Pinch at the Calendar's month view to go into year view.
Pinch twice in the stock browser to see your other windows.
With the TouchWiz launcher, pinch at the homescreen or app drawer to go into thumbnail view.
With the TouchWiz launcher, navigate the homescreen or app drawer by tapping or swiping those little dots on the bottom.
In the call history (log) or contacts, swipe left to send SMS or swipe right to call the person.
Tap and hold the notification bar until the bottom shade disappears. This should take about 1 second. Then swipe laterally to adjust screen brightness.
Press Home + Power button to take a screenshot. Root not required!
Go to about:useragent in the stock browser to amend the user agent string. Note that the change only applies to the current window/session.
Go to [Settings > Accessibility] or [Settings > Call > Call answering/ending] to toggle on "The power key ends calls". You may also toggle on "Answering key" here to use the Home button for answering calls but that's a personal preference.
Go to [Settings > About phone] and spamming the "Android version" with taps will give you an Easter Egg.
In the Calculator app, slide down the number pad to reveal previous calculations.
Hold the Menu button to bring up contextual search (equivalent of pressing the Search button on other devices).
Press the Home button twice to bring up Voice Command.
Hold the Home button to bring up the 6 most recent apps as well as shortcut to the Task Manager.
In the Camera app, press the Menu button and tap Edit shortcuts to have quick access to up to 4 settings.
In the Camera app, use the volume rocker for digital zoom.
While watching a video with the default video player, press the Power button to lock the screen while keeping it on.
In the Camera app, you can tap the screen to focus on an area other than the center. Alternatively, you may frame the object you want to focus on in the center, tap and hold the on-screen shutter button and then move to reframe the shot to your liking. The focus will lock. Release the shutter button to take the shot. I find this to be faster than using tap-to-focus.
Pressing *#0*# in the phone dialer will bring up LCD test.
In the Email app, pinch to collapse all emails by date.
With the Samsung Keyboard, if you enable "Keypad sweeping", you can access punctuations by swiping laterally across the keyboard.
Personal app recommendations to improve usability.
Dolphin Mini. The stock browser supports hardware acceleration which helps with rendering speeds. But Dolphin Mini is no slouch in this area. I think the ability to permanently set the user agent string and to go full-screen greatly improves the browsing experience.
LauncherPro Plus. Fast and smooth animations. Useful and elegant looking widgets. Highly customize-able. I just find it better in every way than the Touchwiz launcher.
Widgetlocker Lockscreen. Allows you to place homescreen widgets on your lockscreen. Just like in HTC Sense 3.0, allows you to launch applications from the lockscreen.
SugarSync. Auto backup all your phone's photos taken with the cam to the cloud and have that auto sync with your PC.
Friday, July 8, 2011
Samsung Galaxy S II Review
3 words are used to describe the Galaxy S II on Samsung's product page: Vivid. Fast. Slim.
It's hard to disagree with Samsung. The screen is brilliant. Performance is blazing. And the device is so light and thin it is jaw dropping.
Check out the official site for specs and features.
The device has been reviewed by many tech sites and bloggers already. So I'll try to keep from repeating things that have been combed over already.
Aesthetics
How thin and light the device is can't be overstated. You would almost begin to wonder if this was really a functional smartphone.
It's large in hand. Using this device with one hand is difficult at best.
There's no notification light. This won't bother people coming from another device without a notification light. But for those that are used to having a notification light, this omission is glaring.
Back battery cover feels extremely flimsy. Exercise caution when removing and attaching it. But this becomes a none issue once it's actually on the device. Also, it's been shown that the battery cover can actually be bent pretty far and still retain it's shape.
A common criticism is that Samsung phones feel cheap due to the amount of plastic used. Aside from the screen, most of it is indeed plastic. However, it certainly doesn't feel cheap. The device doesn't creak or flex. It feels very solid and high quality in hand.
Super AMOLED Plus screen is brilliant. Blacks are true blacks. Colors are saturated (maybe over-saturated to some). However, whites look more like grays. But it's not too noticeable without a side by side comparison. Pixel density isn't as large an issue as I thought it might be. Text look plenty sharp. I struggle to make out individual pixels.
