyday...Sorry i had iphone 4 and although i loved it for me the S2 is perfect you cant beat AMOLED..But again thats my opinion.
Jailbreaking and rooting...il be honest i find jailbreaking alot more easier and simple to do than rooting....Regarding downgrading to a previous version on the iphone that was pretty easy to but sometimes right painful...Just factory reset the phone and you got as it was out of the box.....Well i always managed to find a way just incase i messed up..
Anyway im happy with the S2 it does what i want and most of the apps i manage to live with...I cant see myself without it and only as time will come we will see more quality apps coming in the market..
Next upgrade for me..Galaxy S3...Be sure to find out that will be a world beater my friend...Nice post though very good reading
MuddyPaws1 said:
I also just switched from the iPhone to the S2. I have had a iPhone since THE iPhone so this was a big decision for me.
For the most part, there is no comparison. The S2 is so much better.
But...and there always is one isn't there?
I am now thinking about switching back. The one big hold up I have right now is sending videos via MMS. With the iPhone, ANY video I shot could be sent. No matter the size, the duration or the settings. I always shot video at the highest quality and could send them any time later.
Can't do that with the S2. 1000k limit. That sucks.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
the limit is usaully set by the network not the phone (its usaully 300kb for mms)
unless your talking about sharing online via youtube or facebook etc ???
there is no way you sent a hd video longer then 10-20 seconds via mms on the iphone
I too have been an iPhone owner since it's inception. I toyed around with an Android phone I bought from Craigslist earlier in the year just to see what all the fuss was about. It was an HTC something or another on AT&T. I REALLY wanted to like the Android OS, but I hated that phone. I had to charge it every 3-4 hours, even WITH Juice Defender running. I promptly sold it on Craigslist for more money than I paid for it, so that was a lose/win.
I went back to my iPhone 4, which was tried and true. Then one day, I dropped it on it's face, and spiderwebbed the screen. My entire life was on that phone. Thankfully, I have a no-questions asked warranty from Squaretrade, and they fixed it for $50. (Would have cost me $150 from local iRepairman). I needed a phone to use while it was on vacation, so I bought the Galaxy S brand new on Craigslist for $200 cash. Again, I decided to try to give the Android OS another chance. (I also have a Xoom, and make love to it every day. It KILLS my iPad, but thats another write.)
My iPhone4 came back fixed after a week, but I have yet to reactivate it. I continued to woo the Galaxy S.
When the Galaxy S2 was released. I had a dilemma. Wait for the iPhone 5 and hope it went to the 4.5" screen, (which would have been THE selling point for me), or buy the Samsung Galaxy S2. As soon as the iPhone4S was announced, it was decided. I went straight to the ATT store and upgraded to my Galaxy S2.
I have had it for a week now, and I can say, this IS a fantastic device, if not the best I have ever owned. While I can agree with most of the OP's remarks, the iPhone is a dummies phone. It is no-frills out-of-the-box, and it just works. To also mention, I had a PhoneSuit on it, which gave me 2-3 days battery life without a recharge. The PhoneSuit is amazing. I would only hope they would make one for the S2. The Android phones take some tweaking to get them to work like you want. I expect to see a flood of accessories before x-mas.
I will leave the verdict out on which brand I like better. I enjoyed the no-frills of the iPhone, but I love the Android phone too. It is a true nerds phone.
buxz777 said:
the limit is usaully set by the network not the phone (its usaully 300kb for mms)
unless your talking about sharing online via youtube or facebook etc ???
there is no way you sent a hd video longer then 10-20 seconds via mms on the iphone
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well it was for sure better resolution than the "record for mms" setting on the S2. And the iPhone did the conversion on the fly. So you could take the video in HD today, and a week from now send it to someone via MMS. You can't do that with the S2. You have to know you are going to send it via MMS and record it in that setting. Which means you can't also use that video to send to youtube or use on your computer because the quality is terrible.
MuddyPaws1 said:
I also just switched from the iPhone to the S2. I have had a iPhone since THE iPhone so this was a big decision for me.
For the most part, there is no comparison. The S2 is so much better.