Standby/Power button is located off to the side rather than the top like it is for most devices. This makes sense given the size of the device. The location on the side makes it accessible with one hand. There's a setting that allows you to set that button to double as a call-end key which is nice.
As much as I like this button configuration, it does take time to get used to. It's easy early-on to accidentally hit the volume rocker as you squeeze the device to hit the standby key (and vice-versa).
The location of the light sensor seems awkward to me. It's located on the device's top left. Most people would rotate the device counter-clockwise to get into landscape mode. But if you do that (especially when typing), your left hand will likely cover the light sensor. If you have auto brightness on, your screen will suddenly dim.
On a related note, the light sensor is extremely sensitive. Slight changes in ambient luminosity will trigger drastic screen brightness changes. For this and the above reasons, it make sense to disable auto brightness. I personally just set it at around 30%.
Performance
The phone is fast, but then you already know that. I had a quick hands-on with the HTC Sensation which is also a 1.2ghz dual core beast. The Galaxy S II definitely feels faster than the Sensation. Where the Sensation occasionally has the rare lag, the Galaxy S II simply does not.
In my HTC Desire review, I had mentioned that it was fast and smooth. The Galaxy S II, brings new meaning to fast and smooth.
Onscreen keyboard
Comes with Swype. I won't cover that since everyone knows how awesome Swype is. The following applies to the Samsung keyboard.
The predictive text is very good. It's on par or better than HTC's keyboard. The 4.3" screen allows you to type really fast even in portrait mode.
In IM apps like Google Talk, the Enter key is replaced by a dedicated key for emoticons. This is a minor annoyance since I'm so used to hitting the Enter key to send my message rather than hitting the "Send" button located on top.
If you turn on predictive text and start typing, a bar above the keyboard appears that shows you what the keyboard thinks you're typing. Rather than being an overlay, it shifts everything onscreen up to accommodate itself. When you hit the Spacebar, that bar disappears and everything onscreen shifts back down. This repeats when you begin typing your next word. So, what happens when you're typing full speed is everything onscreen just keeps shifting up and down. As such, you'll need to keep your eyes on the keyboard or else you'll just end up dizzy.
The predictive text sometimes kick in when you don't want it to. Eg, when entering email addresses occasionally.
Browser
Going into tabbed view by using the pinch gesture requires you to do it twice. It's nice but, personally, I'd rather just hit the Menu key and tap "Windows". Usually, I'm zoomed in on the web page when I want to switch to a different window. If I want to do the gesture to get to the tabbed view, I need to double tap to zoom out and then pinch twice. Seems more convenient to just do the 2 taps.
In the Touchwiz homescreen and app tray, there are a couple of dots along the bottom that you can swipe to navigate quickly between the pages. These same dots appear in the browser's tabbed view. But you can't swipe along them like you can in the homescreen and app tray. Not a big deal, but it would have made sense to make this feature consistent across the UI.
The notification bar is always on top when using the browser. Would have been nice to be able to hide the bar, but it's not in the way most of the time. It's only in the way when you go full-screen on Flash content.
Text does not dynamically reflow according to the zoom level. It only reflows at one zoom level, which is the double-tap zoom. Workaround would be to adjust the "Default zoom" in the browser settings to suit your needs.
Browser is fast. Checkerboard patterns rarely appear and in the instances that they do, they last only for about a fraction of a second. On my HTC Desire, the browser starts to get choppy if I enable javascript and Flash. But even with those 2 items enabled, the performance is outstanding on the Galaxy S II.
Adobe Flash performance is great. With the HTC Desire, I was able to play the Flash-based game Plants vs Zombies but animations were choppy and screen presses were not always properly detected. On the Galaxy S II, the experience is much more playable and enjoyable.
Other Software
There's plenty of videos on TouchWiz and the various preinstalled applications, so I'll try to just briefly touch on a few items.
You can have up to 7 homescreens. Unless you root, the main one is always the one on the far left. The homescreens don't loop. That is, you won't be able to get to the far right homescreen from the far left by swiping once. You navigate between the homescreens by either swiping one by one, tapping the corresponding dots on the bottom, or sliding the dots. You can also do a pinch gesture to get to thumbnail view.