But...and there always is one isn't there?
I am now thinking about switching back. The one big hold up I have right now is sending videos via MMS. With the iPhone, ANY video I shot could be sent. No matter the size, the duration or the settings. I always shot video at the highest quality and could send them any time later.
Can't do that with the S2. 1000k limit. That sucks.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
think you should just switch over mate..you sound like an iphone boy through and through...be honest if the 4s was a tad bigger i would of gone for it as well but like i said im happy with what i got now
MuddyPaws1 said:
Well it was for sure better resolution than the "record for mms" setting on the S2. And the iPhone did the conversion on the fly. So you could take the video in HD today, and a week from now send it to someone via MMS. You can't do that with the S2. You have to know you are going to send it via MMS and record it in that setting. Which means you can't also use that video to send to youtube or use on your computer because the quality is terrible.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
iam sorry but through mms the limit is set by the network which is 300kb - 600kb
if i take a video and add it to my sms , the sms turns into a mms , it then converts the picture/video small enough if it can ie it wont be able to ahrink a 30min hd video into 300kb
i dont have to take the video in mms settings the sgs2 can convert things on the fly and does , what it doesnt do is make the impossible happen and shrink a 30mb file into 300kb
the iphone wouldnt either i have owned one (the iphone4) it cant magically make a video shrink from 30mb-300mb into 300kb , as you say the quality would be horrendous even on a small video taken in mms mode , so a longish clip shot in hd would look just as bad if not worse
the iphone works on exactly the same principal so i dont understand your post and your problem isnt even a problem?? try adding an 8mp photo to your sms , its over 1mb and hus to be shrunk , everytime i do this my sgs2 says converting .... then adds the picture
seriously mate the sgs2 does convert media but it cant do the impossible and make the alps fit in your car garage at home
King Shady said:
Cool story bro
... I didn't read it :/
Sent from my GT-I9100 using xda premium
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I was JUST asking myself, did King Shady read this? I hope he tells us or I won't have a decent sleep tonight!
Exidrion said:
I was JUST asking myself, did King Shady read this? I hope he tells us or I won't have a decent sleep tonight!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Glad you'll sleep tight tonight. . Anyways I don't understand how some people can write this much for an online forum - where we don't even know each other!
i love reading these write up before buying a phone. thank you! I pretty much agree with you on most points.
buxz777 said:
iam sorry but through mms the limit is set by the network which is 300kb - 600kb
if i take a video and add it to my sms , the sms turns into a mms , it then converts the picture/video small enough if it can ie it wont be able to ahrink a 30min hd video into 300kb
i dont have to take the video in mms settings the sgs2 can convert things on the fly and does , what it doesnt do is make the impossible happen and shrink a 30mb file into 300kb
the iphone wouldnt either i have owned one (the iphone4) it cant magically make a video shrink from 30mb-300mb into 300kb , as you say the quality would be horrendous even on a small video taken in mms mode , so a longish clip shot in hd would look just as bad if not worse
the iphone works on exactly the same principal so i dont understand your post and your problem isnt even a problem?? try adding an 8mp photo to your sms , its over 1mb and hus to be shrunk , everytime i do this my sgs2 says converting .... then adds the picture
seriously mate the sgs2 does convert media but it cant do the impossible and make the alps fit in your car garage at home
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The S2 does not convert on the fly. I have a 20 second video I shot on the S2 and it will not send it...tried with many MMS apps and it always says file too big.
I have sent 3 minute videos from the iPhone and it just goes through.
King Shady said:
Cool story bro
... I didn't read it :/
Sent from my GT-I9100 using xda premium
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What a numpty! Most pointless post I've read on XDA to date. Go back to GameFAQs. (why am I even bothering?)
Sent from my GT-I9100 using Tapatalk
Good write. I have decided to sell my Galaxy SII and get an iPhone 4S
Sgs2 is class for iphone 4s .Pleas go buy iphone and leave this forum wee hawe job.what kind of smartphone dhont hawe flasplayer?
Sent from my GT-I9100 using xda premium
I like the luxury of having flash but never use. Not a good case anymore. Try watching a half hour video and tell me how much battery you have left...