The application tray is side-scrolling. The applications are not in alphabetical order and there's no way to quickly sort them other than manually moving them around (unless you root). The layout is eerily similar to iOS. Navigation is done in the same way as the homescreens.
If you integrate your contacts with Facebook, the contacts' Facebook profile picture will be used. However, the photos appears heavily pixelated. Also, the photos sometimes default back to the Google Contacts photo. I can't seem to figure this out.
A few observations on the included widgets:
-There are several widgets which can be resized to show more or less information depending on your needs.
-With all the various clock widgets, tapping them does nothing. It would make sense to have it direct you to the clock application.
-There are 2 widgets named "Agenda". The first one on the list only shows calendar items on the local calendar, not your Google Calendar which is just silly.
-There are widgets for AccuWeather.com, AP Mobile, and Yahoo! Finance. When you tap each of these widgets, you are taken to their respective applications. Yet, these applications are not available in the app tray.
Music Hub appears to only work in limited regions. Unfortunately, it's not supported where I am.
Social Hub attempts to consolidate all your social networking feeds in one area like HTC's Friendstream. While it supports more sites than Friendstream, it's not very practical to use. Most would simply prefer to use the dedicated apps for Facebook, Twitter, etc. It does include a native IM app that supports Windows Live Messenger, Google Talk, and Yahoo Messenger. It gets a bit confusing if you sign in for Google Talk since there's already a dedicated app for that.
Readers Hub is just a portal to access PressDisplay, Kobo, and Zinio. Not much to get excited over.
Game Hub allows you to download game demos which tries to get you to pay full price after it gets you addicted.
Polaris Office is included which allows you to edit Microsoft Office documents. Most people would be more than satisfied with it. It integrates with Box.net which does offer Google Docs integration if you pay a subscription fee. Because of this, I personally prefer Docs-to-go which integrates with Google Docs after just a one-time fee.
Samsung Apps is just another app store. I see no reason to use this over the Android Market.
Misc
A problem with AMOLED screens is that it's impossible for the user to know if the screen is off or it's just displaying black. When you power off the device, the screen goes black for a moment and then it vibrates just a bit to let you know that it's done powering off. Nice touch.
Boot up time is impressive. It took about 15 secs for a cold boot.
Upon charge completion, the screen turns on and the device emits 2 beeps to let you know. I wish it didn't do this.
Conclusion
+ Huge 4.3" Super AMOLED plus screen is gorgeous; Pixel density is surprisingly not an issue.
+ Fast performance throughout.
+ Solid build quality while still being amazingly thin and light.
+ Excellent camera and video capture
+ Substantial amount of internal storage with either 16GB or 32 GB
- Battery life is below average.
- No notification light
- No dedicated hardware camera key
At this moment, it's hard to argue that there's a better handset other than the Samsung Galaxy S II. It's just that simple.
If you want something that's fashionable, get the Sony Ericsson Xperia Arc.
If you absolutely can't live without HTC Sense, get the HTC Sensation or EVO 3D.
If you're on a budget but want to get in on the high-end Android scene, get the LG Optimus 2X.
If you're impressed with the docking capabilities of the Motorola Atrix, then get that.
If you're into the Apple craze, then get the iPhone4.
But if you want the absolute best smartphone, there's only one choice and it's the Samsung Galaxy S II.
- No dedicated hardware camera key
At this moment, it's hard to argue that there's a better handset other than the Samsung Galaxy S II. It's just that simple.
If you want something that's fashionable, get the Sony Ericsson Xperia Arc.
If you absolutely can't live without HTC Sense, get the HTC Sensation or EVO 3D.
If you're on a budget but want to get in on the high-end Android scene, get the LG Optimus 2X.
If you're impressed with the docking capabilities of the Motorola Atrix, then get that.
If you're into the Apple craze, then get the iPhone4.
But if you want the absolute best smartphone, there's only one choice and it's the Samsung Galaxy S II.
Thursday, March 17, 2011
I could use a new phone...