Thank you dikai_yang and taking time writing and for posting.
As for many others commenting Ipone vs. SGS2 you seems to have good insight and have taken time to write in a educational way that many of us could learn a bit from.
If you later take your time writing about your experiences I would definitely read it.
blunted09 said:
I like the luxury of having flash but never use. Not a good case anymore. Try watching a half hour video and tell me how much battery you have left...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
On Saturday I went to an artist Showcase (half wanted to go, half forced by the queen), and watched three quarters of the Auburn-Arkansas game. I would say Flash is pretty useful indeed.
Currykiev said:
What a numpty! Most pointless post I've read on XDA to date. Go back to GameFAQs. (why am I even bothering?)
Sent from my GT-I9100 using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Its funny because your post was just as useless as mine . We both troll!!
Sent from my GT-I9100 using xda premium
The only point I do not agree with or am knowledgeable enough to disagree is Rooting vs Jail breaking. Firstly root for me means being able to do anything with your device. Meaning the ability change roms, kernels and aspects of the system.
Now rooting in some phones do not or did not have such a privilege. Phones like droid 2, x10, droid x. These phones you could "root", meaning say the ability to use titanium backup or root explorer. In other words gain superuser access. What you could not do was change kernels, which is the heart of a rom.
So the point you are making about rooting on Android being easier isn't entirely true since some phones do not actually have "true root".
Hi all,
Maybe this is useful for some folks. I loved my original Galaxy Tab and have now upgrade to the Plus. For info, I'm using the devices in Asia (Malaysia, Singapore, China, Vietnam) mostly. The version I have is a 3G with calls enabled.
I use the Tab as my primary mobile phone. It is therefore essential that it fits into the back pocket of my jeans or pocket of my suit pants. I have paired it with a VoyagerPro+ Headset and this works perfectly for calls, audio (mono of course) and Skype. I'd say I'm a heavy user with 2-3 hours of calls a day and a fair bit of web surfing, sms and emailing.
What I loved about the Original:
Contrary to many of the reviews, I really enjoyed the fact that this was an oversized phone, not a pint sized tablet. I never felt there was anything wrong with Gingerbread as an OS on a screen of this size, in fact I really liked the experience. Icons were big, keyboards very useable particularly in Portrait and the whole thing had a solid, Tonka like feel to it. It was also really tough, having dropped it countless times, never without a problem. Another handy feature was the sim card slot; very easy to access as I often swap sims.
What I noticed immediately with the Plus:
Clearly this is a small tablet. You tend to hold it in landscape much more often. The resolution of the screen is the same, but all the icons and toggles are much smaller. This makes quick operation (e.g. whilst walking) quite difficult. If placed on a desk, this is not so much of an issue. The learning curve in moving to Honeycomb is quite steep and (personal matter of taste) the transition from home screen to home screen is a bit kitchy. The tablet feels thinner (though it's not...except at the edges)
What I am beginning to like with the Plus:
Though the operation of the device is more "delicate", i.e. more care needs to be taken about where your fingers tap, there are quite a few cool features to be had in Honeycomb. The widgets are superb. Some of the tablet tailored apps are also great, particularly Youtube notwithstanding that rotation of the screen immediately reloads the video (arrrghh!!!). It feels fast, and after a week I'm already noticing that the battery time is noticeably better. In some of the blogs, the Samsung apps which float above open apps have not really impressed the reviewers, but I have found that the dialer and the calculator are particularly useful, say if you're browsing a site and want to dial or check something.
What I miss about the Original Tab:
I hope that over time I'll have the same trust in the sturdiness of the Plus. Going back to the Original Tab, I feel the same sense as when I first bought it, namely that everything on the screen looked huge. It really feels like you were playing with Lego and now you're playing with Duplo . One of my favorite apps (smart keyboard pro) doesn't play nicely with Honeycomb and so I have lost my multilingual inputs until I find a replacement.
Wrap-up:
It's a week in with the Tab Plus. I had the original for a year. Already, I know I would not want to go back to the original mostly because I enjoy the Honeycomb features, the speed and the longer battery life. I'm still not as fast at typing on the Plus, but hopefully this will improve over time.
For anyone looking to upgrade from the original, be aware that it is may not be the quantum leap you experienced when you first got the Galaxy Tab, but provided you can get used to the smaller icons & toggles it's a good upgrade.
Happy to take questions if anyone's interested.
Cheers,
Marc
marcolamy said:
The learning curve in moving to Honeycomb is quite steep and (personal matter of taste) the transition from home screen to home screen is a bit kitchy.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You might consider a third party "launcher" app (such as ADW, Go Launcher, etc) that can make your home screen and launcher feel more like gingerbread. Otherwise, happy you are enjoying your tab
take care
gary
I agree that it definitely got the pint sized tablet treatment, which is somewhat of a shame given the choice between cramped tablet or luxuriously roomy phone. It has a nice solid feel though, and I was relieved to see with the latest firmware update the Market app no longer forces a nearly useless landscape mode.
I've made icons even smaller than stock with ADWlauncher EX and locked the tablet to landscape mode. I found the stock setup way too huge and "blown up phone"-like than what I want.
My WiFi only 7+ maybe feels a bit more unstable than the 7? Netflix freezes every once in awhile, which absolutely never happened on the 7. Then again the 7 couldn't even stream half the video that's out there, so I'm not complaining.
I actually like the look and feel of the smaller icons. Yes, a bit harder to navigate but esthetically it just feels better to me.
The only thing I really miss from the original Tab is my high res embedded album art. All of the music players I've used are stretching the thumbnails rather than finding the embedded file. I'm assuming this is a Froyo vs. Honeycomb thing?
Speaking as an old school, analog geeky tech guy who was dragged kicking and screaming into the digital age, I can honestly now say I don't know how I lived my life without a Tab 7+ in my back pocket.
rtfm, how do you find yourself spending your time on the 7+? What do you use it for? When do you use it instead of a phone?
speedrabbit said:
rtfm, how do you find yourself spending your time on the 7+? What do you use it for? When do you use it instead of a phone?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
We're still WiFi only out here in the boondocks of northern New England. No 4G and barely any 3G in the area. So the Tab for me is mostly a media consumer. I've tried to use it at work as a notepad, document viewer but it's a bit cumbersome to get everything in order for that big meeting you're going to have. But for looking at, listening to or reading stuff like I say how did I live without it?
Being an old shortwave/ham radio geek, the ability to lay in bed and stream radio stations from anywhere in the world is still a revelation to me.
I've purchased my first 2 Kindle ebooks from Amazon and read them on the Tab. I still have mixed feelings about "owning" e vs. "real" books on the living room shelves but I looked forward every night to reading a book on the Tab.
The 7+ does video where the 7 couldn't. Netflix just works (mostly).
I threw away my old big-red-LED AM/FM alarm clock and i use the alarm in the tunein Radio app to wake up every morning.
If you download the maps that you need before you go on a trip Google Maps is your GPS all set for your vehicle.
Music. I'm still waiting for the proper player to get the album art right, but it's got all my music on it.
Online news. Every morning with a cup of coffee. Read the headlines and a few stories. From just about anywhere in the world. Still for free. Simply amazing.
All of this from a little box that fits in your back pocket.
Hi, same here. I've been using Original Galaxy Tab for quite some time, and I've bought myself a 7+ last two weeks. For me, it is indeed an upgrade version of the original one, but it's not too far away. It has better speed, but it is not as fast as SII. I used SII last month and I thought they would be more or less the same in term of performance as they share the same processor. Is it related to Honeycomb? Anyway, I love the Honeycomb instead of Gingerbread on the original Galaxy Tab. Honeycomb's widget and notification bar are quite useful and eye-candy.
What I miss on the 7+ is the feeling of toughness and durability. The original Galaxy Tab feels solid and tough. Gorilla glass, and the black colour border makes the difference. On 7+, the silver border looks fragile, I accidentally scratch it last week and the paint drop is obvious at that spot. =(
One more thing, when I put it in my pocket, (yes it's my primary phone), I always mispress the power button and volume rocker. Maybe its because this time, the edge is thinner and sharper.