I've been the proud owner of an HTC Desire for about a year. It's been a great run, but I think it's time I could use a new phone. A few aspects of the HTC Desire that has grown a bit long in the tooth:
AMOLED screen
The screen displays perfect black. That's about the only good thing about AMOLED. Initially, I figured that AMOLED would mean better battery performance, but the difference is negligible. Colors appear to be overly saturated. I think I would prefer a Super LCD screen on my next device.
1Ghz CPU & 576MB RAM
The 1Ghz Snapdragon is plenty fast. But there's a couple of instances where I longed for better performance.
1. Adobe Flash: Displaying Flash content just makes the browser lag. Flash works which I appreciate, but I'd appreciate it more if the experience remains smooth.
2. HTC Sense: There's no problems with the versions of HTC Sense designed for the HTC Desire. But I'm currently running the newer version of Sense that was made for the HTC Desire HD. There's occasional lags here and there. Nothing that breaks the bank but of course, it would be good to do away with the lags. Understandably, the Desire HD has 768MB of RAM. For my next device, I probably won't settle for anything less than dual-core 1Ghz CPU & 1GB RAM.
512MB ROM
512MB just didn't cut it even a year ago. The paltry internal storage was a compromise I was willing to make a year ago. Today, not anymore. I will no longer settle for anything less than 16GB internal storage along with microSD expansion slot.
WVGA resolution (800x480)
To this day, WVGA is still a good resolution for smartphones. That being said, I wouldn't mind qHD (960x540) for my next device.
2-point multitouch capacitive screen
This is a very well-documented and serious flaw of the HTC Desire (along with the Nexus One). The screen just doesn't recognize more than 2 touches on the screen. If one touch point ever crosses the axis of the 2nd touch point, the accuracy of the touch points become erroneous. This doesn't really affect things like pinch-to-zoom. But it does make gaming very frustrating. My next device must have a "true" multitouch screen.
Mechanical hardware buttons
I initially considered the mechanical buttons on the HTC Desire as something advantageous it has over capacitive buttons, like those found on the Nexus One. They were, until they started to break down. Currently, my Search button requires substantial pressure to activate and the paint around my Back button has peeled of so bad that the icon is unrecognizable. Capacitive buttons for my next device please.
AMOLED screen
The screen displays perfect black. That's about the only good thing about AMOLED. Initially, I figured that AMOLED would mean better battery performance, but the difference is negligible. Colors appear to be overly saturated. I think I would prefer a Super LCD screen on my next device.
1Ghz CPU & 576MB RAM
The 1Ghz Snapdragon is plenty fast. But there's a couple of instances where I longed for better performance.
1. Adobe Flash: Displaying Flash content just makes the browser lag. Flash works which I appreciate, but I'd appreciate it more if the experience remains smooth.
2. HTC Sense: There's no problems with the versions of HTC Sense designed for the HTC Desire. But I'm currently running the newer version of Sense that was made for the HTC Desire HD. There's occasional lags here and there. Nothing that breaks the bank but of course, it would be good to do away with the lags. Understandably, the Desire HD has 768MB of RAM. For my next device, I probably won't settle for anything less than dual-core 1Ghz CPU & 1GB RAM.
512MB ROM
512MB just didn't cut it even a year ago. The paltry internal storage was a compromise I was willing to make a year ago. Today, not anymore. I will no longer settle for anything less than 16GB internal storage along with microSD expansion slot.
WVGA resolution (800x480)
To this day, WVGA is still a good resolution for smartphones. That being said, I wouldn't mind qHD (960x540) for my next device.
2-point multitouch capacitive screen
This is a very well-documented and serious flaw of the HTC Desire (along with the Nexus One). The screen just doesn't recognize more than 2 touches on the screen. If one touch point ever crosses the axis of the 2nd touch point, the accuracy of the touch points become erroneous. This doesn't really affect things like pinch-to-zoom. But it does make gaming very frustrating. My next device must have a "true" multitouch screen.
Mechanical hardware buttons
I initially considered the mechanical buttons on the HTC Desire as something advantageous it has over capacitive buttons, like those found on the Nexus One. They were, until they started to break down. Currently, my Search button requires substantial pressure to activate and the paint around my Back button has peeled of so bad that the icon is unrecognizable. Capacitive buttons for my next device please.
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