This will b my first tablet. So my question is the design of the plus exactly like the original because im trying to find cases and things and there's not much out there for the tab plus just wondering mine will b here Monday or sooner so just wondering
Typed by my midget minion
rtfm1777 said:
My WiFi only 7+ maybe feels a bit more unstable than the 7? Netflix freezes every once in awhile, which absolutely never happened on the 7. Then again the 7 couldn't even stream half the video that's out there, so I'm not complaining.
I actually like the look and feel of the smaller icons. Yes, a bit harder to navigate but esthetically it just feels better to me.
The only thing I really miss from the original Tab is my high res embedded album art. All of the music players I've used are stretching the thumbnails rather than finding the embedded file. I'm assuming this is a Froyo vs. Honeycomb thing?
Speaking as an old school, analog geeky tech guy who was dragged kicking and screaming into the digital age, I can honestly now say I don't know how I lived my life without a Tab 7+ in my back pocket.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I had both the Wifi and 3G versions of the 7+. The Wifi version was defintiely more unstable. I already sold it. It kept having sleep of deaths.
the 3G version for some reason is rock solid.
Another thing is that I can watch Flash video on the 3G version. For some reason, the Wifi version is more finnicky playing online streaming video. I don't understand it. I tried the same sites, but got different results.
However... the 3G version for some reasons takes a hell of a long time to charge. I was charging it at 4 in the afternoon and it's now 8:20pm and in four hours or so I only got up to about 60% charge. What the hell?!
Mochan said:
I had both the Wifi and 3G versions of the 7+. The Wifi version was defintiely more unstable. I already sold it. It kept having sleep of deaths.
the 3G version for some reason is rock solid.
Another thing is that I can watch Flash video on the 3G version. For some reason, the Wifi version is more finnicky playing online streaming video. I don't understand it. I tried the same sites, but got different results.
However... the 3G version for some reasons takes a hell of a long time to charge. I was charging it at 4 in the afternoon and it's now 8:20pm and in four hours or so I only got up to about 60% charge. What the hell?!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
My Tab + charges in 3 hours and it was always full battery.
First tablet ever for me, bought it for the bat life and size. Needed something bigger than the 4.8 inch Viliv N5 or old Sony UX 280p. Seems my vision is getting worse with age lol, anyhows i have found the device to be very gratifying. Been an old pda user for years, so it feels like a larger smoother pda for me. Check news, facebook, watch vids and such on it. Only complaint is not neccisarily its fault (gameloft games dont run on it). Or at least the ones i playon my G2.
Sent from my GT-P6210 using xda premium
rtfm1777 said:
My WiFi only 7+ maybe feels a bit more unstable than the 7? Netflix freezes every once in awhile, which absolutely never happened on the 7. Then again the 7 couldn't even stream half the video that's out there, so I'm not complaining.
I actually like the look and feel of the smaller icons. Yes, a bit harder to navigate but esthetically it just feels better to me.
The only thing I really miss from the original Tab is my high res embedded album art. All of the music players I've used are stretching the thumbnails rather than finding the embedded file. I'm assuming this is a Froyo vs. Honeycomb thing?
Speaking as an old school, analog geeky tech guy who was dragged kicking and screaming into the digital age, I can honestly now say I don't know how I lived my life without a Tab 7+ in my back pocket.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Let me update this 2 months later. One firmware update and a couple of Netflix upgrades have come and gone. The video playback is rock solid and whatever slight stability issues I noticed in the beginning are not bothering now. I'm still annoyed by the album art thumbnail issue. But as far as I'm concerned the 7+ is top of the line.
And if I've got what I need right now, why do I need ICS?
My Galaxy Tab "died" over the weekend and since I need a Tab I replaced it on Monday with the Plus.
Overall I'm liking the Plus but some thing are bugging me. The fonts and widgets seem smaller, though the screen's are the same resolution. Can't seem to make home screens I'm happy with
On the plus side the P6200 is so much faster! Also the screen seems much more vibrant.
Now if I could only get my screens sifted I'd be a happy camper.
Sent from my GT-P6200 using XDA App
GPRS/EDGE Class details
This is my first post in this forum. I am planning to finalise on Galaxy Tab plus 7.0 (GT-P6200). The Samsung India website doesn't provide exact information about the Product.
Which data class the GT-P6200 belongs> Is it Class 10 or Class 12 or Class 33?
The Exynos chipset used in GT-P6200 is same as GT-P6800?
Is the CPU Overclocked in GT-P6800?
The Tablet GT-P6200 sold in India comes with IR peer and from which country dose the company imports the Tablet (China, Korea or Vietnam)?
I recently upgraded from the iPhone 5s to the Galaxy Note 3.
This phone is a revelation and I want to try and give some indication why.
I have been using iPhones for many years with a detor to Android every few months (itchy feet!).
Whilst Android is clearly the more technically advanced platform, I always end up dumping the Android phone a few weeks later and returning to the iPhone.
Why ? mainly for two reasons. 10 years ago we used to say that a phone is mainly for phone calls. Internet was a limited and frustrating experience. Today I realise that I only use my phone 5% for calls, the rest is email, general messaging and browsing. The keyboard and user experience therefore become very important.
Apple software engineers really "get" user experience. I don't know how they do it but the keyboard on the iPhone is psychic. My typing is terrible but it manages to mostly get the right keys and if not, do the correct word substitution. It must estimate if you hit between two keys then pick the best letter in the context of the word you were typing or something like that. And then the word lookup is terrific and terribly accurate
Now Android keyboards gave me much worse typing. Not only that, but the word substitution was not automatic (no way of setting it). I could never get used to clicking on the correct word substitution after practically every word. This whole keyboard thing made me feel like chucking every Android phone in the bin after a few weeks (aka to ebay).
Recently, epiphany! I discovered whilst testing an Android phone, that savvy users actually never used the default keyboard (duh!). I found that SwiftKey app was pretty popular, installed it and bing!, now I had 95% of the apple keyboard experience.
That's the thing about Apple, you see it works great out of the box. Android you need to fiddle with it, and for many users they just don't have time or want to do this.
Step in the Note 3.
Ok, now the keyboard is great. I don't know whether it's the latest version of Android or a Samsung developed keyboard but many of the issues have been solved out of the box. One other thing though, due to the size of the screen they have taken the liberty of adding a fifth row of keys, the numeric ones. Genius! You know how frustrating it is when you are typing in passwords or email addresses with a mixture of letters and numbers, always having to flick between numeric and letter keyboards. Now problem solved. For the first time it seems an Android keyboard is better then the Apple one!
The other thing that frustrated me was the speed. Despite having better specs, Android phones have always had the occasional stutter. This can occur anytime, when scrolling, opening an app, etc.
The Note 3 seems 99.9% free of this. Again not sure if this is software development or brute force.
So whilst we are on the subject of brute force let's talk specs. The Note 3 has 3gb of memory, a quad core snap dragon 800 cpu running at approx. 2.3Ghz and a Adreno 300 GPU (yes, thats right, a graphics co-processor). The screen is a full HD 1920x1280 and is an AMOLED with Gorilla glass 3. AMOLED was invented by Samsung and its simply the highest contrast phone screen you can get. IPS screens, as used by the iPhone, have slightly more accurate colours and a slightly brighter maximum brightness, but the contrast on an AMOLED is quite striking. As well as 32gb of internal storage it has a microSD card. I put in a 64gb one so now I have 96gb of storage. Note that with Android you can install apps on the external card if you want, which is very useful.
This spec approaches many full computers!
Completing the specs it has a truly monster 3200MAh battery and a removable stylus built into the body. A stylus you say, back to the Pocket PC ? not quite, this is a whole new technology. For taking notes (aka the phone name) or drawing, its really very good. It also has a switch on it for a pop up menu and other fun.
Lets talk about the elephant in the room, the size. Samsung have been crafty here, the screen size is 5.7", only 0.7" bigger then the S4 but of course a world different from the iPhone 5. Samsung do have phones with bigger screens (e.g. the Mega) but in this bracket have clearly restrained themselves, e.g. compared to say the HTC One Max , Sony Xperia Z Ultra, etc.
This has paid off. The screen is larger and much more comfortable to use then a smaller screen, but due to the extreme thinness, lightweight and minimised bezel of the device, does not feel gigantic in the hand.
Its a personal taste thing and you have to push yourself to even try a device of this size. But the danger you run is that there is no going back. Even 5" screens look pokey, let alone the iPhone 5.
It fits fine in a jean pocket and you get use to it faster then you would think.
The main reason for me trying this in the first place was to attempt to replace both my iPhone 5s and iPad mini, which I take to work every day, with one device. Also cutting the need for two contracts. On a side note I have 4G contracts from EE and vodafone. Again its something you don't think you need, but once you have you can't go back to 3G. The EE network is more mature and has better coverage, I assume Vodafone will come up to the same coverage in time.
Lastly lets talk accessories. Samsung just get this much better then anyone else. There are all sorts of things, from charging backs (so that you can use wireless charging) to docks and headphones. However the key breakthrough is the S-View wallet type cover. This has a window in to allow the phone to show status reports of phone calls and texts as they come in, without having to open the cover. The phone is "cover aware" and formats a small square window to fit this window. It also switches on when you open the flip cover and switches off when you close the flip cover. This is just sheer genius. It sounds simple but it raises the functionality to a whole new level. The final piece of genius is that the cover replaces the back of the phone, so it doesn't add much to the bulk (although it does clverely add a less then 1mm overhand to protect the sides).
Samsung has always made excellent phones, but its no use denying that its basic design has been influenced heavily by the iPhone 3, which it has kept to slavishly.
With the Note 3 Samsung has finally carved its own genuine innovation into the market and created something quite special which is going to permanently change the direction of phone development.
Put it this way, Apple will be responding to this either this or next year, and not the other way round.
Its not surprising that this is one of the world's best selling phones. A busy central London Vodafone shop told me recently that Samsung had long ago overtaken Apple with sales volume, especially the S4, but now the Note 3 is their best seller. No surprises there.
I was looking to get something for the holidays and I wasn't sure what to get, I've been weighing all the potential benefits of the things I could get for about the same amount of money but eventually I was just like, **** it, the Gear S2 looks cooler than all the other things, plus I'm kind of tired of fumbling around to get out my phone just to check the time. I didn't even bother with online, just went to BestBuy where they had a $60 off promotion and got it there. Overall I think I'm very satisfied, but I'm going to talk about my negative points so I can sort of, end on a good note.
I think I've been spoiled by my Galaxy S5 LTE-A's 5.1' 1440p display, the display on the Gear S2 I really cannot call "sharp". I don't know why it's like forgotten now days, but PPI for these PENTILE layout displays aren't the same as RGB LCD panels. There are only half as many red and blue pixels, so for the Gear S2, density for blue and red are around 150 not 300, which is like, iPhone 3G level. Now my S5 screen's width is about twice the width of the Gear S2's screen, but it's 1440 green pixels across, where as the watch is only 360 green pixels, and 180 blue/red pixels. Obviously I won't be able to tell this just glancing at the time, but when I read any kind of text, or scroll through the apps and looking at their icons, it's quite easy to tell. Given that this is a watch with a tiny display, you would naturally have it closer to your face so "retina" level would have to be at least greater than iPhone 4's 300. Also, all of my other displays, including desktop monitors, are already retina level so yea... I'm a spoiled brat at this.
Everyone is praising the ring like crazy but I don't think I'm so impressed. Sure it's good but not that much better than just using the touchscreen. For example if I want to get through to the next page of apps, I have to turn the thing all the way around to do that, where as you can just swipe once with the screen. Another problem is with the mechanism itself, the steps are too far apart and there is a lot of room in between steps where the ring doesn't tend to snap back or forth. So often I find my self leaving it in between steps, and it becomes easy to accidentally engage the next step and cause unwanted scrolling/wake ups. It could really use smaller steps with more snap force.
And obviously, lack of app support, almost all of them are made by second and third rate solo developers who are just not good at graphics design so their apps look like **** and totally don't fit the elegant design of the device they're supposed to run on. All the countless Mr.Time watchfaces are just swapping different images even with the exact same date dial. Really? Is that the best way you can think of to use a 360x360 matrix of RBGB lights with 16.7 millions colors each? Make slightly different images rotate exactly like a mechanical watch? What a waste of potential!
Fortunately, I went into this knowing that the app support will be **** because nobody will give a **** for Tizen. I made that decision because I honestly don't use that many apps on my phone to begin with, cuz I don't socialize that much. So it really doesn't bother me if I can't reply to Hangouts because I don't use Hangouts, or Facebook, or twitter, or instagram, or watsup, or whatever social network thing people use. The only things I'll be missing are the high quality watch faces actually suitable for a smartwatch, instead of just changing different stickers on the same mechanical watch face. I figured I'll attempt to make my own, can't be that hard. In the mean time Samsung has a decent selection of worthwhile watch designs.
Aside from all that, using this thing is just great, people say things like oh why would you get another device that needs to be charged every day that does all the same thing your phone can do? Well first of all, charging really isn't even a problem because unless you're terribly unorganized person, you're probably gonna leave your watch at the same place every day anyway. Might as well just sit it on a magnetic dock, it literally adds no complications to your daily routine. And secondly, sure I can check the time on my phone, but you know what else I can do? I can go home, turn on my computer, and check the time on my computer! Just because you can do it, doesn't mean it's the best way to do it. You know what's the best way to check time? According to centuries of trial and error, it's the WATCH! And if you're gonna look at that thing several times a day, might as well give it a pretty screen and info on what's going on on your phone.
The wake up gesture just works surprisingly well, like it's almost really difficult to try and look at the watch without turning on the display. The battery life is just shocking, I've yet been able to make it go under 80% before I go to sleep. It's probably the first smart watch that's barely small enough to not be bulky (yea even the apple watch feels a bit thick), I mean just look at the Moto 360, it's round but look at that edge! It just looks like somebody intentionally made it thick enough to house a battery. Where as the Gear S2 seems to have a natural thickness derived from its overall shape. The back doesn't look as kick-ass as the apple watch but the front is definitely the best there is.
I mean yes it's like three times as expensive as I would spend on a regular watch, but I really think it's worth it, even if I can't use Google Voice/Now, even if I have no access to even slightly creative watch faces. For the features it does have, it does them extremely well, and totally above expectations. Small things like never miss another (rare) message notifications, skipping tracks without having to like, penta-click the tiny button on my headset, being able to unlock the phone without constantly having to use the fingerprint sensor. And of course, being able to say, Yes it's a smart watch, *****! Won't get that from the Apple watch, because everybody knows it's an Apple watch.
Well I just got one from the wife for xmas. I will go over what I like and do not like as I wear it. This is my first wearable also and so far I am loving it. I have small wrists and the bands are nice. I will most likely look for a new band at some point but for now the one that comes with it is wearable...
Also for the apps side I am really hoping S Health is better than it is on my note 3 cuz I turned that off as I have been using a Fitbit Charge HR (which may go to my son but need to see if the watch can do what I want)
I like the Fitbit App as it does everything in one but worst case I can figure out how to use myfitnesspal and s health... more to look into..
and also the guys over at homeseer.com made a free plugin for fitbit into home automation for logging, etc...
Hi,
I have an S2 too, classic, and this is my first "smart"watch. Coming from a lifetime of casio's DIGITAL watches i find it hard to see that the most interesting watchfaces are paid. Well that's life, you buy a very expensive watch and still have to buy accesories.....
For now i don't use the "healthy apps" and what i need is there. I see people complaining about shortage of apps...... The apps that are available are already too much for a watch...
I prefer battery life over apps..... But that's just me. One thing that i miss is the hour notification, alarms on the watch (not vibrating, it will never wake me up) but there should be a speaker in it for that.
Other thing that got me to buy this is the water and dustproof classification. It will get wet, it will get dirty..... Just hope that the gorilla glass can handle it all... Time will tell
beco